Clan (esports)

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A Counter-Strike-Clan at CeBIT 2006

As communities in be e-sports organized teams or clubs called.

The term comes from the computer game Quake , in which player associations could be officially registered as a "clan". Over time it has established itself as the name for associations of computer players. In the case of MMORPGs , the terms alliance and alliance have also established themselves . According to the content of the respective game, there are also legions ( Aion ) and guilds (RIFT, WoW, ROM and many more) that have a clan-like character. In particular, however, due to their role-play character, in which the social relationship between the characters is in the foreground, the guild leadership is subject to significantly more extensive requirements than the original leadership of a Quake clan.

Much of the clan is legally seen a collection of individual persons , but there are clans that as a club , to persons or corporation firmieren. According to the German eSport Association, there are around 40,000 clans in Germany (as of 2005).

Clans often pursue the goal of actively participating in leagues and tournaments . However, there are also clans that have no ambition to compete with other clans, as they focus on the community aspects of computer games. Such clans mostly use the term Funclan , which does not completely exclude participation in competitions.

Unlike clans from the early days of e-sports, which have usually focused on a single computer game today face many clans so-called multi-gaming clan is. Here, the communities divided mostly even in teams or squads ( Engl. For "squads “), Which represent more or less self-sufficient groups of players within the clan. Each team focuses on a specific game and appears under the name of the parent clan.

Naming

Each clan chooses its own name and creates a suitable "tag" (English for "identifier"). This clan tag is inserted before or after the player name in the game. The player can be assigned to a clan immediately. A clan tag usually consists of the clan initials or other short versions of the clan name, which are sometimes bracketed with special characters (e.g .: XY , [XY] , =] XY [= ). There are also clans where the clan name matches the clan tag, for example fnatic .

The clan name is intended to make the clan identifiable on the Internet and at events. It does not necessarily have to match the club or company name, so its function corresponds to a brand . In contrast to associations and companies, there is no clan register in which clans have to register and therefore it is possible that several clans have the same name and / or the same clan tag. Professional clans usually register their names as trademarks (e.g. at the German Patent and Trademark Office ) in order to prevent trademark conflicts.

Organizational structure

In principle, there are no fixed structures in terms of the structure and organization of a clan. However, in the course of time, basic models have emerged which are used by most clans.

An increasing professionalization of the clan structures can be observed. While terms such as clan leader were common in the past , nowadays success-oriented clans are mostly referred to as management . A distinction is made between these two forms of clan organization below.

Modern
  • Management : The management manages the clan and takes care of the strategic objectives. It is subordinate to one or more managing directors or project managers . Usually it consists of several members, each with their own areas of responsibility. Possible positions are: Business Development , Marketing Director , Team Director , General Manager .
  • Organization : The organizers of a clan ensure that management's plans are enforced. You are responsible for day-to-day business, but you can also take on more extensive tasks.
  • Team manager or team leader : Each team in a clan has its own team manager who is responsible for the team's organizational issues. He plans the game operations in leagues and tournaments and usually represents the link between players and management / organization. Often there are so-called team orgasms that support the team manager in his work.
  • Player or Member (English for member ): A normal member of the clan.
Traditionally
  • Clan Leader (English for. Clan leader ): A person, usually the founder or a former player. He manages and organizes the clan.
  • Co-Leader (English for. Mitanführer ): A co-leader represents the clan leader in the absence and supports him in his work.
  • Teamleader (English for team leader ): A team or squad leader is the leader within the team and at the same time the intermediary between the team members and the clan leader.
  • War-Orga (English roughly competition organizer ): A War-Orga is looking for new opponents or training partners in order to arrange game dates with these. He also ensures that agreed deadlines are met.
  • Player or Member (English for member ): A normal member of the clan.

Professional clans

Due to the increasing professionalization in e-sports, more and more clans are now pursuing financial interests by striving for sponsorship contracts and prize money from tournament victories. Some of these sponsorship contracts mean that the name of the sponsor is integrated into the clan name, which in turn means that the sponsor is also mentioned with every mention of the clan. In some cases, companies even operate some factory teams . Examples of this are the German Alternate team and the Samsung Galaxy and T1 factory teams in South Korea.

Professional clans usually have a contractual relationship with their players. They usually pay their players a salary and cover the travel expenses for participating in esports competitions. The successful clans have themselves become companies that employ their own full-time employees and have annual budgets in the six to seven-figure range. Own offices are no longer a special feature, they are often combined with training rooms for the players. The clubhouse of n! Faculty is a special case , which also pursues social purposes and is intended to provide educational work for e-sports.

While in the past the focus was often on the performance of individual players, over time the popularity has shifted more and more to the individual clans. This can probably be explained by the fact that the fluctuation of individual players is very high, whereas the now “popular” clans have been at the top of the leagues for years. The largest teams have their own fan shops in which they sell merchandising items (e.g. T-shirts or mouse pads with the clan's logo).

Individual evidence

  1. Ben, Trixie, Gildenleitung, 1st edition, 2014, Berlin: Gildenleitung
  2. Structures like those of Bundesliga clubs? spox.com, April 24, 2010
  3. Meike Strüber: More beautiful shooting in the club ( Memento of the original from August 29, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. sueddeutsche.de, May 7, 2010. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sueddeutsche.de