It isn't there are several reasons, chief among them that Elite is about the lone spaceship pilot. Factions and Powers happen in the background. We can have a marginal influence on Factions and a greater influence on Powers but that's as far as our political influence goes. It's a different focus. Some players have organised themselves within the game but precisely because of the lack of in-game support, as well as the mode and instancing system, their overall influence is greatly reduced. Within the game they are still a group of individuals, even if they have a common purpose and external management, not a guild.
I think we're talking at cross purposes. I don't envisage Guilds having any political influence whatsoever (except maybe as a significant voting block within a power - which is likely to be the case anyway). I'm arguing for Guild-functionality purely from a social tool perspective (and so to be explicit - I completely agree with your comment).
While you may not wish to inflict Guild play on other players, you are not the only Guild proponent.
Adding another mode would be much less effort than creating the Guild features themselves - it would be just like Open but with Guilds enabled.
Yes, fair point. I do appreciate that there is a sliding scale of what Guild functionality could be - and I am not the sole arbiter of what that should be.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding you - I thought you were suggesting that a mode could exist for some of the expanded functionality which other players have been asking for (player controlled areas, for example).
So please, with all respect, enlighten me on what guilds would actually do, and thus achieve. How would they benefit Elite?
Firstly - apologies. Reading my quote and comment back it came across more "snippy" than the tone in my head at the time of writing.
By my proposal, Guilds would solely be a grouping system which allowed easy communication between selected players (i.e. the people who have chosen to be members of that particular one). I don't see any need for them to "achieve" anything that can't be dealt with elsewhere within the game - such as Power Play. Many of the pro-arguments in this thread have presented that position.
The benefit to Elite would solely be the improvement the social functionality. It may sound minor, but I know for a fact that ED has lost players because of the state of the social tools as they stand (who have then gone onto recommend a "No purchase" to others).
Done with a light touch, the concerns such as Guild warfare being inflicted on unwilling participants could easily be minimised to an impact level similar to that which already exists.
I like mobius (I'm a member I play in it whenever I feel sociable) specifically because it's an at free zone, more power to his elbow. He can run his group however he want's right now he's running it better than FD run open IMO (sorry FD you took far too long to deal with station griefing).
The issue around membership being decided by players is that it's going directly against the ED mantra of blaze your own trail and could be abused, ie vote against me and lose your membership of the faction. Look at Niteowls tantrum above that's what I really don't want to see rearing it's ugly head. Niteowl has already decided he's the senior member and all must bow before him.
When I said compromise I was complimenting FD's design not commenting on the conversation.
Anyway structured missions, wider goals and communites are a fantastic idea. I just don't want it being run by someone who throws epic tantrums whenever anyone disagrees with him.
I'm sorry, but I really don't understand your point. No one could ever force a player to be a member of a guild (and what would they be voting for). This isn't anything that could be inflicted on an unwilling player. So, if Niteowl set up a Guild and decided to be a preening idiot, it would only affect those who had joined it - and they'd be free to leave at any point with no more repercussion in-game.
Of course, players may decided to gun for the person who left - but that situation already exists in game and I can't recall anyone ever complaining about former Guild members (and I'd expect FD to treat it as griefing if it ever did happen).
This (and an element of Asp Explorer's comment above) also ties into a comment I made a while ago in the thread - player Guilds would and should never be "the law". (I'm thinking of the likes of players deciding to interdict and attack any Commander they found in "their" system - something which happens now.)
If FD do manage to sort out the crime and punishment element of the game, anti-social behaviour by large groups of players would have repercussions and be dealt with appropriately within the game itself.
