Since the start of the kinship I’ve looked after our online presence. At first this was via Guildlaunch. We were all a bit disappointed with how that worked so eventually we set up our own website here at eaglesofthorondor.com. I host the site, I designed and built it, and along with Luri I manage it on a day-to-day basis. I’ve continued to do that for the past six months even though I’ve not had an official role within the kinship. My main focus, then, for the next six months, should I be elected to the council, would be to work on improving the website, making it even more helpful to kinnies. The forums are good, but we have a lot of information on the site that could be easier to find, and there’s additional functionality I’d like to build into the site. (I have just read Ame’s post. We could definitely work together on this!)
I live in England, so I play ST+5, which means running raids/instances/… with most of the kinship is impossible during the week. So my second focus would be to organise some European timezone events and encourage some of the in-game officers who play in my timezone to help out. One of the things I’d really like us to do as a kinship, and will work on for the Euro-timezone players, is run more training sessions. We did a few of these a year or so ago and they were really helpful. We have an amazing bunch of allies but it’s daunting to join a skirm/raid/instance/bb/rt that you’ve never done before with a group of people you don’t know that well. Participating in a raid at a slightly lower level with a group of people who you know and trust is a great way to build your confidence and prepare you for joining in when someone on TEB-TALK puts out the call.
I like where the kinship is at right now. I think we have a good balance of ages, skills, interests etc. I believe we’re primarily a social kinship with a core block of players who are particularly interested in playing as a group in instances or on the moors. I think having more members in the kinship would be beneficial but I believe quality is more important than quantity. We have a rule that anyone considering joining the kin must read and agree to our code of conduct—that’s very important to me.
We have discussed the idea of having a “benevolent dictator” like many other kinships have. I think the concept of the council is a very strong one and means that we can do more than if just one person controlled the kinship. Having been involved in the council for most of the past two years I have seen how hard it is for just one person to carry that load. You need a group to share the tasks involved and to have a clearer vision of what the kinship needs to thrive. I believe the Eagles’ council is something we can all be proud of.
Eagles, you have my harp/sword/website skills.