Guild website/forum suggestions

[Lilie]

So...I'm relatively new to WoW and to mastering a guild of which I am on the Auchindoun server. We are a small crew with big dreams, which I think is a good place to be. Anyways, we are all nearing 70 and looking at the next step. We want to start raiding and I know we will need a place for more information flow, i.e. a wesbite. Was curious if anyone had suggestions on forum templates, etc. or how best to run a guild website. I love this site and its organization. Anyways, totally open to any info. Thanks in advance.

[Lavache]

guild portal is a popular choice. its easy to set up and run and a lot of people already have accounts there. it is not as configurable as a site you host and design yourself, but they take care of a lot of the back end stuff. there are a number of other guild host sites around but i dont know names off the top of my head.

psychosis.guildportal.com is our site if you want an example of what can be done with it. its in no way complex or beautiful like tankspot, but it certainly gets the job done.

[klor]

I use mygate.com for hosting. They are relatively cheap and easily managed but you have to deal with all the administration yourself. I use the wowmoon? I think its called for my forums. I am at work now so i can't tell you where I got them, but if you go to my webpage... http://www.humanoutrage.com it will tell you at the bottom where I got both the template for the webpage (which was easily modified if you have just a small bit of web design background) and the forums template. Yes, I know, i cheat

[Satrina]

The most important tool for your guild is a good message board that you can create categories (public access, members only) and different forums (recruiting, discussion, strategies, class forums, etc.) in. This will be the focus point of your guild when not actually playing, and people will spend about 99% of their time there. Pretty much any hosting package you can buy comes with forums. phpBB and vBulletin are the among best message board packages I've worked with. Many "package deal" things come with some no-name garbage thing that is endless frustration.

A big fancy frontpage with kill shots/news, rosters, "last 5 threads" and all that junk is really just fluff that gets about 1% attention unless you're Death and Taxes or Nihilum. Your progression will be the single biggest attractor for recruiting, not how pretty your website is. Focusing a lot of energy and effort here is a red herring.

[Anansi™]

Yeah.

I enjoy guildportal because I could create a free site while having access to forums I could organize and manage. Now if only I could get the rest of the guild to register. . .

[Lilie]

Thanks for the help you guys. Much appreciated.