Within the heart of any good training program lies the BCT, the basic training that EVERYONE takes part in and EVERYONE has been through. It is the event your team members will remember and talk about often. This is a fairly easy program to put together but a bit of help would be useful. If you not, its okay; but find a good Training Officer ASAP.  Let’s start from the top here…

The MOST Important thing to Remember…

Basic Training for clans is about building a sense of brotherhood, not teaching skills to gamers that they already know.

Consider this…

Any new member of your team has probably played on your server, they have probably played often on other servers. Chances are good they played the game in single player for quite some time before ever even considering joining a clan. Why would you waste your time teaching this person how to play the game on a basic level? Right, so what we want to accomplish here is to keep a sense of a military training but we will have a different goal. Our goal will be to introduce the new member to the clan and at the same time provide a few tips and tricks those new members may not be aware of.

Building your Course.

The exact specifics of how your BCT will go from start to finish is a game-by-game and team-by-team thing. It is not something you can exactly copy, besides you want to create a totally original BCT that follows your team alone. Below is a fictitious example of how this could work.The exact flow and itinerary is of course up to you.

- Beginning on voice instruct your new members to join the server and travel to a specific place on the map.

(you should lock the server once your guys are on and ensure the map does not change)

- Introduce yourself and welcome them to the BCT program.

(Be dramatic and excited..it will spread)

- Go into a brief list of  what will happen, and instruct them on what they can say and when. Lay out the rules.

(Make them say things like “Yes Sir” or address you as “Drill Sergent”, state the RULES)

- Perform 5 -10 minute drills that are relative to the game.

(Use this chance to get the needed stuff out of the way, do it now while everyone is still excited about being here!)

- End with a very dramatic drill.

(Finish it off with something like shooting over them as they crawl, make lots of noise! lol.)

-Regather the group at the first position.

(If possible have other clan members waiting at the start position, in line and waiting!)

- Provide a final speech, something concerning the glory of the clan.

(End the speech with a strong catch-phrase, and instruct your current members to repeat the phrase all at once.)

- Call your recruits to the front, and “graduate” them.

(Once they are graduates, have the current members repeat the catch phrase again!)

- Using a term or signal of some kind proceed to “cause havoc” in the room.

(This is a period of everyone bash and shooting each other, respawning, nades, and chaos. ENJOY)

- Follow the ceremony up with some fun time just playing. Provide lots of congrates!

Additional Items.

Time is a strong factor with this, you do not want to spend so much time running the program that people lose interest, and you want to shift from one place to another as often as possible to keep things moving. Pay close attention to how much time each item is taking. You also want to use drills that will provide good solid information or how-to for your recruits. Chose items that you would not expect most people to know.

It may also be beneficiary to lay out the rules ahead of time so new recruits will not need as much instruction right off the bat. You may want to have your recruits in a certain tag prior to the program, or change your own and the teams to something different to help cement who is running what.

The key to this program is bringing in new members with an amazing experience. You want this time burned into their minds and you want that excitement to stay with them as long as possible. You accomplish this by making it an event, not a boring instruction period!

- Hedge

© 2009 tribehaven