Guilds and their Memberships

[Ancalagon]

As The Tolkien Forum is now beginning to fine tune its Guild section, I have a query surrounding the intake of members to each Guild.

There are more than a few members who have alligned themselves to more than one Guild. Now, participation in every Guild I can understand, but membership of more than one can lead to a conflict of interests. It is now become more apparent that Guilds are willing to enter into debates and issue challenges and this in itself means teams must be formed to enter these debates. However, dual membership then becomes an issue when choosing loyalties.

I would like to ask the members of the forum their thoughts regarding this. Should multi-Guild membership be acceptable or should members be loyal participants of a single Guild?

[Arvedui]

I for one cannot see any reason to be a member of more than one Guild. I mean, what's the point? If everybody joined all Guilds, then the whole idea of the Guild is useless. We could just abandon them, and keep all discussions in the forum general.

[YayGollum]

Ah, well. Thanks anyways, Confusticated person. :rolleyes: Whatever you people want. It sounds like you want to make it so we're only allowed to be in one guild. oh well. I'll take the leftovers! :rolleyes:

[Gamil Zirak]

I think you should only join one guild. It takes the point out of being in a guild if you can join all of them. Although, there are some guilds that aren't related at all. Like the guild of politics and the guild of writers. These two guilds have nothing in common. Maybe if the guilds were grouped into categories and you could only join one guild in each category.

[Talierin]

Yeah, I think categories is good... like you should only be able to join one of the Tolkien discussion guilds. But it also depends on what type of guild it is, too. Say, having a rule that you can only be in one artisians guild. Well, what if you are both a writer and an artist as I am? You kinda end up losing by having to pick between them.


I'm a member in Artists, Writers, and Time Lords...

[YayGollum]

Yay! So the guild of Outcasts would be in a league of it's own, right? I would think so.

[LadyGaladriel]

being in all the Guilds is a tad obbessive but I for one are only a member of

The Writers Guilds - because this is one of my main interests and it can be attachted to Tolkien

The Time Lords Guild - This is Because I take History so this could help me and also I love it


The Outcast Guilds - This is because it looks fun and easygoing

oh and the Book club but thats not really set up yet *hint hint*



I think we should ionly be a membwer of 3 / 4 Guilds because I hope that Im a pretty well rounded indivials with lots of intrests and I was to take an active particpation in all of them

[Raamalooke]

Originally posted by Talierin
Yeah, I think categories is good... like you should only be able to join one of the Tolkien discussion guilds. But it also depends on what type of guild it is, too. Say, having a rule that you can only be in one artisians guild. Well, what if you are both a writer and an artist as I am? You kinda end up losing by having to pick between them.

I don't have the conflict of being both a writer and an artist but I agree with you about perhaps only being able to join one of the Tolkien discussion guilds. The artisan guilds seem to be in a league of their own. I think the category idea is a good one.

[Ancalagon]

A Guild is a place for people of like-mind to join together with others of like-mind. However, within the forum, active participation is not the issue, multi-Guild membership (IMHO) is. I don't really see the point in categorising Guilds either as this is supposed to be a TOlkien Forum first and foremost, so any Guild ought to be primarily focused on Tolkien with other subject matter an off-shoot within.

[Grond]

Originally posted by Ancalagon
A Guild is a place for people of like-mind to join together with others of like-mind. However, within the forum, active participation is not the issue, multi-Guild membership (IMHO) is. I don't really see the point in categorising Guilds either as this is supposed to be a TOlkien Forum first and foremost, so any Guild ought to be primarily focused on Tolkien with other subject matter an off-shoot within. I agree with your opinion Anc. In real life, guild membership was exclusive. If one went into the Guild of Artisans it was because One's life goal was to be an Artisan. The lived, ate and trained to be Artisans. One couldn't effectively live, eat and train to be both an Artisan and a Writer.

I think membership in a single guild is the ticket. Participation in other guilds should be allowed but with membership in only one.

[LadyGaladriel]

Hey! we are only having a bit of fun talking and sharing and helping each other . we're not signing our Lives away. TTF should be a fun place not all serious! MGU shoyuld be allowed as I have many intrests and would like to participate and talk regularly with people who are likewise.

[Ancalagon]

LG, TTF is a fun place and not all serious. No-one is questioning the ability to participate in any Guild, we are simply questioning membership. I think it is logical to affliate oneself with a single Guild; but in no way am I questioning anyones integrity or feasiblity; simply loyalty when it comes to inter-Guild debates;)

[Gamil Zirak]

Create "clubs" not guilds if you want to have multiple memberships.

[Parrot]

I agree with the single guild membership position of Anc and others. I think Gamil has hit the nail on the head that one could be a member of any number of clubs or discussion groups while swearing allegiance to a single guild or abstaining from the guilds altogether and lose nothing in the exchange.

Heck, half the fun of a guild is talking smack to the others.

[ILLOTRTM]

No no no!!!! I agree that joining them all is rediculus, but don't tie us down to one! Then I'll have to choose between the guild of writters and outcasts!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Legolas_lover12]

oh great, now i'll have to choose. just perfect ....i think u should be able to be in 3/4 guilds anyway.

[HLGStrider]

I'm a writer and a Ranger. I joined the Rangers before it was an official guild because my RP character happened to be one at the time. I also participate heavily in the politics one and will be in the Outcasts if I can be.
Being a member of the writing club does help one a lot in the politics. I have never seen a list of politic members anyway.
I also found a highly applicable inn keepers guild... as you know I happen to own the long named singles bar.

Personally, I can see the problem, but I think I will say at least two guilds is good... especially if one is politics or writers... things that apply more to our outside TTF interests.

[Elbereth]

I personally think it is silly to have the guilds be exclusive. If a person wants to be a member of different guilds...let them.

The only guilds that need to be exclusive are the "age guilds". And so far...to my knowledge, these are currently the only guilds debating (as it should be.) And I say that if the younger folk want to participate in these debates, they should start a guild for their age group and join in the challange!

PS: I'm a guild leader for two guilds in the forum and a member of several others. I have not encountered a conflict of interest between the two guilds that I run, nor the guilds that I have joined. The only conflict of interest I currently have at the momment is juggling the stress of my life (as it is right now) and keeping up with TTF...which is constantly growing and changing. (that is the reason I have not been as active as I normally have been in the past.) Hopefully, things will calm down soon that things can get back to normal. (:rolleyes: I can only hope)

[Legolas_lover12]

we are thinking of starting a guild. for the yuonger people that is. we aren't quite there yet.;)

and i am a member of the guld of mithril knights, outcasts (because ia am a geek at school and hardly have any friends outside this forum:(), writers, and schalor's hall. although i am thinking of un-joining the guild of scholar's hall because i do not do very much there ...

but my point is that u can be a member of more than one guild anf there will not be any problems. it has worked fine so far. (at least as much as i can see) and why change it now? ...

[Galdor]

I am a member of the guild of Scholar's Hall and the guild of Mithril Knights. I would say that people should be aloud to be members of multiple guilds, but only if the guilds are completely different in nature i.e. If you are member of the guild of Ost-in-Edhil, a debating guild and the guild of Mithril Knights, an RPG guild I see no problem. The problem of loyalties I think only comes up if the guilds are similar i.e. one could not be a member of the guild of Ost-in-Edhil and the guild of Tolkienology, also a debating guild without having split loyalties.

So I would say that one should be aloud to be a member of two guilds if they are not similar.

[Legolam]

I agree with the "member of one debating guild" rule, but not exclusive guild membership, tying you down to one guild. I'm a member of the Periaur and the Politics guild and that's all I intend to be a member of. There is no conflict of interest and I discuss completely different things in both of them. But I agree that being a member of every guild is a little OTT

[Mindy_O_Lluin]

IMO. any one person's identity or character shouldn't be limited to just one thing. People may naturally identify with multiple guilds. On the other hand, belonging to too many or all of them then goes full circle back to being meaningless. Why not have a max number like 3 or 4, as long as each person picks those that are not conflicts of interest, and each person pick one of those four to be their HOME guild (sort of like a 'home page') and identify it as such. They would be full members of each guild, just that the HOME guild would be their primary or highest identity. We all would stick to the 'max' rule as part of our 'code-of-honor', thereby showing our worthiness to be guild members.

:)