Your Kinship is a Football Team
Through my years in football (American) I came to the understanding that you can have the greatest plays in the known universe but that mattered little without the proper players. A football team needs players, and players need coaches and coaches need players. A Kinship is fairly similar to a football team. Without any members, there is no kin, and just like any team, these players need proper management.
“Without you guys I wouldn’t be here,” is what my coach would always say during a bad performance on our part, normally followed by an intense criticism session, and like with many things, he was right. A kinship is one in the same, without members there is no kin. The questions arises then: How do we get members? The answer is far more complicated, and really depends on what you want, and where you want to go and the attitude you want your kin to have.
Open Try-Outs
My football team in high school didn’t have try-outs, yet we were fairly successful my junior and senior varsity years (Ahem, back-to-back state semifinalist…….sorry I miss it) and your kin has the same possibility for success with out having try outs. The method I’m talking about is fairly simple, putting a post in regional chat giving a teaser about your kin, and seeing if anyone is interested. There are a lot of people who talk down on this method, yet if done right it can be successful, and is a damn good way for kins to get their foot in the door. That’s not to say that these people are wrong, because statistically speaking, there are a lot of Kins that recruit this way that are fairly immature, strife with drama and extremely unstable, yet if done properly, it can work. Let me give you an example of how I would post in regional for my kin.
The Guild of Destroyers, a Rank 7 Kin with a house, website and vent server, is looking for new, active and casual members. The Flying Spaghetti Monster wants you to send me a tell for more information.
Now, there was a couple of things that I did there that are different from the normal posts. Let’s start with the obvious on, the Flying Spaghetti Monster (May Sauce Be Upon Him) assists me with a couple of key things. Firstly, it gets peoples attention, which when trying to establish yourself as a kin is a difficult feat, and secondly it sticks in peoples brains a bit because it is off the wall random. This also makes it so that your posts stands out from the 12 others that happen to be posting in Bree-Town, at the same time. The final thing my
Regional Posting Can Work
post does is what it doesn’t do; promise recruitment. NEVER,EVER,EVER blindly recruit people just because they send you a tell. Ask them some qualifying questions, see if they fit in, see what they like to do, see what is their main playing time (more on this part later) and see if they are even mature enough to have other people depend on them. If they don’t fit into your criteria, don’t recruit them because only bad will come if they don’t fit in, or cause drama due to immaturity and one bad recruitment could be the end of your kin if things get out of hand. Don’t be afraid to tell people no, but if they ask for a reason, don’t tell them that they are too immature, tell them that their play time doesn’t match up with the rest of the kin. The last thing that must be understood about posting in regional is that for the most part you are going to get more members, but they always won’t be the quality you are hoping for. There is another method for that once you get a bit more established.
The second method is much easier to enact once your kin becomes more established, and it’s simply running instances and asking the people you are with if they want to join. Sometimes they say no, but if the run was successful and you and your kin had a prominent role in that run there is a high probability that they will say yes. The nice thing about recruiting after a successful run is that you already have a good idea what that player is like, how they work with a team, how they act around other players and how mature they are. These things are very important inside of day to day kin operations, immaturity can kill and kin rather quickly, so can lack of team work, and you need members that have both. Recruiting after runs acts like try-outs, but it doesn’t mean you don’t ask the same qualifying questions because those give you an even more rounded picture of the prospective recruit but it does mean that you already have a little view of how that player plays and how he operates amongst others.
Proper Line-Ups
Any football team has to deal with player management, who starts, who rides the pine and who gets removed from the team, and guess what as a leader of a kin, you are also the kin’s General Manager. Management of a Kin is only as complicated as you make to start out with, the more complex, the more that can go wrong and the bigger of a head you will get so….Keep It Simple, Stupid:KISS. To give you examples, let’s just look at the numbers from top to bottom. So, obviously 1 leader and one successor, but then things get complicated. The correct number of officers is always a tricky thing. My advice is to always keep the number as low a feasibly possible for a couple of major reasons. Firstly, the less people with power means the more likely everyone is on the same page. Secondly, too many officers always ends up with situations that call for the adage, “Too many chiefs, not enough Indians.” The number itself depends on the size of your kin, but a ratio is a good way to think so for me it’s for every 1 officer=5 members/recruits. It keeps everything down to a manageable size, but also allows for easy managing when things hit the fan. The step below officers is members. These are the guys that
Everyone has a job to do, give the right people the right job
have proved themselves to be functioning and productive members of your kin. People who are there to help each other, and play, and should definitely the bulk of your kin. This is your team, these are your players and these are the guys you build your kin off of. The number he is limitless for the most part (although turbine does have a limit on it). A step below these guys is recruits, these are the new guys that you are a bit iffy about and really need to prove themselves before becoming a full fledged member. One thing you should keep in mind when you get a kin house is that these guys should not have access to it, trust me on that one.
Okay now that we have the numbers down, you are probably wondering who should be where. We’ll your successor should also be your right-hand man, and someone who puts the kin in front of themselves, someone who, if you step down, is ready and willing to take over. This choice is all about trust and personality and it is a very personal choice, if you don’t like the person, they probably aren’t a good fit, even if they do all the other things. I could try to tell you it shouldn’t be personal, but it is a personal choice no matter how you look at it. Your officers should be some of your most active and even headed members, people able to mediate and act when they are online and needed. Also,these guys should assist you in recruiting, partially because they can, but also to make your life easier so you actually have time to play the game. You should be able to trust your officers judgment because of the fact that they can recruit new members, if you can’t they aren’t officer material. Members and recruits are just the rest of your players, maybe they are casual, maybe they are a worried about their own self progression, or maybe they look like officer material just will take some time, regular members is where the rest of your numbers go.
In any football team drama will happen, and it can pull a team apart if things go awry and is mismanaged and goes unmediated, drama will ruin a kin as well. When something goes down, guess who’s job it is to mediate….Yours. If there is a dispute between two players, you need to talk and listen to both of those players and figure out what went wrong. DO NOT BECOME A JUDGE, it is not your place to take sides unless a kinship guideline was broken. Instead, see what you can do to make both parties involved content and what is more, able to work as a team again. That doesn’t mean however that someone who is constantly causing drama should get a free pass, and like TO, he should be booted if his behavior continues. If you tolerate drama, kin members become unhappy, stop working as a team, and
You don’t want to be wielding one of these
leave and while leaving try to take as many members out the door with them. You want to cut the problem off at the head and make sure things are dealt with before escalations arise. There is a breaking point where things will become out of your hands, and your do not want to get to that breaking point.
While there are many kins recruiting on any given server on any given day, not all of them operate the same, but they build off the same fundamentals: their members. A Kinship needs members just like a football team need plays, and just like any sports team, those members need sturdy and dependable management. Problems will arise, people will disappear, but remember,anyone is replaceable and the loss of one member isn’t the end of the world. You can’t always make everyone happy, but you can do your best, which is all you can do. Whether you are posting in regional or trying out members in instance runs, you will find like minded individuals, and as long as you manage them right, they will stick around like any franchise football player.
October 5, 2011 at 10:10 am
If The Guild of Destroyers has a stripper factory and beer volcano at the kin house, I’ll join today.
October 5, 2011 at 10:10 am
Unfortunately we have neither lol
October 5, 2011 at 10:47 am
What about a stripper volcano and a beer factory?
October 5, 2011 at 11:09 am
That is a recipe for accidents.
October 5, 2011 at 12:35 pm
In our kin, Seekers of the Seven Stars (Vilya), the Kin Leader and Second, have a vote equal to that of every other officer – with one exception: they can overturn or nullify any officer vote is both agree to do so. So far this power has only had to be used once (and it was the correct decision).
Stilwell
October 5, 2011 at 2:51 pm
That seems like a pretty hardcore governing strategy. To each his own, I guess, I like a more simplistic approach of just asking opinions of what everyone wants to do and try to compromise.
October 5, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Great post. In the end, it’s all about the people. Competence, good attitude and socially functional. Thankfully in LOTRO, that’s the bulk of the playerbase. Unlike some MMOs…
October 5, 2011 at 1:18 pm
Actually not even competent players as long as they are friendly and socially functional. At least it’s what happens in my kin.
Of course, it will be a different story if you are running a raiding kin.
October 5, 2011 at 1:14 pm
I loled at the flying spaghetti monster.
October 5, 2011 at 3:01 pm
My kin has never, and WILL never post recruitment ads. IMHO if your kin doesn’t attract enough attention by being ‘awesome’(IE: helping people, posting constructively in the forums, etc etc) then your kin isn’t worth my time of day. My kin has a steady influx of applications(we get about 10 or so new recruits a month) and we have NEVER once posted a forum thread, or shouted globally for recruitment. We let our actions speak for themselves.
October 5, 2011 at 3:11 pm
Easy there almighty one.
I get it, you are better than all of us, but please take your shoes off at the door I don’t want elitist all over my carpet.
October 5, 2011 at 4:16 pm
Who said that I, or we, are better then you(or whomever). I’m just stating the way WE do it. Easily offended much?
October 5, 2011 at 4:49 pm
I believe the line “your kin isn’t worth my time of day” is what is considered a bit harsh.
October 5, 2011 at 4:27 pm
There are many ways of running a kin but you can’t deny the fact that this is a pretty good guide for people who are not experienced in it or casual players looking to run a friendly casual kin.
I don’t think there’s a need to put such kin down as ‘not worthy of your time’.
October 5, 2011 at 5:44 pm
The Lonely Mountain Band used to run ads in /regional chat from time to time. They were heavily lore flavored to get like minded individuals interested in our kin. As we’ve grown and become much more visible, recruitment has become less of an issue and screening much more important. Letting a bad actor into your kin can make everyone’s life miserable. So we’ve introduced a much higher bar for entry than we once had. Now you -must- sign up for the website forums before getting an invite. As part of that application, you -must- answer questions about your playstyle and expectations of the kin, as well as your experience with MMOs, Tolkien’s works and general interests. You -must- have an in-game interview with an officer before getting an invite. You -must- have someone speak up on your part before getting promoted to member. Adding these checks in place has really cut down on the occasional bad actor and made our members value their membership all the more when they are finally promoted. The screening process also helps to communicate LMB values and culture every step of the process. It took a long time to get there, but having this process in place makes everyone’s kinship life much better. Better for members who are hanging with like minded players. Better for officers, who deal with fewer disciplinary problems. Better for recruits, who understand exactly what’s expected of them in the kin.
October 5, 2011 at 10:43 pm
These are excellent examples of the qualifying questions that I was talking about.
October 5, 2011 at 10:50 pm
Oh, maybe that’s why I can’t find a kin. No one’s advertising anymore…
I would love one of these articles from the point of view of someone who’s new to the game and looking. And maybe some hints for applications too, because I’ve been rejected a few times (with no reason given).
October 6, 2011 at 12:19 am
It just takes time, the kin should be a proper fit, with and attitude like yours, and also about the same play time.
October 7, 2011 at 4:36 pm
Having a regular playing time is more important than one might think. I started a kin while I was on vacation from work only to find out that everyone is three time-zones away. Now I’m signing on when they’re about ready to sign off. A situation that isn’t helped by the relatively low PST/PDT population on Silverload in the first place.
October 6, 2011 at 6:53 am
My first kin just sent me an invite out of the blue as I was walking through Bree. My first instinct was to say ‘no’ but then I figured, sure, why not. I can’t even remember the name of them now. Nocturnal, on Vilya, I found after thought and searching. I chatted to the leader for a while, got the invite, accepted it, and now I’m an officer
But I didn’t find them until I’d been playing LOTRO for four months or so, until my main was level, oh, late 30s, and I’d been on Vilya for around abouts a month. Nocturnal did, and still does occasionally, do recruitment ads. We screen, of course, but we also advertise. Otherwise how will people know about you? Word of mouth is not always sufficent.
Not much point having a kin leader and or officers if there are no ‘regular’ members, though, is there? You’re definetly right, sometimes more officers isn’t always a good thing.
I also lol’d at the flying spaghetti monster. Making me laugh is a sure way to get me to remember you. In a good way. Using fifty million colours on your recruitment ads over and over again is a sure way to get you on my ignore list.
March 31, 2012 at 6:29 pm
Thank you for this well-written & helpful article.
I’m an officer in a kinship (which shall remain nameless). While I enjoy all of the members I’ve met so far we do seem to have one problem: our leader.
When I first joined I noticed the leader would appear online for a moment each day, say he was “only online for 5 minutes”, leave to click on his alts in the kinship for the same amount of time, then exit. This went on for months. Then one day we noticed he had not logged on for a week or more. We also discovered we could not access the kinship house. Payments were over-due, but he had not given any of us permission to pay maintenance nor were we even allowed the lowest permissions to use items in the house (e.g. we cannot drink from the kegs, light candles etc).
We waited for the mandatory number of absent days to tick by so the successor could become our real leader. In the meantime this excellent kin officer started cool group-activities for us to participate in and we were recruiting like mad. Then, only a couple days before he would have lost leadership in the kin, our Leader suddenly logged on…for about 5 minutes tops, then left. And we haven’t seen him since. I am beginning to suspect that he came on only long enough to keep his leadership status, along with his own ‘personal’ kinship house. Needless to say there has been a noted drop in morale.
Though I really enjoy my friendships in the kinship I am frustrated with our absent-but-not-gone ‘leader’. I am tempted to find a new kinship. Certainly I cannot in good conscience recruit any new players with the situation the way it is. Yet I’d feel guilty leaving the good players that remain. I think it’s unfortunate we cannot vote a lame-duck leader off the island, so to speak. Not sure what I should do at this point.