Leaders: What are your guild rules?

I'm interested to see what rules other guild leaders have instilled. I'm also interest in knowing what works for you as well as what hasn't.

Here are mine from our forum:

Please do not incessantly spam guild chat with dribble.

Also, please be clear with your communication, too many mispelled words or abbreviates may make you hard to understand.

The rules for Allaince Chat are like the rules for Guild Chat, only 1,000 times more strict. Please don't embarrass us in front of our alliance members. Do not swear on alliance tab, talk about sex, degrade women, make racist or religiously intolerant comments even if other alliance members are doing this, do not see it as an invitation to join in. You will most likely be kicked.

Do not throw tantrums or become the guild drama queen. In Ventrilo, in PvE, in groups in PvP... do not throw tantrums.

Be helpful to all players and nice to the noobs. Of course the noobs ask silly questions to those of us who have been playing for a year. Remember when we asked the same dumb questions, or wanted to but were too chicken because people are so mean to the noobs? When someone in Ascalon City is spamming local chat asking "HOW 2 INVITE HENCHIE TO MY PARTEE?", please don't respond with "omg newb stfu", but instead with "click on the henchman, and their name should appear in your party list. Then click the plus sign next to their newly appeared name". Again, don't spread the [HotR] name by being a jerk.

Do not put trade chat in local chat, using chat filter evasions like WT.B. That is annoying and rude.

If you get into an argument with a guild member, take it to a pm. No need to poison the guild tab with the disagreement. We are about keeping the peace in there.

[HotR] does not tolerate racist, or religious intolerance. Politics also don't have a place in the guild chat. Oh yeah all you dudes, you might also not want to forget that your guild leader is female before you make pervy sexist comments on guild tab. I have a sense of humor for the most part, but I will let you know if you take it too far.

Members have been kicked for doing the following on the alliance tab dependent upon the level of offense they took, whether they stopped when asked and/or if they appogized:
-Spamming about their political views and not stopping when asked
-Incessant shouting
-Bashing homosexuals
-Negative comments about people's religions
-Racist comments
-Spamming and begging for runs, amber, money, weapons, etc and not stopping when asked
-Degrading women, sexist comments that go beyond friendly flirting

I'm sure I sound uptight compared to other guild leaders. Maybe it's because I'm a teacher and I have to put up with 190 middle schoolers a day. I don't wanna deal with that kind of behavior when I get on the game. So far out of 70ish people in my guild, I've kicked about 10 for this in the past 6 months, so to me it's working. Everyone else respects the rules. I do have a sense of humor, I just don't like when people cross too far over the line. Say whatever you need to say to someone in a pm to solve your problems or do cyber*** if that's what you are into. Just keep it the heck off of my guild and alliance tabs.

Intriguing, to say the least.

I am curious, are members allowed to degrade men? Sex is a part of life but I can understand it can be an offensive topic if talked about in the wrong context.

Surely you, as the Guild Leader, needs to know of such a disagreement. I am sure guild chat would be preferable for me as a Guild Leader so that I may assess the problem first-hand.

Why on Earth not? It is a part of life and people have their freedom to express their politcal views.

a) Kicking someone for their political views is just the same as discriminating due to a religion, which you seem to be against. They are both personal beliefs.
b) I am not quite clear on your definition of bashing, I suppose there is a fine line between talking about homosexuality and views on it and being offensive to members of the human race who have a deficiency in a particular part of their brain causing them to be unnaturally attracted to the members of the same sex.
c) Once again, are members allowed to degrade men / transexuals / hermaphrodites?

--------

My guild rules aren't written as such due to my relationship with my guildies. We are all (I think) a close-knit group of friends, even though we may not know each other in real life. And 'Guild rules' are interpreted and brought about by the guildie's own morality. But I guess if I had to list something it would be:
Be kind, be supportive, be friendly. I think that about sums it up.

Ehrenia

Thy shall be pro.
Thy shall not play gimmicks.
Thy shall try to shout on promanians as much as possible.
Thy shall stop pve for pvp.
Thy shall talk b*sh*t as much as possible.

That's it I think, not sure, they're not written down, every body is trying to stick with them though.

Intriguing, to say the least.

No, members are not allowed to degrade men but that doesn't seem to happen because about 90% of the players are men. You are absolutely right that sex can be an offensive topic if used in the wrong context. We had a member who had recently gotten dumped by his gf, go off the deep end on the alliance tab which is how that rule came about. I could definitely look at rewriting it in a more general context.

If it's petty crap taking up space on guild chat that nobody else cares about and ruining the fun and the mood, then yes, take it to a pm. The members know they can come to me with a legitimate issue about other members.

Just personal preference I guess. It always gets ugly bc nobody will change each other's mind and some people get a little too passionate and don't know how to debate.

Note with kicking someone for their political views, the key word I used was SPAMMING. I had a member that wouldn't shut up about how great Hitler was as a leader and he had really bad timing due to he was saying it on a Jewish holiday. I'm also talking about people slamming other religions and saying insensitive things under the assumption that everyone in the world is Christian or whatever. The general rule keeps people from spewing their agenda.
This is what was happening. Among other hateful spew about lesbians and or gay people. We don't all agree on other people's choices but no need to advertise your hate.
Ha! Point taken! I'll make that one more general.

Thanks for the tips and debate!

Glad to see you agree with nearly all of my points, as to advertising hate towards homosexuality, I was not, I simply stated the physical description of such a person. Read up journals and papers on studies of the homosexual brain, I am not expressing hate, merely fact.

Saying Hitler was a great leader is not a political view in my opinion, it is just a view, I am not saying the kick wasn't justified.

Ehrenia

We have rules or guidelines if you will. We don't specify specific examples but simple short summary statements.

Being Friendly and mature. All guild member are expected to treat each other with respect as well as alliance members. This means no cursing, swearing, degrading treatment or language of any sort. That's the big one.

We also have a rule against solicting or selling things to guild members. We give and trade but not for profit. The guild isn't a market for your wares.

Also no begging for gold. We don't have any to give you, but we'll help you make some for yourself.

As for the talking about politics in guild chat....we aren't a political discussion forum. We are playing GW. That has nothing to do with politics. We are trying to have fun play a video game not debate the finer points of foreign policy. Leave your discussions for the appropriate forums.

Yes we are playing Guild Wars too, a video game, for fun. But having mature conversations about the state of affairs in the world seems a fairly good conversation topic to me. I guess this makes the difference between a mature and non-mature guild, or perhaps just the difference between a guildie and a friend. We enjoy serious conversations about nearly anything and of course humorous conversations too.

Ehrenia

We discuss about beer, we take that very seriously.

Sorry, but I have plenty of friends IRL that I don't discuss politics with because we have agreed to disagree. This doesn't have anything to do with being "friends". It also doesn't have anything with being mature either. I am an older gamer and I like the little free time I have to just enjoy playing a video game. If I want to talk politics there are forums for that. I believe we just have different opinions on this one.

Having agreed to disagree means you conversed on the subject at some point. Find me an immature child with a definitive and firm political view then tell me it is not a mature topic. There are forums for everything, I fail to see your point. Being able to hold a conversation with someone makes someone more a friend that not.

Ehrenia

i bascically only have one rule:

DONT BE A DOUCHE!

pretty simple really

What a frighteningly immature way to put it, your guild must be so prosperous.

Ehrenia

Guild/Alliance chat is not a trade channel
No begging
Be respectful
Be helpful and active (atleast say hi once in a while in guild chat..)

My guild should get this rule, Scorpse wtb love all the time

well me and my friend are tryin somethin we've never seen before. We are tryin to make a guild onlyf ro necromancers and thats the only rule basicly.

My guild started as me and my best friend. We have no rules or requirements. Even though we now have 9 members, we still do not define or enforce any rules. My members appear to be adult enough to know how to act.

Perhaps the only unspoken rule: don't charge people the 100g to join.

We only have 1 unoffcial rule:

Be like Ivy

Unwritten Rules

Within Guild

- Respect each member and seniority

(you're a new member and you must know where you at but of course youll be able to voice your views but still youre new. treat everyone equally, whether he's a leader, officer or member)

- Loyalty to the guild is a must

(if youre a guildhopper, you're most likely to leave the guild after 5 minutes or leave the guild and join a better guild and comeback if the guild is doing well again)

- Accepting Individuality and Assimilation

(if youre guildmate is an ass to others but not to guildmates, its fine)


- Guildmates first before people in your friendslist

(why join the guild? just form a guild with people from your friendslist if that aint so.)

- Maturity

(petty fights are ok. if the fight is caused by not following the last rule, kick)

last rule - Must Support The Goals of The Guild

(why did you effin join a guild then if you wont be able to participate. kick.)


Outside the Guild

Do whatever you want as long as it doesnt hurt the guild reputation (i.e. Dont Fame Farm someone if your guild is opposed to it, dont play bloodspike coz its lame, dont scam in pve, etc etc) or its members. You can trash talk back if you're being trash talked at or you can initiate trash talks to someone who feels leetsauce (yes you can trash talk guilds who feel and voice out their superiority to other players).

but never ever insult a new player trying to play with you or asking questions.

We have written rules in the alliance around not selling on alliance chat, not spamming requests for help etc...

The rules in the guild can be summed up as:

Play nice; and
If you annoy Kes remember she has a big stick

(My beef with you is not your contention re: homosexuality originating in the brain--it's your use of "deficiency" and "unnatural" which is disturbing and unnecessary, whether or not you really meant it. If I had this convo with you over guild chat, I'd leave in an instant. THAT'S why you do not discuss politics in guild, we might have had fun playing together...)

Anyway, back on topic...

Our CoC is in written form--I'm a big fan of policy and procedure, makes everything simpler!--we like to minimize any misunderstandings.

http://www.bhgbheg.com/CoC.html

It is my belief that every guild ought to have a written code. Even if you have no rules, it should be written somewhere, "We have no rules! Anything goes!" So when one guildie complains to you about another one, you can say, "Well, you knew what you were getting into." And, when someone gets kicked for no discernible reason, they can't complain then either.