Guild renown is helped by inactives?

[Perspicacity]

Ok so maybe I'm reading this wrong but the formula for guild decay is:

(LevelMultiplier * AccountMultiplier)

where account multiplier is 10 + modified guild size.

Pretty strait forward so far but its the formula for MGS that throws me off:

Modified Guild Size = Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures

my questions is where do the parenthesis go?

A. (Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts) + Recent Departures

or

B. Total Accounts - (Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)

This little detail makes a big difference, as A implies that inactive are better than recent departures while B implies that both are the same and that's not the most confusing part. If I am reading this correctly the formula implies that having a lower account multiplier is good and since in both formula's inactive accounts lower guild multiplier doesn't an inactive account help the guild instead of hurting it? I need some clarification.

also if I just flat out have the wrong formula could some one post the correct one?

(Source: DDO wiki (http://ddowiki.com/page/Guild_Renown)) <<< Might be the problem.

[Letrii]

there is no parentheses, just subtract inactive and then add recent departures. Or just look in guild tab.

[Neverwinterer]

I wasn't very good with maths, but as far as I know parenthesis are not used in the formula, so it would be:

Total Accounts + Recent Departures -Inactive accounts.

Total account is always >0
Recent departures are always added to the total account size.
Inactive accounts are always subtracted from the total account size.

(what you have done with your B formula is a little trick/mistake and changes the sign of the recent departures).

The numbers in my guild panel match with my explanation of the formula. I can't tell for sure, but it seems to me that inactive accounts are not helping neither degrading guild favor.

I hope I could be of help.

[Zarquine]

Inactive guild members are members who are offline for more than 4 weeks and yes, they are better than Recent Departures who will be tracked for a week (IIRC) and they help the guild's renown. At least small guilds. I am not so sure about big guilds.

But there is no difference between:

- Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures

- (Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts) + Recent Departures

and

- Total Accounts - (Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)

Parenthesis only make a difference if you mix multiplication / division and addition / subtraction.

[Letrii]

Inactive guild members are members who are offline for more than 4 weeks and yes, they are better than Recent Departures who will be tracked for a week (IIRC) and they help the guild's renown. At least small guilds. I am not so sure about big guilds.

But there is no difference between:

- Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures

- (Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts) + Recent Departures

and

- Total Accounts - (Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)

Parenthesis only make a difference if you mix multiplication / division and addition / subtraction.

Wrong, the third one is much different. It subtracts recent departures instead of adding them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_operations

[Zarquine]

Wrong, the third one is much different. It subtracts recent departures instead of adding them.

In elementary algebra parentheses, ( ), are used to specify the order of operations, terms inside the bracket are evaluated first, hence 2×(3 + 4) is 14 and (2×3) + 4 is 10.

(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracket_%28mathematics%29#Algebra)

In pure additions and subtractions you don't use parentheses, you just do the operations from left to right.

And to be precise, the third option is kinda wrong, it should be:

Total Accounts + (-Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures).

That is the reason why there are no brackets in the formula. :)

[Standal]

My understanding is that Inactive accounts only hurt a guild from a renown standpoint if the guild would otherwise qualify for a better small/medium guild bonus. Decay is actually increased for a guild by kicking inactive accounts because then they are counted as recent departures.

AFAIK, the absolute worst guild policy from a renown decay perspective is to kick members after 1 month of inactivity. The guild has already taken all the renown decay from that account that it would, then kicks it and restarts the clock as a recent departure. It also encourages players who don't want to lose guild membership to log in just to stay "active" while contributing nothing to guild renown.

[Zarquine]

I think Standal sums it up quite nicely.

[Letrii]

In elementary algebra parentheses, ( ), are used to specify the order of operations, terms inside the bracket are evaluated first, hence 2×(3 + 4) is 14 and (2×3) + 4 is 10.

(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracket_%28mathematics%29#Algebra)

In pure additions and subtractions you don't use parentheses, you just do the operations from left to right.

And to be precise, the third option is kinda wrong, it should be:

Total Accounts + (-Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures).

That is the reason why there are no brackets in the formula. :)

You typed up a math lesson while I edited in wiki link on order of operations, lol.

[Zarquine]

You typed up a math lesson while I edited in wiki link on order of operations, lol.

Wait until I am really awake... :)

[shores11]

I think you are right that inactive accounts do nothing to hurt guild renown and therefore there is no reason to kick them from the guild. It makes no sense to me that active members are the only ones that contribute to renown decay as in my thinking it should be the reverse.

I will have to rethink my guild policy of kicking players that have been inactive for 3 months or more. Now we want guild members that have been inactive for 2 years it seems. This really needs to be rethought by the DDO developers, there is a better way.

Guild Renown - The Right Stuff (http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=331293)

[Letrii]

IMO, the best way is to remove renown decay.

[Silverwren]

IMO, the best way is to remove renown decay.

I disagree. Renown decay makes a high level guild have to work to keep their high level, and I'm fine with that.

The problem as I see it is that the current system is confusing and no one knows what is the best way to deal with it. Do inactive accounts hurt or not? Do they hurt more if you boot them (which opens up another can of worms regarding accounts and knowing how many toons are tied to it, but that's another subject)? On and on the questions go and all have been discussed in the past and no one has a really good answer.

IMO the renown system needs to be redesigned and simplified so that the leaders of a guild can make better decisions regarding how the guild is run. Right now it's too confusing and no one really knows what's the best way.

[bradleyforrest]

I disagree. Renown decay makes a high level guild have to work to keep their high level, and I'm fine with that.

The problem as I see it is that the current system is confusing and no one knows what is the best way to deal with it. Do inactive accounts hurt or not? Do they hurt more if you boot them (which opens up another can of worms regarding accounts and knowing how many toons are tied to it, but that's another subject)? On and on the questions go and all have been discussed in the past and no one has a really good answer.

IMO the renown system needs to be redesigned and simplified so that the leaders of a guild can make better decisions regarding how the guild is run. Right now it's too confusing and no one really knows what's the best way.
There also needs to be more information available to the guild leaders about which characters are from which account. With the number of alts people roll, it can be hard to keep track of. Being able to see characters grouped by account would certainly clarify which accounts are inactive.

Just had another thought: what about placing an "inactive flag" on characters that are part of an inactive account? That way, leadership doesn't make a mistake by booting the wrong people.

[Gremmlynn]

There also needs to be more information available to the guild leaders about which characters are from which account. With the number of alts people roll, it can be hard to keep track of. Being able to see characters grouped by account would certainly clarify which accounts are inactive.

Just had another thought: what about placing an "inactive flag" on characters that are part of an inactive account? That way, leadership doesn't make a mistake by booting the wrong people.If leaders are only going by what they see on the guild roster, they are always booting the wrong people.

[Galeria]

Booting inactive accounts hurts your guild!

I have tried to explain this to two different guild leaders who choose to believe that booting inactive accounts and making people log in once a month even if they don't play are good policies.

Inactive accounts DO NOT CONTRIBUTE to your decay. It is like they don't exist. Their account is not calculated in the decay numbers.

Booting inactive accounts:

Removes 20% of their total renown from your guild.
Counts for decay purposes for another 14 days.

You are NOT penalized for inactive accounts, you are harshly penalized for accounts that look active but don't play. Making people login every 30 days to maintain their guild membership means they continue to count in your guild decay numbers every single day. And they contribute nothing.

Smart guild leaders know that inactive accounts don't hurt them at all. Inactive-but-occasionally-logged-in-accounts do hurt.

The common practice of deleting inactive accounts is extremely painful for guild renown accrual and retention.

[Chai]

IMO, the best way is to remove renown decay.

Yeap, exactly.

Theres no reason to penalize guilds for having members. Its pretty silly.

[Gremmlynn]

Yeap, exactly.

Theres no reason to penalize guilds for having members. Its pretty silly.Very much so.

[Bart_D]

I think you are right that inactive accounts do nothing to hurt guild renown and therefore there is no reason to kick them from the guild. It makes no sense to me that active members are the only ones that contribute to renown decay as in my thinking it should be the reverse.

I will have to rethink my guild policy of kicking players that have been inactive for 3 months or more. Now we want guild members that have been inactive for 2 years it seems. This really needs to be rethought by the DDO developers, there is a better way.

Guild Renown - The Right Stuff (http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=331293)What if a guild member is not active with any character in the guild but with
- characters not in the guild but on the same server?
- characters on other servers?

Does that guild member contribute to decay? If he does, it would make sense to remove him.

[Jaid314]

removing inactive members is good from the perspective of making your guild more attractive to others.

frankly, i don't think inactive members should count towards decay when they're kicked, either, but i'd rather have a guild that isn't 75% inactive members anyways. yes, it makes them count towards renown decay, but i'd still rather not have a guild full of nothing but inactive members.

[Silverwren]

What if a guild member is not active with any character in the guild but with
- characters not in the guild but on the same server?
- characters on other servers?

Does that guild member contribute to decay? If he does, it would make sense to remove him.

As far as I know, it's the account that counts, not the characters. As long as one character plays regularly on any given account the account is considered "active".

[Rodasch]

My understanding is that Inactive accounts only hurt a guild from a renown standpoint if the guild would otherwise qualify for a better small/medium guild bonus. Decay is actually increased for a guild by kicking inactive accounts because then they are counted as recent departures.

AFAIK, the absolute worst guild policy from a renown decay perspective is to kick members after 1 month of inactivity. The guild has already taken all the renown decay from that account that it would, then kicks it and restarts the clock as a recent departure. It also encourages players who don't want to lose guild membership to log in just to stay "active" while contributing nothing to guild renown.

This is absolutely correct and every guild leader/officer should read this 10 times or more until they understand it completely.

Inactives do not hurt your renown....non-playing "actives" do. If someone log in once a week just to stay "active" but does not gain their share of renown during their login, they contribute more to renown loss than every single inactive combined.

[DragonKiller]

Here's what I hate about the system. We have guild members that were in guild prior to renown even dropping, and recently I have started removing people who haven't logged in for a year... mainly as people stated if someone happens to come back for 1 day every great once in a while, they end up hurting the renown.

IMHO if they would change it so that after being inactive for 3/6/9/12/whatever months or more, removing them doesn't add to the recent departures. I'm ok with it removing part of the renown they earned, but it shouldn't penalize you for 2 weeks simply because they don't log on anymore.

[Grendyll]

I think there should be some sort of status beyond just "Inactive for 2 weeks", at the 3 month mark, the account should become "Extremely Inactive". Kicking such an account from the guild should not cost the 10% or 25% of the total renown gained by the account (no renown loss) and they should only count as a recent departure for 1 week of time or perhaps not at all.

I also think we should be able to set an "Account Name" which shows up as another column in the guild panel display to prevent the guessing game of "Whose Alt is that?". There can be another interface at the character select screen or something, or it could use our forum account name that gets displayed in the forums. Or it could be initialized to DDO_123456789 where each account gets a different unique ID number and we have to set it to something else if we wish. Or it could just be a field on the guild panel without any enforced uniqueness or profanity filters, we would be on our own to police it and work out conflicts within the guild, but give us something to link our alts and help us manage our guilds.

I don't know if an account is still considered active if it is playing on other servers or logging into characters strictly not in the guild in question, but it should not. If it does, that should also be changed as well to count only characters in guild.

[shores11]

What if a guild member is not active with any character in the guild but with
- characters not in the guild but on the same server?
- characters on other servers?

Does that guild member contribute to decay? If he does, it would make sense to remove him.

This is a good question and I do not know the answer to it.

[Tobril]

People who don’t log in aren’t helping the guild get gear/favor/xp/etc.

If you never log in you’re not really in the guild.
(exceptions for pregnancy, deployment, etc)

Unless someone has communicated a reason for a lengthy absence they
should be kicked after a long period of inactivity. My reasoning for this
is that if they don’t care enough to pm/twitter/g+/email/call/etc then are
they really someone you want to have your guild name associated with?

[Backley]

What if a guild member is not active with any character in the guild but with
- characters not in the guild but on the same server?
- characters on other servers?

Does that guild member contribute to decay?

According to http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?p=3782477#post3782477
characters on the same account on the same server but different guilds do count as an active account in both guilds. I think the same would be true if the characters were on separate servers, but haven't seen anyone test that yet.

Edit: My above claim is wrong. If you haven't played on any character in a guild, you are inactive on that guild (even if you are active in another guild):

It's happened before, where for various reasons, we've had people who had inactive characters in the guild but continue to play their mains outside of the guild, even join other guilds, and not affect the modified accounts for our guild (i.e. count as an inactive account).

One thing that's often overlooked is that the renown system is indeed based on accounts not characters, but the number of modified accounts is calculated individually for each guild. Whether an account is considered active or inactive depends on the most recent login of all characters of that account inside that guild. So if you split your time between different guilds, you are indeed increasing the renown decay for all guilds; if all your characters in a guild goes inactive however, you will be considered an inactive account in that guild (although still active in the guilds where you have active characters) and not contribute to their renown decay.

[Gum]

The main thing you want to see in any guild is fun and activity. I think renown is long overdue for a closer look by the developers. The current system encourages those wanting more renown and higher guild levels to leave an inactive player alone so it doesn't count against the guild renown...um...they're inactive, they should never count against the guild in decay when removed. Unfortunately, one of the best policies to increase guild activity and keep a tight ship is also the worst that will count against the guild's renown, a one month inactivity removal policy. The same for 2-3 months or greater.

I also think guild renown, activity, inactivity, and decay should be customizable by the guild leader and stated up front to new members, making the goal/drive/stance/philosophy of guild renown customizable to match the guilds environment and give all members a common focus and common ground to solidify their selves in.

[Simplesimon1979]

Inactive guild members are members who are offline for more than 4 weeks and yes, they are better than Recent Departures who will be tracked for a week (IIRC) and they help the guild's renown. At least small guilds. I am not so sure about big guilds.

But there is no difference between:

- Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures
10-4+2=8

- (Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts) + Recent Departures
(10-4)+2=8

and

- Total Accounts - (Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)
10-(4+2)=4

Parenthesis only make a difference if you mix multiplication / division and addition / subtraction.

Parenthesis make a difference cause it changes the sign of the recent departures

Just messing with you Zarquine

[Perspicacity]

There is no difference between:


- (Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts) + Recent Departures

and

- Total Accounts - (Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)

Parenthesis only make a difference if you mix multiplication / division and addition / subtraction.

I beg to differ. Lets plug some numbers in just so I can demonstrate what I am seeing when I look at this problem:


25 - 6 + 4

A. (25 - 6 ) + 4 = (19) + 4 = 23

B. 25 - (6 + 4) = 25 - (10) = 15


There is a big difference between 23 and 15, granted this doesn't take in to account the fact that I am very rusty on order of operations or proper mathematical structure and am thus probably getting at least one of these equations wrong but that's why I'm confused, I suck at math.

[Cabronsisimo]

I also think we should be able to set an "Account Name" which shows up as another column in the guild panel display to prevent the guessing game of "Whose Alt is that?". There can be another interface at the character select screen or something, or it could use our forum account name that gets displayed in the forums. Or it could be initialized to DDO_123456789 where each account gets a different unique ID number and we have to set it to something else if we wish. Or it could just be a field on the guild panel without any enforced uniqueness or profanity filters, we would be on our own to police it and work out conflicts within the guild, but give us something to link our alts and help us manage our guilds.

I like this idea a lot. Specially the underlined.

[Satinavian]

Yes, Inactive members don't hurt guild renown. Kicking them does.

That is WAI and it should stay as it is.

Recent departures discourages guild to accept members for renown farming and kicking them later while still having 2/3 of their reknown contribution

And it discourages guilds who get to mid-levels, where reknown begins to hurt to suddenly decide to become a small guild of only active members and kicking everybody else, even if they were a more casual guild while recruiting the same people.

Oh, and it discourages kicking players who take a long break because of real-life-issues. Especcially in large not that close guilds one might not announce those issues or having somebody keeping track, who has whatever reason for being absent.




People who don’t log in aren’t helping the guild get gear/favor/xp/etc.

If you never log in you’re not really in the guild.
(exceptions for pregnancy, deployment, etc)

Unless someone has communicated a reason for a lengthy absence they
should be kicked after a long period of inactivity. My reasoning for this
is that if they don’t care enough to pm/twitter/g+/email/call/etc then are
they really someone you want to have your guild name associated with?

twitter/email/call ? Are all your guild that close that you actually share that kind of real-life-information ? I am pretty sure, that is not exactly a very usual procedure. Especcially for those casual guys.

And another interesting thing is the following :

Imagine, you were in a guild, but somehow you lost interest in that toon, maybe having another (nonguilded) main, changing server or quitting the game.



What should you do ?

Logging in once more and leaving the guild : it costs them at least 10% of your earned renown. And counts as active for 14 days contributing to decay.

Don't log in and have your inactive toon stay in guild costs your guild exactly nothing.


So, if you don't want to harm your former guildies (and don't want to reactivate the toon later), simply stay inactive.




I want to think about inactive account as people, who understood decay and took the right decidion.




As for changed rules... i could get behind an idea that allows people to voluntarily leave a guild without increasing decay or costing renown. As i know, there are a lot of players, that don't take this step only because of consideration of their former guild. But i see clearly, that this might easily be exploitet to farm guild levels as a large guild and stay on high levels as a small guild.

[Gremmlynn]

Here's what I hate about the system. We have guild members that were in guild prior to renown even dropping, and recently I have started removing people who haven't logged in for a year... mainly as people stated if someone happens to come back for 1 day every great once in a while, they end up hurting the renown.

IMHO if they would change it so that after being inactive for 3/6/9/12/whatever months or more, removing them doesn't add to the recent departures. I'm ok with it removing part of the renown they earned, but it shouldn't penalize you for 2 weeks simply because they don't log on anymore.I'd even go further than this. As soon as any account becomes inactive it should no longer cost any renown to either retain that account or remove it. This would allow GLs to administer their guilds in a way that best serves those who actively play the game without being disloyal to those they feel earned the right to be kept on the roster.

[Zarquine]

I beg to differ. Lets plug some numbers in just so I can demonstrate what I am seeing when I look at this problem:


25 - 6 + 4

A. (25 - 6 ) + 4 = (19) + 4 = 23

B. 25 - (6 + 4) = 25 - (10) = 15


There is a big difference between 23 and 15, granted this doesn't take in to account the fact that I am very rusty on order of operations or proper mathematical structure and am thus probably getting at least one of these equations wrong but that's why I'm confused, I suck at math.

Yes, B. is wrong. If you add parenthesis to it, it is:

Total Accounts + (-Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures)

or 25 + (-6 + 4) = 25 + (-2) = 23

The minus before the 6 is very important.

And there are no parenthesis in the formula, because they are no needed, you just do the operations from left to right.

Total Accounts - Inactive Accounts + Recent Departures

or

25 - 6 + 4 = 23

See post #6: http://forums.ddo.com/showpost.php?p=3960897&postcount=6

[Mortis1964]

There is also the question of renown bonus for small guilds. Keeping a number of inactive members in a small/medium sized guild could slow down their progression in the long term as the active members miss out on the bonuses because their guild is effectively smaller than it actually is. Removing some inactive members may hurt for a while but reducing the level of their guild could then be a compensation.

[Satinavian]

There is also the question of renown bonus for small guilds. Keeping a number of inactive members in a small/medium sized guild could slow down their progression in the long term as the active members miss out on the bonuses because their guild is effectively smaller than it actually is. Removing some inactive members may hurt for a while but reducing the level of their guild could then be a compensation.

But as the guild size for small/medium renown bonus also seems to be adjusted, inactives don't affect size boni. recent departues do.

So kicking inactives does not only lead to loss of a part of their earned renown and higher decay - it even leads to less guild size bonus, which doesn't even benefit on the long run.

[Calebro]

All these threads about guild renown and when it is or is not OK to kick someone make me laugh. It's all a moot point as far as I'm concerned.
Every guild in existence will eventually plateau. Every single one. It may happen at level 26 and it may happen at level 100. It doesn't matter when it happens, but it will indeed happen.
The bottom line is this:
If your guild even considers kicking someone due to renown reasons, your guild is not a guild that I would want to be a part of.

[Silverwren]

All these threads about guild renown and when it is or is not OK to kick someone make me laugh. It's all a moot point as far as I'm concerned.
Every guild in existence will eventually plateau. Every single one. It may happen at level 26 and it may happen at level 100. It doesn't matter when it happens, but it will indeed happen.
The bottom line is this:
If your guild even considers kicking someone due to renown reasons, your guild is not a guild that I would want to be a part of.

Your comments make ME laugh. The point of this discussion has not been about WHEN to kick inactive peeps, but IF, and you missed the point.

Furthermore, most guilds do not wish to plateau at any level except 100. Our guild would very much like to get to higher levels than where we are at currently (48). To do this we need to maximize to amount of renown our members gather, and do it in every way possible.

In actuality, your bottom line is moot. It's already been established that booting inactive members hurts guilds.

[Gum]

But as the guild size for small/medium renown bonus also seems to be adjusted, inactives don't affect size boni. recent departues do.

So kicking inactives does not only lead to loss of a part of their earned renown and higher decay - it even leads to less guild size bonus, which doesn't even benefit on the long run.

There has got to be a better way for the developers to do renown without penalizing a guild that simply wants its members active while trying to keep other guilds from inviting a bunch of new members for xp then kicking them for fairness sake. A guild should never have a bunch of inactive people on the roster just for the sake of renown.

Again, it would be nice to have customizable renown policies for every guild leader, but still have a core renown system that applies to all guilds, this way if a guild chooses to be very active and not keep non active characters on the roster, they don't have to fear a renown hit. Take away renown all together, do you really want a long list of inactive players on the guild roster, or do you want to see peak activity to promote and increase fun times?