In the past Guild Banks have been controlled by 1 or more people who were aligned with one another as either Guild Officers or friends, and often the items in the Guild bank would be pilfered for their own greed and those items would be sold online for real cash thus cheating the Guild members out of potential upgrades or items for new recruits. This would often go unnoticed by the majority of the Guild because 1 or 2 people were in charge of the Guild bank and if anyone ever asked about being able to use a particular item they were either ignored, informed that someone else is using it or that it was sold in game for Gold/Plat so that the Guild could purchase Reagents for the casters (most of the time these excuses were lies…)
I would love if while in a guild that there is a separate guild bank, this guild bank should require at a minimum at least 3 people to approve the removal of an item out of the Guild bank and a notice is sent in-game to the guild members that XXX item has been removed from the bank. Creating transparency with what is happening within the Guild and particularly with the Guild bank is crucial to building trust and openness within the for all of its members.
I would like to see this taken further, as an example a Guild should be able to flag items in their Guild Bank as reclaimable from new recruits who either join the guild and are outfitted with HQ gear so they can assist the Guild right away, but if they don’t make the cut or they attempt to keep the borrowed gear if they quit the Guild can reclaim it back into the Guild bank. I think this approach could make recruiting safer for Guilds who need to equip new members with tradable items during their trial membership, and at the same time it would encourage new recruits to give 100% during their trial period and to show-up for raids that may not benefit them equipment/quest wise… After all, to paraphrase Jungle Book “The Strength of the Guild is the Players, and the strength of the Players is the Guild”…
Thoughts?
Rint
Other games have logged bank transactions so that all members can review them when they log on to see who removed what / when. Perhaps similar code gets implemented in P:RotF, given enough time and resources. Granted this is after the fact, so if grand theft occurs it is too late to stop it but at least you know whose reputation should forever more be trash.
I for one do not want broadcast messages for each guild bank transaction, especially if an officer is passing out / receiving craft material stacks (ugh, the spam, make it stop!). Also, requiring three officers (or 4, or 5) doesn't eliminate your "evil officer cabal rips off the guild" scenario - but it does make it harder to manage day-to-day operations.
Your idea to flag and be able to recover items from new recruits should they not meet your standards is interesting. I would not use the feature in any guild to which I belonged, but if it helped you recruit new talent have at it. What happens if they sell items before you wash them out? What if it was BoE? Would you want the game to reset these things and just retcon the items back into the guild bank?
I find it unrealistic for us to expect the devs to police human behavoir - there are just bad gamers, cheaters, low lifes, you-name-it in every world. No amount of coding will be able to protect you in Terminus - only the community you choose to share your adventure with can cushion the blow should hard knocks happen (and they will...).
Kumu said:Other games have logged bank transactions so that all members can review them when they log on to see who removed what / when. Perhaps similar code gets implemented in P:RotF, given enough time and resources. Granted this is after the fact, so if grand theft occurs it is too late to stop it but at least you know whose reputation should forever more be trash.
I for one do not want broadcast messages for each guild bank transaction, especially if an officer is passing out / receiving craft material stacks (ugh, the spam, make it stop!). Also, requiring three officers (or 4, or 5) doesn't eliminate your "evil officer cabal rips off the guild" scenario - but it does make it harder to manage day-to-day operations.
Your idea to flag and be able to recover items from new recruits should they not meet your standards is interesting. I would not use the feature in any guild to which I belonged, but if it helped you recruit new talent have at it. What happens if they sell items before you wash them out? What if it was BoE? Would you want the game to reset these things and just retcon the items back into the guild bank?
I find it unrealistic for us to expect the devs to police human behavoir - there are just bad gamers, cheaters, low lifes, you-name-it in every world. No amount of coding will be able to protect you in Terminus - only the community you choose to share your adventure with can cushion the blow should hard knocks happen (and they will...).
+1
Was writing something similar, now i dont have to :-)
~~~ <()> ~~~
Valor and virtue ride with me, my blade defends the helpless,
my might upholds the weak, my words speak only truth,
my wrath undoes the wicked!
<~ Vaultarn Stormborn ~>
Rint said:In the past Guild Banks have been controlled by 1 or more people who were aligned with one another as either Guild Officers or friends, and often the items in the Guild bank would be pilfered for their own greed and those items would be sold online for real cash thus cheating the Guild members out of potential upgrades or items for new recruits. This would often go unnoticed by the majority of the Guild because 1 or 2 people were in charge of the Guild bank and if anyone ever asked about being able to use a particular item they were either ignored, informed that someone else is using it or that it was sold in game for Gold/Plat so that the Guild could purchase Reagents for the casters (most of the time these excuses were lies…)
I would love if while in a guild that there is a separate guild bank, this guild bank should require at a minimum at least 3 people to approve the removal of an item out of the Guild bank and a notice is sent in-game to the guild members that XXX item has been removed from the bank. Creating transparency with what is happening within the Guild and particularly with the Guild bank is crucial to building trust and openness within the for all of its members.
I would like to see this taken further, as an example a Guild should be able to flag items in their Guild Bank as reclaimable from new recruits who either join the guild and are outfitted with HQ gear so they can assist the Guild right away, but if they don’t make the cut or they attempt to keep the borrowed gear if they quit the Guild can reclaim it back into the Guild bank. I think this approach could make recruiting safer for Guilds who need to equip new members with tradable items during their trial membership, and at the same time it would encourage new recruits to give 100% during their trial period and to show-up for raids that may not benefit them equipment/quest wise… After all, to paraphrase Jungle Book “The Strength of the Guild is the Players, and the strength of the Players is the Guild”…
Thoughts?
Rint
Requiring multiple 'people' to approve something does not solve your problem. Why? Alts. If I'm the guildleader one thing I'll do is set my alts to all be officers and check all the right boxes so I can approve my own decisions. If some close friends are officers, their alts will also have that authority. The problem is having 'the guild bank' being a single repository. You want a better banking system whereby you can tailor the access down to a very fine detail? Look at EVE Online and their corporate hangers and wallets. Money is separate from items for one thing, and you have multiple separate hangers for items and within them you can even play storage containers with their own passwords. You can, for example, have one section just for crafting and only those players who declared crafters can access that (and only that) section. Within that section you could have password locked storage containers so the food makers would only know the password for the food containers and the jewelry crafters would only have the password to the jewelry and precious metals container.
You can set permissions for adding items only, depositing money only, view only, etc. And to keep every honest, every movement is tracked and logged and those logs can be reviewed by anyone.
I think having tools to manage the guild bank are important - taking WoW as an example, guild ranks, member/rank permissions, bank tabs and tab specific permissions, and proper logging are fantastic.
I agree with others that requiring multiple people to 'sign off' on actions is not an absolute solution and will get tedious in the long run, and can constrict the ability of the guild to quickly distribute thier items.
There will always be bad apples, and good people / guilds can and will get stung, but this is where the community (policing) and player reputation should come into play - encouraging actions and consequences. For this to happen effectively, a player (account) should always be identifiable, regardless of which toon they are on (so they can't hide behind alts).
In community-focused games (like EQ1 was), people took guilds seriously. We researched guilds, and planned in advance which guild they wanted to pursue. Many guilds had the application process last 3-6 months. Point is, the guilds future depended on its reputation. I'm hoping this game will emulate. 6 month applications won't fly these days, but still. You will always see guilds crop up that portray certain negative features, but overall you should know in advance.
Personally I find it better, when it comes to reagents and raid items which are tradeable, to be distributed immediately to the players who can utilize them, and not hoarded. If you do not wish your treasure troves to be looted, don't create them to begin with. Added benefit: your members will be happier.
I ran a guild on EQ of approx 400 players, our meetings on Sundays would bring 50-100 players, our guild bank was made of at least 6 different characters filled with 10 slot bags but the goal was simple: the guild bank was full of items that higher level players no longer needed and were willing to give to lower level players. Every meeting ended with the guild bank alts logging on to link items which were rolled on by lower level members who could actually use the item as an upgrade. The guild bank would clear out as much stuff as possible making sure all members of the guild are fully outfitted by redistributing the 'wealth'. This ensured that the bank was never full of items which could be stolen, and that the members were essentially the most valuable part of the guild.
TLDR: Keep your guild bank empty and members fat with wealth and items.
This Idea of trying to "stop or Prevent" people from taking items nd selling it for greed is basically impossible to stop, ans honestly if you see it happening and you don't like it just leave, it's prety simple or let your GM know about it and see what is done, maybe he'll get kicked/demoted and he can never do it again and possible he might go out of his way and purchase the item again and simply replace it. If he doesnt and you think he handled it poorly you can well leave. there will be plenty of guilds out there and id say most will be well maintained and have trustworthy people in them and they wont simply just see an item in GB and sell it and wait for recruit or senior player to come up and ask for it and get it depending on time in guild/helpfulness they done while in the guild.
I think, as has ben mentioned before, guild ranks and privileges should be sufficient. Let the guild leaders set those permissions and be done with it becuase you simply cannot code "good behavoiur" into the game. Yep, it sucks to get ripped off by either members or your leader, but sadly that is just part of gaming or even life in general. Do your research before joinging a guild. Keep new recruits at a lvl wehre they can't empty the bank and things should be as good as they can be.