10-23-2006, 02:00 AM
It basically comes down to: Why would someone trust you to judge their performance fairly and objectively? I don't see that happening in a brand new guild with recruits taken from the general population.
Now, in The Core, which can fairly be said to be the most progressed and successful Horde guild on Tichondrius, we use a loot council system, which basically takes much of what you want -- rewarding people who perform and contribute to the guild as a whole the most -- without all of the awkward ranking system that you're describing. Over a year ago, our guild, then called The Offenders, used a modified DKP system that caused all kinds of strife and ill feelings. When TO broke up and the core members of the guild formed The Core, we switched to using a loot council with all guild officers and class leaders voting to decide who gets what items. It succeeds where the DKP systems fail, because first and foremost, the guild members trust our guild leaders to make what are in the end subjective decisions. The loot council takes into account attendance, contributions, and past loot obtained, like a DKP system would, but having a council allows the council members to alter their loot decisions based on subjective reasons. A guild member can improve his or her ability to obtain items by improving his or her raid attendance (btw, one gets raid attendance credit even if you're outside picking herbs -- just as long as you're online and ready to sub in if needed), but while the loot council tries to distribute items fairly, it's pretty obvious that the best performers do tend to get the first pick of the hottest loot. It's a subjective decision-making process, but it works because the guild members trust the guild leaders to do the right thing.
Now, in The Core, which can fairly be said to be the most progressed and successful Horde guild on Tichondrius, we use a loot council system, which basically takes much of what you want -- rewarding people who perform and contribute to the guild as a whole the most -- without all of the awkward ranking system that you're describing. Over a year ago, our guild, then called The Offenders, used a modified DKP system that caused all kinds of strife and ill feelings. When TO broke up and the core members of the guild formed The Core, we switched to using a loot council with all guild officers and class leaders voting to decide who gets what items. It succeeds where the DKP systems fail, because first and foremost, the guild members trust our guild leaders to make what are in the end subjective decisions. The loot council takes into account attendance, contributions, and past loot obtained, like a DKP system would, but having a council allows the council members to alter their loot decisions based on subjective reasons. A guild member can improve his or her ability to obtain items by improving his or her raid attendance (btw, one gets raid attendance credit even if you're outside picking herbs -- just as long as you're online and ready to sub in if needed), but while the loot council tries to distribute items fairly, it's pretty obvious that the best performers do tend to get the first pick of the hottest loot. It's a subjective decision-making process, but it works because the guild members trust the guild leaders to do the right thing.