A Complete History

Compiled and Edited by Marty

A STATEMENT BY YOUR AUTHOR

What you are reading now is my most current draft of the Guild history. It is done primarily from information received from Zezmo, Illiad, AfraDZac, Argos, Levan, and my memory. Please understand that this is a work continually in progress, and that there are different memories concerning some of the events stated here. If you send me email with corrections or additions, they will be included here.

I need your help! Are there errors here? What have I missed? Please email Marty with any and all comments you have. I will try and incorporate as much as possible in my efforts to discover the past. I want your personal history, the names of all characters you played, your perspective on Guild events, and anything you else think should be included. I want anything from any past or current member of the Guild who thinks he or she has something to add to the history of the Guild. Please help me out!

PHASE I - NWN and ILLIAD - 8/95 TO 5/96

Back in the early summer of 1995, in a game called Never Winter Nights (NWN) on a small but growing service called America Online, a small group of gamers began playing together. Their spot was the Never Winter Woods, and their purpose was: to protect less-experienced and less-powerful players from evil players who would kill them, to seek out and destroy their enemies, and to just have a lot of fun. In NWN, players battling other players was known as "player versus player," or PVP. Among these initial players were Illiad (a/k/a Aragon), Mael, Lazrus, Rodney Dark, Drizzt, and Chicarra (a/k/a LilSis, Saroya, and later AfraDZac), who was recruited by Drizzt. All were experienced PVPers at the time.

NWN had two types of Guilds: sanctioned and unsanctioned. While this band of warriors wanted to form a Guild, they shunned the "corporate" nature of being a sanctioned Guild, and applied for status as an unsanctioned Guild in NWN. There was never much of an effort to become sanctioned as long as NWN existed. The first official "meeting" of the Guild was on August 6, 1995. During the second meeting, Illiad52 was elected GM. WG Mael was elected 1st AGM, WG Wilhmshif was elected 2nd AGM, and WGW Drittz was elected 3rd AGM. The Guild had about 15 members at the meeting. Drizzt was the 1st one to use the WGW prefix on his name. Some of the 1st members used only WG, the they had to change to "WGW" because there was an Elf Guild called Winter Guard using that prefix. On October 12, 1995, the newly-formed "Warriors and Guardians of the Woods" was given a bulletin board on AOL and was officially recognized as an unsanctioned Guild.

The WGW had many encounters from its inception with evil PvP guilds. These included the Pirates guild, the Grey Knights, the UDL (Undead Lords), KAAOS, and ITB. The stories of WGW's excellence in PvP tactics are legend. Fights in the Woods, the Shack, and the Sewers (all PvP areas were dominated by the WGW regularly. During this period of time, WGW grew by leaps and bounds because of its reputation.

Around December of 1995, two of WGW's most hated foes were created: the Ark and the Mech. The Ark are a loose band of rogues who enjoy killing other players, particularly less experienced players. The WGW and Ark spent many an evening battling each other, and both sides included fine warriors. The Ark were crushed by January of 1996, but some of them continued to visit the Woods from time to time to cause havoc. It was about December of 1995 when I, WGW Marty, joined the Guild. I was recruited by WGW Trend. The officers of the Guild at that time were Illiad (GM), Mar1us (a/k/a Mael) (1st AGM), Drizzt (2nd AGM), Donman (a/k/a Locke and Ockham)(3rd AGM), Chicarra (a/k/a Lilsis and later AfraDZac) (Admissions), Trend (Ambassador), Debcon1 (Scribe), Yeeouch (Warrior Advisor), and Zezmo (Warrior Advisor). Zuby was a member at the time, as was Czolen. The Guild roster listed 58 members. Later, I had a character named Spike, who made occasional appearances just to cause trouble.

The Mech were a group of cybernetic creatures whose goal was the domination of NWN. The WGW and the Mech battled constantly, both in the Woods and the "Shack," another area where heavy PVPing could be found. In about February of 1996, the WGW and the Mech became drawn into a war which lasted a few months. Another "good" guild, the SOM, were battling the V, a group of Vampires and evil PvPers. SOM asked the OMM and the WGW to help, and the V asked for assistance from the Mech and the UDL. The Mech, UDL, and the Vs showed up in force. However, the SOM failed to provide even one squad for their war, and the OMM furnished only one. The WGW furnished several, including two squads of seasoned veterans who defeated several squads of UDL, Mech, and Vs. However, the remaining WGW were mostly inexperienced players (such as an unmaxxed Marty) and were crushed by more experienced V, UDL, and Mech squads. In the end, the evil guilds prevailed. Thus began a war of words, and later constant battles between the WGW and the Mech all over Neverwinter.

One very unfortunate result of this heated battle was allegations of hacking on both sides of the war. The truth is that someone had sent an illegal third-party program called "XGM" to many Guild members, particularly newer ones. They got caught playing with it, and several TOS (terms of service) violations occurred. On this point, Illiad52, interviewed by your author for this text, insists that no WGW used the XGM program for PvP activities. Indeed, the newer players barely knew what it was. The WGW lost many warriors to this series of events, and Illiad52 resigned his post as GM, because of the TOS issues as well as real-life time constraints. Truth be told, the Mech were hacking at the time too. Many WGW left the Guild at that time. WGW Z Man (an alternate character of Zezmo) was elected GM at the suggestion of Illiad. There were about 15-20 active members remaining after the split, and they included (and I am going by memory here) Warder, Reaper (a/k/a Varen), Duncan (a/k/a Dunkin, Aggar, and Agg), Good, Smoke, Metis, Penny, Marty, Crabb, Locke (formerly Donman and later Ockham), Anduin, Zannie, RWK, Hermit, Rhuarc, Czolen, and others.

PHASE II - NWN - ZEZMO - 5/96 - 7/97

Zezmo appointed his Council, which included many of those listed above, and Zezmo, Marty, and Metis redrafted the Charter. I became a member of the council as "Warrior Adviser" later in 1996. The latter half of 1996 was a period of growth and prosperity of the Guild, as the WGW were the unquestioned kings of the Woods, and a Guild respected for its skill in battle and its charity towards strangers of good intentions in the Woods. Version 4 of the Charter was created in October of 1996. During this period, many fine WGW were recruited, including Fean, Thorn, Knight, Druid, Talon, and Rigel.

By December of 1996, however, things were getting boring, so Zezmo and Aztek, leader of the Mech, decided to start a war. The War would be in three phases, and the theme was to be the War for the Woods. The first battle was in January of 1997, and the WGW were victorious. Battle honor's went to the Z Wardogs, which were Zezmo, Marty, Rhuarc, and Czolen, among others. Some imaginative counting by the Mech made it look close, but the truth is that the WGW crushed the Mech in Round 1.

Round 2 occurred in the Spring of 1997, and it went to the Mech. The WGW, complacent from their first victory, lost the battle, but again the Z Wardogs prevailed in their skirmish. Hermit, a long time WGW and a fine warrior, had defected to the Mech by this time.

Round 3 was scheduled for the Summer of 1997, but AOL decided to remove NWN from its system. The Great NWN Cataclysm occurred in July of 1997, before the final battle could be fought.

Many fine WGW were recruited during the time of the Mech War (12/96 through May of 97), including Argos, Shinto and Daphne (who were playing NWN with another Guild, the SSB, when they joined the WGW with different characters), Treant (later Wyvern), 6wig (later Chronos and Wolf), Vortex, and Levan. An email from 1/10/97 indicates that 6wig was being raised from Initiate to Squire, and that Fean, Rigel, and Zuby (among others) were raised from Squire to Guardian. A Guild membership list from 2/27/97 shows Levan and Treant (later Wyvern) as Initiates.

Something should be mentioned here about our closest allies in NWN, the Temple of the Four Winds. This non-sanctioned Guild was also based in the Woods. Although they were monks who followed the ways of neutrality, they were true friends of the WGW. Among their members were Sun Tzou, Chari Blsm, Conqur, Seb Alexander, Ka Manthra, Vet Vic, BigPup, and Wolf MKII.

PHASE III - UO AND LEVAN - AUGUST, 1997 - SPRING, 1998

After NWN died, there was an attempt to continue the WGW in two different games, Lords of Empyria (LoE), and Ultima Online (UO), both of which were in beta testing. Marty, Metis, and Zezmo tried playing LoE for a while, but the game was poorly made and even more poorly run, and that effort ended shortly.

Levan, Argos, and Chronos (formerly 6wig and later Wolf) joined UO and started the Guild anew on the "Sonoma" shard. Many fine warriors were recruited by these three, and the Guild owes its existence to them. If it were not for these three, WGW would have surely died with NWN. Levan was elected among the three to be GM.

WGW began on the Napa Valley shard, but Levan, Argos and Chronos believed it would be better to move to the Sonoma server as a temporary home. These three were completely new to the game, and did the "trailblazing" work for the Guild.

Knowing these three seasoned veterans now, it is difficult to see them as UO neophytes. However, the following tale from Argos is both telling and pretty damn funny. I reprint it from one of his posts in December of 1998:

"It seems so long ago... I do remember that there were only 3 members in WGW (Levan, Wolf, Argos). There was no Shardmaster yet, or even a leader. But the land was new, our hopes were high and there was only a handful of huts dotting the land. In fact, when we placed the first hut there was only one other in the area, which was the clearing where the WGW training hut still stands. (Editor's note: this is the crossroads to Yew, Britain, and Skara Brae, where the original Guild Hall was placed).

I'll let out a little secret, WGW got the money for the first few huts by tailoring (we learned later it's not the best way, but we were newbies and couldn't do well in dungeons... yet). Back then we made skull caps, they sold for 12gp each and you could sell a bolt with only 1 piece of cloth back to the vendor for 45gp. Things have changed. Huts only cost 14,500 gold, which we raised in a few days. So, we all started to look for a place to build. I came up with the site near the crossroads, which is still a great place. It was near Yew (the forest town), a Moongate, and a spawn area. It was tough leading the others there.

Next we found the cheapest price we could on a training hut. It was in Trinsic from a "red" vendor. Back in those days there were evil vendors too, which might explain what happened. Now, think about this: Levan bought the deed and I was his escort. Neither of us had the skill to recall, let alone mark the spot. He took all the precautions he could think of so it wouldn't be stolen. PK's had already invaded the land so there was tons to worry about, and at the time 14,500 gold seemed like ton of cash. I think this was the last time I saw Levan run, and run we did.

We made it to the spot with no trouble. Then we paced around the clearing, "How would this spot be?" "No make it near that tree." Finally, we decided on a spot and placed the building. That might have been the happiest moment I had in UO. Levan and I went inside thinking: "Finally, a place to train anytime we wanted!" The first thing I noticed was that the dummies looked different than in the towns, as they has clothes on. Oh well, let's get my mace skill up anyway. When I clicked on the dummies, I heard some odd noise like change in a purse. I did that for awhile and my dex went way up. "Odd," I thought, "my strength should be going up." "Hey Levan, are you sure you bought a training hut and not a thieves hut?" "I'm positive, it said training hut", he replied. "Well these dummies look funny and my dex and pickpocketing are going up ..."

"^%#*^% %#%^$(*^ UO!" Levan exclaimed!

Well now you have heard the story. I'm sure that our rivals are happy to learn that WGW started as thieving/tailoring guild, but we have moved on from that. Next came the training hut, Wolf's smithy, and our first new member, Guthrum. The rest is history. I hope you enjoyed learning about the early days of WGW in this new realm."

Levan was good enough to add his thoughts in a file he sent me on this subject. Here is his side of the story, with just a few grammatical changes:

"Argos, Wolf, and I found each other drifting through the realm of Sosaria in August of 1997 on the Baja Shard. Overjoyed with the discovery of one another, we decided to reband as WGW, our beloved Guild from NWN. Sosaria was a much crueler land in those days and we were all glad to have found family in this world. Green and Gold were selected as our Guild colors. I was elected GM by his brothers and UO WGW was formed. Soon WGW moved to the "new" Napa Shard. The group grew to about 20-22. Notable among them were Geza. In fact, Levan and Geza scored WGW's first kill of a Player Killer or PK. Geza was a ferocious warrior with a great appetite for feminine attention. Wolf recruited Drezden and Kraw, two outstanding brothers who helped WGW greatly in our early days. Kraw worked diligently to supply WGW with full spellbooks. Drezden was a fine adventurer, and it was these two who discovered and perfected the "Tailoring Method" of raising gold. Mennion and Jade had a big influence on WGW as well. They were excellent adventurers, and were always training newer folks in the ways of Dungeoning. The oft wild and crazy but always faithful Digital Strider was a great addition to our group. Brother Majeero was lost to the forces of evil, the temptation became to great for him.

There were many others. Alas, most were lost when we decided to move to the opening Shard of Sonoma. PKs were rampant and fully developed on Napa. We hoped to have an equal start on Sonoma and be able to compete better with the forces of evil. It was at this time we lost Pug and Lenin, two solid members who opted to stay on Napa. WGW lost approximately ten members due to this move, but it was best for us in the long run. The connection was better for most who moved and we learned quickly how important connectivity is in UO PVP.

Our brethren from NWN began joining us on Napa but more came when we started to solidify on Sonoma. Fean, Marty, Afra, Metis, Wyvern, Thorn were welcome additions. It was during this time that WGW met FoS, a small band of Dread Lords. I had encountered KRULL and Vone on numerous hunts and had formed a mutual respect with them. Based on KRULL's familiarity with me, those wearing the green and gold were given safe passage by FoS and were protected from this evil band of villains and murderers.

By the Spring of 1998 WGW had expanded to the Pacific Shard and had appox 40-50 members on Sonoma. I appointed Wyvern Pacific Shardmaster. Shortly after, I stepped down as Sonoma GM."

I (Marty) joined UO in January of 1998. Levan in particular was responsible for helping me develop my UO characters. Looking back, I am amazed at how patient he was with this newbie. Others active in the Guild at the time I joined were Wyvern, Zuby, Kraw, Guthrum, Tanda-ur, Mennion Leah, Majeero, and others. Shinto joined us shortly afterwards, as did many others.

By the Spring of 1998, it appeared to me that the rigors of leadership had weighed heavily upon my friend Levan. From my observations over the years, this is the natural course of things. It is an unfortunate truth that while memberships change, and we go through periods of growth and reduction, members do not always get along. Further, members often make the GM's job more difficult than it has to be. It is my personal opinion that this has always been the way of things, and will likely always be the way of things. One low point of his tenure was the loss of the Guildhouse near the Yew Crossroads. At any rate, Levan was clearly ready to step aside, and he did, naming Shinto as his replacement. Levan had rekindled the WGW spirit in UO, and it would have surely died with NWN without Levan's efforts. This will always be Levan's place in WGW history.

One side note is interesting. After stepping down as Guild Master, Levan disguised himself as the villainous Shane, a PK who loved to test WGW's mettle. Levan, a master at PK battles himself, usually prevailed in these battles. It was not until many months after the disappearance of Shane that Levan finally admitted to his trickery. Nearly all WGW were glad for the training which Shane had forced upon them.

PHASE IV - UO - SHINTO - SPRING, 1998 - NOVEMBER, 1998

In the Spring of 1998, Shinto took over leadership of the WGW. He writes as follows concerning his tenure as GM:

"The Warriors and Guardians of the Woods were already an established force within the lands of Brittania when I heard rumors of their existence and began my journeys to meet them. The new guild hall was built using funds raised by many fine WGW. It was placed in its current location near yew and has been the site of many WGW memories. Many fine Warriors joined our ranks on Sonoma and the guild flourished while the gameworld did. The men and women who answerd the call and donned the Green and Gold of the WGW on Sonoma were a worthy chapter to the WGW history file. Many ancient names, already the stuff of ledgends, joined on Sonoma to add new chapters to their long histories. Marty, Fean, Argos, Metis, Wolf, Levan, Thorn and Wyvern provided an experienced hand that helped shape our new Warriors. The names added to the rolls of history on Sonoma were worthy additions to our history. Kraw and Drezden helped many new WGW find their way in the new world during the early days. Frostfire and Morgan were two new Warriors who embodied all the WGW stood for."

"The Shinto era was shaped by an expansion of WGW both in membership and shape of purpose. As the WGW grew it came into conflict with many of the evil guilds that preyed on unwary travelers within the woods. Once awakened the WGW was forced to carry the battles to evil into the dungeons where evil most often lived. It was an established tradition that an attack on one WGW was an attack on all WGW and would bring swift reprisial. There were three major guild wars within the Shinto era. The first was against a guild of thieves known as the Wolfpack. They were defeated anytime they faced an equal number of WGW. Comprised mainly of archers they were able to find limited success by ambushing lone WGW as they entered the town of Yew to bank. The war was ended after a few battles and the wolfpack came to an end as a guild. Communications and coordination were a shortcoming within the world as a small group could have success by planning a raid and then fleeing before a response could be mounted. This difficulty with gurellia warfare was to continue in the WGW's next major war with DMD. This small group of players was a band of thieves centered in the dungeon of deciet. Many of their members were brutal warriors in their own right. A series of battles raged throughout the town of yew and within the dungeon Deceit. The victor was usually the guild that had planned the attack as they were normaly better prepared for the battle. WGW and DMD eventually made peace and became unofficial allies based upon the mutal respect developed during battle. The final guild event was a war with a small band of murderers. Krull, Vone and Shane were a skilled group of murders who engaged in a series of skirmishes with the WGW. They engaged in open warfare once and after that defeat relied upon gurellia tactics until they faded away."

"Many Warriors commited great time and effort to develop tradesman to support the WGW with the fruit of their labors. Czolen was the first GM bowyer and supplied many a WGW with a fine bow. Argos was the first GM smith within our family. Levan developed the first GM Alchemist and the first GM Mage. These were followed by many other Warriors who provided many needed items for their brethen. Chief amongst these was Marty with his many skilled employees."

It is your author's observation that Shinto's reign ended much the same as Levan's had. The burdens of leadership seemed to weigh heavily upon Shinto, who tends to be most comfortable when he and his lady, Daphne, are alone together. Shinto withdrew from the Guild near the end of his reign, and a split developed between those supporting Morgan and those supporting Argos. It was at this time that I had a major falling out with Wyvern, who ended up leaving the Guild. It would be unfair for me to say more on that point, other than that our attempt to expand to other shards met with no success, and several members left the Guild at that time. Like Wolf, I tend to think Shinto has overstated WGW's success against DMD. While WGW was a PvP force to be reckoned with, only a few of our members really mastered PvP in UO, in my opinion. Levan and Shinto were the best examples.

Wolf adds the following: "Shane was the third person in Kulls band [the FoS] with a new recruit named Algrim that joined at the end. Shortly thereafter they faded from the land. The Wolfpack disbanded and formed FU, who then allied with DMD to hand WGW some of the worst spankings. The utmost being 6-7 DMD/FU troops spanking 10-15 WGW in the abbey and the grounds around it. WGW had a few bright spots in that "war" when we were able to execute well planned battles and actually listen to the battle leaders. Unfortunately dark times clouded the otherwise brilliant leadership and direction of the guild. The multi-shard attempt along with bitterness over repeated losses during the DMD/FU war built up a nasty storm cloud. Sadly I was too much a part of that foul storm. When all the chaotic forces played out the guild was able to spring into another round of rebirth and saw many strong members come and older members assert their strengths as well."

Scott Hall of the Wolfpack, later the FU, later DMD, and even later as a WGW in Asheron's Call (see below) writes as follows: "I was fortunate enough to witness many a battle fought against this former leader of the Wolfpack and later the black sheep of the DMD family. If there ever was a thorn in WGW's side, it was this mad man. At first WGW viewed me to be nothing more than a common town thief cutting purses from old ladies. The guild was soon to find out there was much more and the man's hatred of life ran deep. This stone cold killer stood against everything WGW held dear and the desire to wipe him out spread throughout. What made things worse was he was not alone. His close friend Lucki brought just as much anger from the guild if not more for his thievery from the guild. This led to some of the most epic battles felt all the way into the heavens between me as Hall and Bethor of the WGW. Hall always had the upper hand and on the verge of victory, Bethor's faith in the guild and its beliefs pulled him through with the love of his family to overcome the black hearted one. Towards the end though, the unity and tightness of the guild took Hall out with a plan more devious than even this man could come up with. Jyzelle, Fean and many others set the man up to kill him with no chance for survival and it worked to perfection. Since that day he was no longer a threat to the land and good definately triumphed over evil. Long live WGW!"

I think that Scott may be exaggerating just a bit, but he certainly gave a lot of WGW heartburn at one time or another, and he made things interesting.

PHASE V - UO - ARGOS and JYZELLE - NOVEMBER, 1998 - WINTER, 1999

Marty's observations: I write this almost two years after most of the WGW left Ultima Online for the greener pastures of Dereth (Asheron's Call - see below). When Argos took over the mantle of leadership from Shinto, he reinvigorated the group and many good times followed. WGW had grown to about 20-30 active members and we had a nice guild hall east of Yew, where many guild meetings and activities took place. During this period, not much Player versus Player action occurred, largely because the PvP system in UO was badly broken, and never really fixed. Argos reigned until the Summer of 1999, when Jyzelle took over as Guild Leader.

Jyzelle took over at a bad time, as the WGW were burning out on UO and nerves were getting a bit frazzled. Nevertheless, many good times were enjoyed until the Winter of 1999, when most WGW left UO. Notables staying behind, and never rejoining us in AC, included Metis and Rhuarc. I miss them both to this day and hope that they return to us again.

PHASE VI - ASHERON'S CALL - LEVAN and MARTY - WINTER, 1999 TO THE PRESENT

Marty's observations: In the Winter of 1999, Asheron's Call was released by Microsoft and many WGW entered into that game. These included me, Levan, Shinto, Argos (a/k/a Phoenix and Chili Dipper), Wolf, Nexus (a/k/a Storm), Morgan (a/k/a Mistress), Frostfire, Czolen and a few who never played much Ultima Online: Warder, Rigel and Zezmo (a/k/a Z Man). New players welcomed into the group inlcuded Merkrune, Talon, Athena and Misha. We did very little recruiting, however, and our numbers have been fairly static. Initially, Levan was the leader of our group. After a very short time on the Frostfell server, we gave Darktide a try. Darktide is a PvP server and things didn't go too well. PvP in AC is really for hardcore gamers using third-party programs. Further, DT was full of what has become known as grief players. This simply wasn't suitable for WGW. So, in the Spring of 2000, I announced an effort to move back to Frostfell with brand new characters, and most followed. I was the monarch of the "new characters" and Levan was the monarch of the "old" characters. A few months later, when Levan too returned to Frostfell, we merged the two groups, with Levan as monarch. We had a lot of fun for many months, but Levan eventually got bored and stopped playing, so I took over as Monarch in the Spring of 2001.

During our time in Asheron's Call, Morgan introduced us to another monarchy, led by Archane Wind. Her character, Mistress, was a leader in that group, and many of them became good friends of the WGW, as the Temple of the Four Winds group had been so many years ago in NWN.

At the time I am writing this, a major move to a new game, Dark Age of Camelot is being planned and discussed. It is interesting to note that WGW in NWN lasted from 8/95 to 7/97, that WGW in UO lasted from 8/97 to the Winter of 1999, and that AC started in the Winter of 1999, and looks like it will end in the Winter of 2001. Amazingly, each game lasted almost exactly two years.

Dark Age of Camelot (October 2001 to the present)

Asheron's Call ended rather abruptly for WGW in the fall of 2001, upon the release of Mythic's Dark Age of Camelot in October of 2001. As DAOC was nearing, I (Marty) made a conscious decision to try and move WGW from AC to DAOC. Our membership was down in AC, the PvP was non-existent, and people were generally frustrated by the game. Levan, Zezmo, Warder, Argos a/k/a Nuadu, Rigs, Misha, Shinto, Wolf, Bethor, Templar, Nexus and I all came over to DAOC from UO. Since I had made the push to come, and I had really been doing all the administrative work for the guild near the end of AC, I asked to be Guild Master and I was elected. Mistress and the Archane Wind guild came over as well, and her character Mythralis remained a good friend. In fact, their guild Way of the Wind and WGW formed an alliance very early in the game, before we really knew what to do with an alliance.

New friends we met early in DAOC included Ionus, Samhinious, Cas, Aratak, Redwood, Maijarie, Roberto (a/k/a Bombaldi and Kepnar), Angelwolf, Corbeau (a/k/a Grizzli and Moliere), Ironoak, Dahakon/Nilnop, Mysterios, Mannslaughter, Lechuga, Slapy and Osys. The list of people who joined WGW later in the game is way too long to list here, and can in fact be seen on our website. However, to record their names for history, I will mention some folks that were a big part of WGW but are no longer with us: Doppel, Felar (a/k/a Felaridh), Finndithneen, Mikosarah, Timmerran, Kastly and Ciath. For those of you who are still active with WGW, I hope you will write something for our history!

I spent my early days in DAOC with my characters Emanon the Eldritch and Marty the Ranger. Emanon's prime job was to make money as a tailor using DAOC's crafting system so that we could make the gold necessary to form a guild and buy an emblem. We were able to form a guild within the first two or three days after release, and we got our emblem after about ten days. Believe me, making 150 gold in ten days, starting from complete scratch when DAOC was brand new, was not an easy task, and everyone in the guild (which was maybe ffice:smarttags" />10 to 12 people) contributed. Once we had the emblem, I focused on Marty as my main character. However, it became pretty apparent that was going to be an issue, because many of us chose Rangers as our starting class (Levan, Nuadu, Templar, me and others). Further, we had no heavy tanks. So, after a few months of getting Marty to about level 32 (it was not easy to level back then), I completely switched characters to Martee, a Hero, which was my main for a long time. My first record of a relic raid was a screen shot I took when a group of Hibernians (maybe 75 of us around level 35 and 40) attacked Castle Myrrdin in Snowdonia. It was a good effort but of course it failed.

After a strong start, WGW stopped recruiting new members. However, the game began to drag a bit and WGW's membership began to fall. After about six to nine months in DAOC as GM, I was burned out. I asked to step down as GM, and Zezmo took over again. He too was pretty burned out however, and after a few months the guild was failing. Several of us put alts in other guilds. Zezmo, Warder, Ionus and I had alts in Phoenix Guard, a group of really good people led by Ravenlily. We played there happily for a few months, when Corbeau and Bombaldi (who had been dabbling on another server) made the decision to reinvigorate WGW on MLF/Hib. Had it not been for those two, I suspect WGW would have died altogether. Their energy was infectious, and all the old guard came back to support the effort. I suspect that this could have been a difficult time in the minds of some, as there were a group of pre-DAOC WGW and a group of "new" WGW from DAOC only. In the end, however, I credit our democratic system, which rightly placed Bombaldi, Corbeau and Angelwolf in positions of leadership, with smoothing over any issues. It is hard for me to imagine the days when those three were considered the young guns of the guild, but it was true!

Since those days of when WGW returned to Hibernia, we have enjoyed fairly consistent growth in numbers, skill and reputation. WGW is currently the largest guild on MLF/Hibernia, and in the Top 25 of realm points earned all time. We are a combination PvE and RvR guild which caters to all players who fit in with our sense of values. We remain a group of mature gamers who reject the elitism shown by some online RPG guilds, and we remain open to everyone who wants to have a good time. And we are still going strong!