A Prelude of What's to Come...? Guild Information Extravaganza

As you've probably noticed, BioWare gave the community a little pre-PAX treat in the forum of a slick new Guild Headquarters page.

Today, we’re excited to announce the launch of the new Guild Headquarters (HQ) as well as the Pre-Launch Guild Program. Many members of the community have already been organizing guilds on the forums, and we’re now happy to provide the tools to officially register and reserve your guild’s name. In this new section of the website, you can search for an existing guild to join or you can create a new guild and begin recruiting members. When Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ launches, you may be able to import your guild directly into the game, subject to availability and meeting certain criteria*.

Every guild gets its own guild mini-site on www.StarWarsTheOldRepublic.com, complete with information about the guild, its recruitment status, and its own public and private forums. Create or join a guild now and you’ll have the opportunity to have your own space to socialize and organize before the game launches. Every guild is automatically entered into the searchable guild database, which makes it easy for players to find their ideal guild. Get your guild together early and get ready for The Old Republic!

To learn more about guilds in The Old Republic, check out the Guilds Game System page for details, and to search for or join a guild, visit the Guild HQ now! Also be sure to visit the Guilds FAQ for answers to commonly asked questions.

*Conditions and restrictions apply. See Guilds FAQ for full details.

To discuss the Pre-Launch Guild Program, please use this thread in the Guild Hall forum. To report bugs, please use this thread in the Website Feedback and Support forum. Please note that some words and phrases, particularly some relating directly to Star Wars, are restricted. If you feel your desired guild name is restricted in error, please contact us using the site support form.

So far, all of the reaction that I've seen regarding this has been overwhelmingly positive.   As Ayane points out though, there are some interesting bits in the FAQ section.

Is my guild* guaranteed to be transferred into the game and what are the criteria our guild needs to meet for the transfer?

All guilds that meet the following criteria will get transferred into the game: 1) At the beginning of Phase 3, the guild leader must log in to the website and verify that their guild remains active and wants to be imported; and 2) The guild has at least four members who have pre-ordered the game by the time we initiate the import. Details about Star Wars: The Old Republic pre-order program will be provided at a later date.

Emphasis mine.  A clever way to not only make sure that SWTOR is pre-ordered as much as possible, but also that there's a certain level of commitment among the guilds who are signing up ahead of time.  Four seems to be a reasonable enough number for most guilds.

A 500 member cap is about average right now, so folks in guilds who run the risk of exceeding that will probably institute a no-alt policy at first, which is par for the course.  Now I'm even more curious to see what sort of information is revealed at PAX!

Toiling Away for Your Guild

Peons hard at work.

SWTORCrafter asks today, "How can a guild best support their crafters in SWTOR?"  While this largely depends on the game, I feel that much of the onus is actually on the Crafter in this scenario.  The Crafter and their crew must first explain why it is in the best interest in the guild as a whole to assist you in your endeavors.

Let's take EVE Online, for example. In EVE, my corporation and I would regularly sponsor “Mining Operations” for the benefit of the entire Corp. In EVE, almost 95% of every item or ship that you see floating around in space was originally made by a player. It was a lot easier for people in EVE to understand how the raw minerals that we were gathering could directly benefit them because the same raw materials that we were extracting from space rocks, could then be used to craft any number of things.  As a Tailor or a Leatherworker for example, how would you convince the plate-wearing Tank that he really needs to give you a hand?  The answer hopefully is that the Tank is an awesome person and would gladly help you regardless, but not everyone is so lucky.

Much of it depends on what all we'll be able to craft using our Crew Skills.  With three of the skills still locked away in the depths of BioWare mountain, it's unclear for example, if the Armormech Crafter will be able to craft all wearable armor or not.  The skill is defined on the Official SWTOR site as having "the ability to work with hard metals and electronic shielding to construct all types of personal armor."  If they do indeed craft armor for everyone, convincing others to assist you will be much easier.

The Scavenging Missions UI

Another great feature of the Crew Skills system is that not everyone even wants to craft, or even gather for that matter.  As a Crafter, you'll want to quickly identify those people in your guild and work out some sort of exchange.  Some of them may be more than willing to hire out their own Companions' services, running Scavenging missions for you while they're offline.  This could end up working to everyone's advantage, as long as your guildmates have a free Companion.

While you can still go out and Gather resources yourself, it sounds like the bulk of this can be offloaded to your companions.  We may not need to organize a "Guild Crafting Night" per se, but I think that it'd still be a great idea to do so.  Some of my most enjoyable MMO moments have come out of random events like these, because of the people I was with at the time.