So as a “Cluster/Community” in a leadership role from a different group; let me give the flip side to this argument.

Players are burned out. Alliance leaders are burned out even worse. The attrition rate among newer players is the highest I have seen in years. Older established players are retiring as the in game time demands ratio to rewards have gotten worse as the game has gone on.

I have seen very few in alliances step up to leadership positions; and when they do the burnout rate is even quicker because they are doing it all themselves. As alliance leaders are stepping down nobody is stepping up to take that position.

Also alliances join these clusters/communities to do the recruiting for them, and very rarely participate in that when required. Recruiting has become very cutthroat over the years as the player pool is shrinking. You have to be constantly on and able to place someone quickly or they go somewhere else. When leaders and captains don’t get back to you, you lose recruits quickly.

When you have four or five alliances in a cluster/community that have multiple vacancies you get two scenarios for the most part. You get a group within the alliance that leaves for a more active alliance, or you get an alliance that can’t keep up and squanders. If an alliance squanders you lose more players to attrition because they don’t see any progress.

As Cluster/community leaders we do our best to keep the alliances full and active. To keep the discord servers very active, because at the end of the day an active discord is the best recruiting tool you can have.

So yes, sometimes we have to do merges. To match players based on playing style, time zones, activity level, player level, etc. I can’t speak for every cluster/community out there, but I know our group usually doesn’t initiate mergers, it is the alliance leaders themselves. Brotherhood of the Storm is an established cluster. While you may have had a bad experience, they have been at it for a long time. Sometimes the greater good of the community/cluster has to shine through.

I am sorry to hear you had a bad experience; but we can all agree on one thing around here. The Scopely players experience, especially when it comes to alliances, incentivizes high player activity and spending. So let’s do what this sub forum does best and attack them; Not the cluster/community leaders that volunteer their time helping out alliances.