Which setup do you prefer for IC guild chat?

I personally like an imaginary guild hall/central location the best, but sometimes people are ICly out and about questing/doing their own thing! In those situations, its nice to have something that still allows them to RP - so I've always liked the combination of the two. For example, a guild hall where people can interact, but everyone's hearthstones also can "tune in" if needed/wanted. Sometimes, though, this causes confusion and I've not noticed that many guilds do the combo.

The only one I really DISLIKE (and I suspect I am in the minority here) is guild chat that can only occur in an ACTUAL in-game location. I often like to go quest, raid, fish, etc... so I dont like when I feel like I can *only* RP in /gchat if I'm at a very specific place. 

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(( I definitely prefer the pure "walkie talkie" setup.  The Meddlers and the Silver Dragoons both use this approach (the former having a mental network of sorts, the latter a guildstone for spoken long-distance communication) and I think it works really well.  The Dragoons also have a separate chat channel for an imaginary guild hall, but although I listen in on it, I've never actually had my character "there" in the off-camera room.

I'm not a huge fan of the "imaginary location while I'm actually elsewhere" concept.  Unless it's absolutely necessary, I don't like having my character ICly in a different place from where she currently is in the game world.  If someone approaches me ICly while I'm doing something mundane like farming mageweave in the Hinterlands, I prefer to come up with some half-arsed IC reason why I'm there, instead of saying "ignore me, I'm not really here".  If I bring a character to a purely out-of-game setting (like the White Hart), I won't have that character logged into the game at the same time.  Kind of weird, but just a personal hangup of mine. :)

I know a lot of people do use the separate location thing, though, just for convenience purposes. ))

Personally, I'm not a fan of the 'walkie-talkie' thing. It's just something I wouldn't make use of, even given the opportunity (being in a guild that used them, for example).

In the Blackwater Buccaneers, I usually use guildchat as OOC, unless there is an RP event that cannot be adequately RPed ingame. (Being on Tsilas' ship, ship-to-ship battles, Flyntlocke Harbor, etc.) Though I rarely make use of it.

I suppose if you want to use 'guild-hall' as synonymous with my ship thing, then yeah, I guess I do that sometimes. But only for specific uses, and rarely random 'just because' RP. 90% of the time though, I use guildchat for OOC. Both for Blackwater Buccaneers, and The Scourge. Just for convenience.

I'm a big believer in the OOC guildchat at this point. Simply I've seen too much variation in roleplay style and the inflexibility of an IC guildchat doesn't appeal to me anymore. I prefer the standard RP channels (say, yell, and emote) for my IC material and events , Party, Raid, or Custom Channel for closed RP events. That way folks can come in, say hello without feeling they're walking on top of a scene and we can avoid the bracket phenomena. I also must say that I detest brackets in the public RP channels, but that's because I'm elitist scum. ;)

Like Tsilas, I don't like the walkie-talkie thing and wouldn't use it, even if in a guild that did (unless, maybe, it was for emergency contacts etc, not chatting). 

And like Mag I also don't enjoy the idea that my character can be chatting away either in her head or theoretically in a guild hall or somewhere, whilst *physically* she's in another location altogether.  For me personally, not only would it be difficult to remember what I said to whom where, but I think it seriously impacts the *quality* of RP.

Man I sound old and crotchety.  Basically it comes down to if I'm in-game then I'm IC, I am where I am, and therefore I RP where I am.  For me an OOC GC is the only option that actually seems real.  Anything else is diverting my IC attention and weakening my RP (which is pretty weak to begin with, especially if I'm online at 2am or something  :) )

If I had to have a IC GC, I'd go for a flexible approach - decide on an imaginary place where the RP is 'occurring' at that particular time (guild hall or other) and go from there.

**adds a bit more after Iloam's extra posting below**

I dunno that you'd even *have* to have an OOC channel as well as your IC GC.  Just so long as being in the guild and online doesn't assume that you're somehow *there* to the other guild members, if that makes sense.  So if you had the walkie-talkie thing, for example, some characters would simply choose not to carry one.

And I think 'Heavy RP' is too much a personal definition and viewpoint to get any kind of meaningful data on - for each of us, our way suits us best.  As stated earlier in my personal version of RPing I'm IC all the time *in the world* - so I can't be in multiple places at once, and thus can't text-RP (to include channels) at the same time I'm galivanting around the countryside.   But I know lots of RPers who can multitask and multichannel and be conducting several simultaneous RP scenes.......  I have to admit I'd be irritated if I was in a guild that had an OOC GC and someone called it a 'lesser' RP guild than some other that had a IC GC and whose members could be mysteriously in 3 places at once!

And no, I don't care if dragons *do* mess with the time-space continuum  :)

For me the best thing about GC is to OOC connect to others and work out times and places and reasons to meet for face to face in-game RP.  However in an IC GC guild, I'd just do that in whispers instead, and simply not use an IC GC.  I think you should, if starting a guild, just work out some guidelines that suit YOU, and let everyone else work with or around them as suits their style of RP  :)

Okay, since we're getting a large amount of "I prefer OOC guild chat" answers I need to throw out there that the question is specifically asking about IC guild chats >.> 

I want to hear the opinions, though! So I guess my request is that IF you really couldn't STAND an IC guild chat and just absolutely refused to use it and INSISTED on an OOC guild chat in EutopiaWorld :) ... then please let me know, but perhaps to stay on topic, leave a suggestion/opinion/idea on how you would run a Heavy RP guild with an OOC Guild Chat?

Would you create an IC channel elsewhere besides guild chat? If so, please apply the original poll question to said channel. Would you not make any effort to provide continuous, ongoing RP for guild members unless they actually saw each other physically in game? If so, how would you facilitate that (i.e. weekly guild meetings? using /gchat as a general "who wants to RP right now? sounding board, etc) or would you not make that effort at all?

Also tossing these out there: If guild chat is OOC, do you think the guild can really be considered an RP guild? If yes, is it a general yes or would you further clarify it as a "low RP' guild? Do you think OOC guild chat discourages or stymies RP, makes no difference, or encourages players to physically get together more often for RP? 

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I tend to be very informal and spontaneous. If someone starts RPing in guild chat (Swiftstride's being OOC for the most part), I go with it and improv my way just like I would if someone RPed at me in instant messenger. I'm just ambling around questing or whatever, OOC or minimally IC, reacting to the world, and the RP is going on in whatever setting we come up with :) It's not a good mode for deep and intense RP, perhaps, but it's a lot of low-impact fun :)

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The Future is full of beautiful unmade mistakes. ~Abe

I think IC guild chat can be an excellent tool.  Not one that works for everyone though, just like goblin jumper cables.  To each their own.

I've been in guilds with and without it, that I would definitely consider RP guilds that fit my definition of "heavy" RP guilds.  It all just has to do with the people and mix and how comfortable they are with the different tools.

I tend to prefer the walkie-talkie thing, as I'm usually in-character when I'm in game, but I have done the guild-hall thing and enjoyed it as well.  I can see any of the options working.

I like the idea of using guild chat for IC guild chatter, but that means you cannot have non-guildies visit your guild hall/boat/whereever.

((

Personally, I prefer IC interaction to be face-to-face (so to speak), in the game. But I realize that this is not always convenient.

For that reason, I voted for the in-game walkie-talking option in the poll. Scartaris has one (made by a goblin in Desolace, to whom she was introduced by an orc named Horkin), and she has given matching units to a handful of her friends.

Which beings me to the "guild chat" part. I don't see the need for there to be a specific "IC guild chat". Sometimes I talk IC with people in the guild. Sometimes I do not. Sometimes I talk IC with people not in the guild. Sometimes I do not. I do not see a need to make a distinction between how or when I am IC with guild members vs. being IC with non-guild members.

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With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.

((I chose "another variation" because I'm usually a fan of OOC guild chat.))

"A 'walkie talkie' setup for people to IC chat over"

But I'm not picky. Any permant IC guild chat is good for me, and evidently the only sort of guild I'm happy in.

There and Back used to have a guild chat setup... the premise was that your character was exactly where your character currently happened to be... you were just screaming really loudly, so everyone in the entire world could hear you. It was so awful it was good.

We use the walkie-talkie setup because we're often separated and may need help quickly.  Our guildstones also give us a rough idea of where people are in the world.

We have a separate OOC channel as well.  This is the set up we inherited from the guild's founders and it's worked really well.

Recently, we added an IC guildhall channel, partly to allow us to do more RP together when on alts or elsewhere OOCly and partly because our IC hall is through a locked door off the garden of the Keep.  We chose a new channel vs. the guild channel so we could have visitors in our hall when the story calls for it.

Well, I can see points. I tend to not turn away any rp from out of guild, well, minus the occational table dancer character and whatnot, but nor do I tend to seek it... i'm a little comfortable with having a group of IC friends that my character likes to hang out with and well, she tends to gravitate strait to them rather than sit with new faces. I'm not really sure if that's wrong or right. It's comfortable, and fun, and I do love meeting new people when they approach me, but I also dont approach others myself. I guess I walk a fine line between being happy with accesible rp whenever I want it and missing some opportunities out in the world. Both make me happy as a player and an rper though.

I've got to say I prefer the walkie talkie, it allows me to roleplay aty any time I want to, even when i'm out in the world by myself. But I suppose you do have to be mindful about watching for opportunities back in the world.

I'd be hesitant to say that insular rp is wrong always, I dont think you can convince a person to just give up conveniance, generally anything that makes roleplaying a little more smooth and easy to arrange is a nice thing but you really have to be accepting and open to people you dont know as well. I have to work on that from time to time.

TLDR version: I like the walkie talk version of guild chat. It lets me roleplay and comment on my surroundings and actions regardless of whether i'm farming cloth in the middle of nowhere or grinding dailies or shopping in stormwind or anything. I dont have to hope I run into someone, hope that they rp, and hope that they aren't busy.

I used to prefer OOC guild chat and a separate IC channel for random "I'm OOC questing/on an alt/etc" RP. But the people I played with then weren't too big on RP in game in general, and I didn't know many people outside my small group of friends, and later the larger guild I joined.

Swiftstride does work like this, and it works well for the RPers there. Some really cool stories get told in the custom IC channel, which has a very malleable usage (sometimes it's a place, sometimes it's CrimsonRedux telling a train-of-thought story, etc.).

Since working with the Dragoons and the Meddlers, I've found the OOC custom chat channels for both guilds to be a fun option and -less- exclusionary. I can make contact with various friends who aren't in the guilds but are affiliated (that's actually how Drauglos and I ended up running about Dalaran Crater and Tirisfal last autumn and making up RP from that; just chatting in channel about where we were, who wanted to kill the Headless Horseman, etc).

The IC guildchat for both groups doesn't demand that ICly I be in a particular place. It's used for quick communication, and if the walkie-talkie idea is a little vague (I tend to emote whispering/speaking very quietly into my guildstone, Harrigan retypes his words in both /Guild and /Say) it still works for the intended purpose and can be gotten around. Also, it does let the guild members have a guild-only communication method, which I think -can- be important to guild cohesion, just as a solely OOC guild channel can have the same effect, depending on the purpose of the guild. There are channels for guild buddies and affiliates and non-guilded alts, and then there's the "family" of the guild chatter. If it's not the only channel used for communication and RP, then there's nothing wrong with that in my opinion.

It likely does help that both groups are also very big on the face-to-face in addition to using IC guild comms. We have weekly meetings, arrange other personal RP interactions, go to the Leaf or other RP events, etc. So the Guild Chat feels more supplementary than anything, and a means for the IC arrangement of the OOC planning.

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Alt chars: Camyra, Vyana, Daevlynne, Lormar

Horde alt: Linnadia

If I had to choose one of the variations I would go with the walkie talkie. I prefer to be where I am in game and be IC there. Before I left WoW for a few months the Scourgebane were holding weekly meetings which included more than just the guild. We also used guild chat to coordinate where we would like to quest IC together or where we could bump into each other. We also had a channel (/northward) where we would include people from outside the guild in such discussions.

--------Not completely on topic, my views on heavy RP guilds below---------

I think the idea of "Heavy RP guilds" keeps RP very insular and out of the public eye in the chat channels. Heavy RP guilds also (for the most part) exclude people who care at all about raiding. Due to the nature of raiding it is seemingly important to have the right tag over your head so you can go with people as silly as that is. The same goes for RP, if you don't have that tag over your head then you can't be in the OC guild chat. There seems to be an issue with these two being exclusive to each other and bars people who may be interested in one from participating in the other. This is not true in all cases.

This is why I prefer face to face anywhere in the world RP. RP in instances, RP in raids, RP in towns and RP in the wilderness.

I am attempting to find a good day to start the IC meetings again and anyone Hordeside is invited to attend.