Discussion for "Guild Of Writers"

Tiran · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 1:43 am

Shorah!

I like to start a discussion about the Guild of Writers and fill you in with information from 'us'. 'We' are members from various groups that are dedicated to age creation and age creation tools for a long time. Some of us started in 2004 when Prologue was shut down and before Until Uru was available much later. We are interested in assisting and guiding the creation process of the Guild of Writers because we have an interested to get things done right using the proper way. However we are neither interested to rule the GoW nor do we want to create an elitist group for our own purpose. Rumors that we want to rule the world are greatly exaggerated.

Mission statements

I've given some thoughts how to create or boot strap the Guild of Writers. The ideas are purely my own ideas and may not be shared by other members of our group.

Phase 0: Find a suitable location to discuss the boot strapping process. Some people have suggested to use http://uruguilds.org/uruguilds/ but I like to wait until Greydragon has decided if Cyan is going to provide us with discussion groups here at http://www.mystonline.com/forums/. The user base is much larger, this is the official forum and one doesn't have to wait until the administrator has approved the account.

Phase 1: Discuss and define common goals and rules for the GoW. I like to get into this topic later.

Phase 2: Discuss everything with the DRC/Cyan and get approval and acknowledgement from official side.

Phase 3: Build the infrastructure: web site, membership, vote for official representative aka Guild Masters

Phase 4: Get in touch with the Guild of Maintainers to establish communication channels.

Phase 5: Create ages

Common goals

* The main goal of the GoW is to provide all means and the infrastructure for age creators and tool developers. The GoW must focus on making the age creation process for every interested user as easy as possible. We don't want the GoW to become a discussion group about cavern politics.

* In order to assist people in the age creation process the GoW provides an infrastructure including a discussion area (forum), a wiki or similar for tutorials, howtos and documentation, download section for tools, seperate areas for each age creation team, a subversion repository for collaborated development, a bug tracker for tools and ages etc.

* The GoW membership is open for everybody but in order to apply for membership people have to show that they are interested in becoming an active member. We don't like to have hundreds of dead accounts around. We don't want to decide the rules yet but we have some ideas:

o Everybody can become a supporter. Supporters have access to the public areas of the forum and other resources like wiki and tools.
o A supporter can apply for membership. The supporter becomes a Guild Cadet and works together with other guild members on an age, tool or other age related stuff.
o After a while the Guild Cadet promoted to Guildsman / Guildswoman. The time depends on the quality and amount of work e.g. show us a fully working age and you'll get instant membership.

o The GoW is governed by five Guild Masters. The guild master are purely representative and act as liaison between the GoW, the other guilds and the DRC/Cyan.

Important

We (the group of age builders) don't want to set the rules alone! In fact most of us aren't interested to apply for the Guild Master position. We welcome everybody to work towards the common goal. It doesn't matter if you are new to the cavern or working on Uru ages for years. Don't hesitate and get involved.

The GoW is NOT for coders only. You don't need to be a Python or C++/C# developer. In order to produce high quality ages we need all sorts of people from 3d object creators over designers to story writers and puzzle creators. We need musicians to create sound effects and music and artists to get the lights and colors right. Age creation is team work!

Please read the Age Creation FAQ about age creation and H'uru: http://blog.hurustudio.org/age-creation-faq-info/

Paradox · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 2:02 am

Guild of Writers contacts:
Paradox
Tiran
Robert The Rebuilder
AdamJohnso

The above people are working to lay a secure and stable foundation for the Guild of Writers. They have no interest in leading the Guild when it is formed, nor do they wish to hold positions of great authority. As I said: working to get the Guild *set up*

Calam · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 2:05 am

The Assembly of Guilds would like to offer you our forums in the attempt to centralize the emerging Guild structure. Even if you guys don't plan on using it for the long term, we're happy to accomodate you for however long you'd like. I've created a forum specifically for you guys to use:

http://www.uruguilds.org/uruguilds/viewforum.php?f=34&sid=cab08bc37cff175e1f1336234d853160

Feel free to use it however you like. I'd like to see all the currently forming Guilds to stick together as a group, and I hope you guys will choose the Assembly of Guilds to do that. Think of it like a virtul Guild Hall.

Tiran · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 11:01 am

I forgot to mention an important point. Personally I like to see all guilds to be a voting Meritocracy. Membership in the guild should (in my humble opinion) be decided on the merit of the member. The position should be based on the merit as well but also voted upon. It benefits those members who are investing their free time and money for others and IMO fair, too.

Dovahn · **Joined:** Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:12 pm **Posts:** 107

[post deleted by Dovahn]

Tiran · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:23 pm

I didn't meant to offend or demote you when I started a new topic. I simply didn't wanted to take over your thread and have a fresh start to express my personal opinion. Well ... and I sorta forgot about the other thread ... :oops:

I had so many discussions about the GoW lately that I wasn't sure which forum already had a thread about the GoW.

Dovahn · **Joined:** Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:12 pm **Posts:** 107

That's okay; I get it now. I just had a feeling that this would become more the "official" GoW thread and that mine would no longer have a purpose. The way it's looking, your thread is more about the ideals and structure, and mine is about the technology, so we both have a place.

Sorry for the disruption; I edited my earlier post so we're back to normal. I'll also change the name of my topic to better reflect it's purpose.

As for your ideas, I think they are great. It might be a good idea to have a few more specialized positions, such as "Project Leader" or something if a group of guildsmen/women want to work on an age, just so that there is someone to report to and keep track of everyone's work.

Now, when you say "merit" of a member, what do you mean? The quality of their work?

Dovahn

MattyQ · **Joined:** Thu Apr 19, 2007 9:17 pm **Posts:** 9

Well, since the other thread has become the technical discussion in the last 10 minutes, I'll just move my post, as I don't think it's any longer suitable for that thread. =P

It seems to me that the Guild of Writers shouldn't just be for those who are able to program, but should be a place where people who have a knack for plot, words and a great age concept should be able to collaborate with those skilled in programming and a great visual sense.

I honestly believe that it is necessary to make writers (of the word variety) a more active part of this process. There have been a lot of terrible/boring games that have come out recently, and I think it's in part that these companies don't employ people who are totally dedicated to the creative process (not using seasoned writers for game scripts and stories just doesn't cut it anymore).

In any case, Uru would be a great place to build a community between people who have an idea and the discipline to lay it out in detail, and the people who have the skills and vision necessary to bring it to life.

Atrius Opheria · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:36 pm

Hey there, I also support the Guild of Writers. This is a great idea.

Dovahn · **Joined:** Mon Dec 11, 2006 11:12 pm **Posts:** 107

MattyQ wrote:

This is a really great source of information, and I appreciate you guys working to put together the Guild of Writers.

And I would like to see it get merged with the other thread, as I feel there are some important posts/people there that you shouldn't forget about/miss.

Yeah, the way it's looking that the other thread is more for the programs used to make the ages, and this is about guild structure & organization. It might make sense to merge them, though.

Dovahn

Erik · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 1:13 pm

Like the sheet in Kirel says, the Writers' tasks are the most arduous and intense. I guess the tasks are even more intense for the Explorers, as we have to start from square one and have to educate ourselves in the Art.

It's obvious that for something so important, a good organisation is needed!

And I just wanted to say that I think it's awesome that the current Age Builders want to form the Guild of Writers with their fellow Age Builders without bickering, that you're willing to share your hard work with each other and that you're already thinking about a possible Guild structure.

I would like to wish all the Age Builder good luck in the process of forming this Guild.

Tiran · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 4:00 pm

MattyQ wrote:

It seems to me that the Guild of Writers shouldn't just be for those who are able to program, but should be a place where people who have a knack for plot, words and a great age concept should be able to collaborate with those skilled in programming and a great visual sense.

You are right. The GoW needs more than just coders. Have you read my *whole* posting? I already said that in the last paragraph.

oldbushie · **Joined:** Thu May 03, 2007 3:42 pm **Posts:** 73

I think having a ranking system would be great, and everyone would have a rank for each possible skill. Perhaps people could vote on the quality of your work, much like ratings for various freeware out there? This way there wouldn't be accusations of favoritism, and everyone's votes would count equally.

So, there could be a rank of 1-10, 10 being the highest, in areas like 3d modeling, scripting, programming, 2d art, music, sound effects, puzzle design, and perhaps other categories. This way people can form teams based on how much they need certain elements, and PM members they think would be suited for the task. There should also be portfolios for the more dedicated guild members to post samples of their work; they could either link to a personal website or (for those who can't afford it) an allocated amount of space for each person to post their best samples. Perhaps 5-10 megabytes of space, depending on how many people become dedicated members and how much total space the Guild Of Writers website would have. An alternative to that, if space is really lacking, is just to have any images be linked from a free image server, but I can't think of a good place for music or code to be permanently uploaded to unless people just use places like megaupload and update with a new link now and then. Writing samples are obviously not an issue because text takes up so little space.

Tiran · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 7:30 pm

We are trying to have as less levels as possible. So far we may have the following levels of membership

* Supporter (open for everybody)
* Guild Cadet
* Guildsman/woman (full and voting membership)
* maybe Guilds Captain (organizator and team leader for a project or age)
* five Guild Masters (liaison between GoW, GoM and DRC/Cyan)

We haven't decided which system we are using for the site. I like to have something like Trac (http://trac.edgewall.org/) for the technical part and a good forum. Plone would be the ideal solution but I may be the only Plone expert (I've written large parts of it). It's a powerful but complex ECMS.

calistoaris · **Posted:** Sat Aug 04, 2007 7:47 pm

It sounds like things are coming alone quite nicely. If you need any help, I'm available.

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