![]() ![]() The research for this thesis was carried out over a nine-month period in 2005. DKP is an acronym for Dragon Kill Points. I have also found that is common among guilds to legitimate their hierarchies and strengthen their communities through intraguild economies widely known as DKP systems. I illustrate this claim through findings of overt governance, such as in hierarchies and formal rules, and through the supporting of this governance through social bonds and identity building encouraged by guild communities. In this thesis I argue that it is within guilds that the most powerful forms of organization arise within game-oriented synthetic worlds. This, along with the predominance of guild, or guild-like structures, across most (if not all) currently running MMORPGs makes them an important aspect of these communities. Guilds do in fact directly affect the social and gaming experiences of players. Much of this has focused on the scale of individual players or of (synthetic) world wide communities, however while only briefly acknowledging the effects of guilds – player run communities within MMORPGs – have on all of these topics. The academic literature thus far has covered a vast amount of ground in exploring issues such as governance, sociality, economics, and identity. ![]() These are largely populated, graphical, avatar mediated, online spaces, or to be more precise, game oriented synthetic worlds. Massively multi-player online role-playing games, or MMORPGs, are gaining momentum in both popular cultural and academia. ![]()
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