This article is a continuation of the last one I did and picks up where it left off after guild rank 5. For the first 5 ranks see that article. The primary body of this article deals with guild alliances.
Guild Rank 6
Alliances
The first thing, and probably the most exciting thing, you receive at guild rank 6 is the ability to form alliances. The alliance function was quite an early concept to enter the game from way back in development when guilds were called regiments. The basic idea behind the concept was that multiple regiments would ally and form an army which would march into battle. Different regiments would have different missions and roles on the field of battle. The fundamentals of the scheme have stayed the same and now guilds can enter into alliances in place of regiments. Unfortunately though, alliances offer little beyond advance communication utilities.
To access the alliance menu you must first open the roster tab on your guild screen. From there you should see two tabs at the bottom. One is labelled "Guild" and displays your standard guild roster. The other is labelled "Alliance" and displays the closest thing to a GUI you'll find for alliances. If you are not in an alliance, the tab will still appear at guild rank 6, but instead of alliance utilities it will display two text boxes, one for the name of the alliance you wish to form and the other for the name of the unallied guild you wish to form it with. To create your own alliance is fairly self-explanatory from the alliance tab; find ally, name alliance, enter ally's name, press enter (or in this case, click on the form alliance button). Congratulations on your alliance. To join an alliance that has already been created someone from that alliance must invite you. At the time of writing there is a maximum of 10 guilds per alliance.
;)
Once in an alliance, of your own creation or otherwise, you can access alliance information from the tab on the guild roster page. The top box displays a list of all the guild masters and guild officers in the alliance. Note that, while guild master is obviously set, alliance officers and guild officers are not. E.g. a player can be a guild officer but not an alliance officer and vice versa. The annoying thing about this system is that every character, bar the guild master, enters the alliance at the rank "Alliance Hopeful". At the time of writing there is no way to mass promote your members and you (being the guild master) must go through each name right-clicking to promote, more often than not 2 or 3 times. For a guild with 12 members I can see how this would be a drag. For a guild with in excess of 100 or 150 members it is an excruciatingly boring, full day, task. I hope you didn't have any pre-made scenarios planned for today.
Once you have sorted out your alliance ranks you may find yourself wondering; what has actually changed? Well, there are a few things, though don't get too excited, for a mechanic that has been so talked about there is nothing revolutionary. The first thing you will notice, or check out if you've heard about it is the alliance chat. Just like guild chat you now have access to alliance chat, which, just like guild chat, is divided into 2 channels; peasant and officer... member and officer. These can be accessed by using the slash commands: [/alliancesay {text}] abbreviated to [/a {text}] and [/allianceofficersay {text}] abbreviated to [/aos {text}]. Something else you may notice is that now, when you schedule guild events on the calendar, you can now select an option to "allow alliance signup" or "share with alliance". This simply means that other members of the alliance that are not in your guild can sign up for events that you have scheduled. This is a useful tool if you want to organise large RvR strikes with several war bands. That's it for alliances at this time, it would be nice if Mythic added some additional functions to the limited ones available, but it's certainly not a top priority.
Access to Guild Halls
At guild rank 6 you also gain access to The Viper's Pit or Sigmar's Hammer. These are the Guild Halls for Destruction and Order respectively. You will gain access to the merchants inside as well as the flight master and Officers' Hall. The Guild Hall contains all sorts of npcs; there is a career trainer, a crafting materials merchant, renown merchants (1 for every tier), quartermaster and a flight master, though there is no renown trainer. The Officers' Hall is located inside the Guild Hall and only allows access to guild masters and officers. The room was designed for use as a meeting place for guild higher-ups to discuss tactics and plans if their alliance chat won't suffice. However, alliance chat seems to suffice and the room is largely used for logging out in. This is because a Guild Hall offers a bonus to rested XP regeneration while you are logged out in it and the officers' hall offers a further bonus on top of that, though the exact numbers are unpublished.
;)
Tactic Point
Just as with guild rank 5 you will gain another tactic point to use on your guild standard. At guild rank 6 you will still only have one slot and one standard open to you. As you gain access to additional standards and multiple tactic slots your range of options and choice of configurations will improve and broaden along with the applications of your standard.
Guild Rank 7
You will gain a third tactic point at guild rank 7.
At this rank you will also gain access to guild crafting materials from the guild merchant in your Guild Hall. If you engage in PvE then these materials will likely be familiar to you as they are a limited selection of materials that drop in from monsters in the PvE side of the game. If you rank up exclusively through RvR based activities then you probably don't craft either, but if you do then you'll want to check these out, especially if you are into Talisman Making or you are an Apothecary.
Guild Rank 8
At this rank you receive your fourth tactic point.
You also earn the ability to set up guild only auctions in the auction house. What this means is that if you want to auction an item but want to keep it in the guild then you can select this option and only fellow members of your guild may purchase it. There is currently no way to extend this offer to your alliance.
;)
Guild Rank 9
Congratulations, you have earned your fifth tactic point.
More exciting is the second tactic slot you have earned on your standard. Finally, you can start equipping some more of those tactics. Choose carefully which two you want, you still only have one standard at this guild rank and you can only edit the tactics once every 24 hours, you don't want to change them only to discover another group needed that configuration for their dungeon run in an hour.
Guild Rank 10
You will also be able to reserve your heraldry at this rank. It costs 10 gold (or near enough), which the guild master will be charged for, though he can always raise the guild tax if he's broke. The heraldry won't be fully revealed until guild rank 20. You will be able to see part of it now and reserve all of it so another guild won't be able to take it (though they can come very close to copying it). At guild rank 10 you will be able to see all parts of the heraldry but the emblem on your guild standard. You won't get the guild cloak until guild rank 15 and the emblem won't be visible on either the standard or the cloak until guild rank 20.
Oh... and you will receive your sixth guild tactic point.
