Interview by :
Nick Brown (EvilEdwin)

The Alliance guild Caelum is without doubt the most renowned guild on Thunderhorn-EU. As with many guilds Caelum’s origins lie with another guild, The Lost Battalion. After the original guild master of TLB Lukeyboy left, Lianad assumed his position and a flurry of recruitment followed. Unexpectedly though Lukeyboy returned and found his guild had taken on a new, more “hardcore” persona. This led to an exodus of many of the high level players from TLB, including Lianad, and this resulted in the creation of Caelum on 21st May 2005.

“When we decided to make a new raiding guild, we had a meeting for the new name”, Lianad explains. “I wanted something unique, something that was a new name on all servers. Eteris came up with this name and we all loved it very much so Caelum was born. When we made Caelum we had just 15 players to be able to raid Blackrock Spire.”

Caelum tries to maintain the same core team of players and many of them have been with the guild in excess of a year. Because Caelum is intentionally kept small, 45-48 players, it allows the members to get to know each other well and to learn the instances together, creating a family mentality amongst members. Caelum is comprised of players from all over Europe, mostly in their twenties, from all kinds of backgrounds, but all have a desire to perform well in the raid instances.

Caelum’s guild hierarchy is a familiar one. While the guild master is supported by his team of officers, Caelum also has class leaders who assist those of the same class with advice and encounter tactics. Raid leaders are also present, taken from amongst the officer ranks. Unusually though Caelum also has leaders for each trade profession.

“During normal times we have five to six days of raiding a week, but during the summer we switched to a four to five days raiding schedule. We often do encounters with fewer people, we recently cleared Blackwing Lair with 34, and usually the experience is different to have a small raid versus a hard encounter. But this is the curse with keeping the guild relatively small. Also the loss of a player, if he has to stop playing, is very big in our case. But somehow we manage.”

Recruitment for Caelum is a long process, and a trial can last for a relatively long period. “We have to have a spot for the respected class open and we usually have targeted players in advance, or look through our recent applications. We invite the applicant to a test raid, usually a tier below the top instance, either Blackwing Lair or Molten Core, but now that Naxxramas is out maybe Ahn’Qiraj. The class leaders guide them and monitor their performance.”

“During the test run we don’t expect miracles we look mainly for mistakes and if all is okay…that person gets recruited. After the test run there is a trial period which lasts between one and three weeks, during which all trials have full access to everything except the guild bank.”

Passion for World of Warcraft is a key requirement for any Caelum candidate. “The person has to enjoy it very much, to understand what it is to play a MMORPG, that it takes time and that you cannot get everything from the start. After that it’s the personality, to be open minded, active in discussions and to be able to socialise with us.”

“We have a very nice Italian Warlock who happened to have very high singing skills and showed them on Ventrilo during some late night raids. Recently we recruited a person that we had been targeting for more than a year…nobody can believe he is with us now. Even if we have a player targeted we don’t poach players from other guilds. I personally don’t recruit players that are currently in a good guild. I would rather get a player that is unguilded thea have a player jump from one guild to another.”

Success in the high level instances brings its admirers and critics alike, and Caelum has its share of both. “For people who do not know us we are people with big egos. But for anyone who has the chance to know any of us we are just ordinary people and a guild that has had more PvE success than the majority.”

Caelum at present is one of two guilds to have beaten Ahn’Qiraj on Thunderhorn-EU, the other being Soldiers of Light, and is currently making solid progress in Naxxramas having killed three bosses to date. If Caelum’s past success is any indication then it will only be a matter of time before they find themselves confronting Kel’Thuzad himself, competing in the race to be the first on Thunderhorn-EU to defeat him.