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Just FYI, next weekend I'm moving so game time will be limited.  Packing/unpacking for the next couple weeks and I don't know when I will have my internet hooked up.

Someone in Wispwood was building this:




Today the Wispwood Guild Tower stands 10 years old. 

(note that this is cross-posted into both the Siege Stratics forums and our guild/alliance forums as it has parts that pertain to each)

Community (n): an interacting population of various kinds of individuals in a common location.

There are two thing about this game I love that I have not found in any other MMORPG that I have played.  The first being the way this game forces you to interact can foster great communities, which I will mostly talk about.  The second being the pvp that I love that is now long gone, but is not the point of this post.

During my time in UO, I've been primarily part of 4 communities.
1.   During my trammy years, as part of the Britain Forge community, in Trammel, on Pacific.  This community was destroyed by repair deeds and insurance, though I left it long ago.
2.   After I finally got the balls to venture into felucca, I joined the Rangers of Skara Brae (RSB), a guild that was part of the Skara Brae community on Felucca, Pacific.  Here various types of guilds would interact with each other on a daily basis, be they good (RSB), outlaws (KIN), thieves (BUB), murderers (FL), and it was fun.  This community began to die with the advent of Trammel, but was destroyed when AoS came out.
3.   Wispwood Community.  Ahh yes, wispwood, it's what really drew me to this shard.  When I first joined back in 2003, Wispwood itself was always busy with all sorts of people.  Citizens, allies, friends, enemies, and unknowns came by all the time to have an ale at the Unicorn, duel at the dueling pit, or raid our town.  I'd say it finally died out in about 2005-2006.
4.   The Siege Stratics forums.  Yes it is a community, although one that bitches to each other more than anything.


The last few years my main purpose was to rebuild the Wispwood community by helping rebuilding Wispwood, its allies, and this shard.  A guild or an alliance does not make a community by itself, and the only way the Wispwood community would ever become strong would be with a strong shard.

The community is more than just the people hanging out within it.  But what immensely help it are the people that maintain its lore.  Websites devoted to bringing communities together and sharing their news, events, and history, something that hasn't existed for 7-8 years.  No other game could bring this about but UO, and I doubt no other game would.  But even if a classic shard were brought about, I doubt it would bring about people to write the same type of lore that existed when uo first begun.  I just wish I was around at that time.  Some of these websites that I knew of were:

The Community of Skara Brae
Skara Brae Chimera
Council of Nine
Sosarian Atlas

I know for a long time I've been fighting a loosing battle.  And I guess that this is the point where I'm giving up, I'm done.  This doesn't mean that I am leaving.  But, I'm no longer going to try and actively build up a dying guild, and a dying shard, within a dying game.  It's an admirable goal, but one that I believe can never be achieved.

In about the last year that I have actively recruited for CWS, we have had 46 new members (Initiates), mostly from NEW.  Seven of them are relatively new initiates, but of the remaining 39:
•   13 have lasted about 2 months and were promoted to full membership (Citizen), or about 1/3 of all recruits.
•   Of the 13 that made it to full membership, about 4 of them are active today.

So roughly 10% of people who joined CWS over the last year still play.  This is a horrible statistic.  And I share it not because I think it's a CWS problem, I see similar issues with recruits that make it into GIL, the largest recruiter of new people on this shard. 

Once you figure that of all the people that join NEW, only 50% ever graduate and make it to another guild (I think the real number is less than 30%).  So between 30%-50% of the people who join NEW ever move on, and of those only 10% last, that means we have about a 3%-5% a new person to this shard ever make it as a full productive member of our community.  I believe the 3% to be more accurate.

This tells me the allure of Siege exists, people ARE joining, they're just not staying.  Imagine if we as a shard could increase this number from 3% to 10%.  That would mean another 50 people or so running around each year.  How about 30%, or 50%!  And these are just the people that run through NEW, I have no idea of the numbers of other people who join this shard and don't make it to NEW.

With this, I am giving up the positions of both Lord of CWS and chancellor of the White Council to anyone qualified who wishes to lead them.  If no one steps up, I will still perform the administrative tasks required, but no longer have the desire to lead.

I will still be around and in game (albeit less frequently), having an ale at the Unicorn, out hunting with friends, or whatever.  Simply put, my desire to try and rebuild something that has become obvious to me will never again exist is gone.  I do not know if I will continue my assistance in NEW.

And with that, I guess I finally say goodbye to the communities that I was once a part of, but are no longer here.  I've met some great people in this game, many who are long gone, some who I still play with.  Hold a tavern night, and I'll be there ordering an ale recanting stories of times past.  And if anyone ever discovers a game with the same richness of lore, that fosters a community that UO once had, and gives the same risk and fun in pvp, please let me know.

And with that, I'll close with a saying we had in the Skara community, appropriately changed:
"May we all stir with the Spoon of Skara Brae."

Welcome to the alliance Sturdy!

welcome back man.

I have an alchemy SoA.

Welcome Nathema!

Yeah, saw the post nice job.  How long in between you asking them the question and they responding?

They were introduced about 6 months ago.  They are the teleporting globe thingy's.  I should really get one for the Unicorn.  If you walk up to it and say 'luna mint' it will teleport you to the luna bank for example.

Hi Deamon, met you earlier.  You looking to join Citizens of Wispwood Shire (CWS) or Gilfane (GIL)?

Post here, and best also to include a way to contact you, and I'm sure the right person will get in touch with you.

Golems in Ilshenar.

If only the shoes were purple....




Sorry Troop, trying to find the perfect one for you.

Yes it was fun.  Pretty much what Sara said.  There were purple monsters (regular monsters just hued purple) that each had a chest locked down on the ground that would remain locked until you killed the monster.  once you killed the monster, you opened the chest and took a ticket that you traded in for a stuffy bear.  We started at brit graveyard, and there were books locked down with clues as to where to go next.  Took us to Despise, brigand camp (which we skipped), lich fields near yew, then the orc fort.

seems to be working now but things reverted?

Hail Blasphemy,

Congrats on the upcoming little one!  You'll have fun in GIL and the WC!