Having a money back if success system is interesting. It still doesn’t feel right to me though. A bit like Cynwise was saying, WoW is a hobby. As soon as real life money gets involved, the feeling changes and it’s not quite a game anymore.

On a side note the whole its not my money thing does come into play a lot with guilds like this. I could see a compromise maybe like you stay for a while and the guild will refund half or more of your money. Yeah it sucks that you have to pay the full cost up front but if you prove to be a reliable raider then you can get some or all of your money back.

Maybe this has always gone on and I am only recently becoming aware of it! I just hadn’t seen it on the forums before.

I’ve always thought the “signing bonus” idea seemed like a bad way to get someone into your company/guild/whatever. If they have to be bribed, are they really that interested? And how desperate does that make your organization look?

However, if someone offered to pay for me, it would make me think they are serious about giving me a prime spot. Why else would they pay 25 bucks to get me there?

So I can see a guild willing to pay being a guild that is serious and has done their research about me enough to be willing to invest in my services.

I would then pay my own way.

Same goes the other way for me. If I where in a top end guild (not even close) and I offered to pay for someone to transfer and they accepted, I would then decline them.

My reasoning would be they are just looking for a free transfer. Any serious gamer would pay their own way for a chance at a guild where they are guaranteed a spot and some serious progression. At least in my opinion.

The whole paying for the trip back thing is a non issue. You where paid to come over and help. If you need to go back, that means you did not help. Why should they pay for your way back, you already made them waste money getting you there for nothing.

Coming from someone who has done a lot of guild hopping in her day (and hopes to not have to do that anymore), I felt more inclined to perform and be good at what I do, because it was MY money that I was having to shell out each time I transferred/joined a new guild. I also knew that if things didn’t work out, it was MY money that was going to be spent to leave the situation and find a new home. That motivated me to give it my all.

It’s sort of like kids who are spoiled and come to not appreciate anything they have, because they didn’t pay for it. If you are were the kid who had to do chores and earn an allowance and pay for your own toys/games, you would be so careful with those toys that you would make SURE they did not break or get left behind. The child who had everything paid for them would probably be more careless with the toy/game and probably wouldn’t even bat an eyelash if they broke it or would move on to another form of amusement more quickly.

Do you see what I mean?