Guild Hall Decorating

What a busy few weeks it has been! Along with some things at home keeping me busy and a couple of betas I've been squeezing in some time for, the guild halls have taken up a tremendous amount of time. Most of it is done but still much tweaking to do as ideas continue to pop in my head. I'm definitely not as talented as most of the decorators I've seen out there, and it can take me days of staring at a room before something finally hits me.

While we had the money to obtain the level 50 guild hall, I was a little worried about the weekly maintenance and how we'd sustain it. But the guild came through and almost half the members donated both money and status, a few quite generously. The size is just perfect for us. What with the costs of the level 70 hall, as well as the lag I hear many complaining about there, we have no intention of upgrading when we hit level 70.

The halls have made game play so much more convenient. While you used to just have one gate ability with an hour refresh, you now also have a guild hall gate with a 15 minute refresh. Gone are the boat rides, waits for spires, and multiple zonings. We have just about all the portals and bells and can get places quickly now. The tradeskill stations are all there, as well as the writ givers and vendors. So it's been nice to be crafting alongside guild mates I usually rarely saw.

Here's just a couple pictures to share. The first here is the entry room. That center device is hard to see here but is an orrery with planets rotating around it.

We have a recreation room off the entry that has a gambling area as well as the bar here with some clickable kegs with free drinks. Watch out for the big keg behind the bartender. The effects from that one take along time to wear off!

One of the first things a few guild mates asked for was a spa, so that was one of the first rooms I worked on downstairs.

I think the halls have been a wonderful addition to the game. But it has had both positive and negative effects on our guild and I'm sure others as well. Our members have built stronger relationships because of the halls. It's a central meeting point regardless of race. And we've all been having a blast hanging out together. But for those that had alts spread across multiple guilds, I think it has put some pressure to stick with one guild. Most would prefer to donate status to one guild hall rather than several, so we have seen some departures for larger guilds. But we anticipated this might happen so were prepared for it.

At the moment we're closed to general visitors, but may change that in the future. But if anyone wants to stop in, don't hesitate to give a holler and I'll add your name to the visitor list.