Eterna Gaming™ spent
some time recently chatting with
Sean "Dragons" Stalzer, Guild
Leader, CEO and Author for
The Syndicate (one of the
oldest gaming communities and the
longest running guild in the
world, according to The
Guinness World Record!)—and
we learned a lot about how this
unique community/guild came
together, what kind of activities
they enjoy, and what they're
looking for in new members!
Tell us about your guild and its
history. How long has it been
active? Any reason for selecting
the guild name?
The Syndicate was founded in 1996
and holds the Guinness World Record
(http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/longest-running-online-gaming-guild)
for the longest, continuously
operating, online gaming
guild. Our website, www.LLTS.org
has a good deal of our history in
there and 150+ articles written
about us that can fill in alot of
the gaps. We also have two
books that are published (Legend of
The Syndicate and Beyond The
Syndicate) available on lulu.com and
Amazon. Those cover the first
15 years of history and share what
we feel is one successful way to
build a large, stable, long term
community.
A brief synopsis is that we were
founded in an era where a 'guild'
meant something different than it
does today. Where gamers had
entirely different expectations. In
some ways the visions were larger
since no one knew what gaming
could/would deliver and in other
ways they were naive and
simple. We helped in the
earliest phases of Ultima Online and
have since moved through nearly
every major game that has come
out. We have had huge
presences in Everquest, World of
Warcraft, Shadowbane, Star Wars: The
Old Republic and now in Shroud of
the Avatar. But you will have
found us in everything from DAOC to
Guild Wars to Asherons Call to Aion
to just about anything. There
is a fairly complete list on the
website.
We are a very large guild with 1200+
members. That said, we have
almost no turn over. We lose
maybe 1-2 people per year who are
unhappy with the guild and choose to
go elsewhere. That is because
of the way in which we recruit
members. We only take people
similar to ourselves that we know
very well and are friends
with. Once members, we offer a
huge number of benefits from our
annual conferences to unique testing
opportunities not available to the
general gaming public to hardware
testing opportunities to for-pay
strategy guide writing and much
more. So while its very tough
to get in (over 4,000 apps per year
come in and only the referrals of
close friends get admitted), the
benefits and the community that is
drama free and friend focused keep
that retention so high.
Is there a philosophy you follow
as a guild? If you’re recruiting,
what do you look for in guild
members?
We have a couple core
philosophies: Guild First is
the external facing one (i.e. every
action a member takes must reflect
positively and professionally on the
guild and you can never side against
the guild and remain a
member). Internally its Friend
First. We never back-stab each
other. We don't sell things to
each other. We don't exclude
people. We use a very
inclusive loot system.
We recruit for games that we have a
huge presence in. We do not
add members to games where we have a
smaller presence. We do have
several applications live on our
website but the #1 requirement is
having a referral. And
referrals are only given to people
we know well. So the advice to
anyone wishing to join is: Get to
know us. We are not the right
guild for everyone so learning more
about us will help a prospective
member make the right choice and
build that friendship which can lead
to a referral.
What has been the most difficult
experience with the guild? Most
rewarding?
There are two books that cover this
question in great detail.
Everquest was the most
difficult. In those early
years the idea of making an entire
server of guilds fight over a few
bosses, that spawned once a week,
and that were the only source of
gear to progress further was just a
horrible idea. That made for a
difficult time because everyone was
learning the concept of raiding and
the concept of large group
activities (which most of us take
for granted today) while being in an
environment where you may not see a
boss for weeks or months depending
if it spawned when you happened to
be online with enough people and if
you happened to get there sooner
than someone else.
The most rewarding aspect of the
guild is our annual conventions
known as SyndCon. We bring
together 200+ members for 5 days and
they are insanely fun. It
takes the virtual friendships and
makes them real. You get to
interact with developers and
hardware manufacturers. You
get to raise money for
charity. You do a bunch of
really fun events. But in the
end, you build a very powerful
personal, shared experience that
makes the gaming side of things much
more rewarding.
The Syndicate is known for
helping others learn games fully,
being active in a lot of MMORPGs
and even FPS. Any other activities
you enjoy?
The Syndicate is active in quite a
few genres. There is a big
MOBA component with games like SMITE
being very popular. There is a
big RTS component with games like
Grey Goo taking center stage right
now. As you mentioned FPS and
MMOs are also popular.
Survival games like DAYZ and Ark and
Rust are all very popular.
Mobile gaming is big.
Internally, we invest alot of time
working with game developers across
those genres to develop the next
generation of games. Those
relationships and that ability to
come together as a team of 5 or 500
to help someone out is something the
team enjoys a great deal.
What role do you aim to play in
the gaming community? What plans
do you have in the future?
As I mentioned above, first and
foremost its "Guild First" but that
philosophy should not be confused
with a lack of caring about the
community. A vibrant gaming
community benefits all of us.
We invest heavily in the community
doing everything from working with
young guilds on how to build a long
lasting entity; to running events in
game to help players (for example
our Craftsman Day events that we
started in Ultima Online and that
have been copied by many guilds
across many games since then) to
strategy guide writing. We 2nd
book was a chance for us to publish
a model that we felt can build a
successful community and we intend
to expand upon those tools in our
third book as well.
Anything you’d like to say to
your guild/community members? To
the public?
I talk to my community members every
single morning :) So to them I
would simply say: Long Live The
Syndicate!
To the gaming public at large:
The Syndicate is very old and as
such has a very long and very
detailed, rich history. If you
are interested in learning more
about us, please check out
LLTS.ORG. If you are looking
for one model, that worked well for
us, to build a stable community then
check out our book Beyond The
Legend. You can get an ebook
version over on Lulu.com (or a print
version if you prefer).
Eterna Gaming would like to
thank Sean "Dragons"
Stalzer for spending some
time with us—and all of The
Syndicate for helping to make
the Gaming World an
exciting experience for everyone!
For more information on The
Syndicate, be sure to go to:
http://www.llts.org
