Officers' Quarters: Rebuilding your roster
by Scott Andrews 
Sep 26th 2011 at 9:00AM
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook, available now from No Starch Press.
If there's one phrase that drives sports fans crazy, it's "rebuilding year." In sports, a rebuilding year is one in which expectations for the team are low, either because the team traded away aging veterans, gave starting positions to young and inexperienced players, or both. But sports fans are an impatient bunch. We don't want rebuilding years -- we want championships. Thus, teams do everything they can to deny that they are, in fact, rebuilding.
The same is true for guilds. Potential recruits don't want to hear about rebuilding -- they want to join an established organization in its prime. Thus, when your guild is in that starting-over situation, it can be very difficult to dig yourself out of the hole.
For some reason, I've received three emails about this topic over the past two weeks, so I figured I'd feature one of those emails here. I chose the one that bounced my message back when I tried to reply to it, so at least that person will know I did respond!
Dear Scott and the Officer's Quarters,
I am writing to ask for some perspective on the current state of my guild and the actions I could take to turn things around. I am the GM of a small guild on one of the older, more established WoW servers. I am told this server has been around since the early days of vanilla WoW.
As with any established server in any game, cliques are formed, reputation is king, and small guilds have a hard time flourishing when three quarters of the active player base belong to one of a few monster guilds. Our server has both monster progression guilds that field multiple 10-man raid groups in addition to 25-man groups as well as the Mega-store bargain perks blowout guilds that give every member the ability to invite new members with no real guidelines for membership.
My humble guild began as a way for a few real life friends to play together. Raiding, progression, and consistency were never a big deal for us toward the end of Wrath. Once Cataclysm came along with guild levels and the perks associated with them, our roster of casual and fun people plummeted. Some left the game completely because they were accustomed to blowing through the Wrath content without any difficulty. Others were deployed with their military units to the ends of the earth to fight real life wars. At this point we are left with the few real life friends in addition to a mere one or two other active members.
Enough of the back-story, now it is time for the point of my email:
How can a weak-roster guild survive amongst the concrete establishments of the dominant guilds? What can I do to find new members who could be beneficial to the guild and our goals of breaking into raiding without having to beg?
Recruiting only brings about a few scenarios and none of them are beneficial. Aside from the replies that need to know a guild level before asking anything else, we often find someone who could be an excellent guild member, only to see them leave two days later because they are too impatient to wait as we try to put together a raiding core.Hi, Sad GM. Here are a few pointers to help your guild get back on its feet.
I have tried several things to help boost interest in my guild, such as free gems, enchantments, food, pots and repairs care of the guild bank. I'm not sure what else I can do to entice new members.
I seem to be stuck on a server full of people who would rather be a non-raiding member of an established and popular guild than commit to a smaller guild and actually raid every week. It could be a twisted perspective on my end, but I just cannot understand the community that I am dealing with.
Any thoughts, suggestions, or criticisms would help my guild and myself greatly. We are struggling to survive and our time seems to be running short.
--Sad GM
1. Leverage your uniqueness. In a server full of huge guilds, surely there must be some players who are sick of that model. When you try to recruit, emphasize what makes your guild different from others. Start with its small size and the opportunity to be part of a fresh raid team without cliques or favorites. Think about other ways you can differentiate yourselves from the mega-guilds and use those points in your recruitment pitch.
2. PUG. After last week's controversial tier 12 nerfs and the tier 11 nerfs prior to that, raiding has possibly never been easier and more PUG-friendly in the history of WoW than it is at this very moment. Bring some PUG players into your raids and see what you can do.
Keep your expectations low but your attitude positive. Maintain a friendly atmosphere, and do your best to encourage rather than criticize. Players will take notice that your PUG runs are less hostile -- and likely more fun -- than the norm. Stick to the same schedule each week and try to bring back the same players (at least, the ones whom you would want as future members).
Don't balk at inviting alts from other guilds into these runs. Having more players on the server aware of your guild is never a bad thing, and leading PUGs is a great way to build up that awareness.
3. Form an alliance. Another option would be finding another small guild to run raids with. If the alliance is successful, you may eventually decide to merge into a single guild.
Even if you don't, the fact that you're actively raiding will help you to attract new members -- and retain the ones you invite. Players have little patience, as you've seen, with a guild that isn't actively raiding, so doing whatever you can to offer raid content to your members should be your top priority.
As a last resort, patch 4.3 will give us the Raid Finder feature. However, it's unclear at this point whether that will actually help guilds to find members or whether it will become a hotbed for griefing ("lol i pulled the boss and left group") and willful incompetence ("i don't need hit gear, i just need this one trinket for arena . . .") like the Dungeon Finder often turns out to be.
We've only got one more major patch to go in Cataclysm. For guilds in situations like yours, the best time to recruit is between expansions, particularly toward the start of a new one. If you can stick it out till then, you'll be in a good position to fill out a raid roster with quality players. Until that time, I think those three options are your best bets.
/salute
Recently, Officers' Quarters has examined how strong new leadership can create a guild turnaround, the pitfalls of promising more than you can deliver, and lessons learned from Scott's own guild demise. Send your own guild-related questions and suggestions to scott@wowinsider.com.
Filed under: Officers' Quarters (Guild Leadership)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Nim_face Sep 26th 2011 9:25AM
I really appreciate this post, actually. The last few weeks I've been struggling to put together a guild (of PVP backdrop, however), and it's very difficult to find enough people to stay. It's put me out of the loop a fair bit, and I've grown quite unwilling to try to put together a guild.
Hal Sep 26th 2011 9:40AM
My guild just found itself in a similar situation; a blow-up over a decision by the officers led to half our raid setting off on their own. We've just started recruiting, but it's not easy. We've had people join and then quit in the same day, for reasons that are never clear. Not wanting to stick around in the aftermath of drama? Impatient for the rebuilding part? Hard to say.
It sucks losing people you trust, but there's just no substitute for sticking it out.
And if you're one of those people looking for a new guild to raid with? Don't be a jerk. Ask about the state of the guild before you join, and if you decide to quit the same day, tell someone about it. And don't accept gear or mats from somebody to get geared up before leaving, and don't take everything from the guild bank that isn't nailed down.
Stupid sociopaths.
furrama Sep 26th 2011 3:45PM
I still don't completely understand why you would let brand spanking new guild members have any access to a guild bank, or at least very much access. People lie on applications and in interviews, and some lie very very well.
Limit access to two or three stacks a day in the random tab, and see how they do for a probationary period. Then give them more freedom and see what they do.
Hal Sep 26th 2011 4:01PM
All guild members start with basic access to the general tab. It's limited, but you can use it to pass around stuff for alts or deposit stuff someone else might use.
And yet, those people will still grab the most valuable thing t hey can find in there (usually a few Cata-greens or some stacks of food) and then skedaddle.
As I said: Sociopaths.
jtrack3d Sep 26th 2011 9:42AM
My guild is also small.
#1. Leverage Uniqueness - Absolutely. Be selective even if you are desperate for players. That is, being small's benefit is that you are actually somebody in the guild rather than noise.
#2. PUG (DONT)... not really PUG, but build an extensive friends lists of players in those bigger guilds that have seen / done that content and befriend them in chat and ask them to help. They don't have to come over to help.
#3. Form Alliance - Not really. This never worked for us. It's nigh impossible to co-schedule and it always feels awkward because the two guilds don't have ownership. That is, is it your guild filling from their guild or vice versa. You have to negotiate and it's just messy.
Consistent raid schedule is KING! - Many players have real-life schedules and choose their guilds based on when they play. You can win players just by having a schedule that matches their game play.
That schedule is tricky. If you want big-guild players' help, you have to be sure you don't raid when they do. If many guilds do the Tues - Thurs. gig., then you can try Fri - Sun. Whatever you pick, stick with it and recruit people to match that schedule. Don't try to ask your guild what they want... you'll never have a consistent schedule.
Spellotape Sep 26th 2011 10:57AM
I actually agree with the advice to PUG, especially since often the people you PUG will end up being the people you've suggested to befriend (alts of competent raiding mains etc). That said, people who are already in an established guild are unlikely to leave theirs to join yours no matter how friendly or progressed you are - PUGs are often free agents for a reason (good or bad) and if they're good people/players and you invite them back, they might join the guild.
Jay Sep 26th 2011 9:46AM
I have a little guild experiment going, I used to be an officer in a guild and kinda miss some of it so recently I've founded a small guild with the nische that we only raid once every week, to cater to people like myself that now once we've grown up just kind find that time to invest which I put in before, but still like the social experience of raidning.
And boy has it been a struggle, and still is. We've done all the steps that Mr. Andrews brings to light. And when we recruit we emphasize what makes us unique. On a densly populated server we've found maybe 5-6 people who wants to be formed in a guild this way, the rest we pug.
There's definetely a "Lol no mass ress?!?!?!"-mentality nowadays. And frankly the way the current guildrep/xp is designed is flawed in my opinion since i absolutely favors large guilds.
lownwolf Sep 26th 2011 11:09AM
In my guild we raid only 1 night a week as well. A lot of people assume that it really hinders our progression, but pre-nerf we were clearing to majordomo in 1 night. Last week, our first raid post-nerf, we cleared to ragnaros but didn't pull, and we started particularly late. And all these clears were with at least 4-5 pug's. It was frustrating to know that if we had a consistent roster we could have been full clearing in 1 night for quite some time.
When we originally moved the guild towards the 1 night schedule, I really assumed there would be a good number of people that wanted the fun of raiding without the huge time commitment, but, after this much of Cataclysm playing out with only 1-2 real recruits that have stuck with it, I'm a bit disheartened. We attempt to recruit with that being one of our major selling points, and we just don't get the bites.
any tips would be highly appreciated.
Moorit Sep 26th 2011 10:12AM
I'm the GM of a smallish raiding guild, and everyone we've ever recruited has come to us through pugging in trade chat. Sometimes we get jerks, sometimes we get hilariously memorable jerks, but sometimes we get solid people who know their stuff and like our vibe. If we have an open slot and the pug is interested, we ask them to come back to a few more raids to make sure they're consistent and serious. We've found some amazing people that way and it's a lot less stressful than other methods of recruiting.
Didax Sep 26th 2011 11:04AM
I was going to comment and say the exact same thing as Moorit.
For small guilds, set up consistent raid times, get your guilded core together, and pick up some PuGs to do raids with. Just make sure to vet your PuGs through a site like wow-heroes so that you can have realistic goals about what content you can down.
My guild is also a small-population guild and 4 of our current members, including one of my most trusted officers came from leading successful raids with a few non-guilded members.
Baribal Sep 26th 2011 10:18AM
One thing that I found to work well is to work the margins if that's available to you. You mentioned you had members in the military, and I know we can have crazy irregular schedules. If you have the time to do it, try and make it a selling point that you will have flexible raid schedules. I know all I wanted was an opportunity to raid every week I could, which is difficult when you don't have a set work schedule.
Find a uniqueness of any sort and exploit it, and those unique players will come to you.
Badgelooter Sep 26th 2011 10:26AM
I would add a few things to the suggestions:
1) Make your trade recruiting messages as specific as possible. Instead of "LF 2 healers for regular raid spots", say " is looking for a Holy Pally and Resto Druid (DPS Offspec preferred) for Firelands progression. Raid times *whenever you want to raid*. Pst *me or other officers* with questions." While the general message may seem to hit a wider audience, you'll inevitably get some tells to the tune of "I have a resto shaman, any room for one of those?" These days, raid comp matters less and less. As long as you have a mage or a shaman for heroism (and that's fairly optional for T12 as it now stands), most groups will have what they need to down bosses.
2) Pre-recruit for PuGs. Instead of getting 8 people together then looking for your tank 10 minutes before the raid starts, begin looking 2-3 hours beforehand. I see messages like "Firelands guild run LF one tank and 2 DPS (1 ranged, 1 melee) for raid starting at 8 server time. Pst for info." Assuming everyone shows up (which is a good indicator of whether they'll show up when they are in your guild), you don't get the one-man-down syndrome where you're looking for one player, and 2 minutes before you find him/her someone else drops group because they're tired of waiting or get a better offer.
3) Make sure you have at least one of the tank spots covered. Nothing turns me off more than the classic "LF2M Tanks for FL Run, then g2g." If needed, reroll so at least one of your tank slots is covered. In my mind, a group that doesn't know at least ONE tank means they've run off any tank they've tried before.
4) Follow up with your PuGs. Someone get a piece of loot? Thank them for their help, congratulate them on their new gear, offer a gem or enchant, and ask them if they'd like to come again. If not, no hard feelings, but leave the door open. Add them to your friend list. Use the in game calendar to invite them on future runs. My server has several established PuG groups (established in the sense that 6-7 people are there 80% of the time). I know who the good players are, and if they're running a PuG and one of my alts isn't needed for a guild run, I'll gladly hop in.
5) PuG yourself. Meet people, befriend them, and behave yourself while you're in their group. I don't advocate fishing in someone else's pond, but it's never improper to ask if they do an alt/PuG run regularly. If so, you might comment that your guild is looking for solid players for a run on Thursday (or whenever) and would they like to come with their friends next week?
6) Last, make sure your guild members are playing nice in trade/LFD groups/PuGs. Nothing will get me to push my kick button faster than hearing about a guild member being abusive in trade, ninja-looting something, or treating another player badly in LFD. People with your guild tag represent you, and more than anything can help/hamper your recruiting.
tibbelkrunk Sep 26th 2011 2:53PM
Great points, all of them.
I am definitely in agreement with the recommendations to pug when there are empty spots. Nothing says "this guild is dying" (to recruits and to current members) like canceling raids because there aren't enough people.
Regarding guild recruitment ads, another thing I suggest is to always be absolutely sure things are spelled, punctuated, and capitalized correctly. Using leet speak (or just lazy speak) sends the message that it's not important enough to you to type it correctly, and you're likely to get people for whom it's not important enough to gem correctly, be prepared with raid strategies, or even to show up on time.
Little things matter. Take care of them all the time, especially when you're pugging, and you'll get whispers after the raid like, "I really enjoyed the atmosphere tonight -- is your guild recruiting DPS?" There are lots of people who value the little things, and would be very happy to find a guild that values them too.
Eirik Sep 26th 2011 3:36PM
My guild is small, nigh nonexistant these days. We can often form 10 man firelands raids ... on good days. Firelands *trash* raids.
We never did get into BWD other than crashing on the first boss. So... I have been pugging myself out to a guild that HAS been doing some raiding, so I can get a feel for the fights involved and help lead our guild into doing those raids.
Pyromelter Sep 26th 2011 3:38PM
Uprated, needs to have some clarification though
"As long as you have a hunter, mage or a shaman for bloodlust (and that's fairly optional for T12 as it now stands), most groups will have what they need to down bosses"
added: hunter, bloodlust
subtracted: heroism
rayden54 Sep 26th 2011 6:14PM
The only thing I have to say about recruiting PuGs is don't be a jerk. If you're going to restrict certain loot items to guildies only, say it up front. Not after it drops. If Bill from your guild decides to log in an hour late and wants a raid spot, don't just kick the PuG. Either make sure the PuG knows up front that you might be replacing them with Bill (if he ever bothers to show up) or apologize to Bill and tell him he should have shown up on time. At the very least, explain the situation. And remember, even if you do get the PuG to join your guild, it might not be a good idea to tell them that you're transitioning them to loot council.
YMMV, but my experience in joining a guild after being a regular PuG didn't end well. It was at the end of Wrath. They didn't ninja loot, they didn't kick me, didn't insult me. They were actually quite nice to me. But, in the end, they were a group of RL friends who knew each other from before Vanilla, and I was just the PuG from trade chat. I logged out one day, logged in the next, and discovered that we were now being led by the guy we carried to his epics (I still don't know how he ended up the leader). We did well either way-finishing ICC normal and starting on Heroic. By Halion's release they'd started heavily recruiting for Cataclysm. I still liked them ok, and they were probably a good guild, but they were not the casual raiding guild I thought I had joined. The problem is, I think that's what they wanted to be from the start. I just didn't know it.
If it really is your intention to rebuild into a hardcore progression guild with DKP and a big bench, it might be a good idea to advertise that up front. Recruiting may go slower, but in the long run, It'll save everybody time.
araquen Sep 26th 2011 10:32AM
Okay, I'm in a similar boat, but we did rebuild. This is what I did (as GM).
1) It is beyond imperative that the GM and the officers are hands on and this needs to be all-hands-on-deck affair. No one can be afk. if you, or your officers, cannot commit to the effort of rebuilding, then you need to reconsider what your goals in the game are. I'm not trying to be a d***, but if the officers are MIA then the guild will follow.
2) Figure out what your guild is all about. Are you a competitive progression guild, hardcore progression, semi-casual or mature raiding, casual, pvp, social? Be honest with yourself, because there are folks that fit these buckets, and if you are honest about your guild's goals then you stand a better chance of obtaining, and retaining, great people. If you are not clear, or are afraid of who you are, then you will find people joining and leaving since you, and they, are not on the same page as far as expectations.
3) As mentioned above, take a good look at what you are as a guild and see if there is anything that sets yourself out from the crowd. If you're hard-core/competitive progression, what sets you apart from all the rest? If you're semi-casual - what's your approach to raiding? In either case, do you promote alternative forms of content? Do you promote a social aspect to your guild? How long has your guild been around? What level are they? I'm not saying you have to, but your answers will help define you. This is your marketing strategy.
For instance, competitive progression and hardcore progression are going to look at your rank on your server, as well as other things that indicate your team is aiming to be the server best or run with the pack in the top 10 server-wise. Semi-casual runs a wide gamut so do you cater to the family/working player? Do you raid responsibly? What do you provide to the player to make THEIR time in game more effective and enjoyable?
4) Recruit, recruit, recruit. At our lowest ebb, I had re-written our guild recruitment page in the forums. I updated as many non-Blizzard Wow-sites I could get my hands on. I actually found a rocking tank from a site called looking for guild dot com.
If you are worried about what to say because you are rebuilding, Matticus gave me the best advice ever - you're not rebuilding, you're going in a new direction. You can also pick up on some resume tricks - if you aren't 6/7 or HM in Firelands, don't mention it. If you're still in T11 say things like "we're farming T11 to be able to hit Firelands running" or some such. Be honest. NEVER tell anyone you're in content you are not in - but never make it look like you're not current because you CAN'T do it. Make it so you CHOOSE to be there for strategic purposes. Before the FL nerf, one of my friends, and a server best raider, told me that with where my team was, our best strategy was to stay in T11 for ONE of our raid nights and visit FL on the other, even if it was just rep farming. And that's exactly how we marketed it.
Also, there are a lot of people out there who were gone for the summer and are coming back ill-equipped for Firelands. That is a potential recruitment base since most high-end progression guilds are not going to help theses people gear up.
If you're not running with the progression pack, don't make your recruitment post look like you are. My new recruitment post clearly states "Walking a Path Less Traveled" The copy is nothing like the typical forum recruitment thread. We talk about the people who are tired of the rat race of progression raiding, the folks who are too far behind the gear curve - folks that want more than just one thing and are tired of seeing a dead guild on off-nights. Folks who read our app know exactly where we stand and what we are. I am not saying folks are beating down our doors - but what we are doing is not wasting anyone's time. The folks who are coming to us are not at the beginning of the decision-making process, but at the end. They already know we are a fit with their in-game goals, it's now a matter of whether we fit "culturally."
5) Don't be afraid to admit to rebuilding. I know this goes counter to what was written above, but the fact is, you're not alone. A lot of guilds are rebuilding. The folks who are going to want established teams are folks who are looking for a specific type of raiding. I'll tell you, I had to replace almost 80% of my raid team, and when we finally got Shannox down Tuesday (in our first foray into FL since I needed to rebuild), I had folks sending me tells they were thrilled to be part of the *guild's* progression. And nerf or otherwise, you could feel the energy from the raiders who knew they got the guild its first Shannox kill.
However, be gracious about why you needed to rebuild. Drama is off-putting. If you need to rebuild because of drama, a simple "disagreement with guild management" suffices. The only thing you need to clarify is if the break happened because of a debate between hard-core and casual approach to raiding. And if that was the reason for the break, then before you go back to recruit, you have to take a firm stance on your approach to raiding and make sure you have buy-in from all of your raiders. But if it was simple hair-on-fire, crazy-drama, then anyone who needs to know that dirty laundry is probably going to bring their own drama to the table and is someone you probably won't want in your guild.
6) Do things in guild. When we couldn't field a raid, we ran 5-mans or FL trash. I have an officer dedicated to building up pvp, and we started pvp nights. I have another guildie heading Legacy Night Sundays. It doesn't matter if only 3 people show - eventually there will be more. Activity breeds activity.
7) Network, network, network. PUG your raids. I found some wonderful guild friends and got several new guildies through pugging. If you are bringing good people to the table, word about you will get around and people will be more willing to look you up, app, recommend you to friends or even start an alliance. And don't leave it to just raids - ask them along to the other things you do.
Rebuilding is a hard, long, tiring process. It can be greatly rewarding if you put in the effort. But I will not deny that it can, at times, be heartbreaking. Patience is necessary. And be honest with yourself. If the game ceases to be fun because rebuilding is consuming you, then is it worth it to you?
I wish all my fellow GMs in similar straits the best of luck.
Bruce Sep 26th 2011 10:34AM
Our guild has it's roots in a Vanilla launch guild and through-out expansions has had it's moments. Server 3rd in BC. After some huge officer issues mid Icecrown, which put our LK kill back about 3 months and made it a ten man kill as opposed to 25 man, things have jsut gone downhill. A small increase in interest after the sundering, but for some reason we cannot seem to hold on to new people. Or at least our retention rate is 1 in 10 at best. We have a mature and casual atmosphere, though raiding is taken seriously, and for the life of me, I don't know why people move on for uber guilds where they hardly get a look in to the roster where they had a pretty much guaranteed spot with us. Even at the start of Cata we were progressing quite well, we still lost people...
I think the mature people who liked to play the game for the people and the fun of wiping and killing a boss under their own steam have all upped sticks. My theory is that the dumbing down of content has made it easier for people to get gear and look pretty in SW, and this means that pretty much anyone can kill stuff... this in turn means that the mature, well balanced people get fed up with idiots in dungeons and the odd PuG having massive egos because of their epeen. There is no patience in the playerbase anymore (the recent nerfs confirm Blizz know this), and those of us who are willing to raid one, maybe two nights a week are just left in the dirt, looking stupid because while we are able to kill a boss pre-nerf at the rate of one every two nights, we are behind all the other guilds and look like a bunch of nubs.
Jon Sep 26th 2011 12:38PM
I found myself in this position a few months ago. The guild I had been in with some friends found itself dwindling towards the end of Wrath. The guild leader got hacked and decided to quit the game and a lot of the other members moved on to other guilds and that's how I inherited guild leadership.
The most important thing you can do is BE PATIENT! You aren't going to rebuild overnight.
As the author mentions, leveraging your uniqueness is key. In my case, the people left in my guild were all in the 25-30 range with careers which led to less hardcore play and a focus on weekends and nights. There are a lot of people out there looking for that kind of environment - we just had to find them.
The Guild Finder tool that Blizzard added was a big help to us. I opened up our recruitment as a casual/social guild. This allowed us to build a member base and meet new people while providing them with some of the guild perk benefits. We met a lot of great people this way.
When we had built up enough people I started scheduling casual raids for Saturday nights. We knocked out BoT, BWD, and TotFW within three weeks of each other and we are now working our way through Firelands.
hrrly1 Sep 26th 2011 2:57PM
PUG is the best way to get recruits and keep people.
Its not very realistic to expect people to wait around for you to build a core before you start something. That phase can and will last for months, so even if they leave quickly after joining then I don't think its them being impatient. Just realistic.
Your progress won't be smooth and it takes a large amount of work to keep things running smooth on the GM/RL side, but its the only way to get off the ground.
I disagree with points 1 and 3.
Unless they raid at some odd time of day, there is little to no uniqueness to leverage with a small guild mid level guild that's trying to put together a raiding core. That's basically the rule for all guilds now. The mega guilds are the exception.
Steer clear from the alliance way of going about things. Been burned too many times with arraignments like those. They either poach your raiders or you end up poaching theirs. Either way someone ends up looking like a jerk. And mergers hardly ever go smoothly cause I always end up with a situation similar to a guild just poaching players. Some of your guildies will raid, and the others land on permanent bench. Pretty hard to swallow a situation where you spend all that time and effort getting a good player to join up with you just to see them get nearly permanently sat cause the merged guild now has too many of their class.