TERA news » For Lunar Sky, TERA is Fun With Friends
TERA is more fun with friends—and the Lunar Sky guild on Tempest Reach has found a good game/life balance that they take with them into nexus raids, PvP, server-wide events, and more. Learn what it’s like behind the scenes with their guild leader, Sliph, in the latest installment of our interviews with prominent TERA guilds.
Our thanks go out to Sliph and everyone in Lunar Sky for taking the time to share the inner workings of their guild with us.
Guild Spotlight with Lunar Sky on Tempest Reach
Q: Thank you for joining us for the guild interview! Lunar Sky has a long history going back to TERA’s beta tests. Could you tell us a bit more about Lunar Sky?
A: Lunar Sky was actually created back in July of 2009 as an Aion guild by me and my wife, Lalaru, who also plays and runs the guild with me. It’s funny to think back, but the only reason we created the guild was to open up chat options and to have easier access to groups for mission runs and PvPing. We became very successful and grew to around 30 members during our stint with Aion. After hearing about TERA, however, and managing to get into the very early closed beta, we became instantly hooked and knew right then and there that Lunar Sky was going to reform and become a TERA guild—no question.
We have always strived to provide and be more of an adult-oriented semi/casual-hardcore guild. Most of our core members are older individuals with jobs/kids/wives ect. Our mantra has always been that real-life obligation will always take priority over anything in game. However when it’s time to play, we play hard and efficiently and have a damn good time in the process! We enjoy a more mature gaming environment so we tend to weed out the “l337 kiddies.” We are not uber-hardcore, nor are we uber-casual either. We have what I feel is a good mix of both in the guild, and this strategy has worked out well for us.
Q: What are some of the usual activities for Lunar Sky on a typical day/night? What are your favorite things to do as a guild?
A: Lunar Sky is a very large guild now with members across all times zones, so we have things going on almost 24/7. However, I have to say our largest daily activity is forming nexus raids for every single nexus every day. It’s actually pretty amazing when you think about it, but on a typical day we have anywhere from three to five-plus nexus raids going during nexus time of just guild members. I would have to say that this alone is the one thing that the majority of our guild members enjoy doing. It’s basically our “get together” time where everyone logs into Ventrilo and has a good time talking, laughing, and joking about whatever happens to be the topic of conversation that day. I’m very thankful that some conversations where never recorded!
Besides the nexus raids, we have static groups within the guild that get together daily to tackle some of the more challenging content that TERA has to offer and to progress their characters. We also have our altoholics that get together daily as well to level all of their alt characters. Finally, as a vanarch guild we always get together every term and take guild pictures in whatever province we control at the time, which I then post on our website and Facebook pages. Everyone loves taking guild photos, and we always end up having to take multiple photos to try and get as many members as possible their chance to be in it. It’s always a good time, and it’s personally my favorite thing to do as a guild. We even sometimes break into groups after the photo for some guild PvP action and place bets on each other. It’s always in good fun and is something that many enjoy and remember.
Q: What has been the most challenging experience as a guild? The most memorable/fun experience?
A: I would have to say that organization was and is the most challenging guild experience there is. I have to give a huge thank you to our officers and a shout-out to Lalaru because without her at my side I could never do it alone. She handles pretty much 99% of the day-to-day activities for me, including organizing nexus raids, community events, and even static groups for people—and generally trying to keep everyone happy. It’s a daunting task that I feel some people don’t realize just how much work and effort goes into or fully appreciates. She is known as the “guild mom” and has that title for a reason.
Whenever there is an issue, be it in game or even personal matters, it is her whom everyone goes to before coming to me (I think I scare people or something). I handle more of the background guild workings such as the website, Facebook, recruitment, etc. I’m basically more of the guild infrastructure guy. This has its own challenges, of course, but it’s not something that most people think about. I take a lot of abuse from some of our members because of this; they constantly taunt me with “Who is this Sliph guy anyway?” jokes. However, I see it as a twisted form of endearment. At least that’s what I tell myself. As for the most memorable experiences, I would have to say that one of the big ones is when we finally became the top-praised guild on the server and have held that ever since with more than 22,000 praises. (You should have seen us when we got 9,001!) All of us are very proud of this and, as a guild, take great pride in it. We have also organized and been part of many community activities. Our last major one was the Spooktacular Halloween Event, which went over extremely well with the server as a whole and everyone had a great time. All in all, we have given away well over 100,000 gold worth of money and prizes during these events.
Q: Going forward, what are your plans for TERA?
A: Lunar Sky has and always will be in it for the long haul, as we truly believe there is no other MMO on the market that can even begin to hold a candle to what TERA has to offer. With TERA going free to play, we have seen a huge influx of new and also returning players that we had lost and are very glad to have back with us. We plan to keep enjoying everything TERA has to offer us and look forward to all future updates—and of course plan to always be a major part of the community that we love and enjoy so much.
Q: Anything you’d like to say to the guild members? To En Masse?
A: To my guild members I would just like to say that I am very proud of you all. We have an awesome, diverse community of colorful individuals, and I take great pride in the fact that no matter what problems we face or what bumps in the road we encounter, we always manage to handle them without imploding on ourselves—and that fact alone is just amazing and to be commended. I can’t tell you guys how much it has meant to me to be the GM of such an amazing guild with such awesome people in it. You guys are great; keep on keepin’ on.
To the En Masse staff, I would like to say thank you for everything that you do every day. I know full well and can appreciate at least on a small level what you guys go through on a daily basis. Really, all I can say is continue to do your best and please know that there are those of us out there that appreciate the work and effort you guys put into providing us a quality MMO, and I wish more people would realize that. I can easily say that in all my years of playing MMOs, the En Masse staff and GMs have hands-down been the most involved with the gaming community I have ever seen. My hat goes off to you guys.