Part 1: How to join a good team

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We are here today to discuss the qualities and faculties of a good alliance member. This is not a discussion on basic game-play, though I will mention some examples of good habits to be in, so an average competence is assumed when discussing this topic. One thing that is important to note is that I am merely speaking to what makes me think of a good member and what I look for when recruiting. My personal opinions on the matter are subjective and by no means an absolute truth. This guide is merely a journey through my thought processes on how to get into a good alliance and more importantly how to impress your peers to secure future recruitment.

First, we should lay some context and think about what it means to be an alliance member. This is an incredibly vague topic and there are tons of qualifications that go above and beyond what is expected of a normal member, like organizing wars or doing diplomacy, let's just focus on what a leader expects from a normal member. Well we can measure a player based on eight things:

• Activity. How often you login the game.
• Defenses. How diligent you are with defending the outposts and colonies of your team.
• Communication. How well you communicate with your team.
• Expansion. How diligent you are with spreading and strengthening infrastructure.
• War Initiative. How diligent you are with attacking targets your alliance has deemed hostile.
• Economy. How diligent you are with expanding your personal economy and that of your team.
• Trust. Self-explanatory. A measure of how much people can believe what you say.
• Personality. More subjective, but generally how you behave and how easy you are to work with.

The above are the main things we can measure and investigate about a player when evaluating their quality. Some leaders have different preferences to which qualities they value more highly. I can only speak to my personal opinions and how I view and evaluate my own potential recruits and how I decide if a player in my team is someone I want to invite back again or if I want to avoid them in the future.

It is very difficult to evaluate some of these things even if the person is already in your alliance, even more so if they are on a different alliance on the server, and even more so if you are only hearing about this person through someone else. Seeing a player play in another alliance and hearing about them through a friend is about the same depending on how much you trust your friend's opinion. Let's now talk about how to get into a good alliance.

• Activity. This is fairly easy to determine, you can't see a full picture of activity over a long period, but you can get a general sense. Talk a lot in game with the alliance you want to join, try to talk to them out of game too if you can through MSN or Skype. Be active with moving your squads as well, and they'll see how active you are to some degree. People will also check your statistics to check for your activity and to see if you actually use your activity to accomplish things. Number of victorious battles, outposts captured, colonies conquered, and wreckages captured are all good indicators of strong activity.
  
  
• Defenses. This is practically impossible to show them before you join them. If you want to join a team you're engaged at war with, or they have a chance to watch you at war, they may notice that defenses are often done by you. This is a huge deal and I definitely notice when people I'm interested in are good at defending.
  
  
• Communication. This is the most obvious aspect of any recruit before he joins. All you are doing to your potential leader is speaking with him, so communicate well and often; he will think that you will continue this good communication after you join.
  
  
• Expansion. This is something that is easy to tell as well. They will check your statistics and look at how many outposts you have captured, and might mark you orange to see how many outposts you have currently. Holding lots of gates and radars is a huge plus that leaders do look at.
  
  
• War Initiative. Ironically, this is something best seen when you are enemies with the alliance you want to join. Perhaps you want to change sides that era, though unless there is a good reason for leaving your team this can hurt the "Trust" factor. Another possibility is joining them in another era, which is more likely; fighting someone and doing it well is a fantastic way to advertise yourself. Some leaders might hold grudges, but they aren't worth your time. If you show you are a good warrior and play smart, an alliance of quality will notice that and recruit you. They may also look at your statistics to see how many battles you've been in, units you've killed, etc.
  
  
• Economy. This is usually all about statistics. They will look at how many wreckages you have taken, outposts you have captured, and colonies you have conquered. I focus mostly on outposts captured, but some leaders will care about all three. You can really only evaluate personal economy this way, so they may not notice if you are great at capturing resource outposts, but they can infer it from your other stats.
  
  
• Trust. This is very subjective and difficult to determine. The friendlier someone is and more mature they are, generally the more trustworthy I perceive them, so keep that in mind. Older players are generally more trustworthy too, so I would recommend being more forthcoming with your age the older you are. If you are young I wouldn't recommend lying, as it is counter intuitive to being seen as trustworthy, but speak with proper grammar and they may assume you're older. Also try to avoid changing alliances too often or breaking agreements with people you may want to join in the future, people remember.
  
  
• Personality. This will depend heavily on whoever you want to join. All that matters is how you get along with the leader and people in his team, because he will ask his team if they know you. Sometimes you get a group of young high-school kids who love joking around and being silly, sometimes you get a college crowd that only talks about drinking and partying, and sometimes you get an older crowd who love talking about their kids. It all depends on how you fit. I have denied members who are perfect on most of the other qualifications due to an abrasive personality, so try to be friendly and easy to get along with and you will more easily fit into groups outside your norm.

Depending on the leader, the alliance, and how well you were able to advertise yourselves on these eight points, you may get the chance you need to prove yourself a quality member. Not every leader will care about all of these things, some leaders may care very little about some of them, and some leaders may place far too much emphasis on some of the others. The important thing is most aspects of being a member can be boiled down into these eight categories. If you show them, leaders will notice and you'll get your chance. Please try to limit bragging about wins or ranks to advertise yourself, most recruitment in top alliances is done through friends or being directly observed before an invite is sent. Rarely will scores or ranks make the difference, because they could mean nothing if it was an easy era.

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Part 2: How to stay in a good alliance, can be found here:
viewtopic.php?f=171&t=12208

Thanks for reading. Everyone knows how to locate an alliance, I get 20 messages a day asking to join. That's not what people need help with. They need help with advertising themselves.

A good leader will notice you if you do these things, that's what the guide was about. A fair point, but I wrote this from the perspective of a leader and how I would pick someone to recruit.

Again a very useful guide that definitely shouldn't be burried deep inside of the forum