Why a Coat of Arms?
In about 3 months and 6 days, it will be our guild's 2nd anniversary!!
I don't know if the crew already has something planned or not, but I still really, really want a coat of arms for our guild emotion_dowant
For anyone who might not know what a coat of arms is, please click the spoiler to see some examples.
Ours doesn't have to be as elaborate or as complex as the examples, but every kingdom should have a coat of arms emotion_kirakira
Ideally, I'd like to see our guild have one full-fledged coat of arms, and a simpler one (maybe just the shield and a motto) for each of our mascots (kinda like the shields that each Harry Potter house has - see spoiler).
Cool! How do we get one for us?
So what I want to suggest is that we hold an art contest in the Art Contests subforum, where we ask participants to design a coat of arms for our guild. I'd even be happy to help fund the prizes!
But before setting up that art contest thread, I'd also suggest asking in guild first, for input and so on, so we can all sort of agree on what sorts of thing we'd like to see on the coat of arms. By the way, I came across this slideshow that gives a brief introduction to designing a coat of arms, so maybe other participants might like to consult it for ideas or guidelines (especially slides 18 to 22).
For the art contest thread, I'd also suggest giving participants minimum size dimensions, a minimum resolution, and the format type of their entries. This will help ensure that as a guild, we can resize and manipulate the image as much as we want in the future, without losing too much quality in the image.
I also want to suggest that the final decision be put to a guild-wide vote that lasts a few days, to give as many members as possible a chance to voice their opinion. If we get a LOT of entries, the crew may also want to consider selecting their top 5 favorite entries for the rest of the guild to vote on. Up to you.
Most crucially, this voting thread should be viewable by guild members only, especially if we use the poll feature so people can vote anonymously. This way, we can decrease the chances of mules voting, hopefully. But I'm not sure if you can make only a topic that's viewable by guild members only. You may have to create an entire subforum for guild members only, and then create the voting topic in that special subforum. It might also be a good idea to screen new membership requests during the voting period if you want to allow anonymous voting.
I know this might sound like a bit much, like who would go through all that trouble to "cheat", but we are talking *possibly* trillions in prizes, so that might be enough incentive for some people to behave in less than honourable ways. Besides, the purpose of this voting is to find the design that truly represents the most of us, so I think that's worth all the extra measures to ensure fair voting.
I also want to suggest that this art contest takes place before or concurrently with the guild's anniversary celebrations (I assume we'll have some mrgreen ) and that the contest lasts 1-3 months, to give people plenty of time to submit some kickbutt entries.
After the contest thread is set up, we will need everyone to help advertise for the art contest, so that hopefully, we will get lots and lots of entries! whee
Ideas for the Coat of Arms!
Finally, I figured I'll share what I'd like to see on our guild's official coat of arms! Here goes:
- - Our guild name: Kingdom of Kindred
- Our guild motto (I don't know what it should say yet; we should probably vote on that before holding the art contest, figure out the "values" that we want to uphold as a guild, could be funny or semi-serious)
- Our 4 mascots (in their official colors maybe? I remember we had a thread that introduced all the mascots and their colors, but I can't seem to find it), or 4 symbols, each representing one of the 4 mascots (ex: Machia's bell, Owlatte's wing, Cereal's neckbow, Pierro's makeup? idklol)
- 2 other kins as shield supporters (Since our current mascots were decided a long time ago, and we've probably had some members come and go since then, giving the current members (old and new) a chance to vote on the shield supporters may help them to feel a greater sense of connection to the guild.)
► Did I miss anything?
► What would you like to see on our guild's official coat of arms?
► Any comments, concerns and/or suggestions?
And thank you for reading emotion_bigheart
P.S. To the crew, I apologize if I have said anything that you might have already thought of. I don't mean to come off as a busybody or to sound overbearing >.<
