I’m a solo’er. I don’t really like grouping, and will avoid it whenever possible. However, I am a raid leader for my guild. Why? Because I think that people in a position of authority should be competent in their position. I saw a complete lack of people able to disect an encounter well enough to lead a raid and make adjustments as needed. So when our second ten man group was forming up and heading into Naxx, I stepped up to lead it.

My motivation? The guild would lose members if someone that knew what they were doing didn’t step up to lead the group, and while I don’t really want the job, I’d certainly do a better job that that guy over there.

My reward? The feeling of success as we down each boss. The pride when a chronic void zone victim finally moves without being told. Seeing my fledglings turn into competent raiders in their own right. The knowledge that most of these people now have the capability to step in and lead the raid, if I couldn’t make it.

But if the majority of members prefer one style of play, then expectations start to shift. Even with no max guild size, if the majority of members want to solo then it becomes a more solo centric guild. Not a problem until you realise that most of the core community building in guilds usually comes from a core who tend to play together. Communities change and shift over time, but I really think most people join a guild with the expectation that they may want to group with guildies at least some of the time. If that becomes more difficult or stops being a focus then you’ll stop attracting that kind of player and the core community can’t hold together. If people didn’t want a core community then that’s fine ofc.

The distinction between high and low social members is a good one.

When I drafted up the rules for my now defunct WAR guild, I instinctively accommodated low social players, because depending on my mood, I often trend towards that end of the scale myself. Yep, I’m obviously going to favour an ethos that suits my own preferences!

The idea was to enshrine self-determination as the most important principle in guild life. If you want to group, you have to make the effort to join one or set one up yourself. If you find that despite your efforts there just isn’t enough interest in grouping activities, then ultimately, you should be looking for another guild.

My vision for the guild was simply to form a community of like-minded WAR players, with guild chat, voice chat and forums to facilitate that. I assumed that most people wanting to play WAR would not be averse to grouping, which turned out to be the case, but at no point did I want anyone to feel obliged to do so.

Perhaps a game like WAR needs a more pro-active approach to grouping from a guild’s leadership, but the issue of whether my approach was successful is muddled by the fact that most of our members’ left the game because it simply wasn’t good enough. We certainly attracted a lot of players in the early days, suggesting that there are plenty of people out there seeking a hands-off leadership approach that emphasises individual responsibility.

So, perhaps the key to all this is ensuring that prospective members are made explicitely aware of the kind of guild they are applying to. You can’t complain about a glut of solo orientated members if the guild rules you signed up to explicitly accommodate that playstyle, and you can’t complain about being pressured to group if you join a raiding guild.

Give me a break.

So if there was
1) a little checkbox when you log in that lets you appear offline to your guildies only, that would solve all the problems?
2) no maximum guild size

… would you still not want solo players in your guild? What would be the down-side?