Some of you may be familiar with the works of Italian philosopher Machiavelli and others will at least have heard of him. I’m not going to argue for or against machiavellianism here, but his below quote will get us started on the discussion of how a raid (or guild) leader will get her raiders to do as she says. This is a similar topic to the one I tackled in 7 Different Shades of Stupid but this time I’m approaching it more from a philosophical point of view than a hands-on one.
“Upon this a question arises: whether it be better to be loved than feared or feared than loved? It may be answered that one should wish to be both, but, because it is difficult to unite them in one person, is much safer to be feared than loved, when, of the two, either must be dispensed with.”
Nicolo Machiavelli, The Prince – Translated by W. K. Marriott
Many raid leaders seem to employ fear as their primary means to control their raiders. If a raider doesn’t perform as she should, repercussions follow. Whether you will hear the leader’s wrath on Ventrilo, get deducted fifty DKP or get kicked from the guild – if you don’t do what your leader says you will be in a world of pain. Ruling by fear means that you keep the expected repercussions for negative actions higher than the expected gain and therefore make it unwise for people not to obey you.