Introduction
I think there are a lot of us who are part of a Reddit Clan or have been but who really do not know the history of the RCS or the other Reddit Clan Systems (RAC, RWCS) that have come to be, and honestly, how the systems are related or run. Some might wonder in passing how the RCS was formed, or why it seems to be privileged on /r/ClashofClans with things like the sidebar wiki. Or they might wonder why there are multiple clan systems similarly named and if there really is any difference between them.
I also think not everyone realizes that not all Reddit Clans are related, though many of those that are now independent or belong to clan systems entirely outside of Reddit may once have been part of the original group of clans. Occasionally one of the older leaders or members will say something in a passing comment that hints at the overall history and you might stumble on it and say “hey, neat!”
The History of the Reddit Clans hasn’t really previously been written down in any one location. What there is of it exists in two places: the memories of those who experienced it and the posts and comments scattered throughout reddit. And now also, you can find at least some of it here in this enormous post that I hope you’ll read and enjoy.
This history started out as a goal to simply find the oldest post mentioning the RCS, but then as I found things and started asking questions it grew into so much more, and it only seemed right to share it. It turns out that most redditors might pick up a mobile game and some will stay with it and some won’t….but most keep coming back to reddit; and, because that’s true, they can be contacted. Because people were willing to talk to me, I was able to talk to people instrumental in the history of the RCS. Adding this to culling through a LOT of old posts and comments on the main Clash of Clans subreddit (/r/ClashofClans) and elsewhere, I found a lot of things that were new to me, and honestly enjoyed the journey very much! I hope others might too.
So, dear members of the modern RCS, RAC, and RWCS, those from the past who might stumble here, and any other person from reddit who cares to read this: below, is, to the best of my knowledge the history of both /r/ClashofClans and the Reddit Clans!
Disclaimer: What is written below is what I believe to be true or my interpretation of what was available to me. Where possible, I’ve tried to find posts or comments that support what I’ve written, and also to talk to those key players who were involved. But, I cannot claim to have found everything and talked to everyone. Not everything was, in fact, documented, nor is everyone’s memory 100% correct about all of the details of the past 3 years, and there were some conflicts. While I did talk to some who did have access, I also do not have access to the Leaders subreddit nor to the modmail of the several subreddits where important past decisions have been made.
Also: I have tried to be objective, but in the end, I am more of a storyteller than anything and I do have opinions. I’ve tried, where possible, to keep the opinions contained in the quotes of others and to give voice to both sides where conflict exists. However, I’m not going to lie and say I don’t have sympathies and bias, but I do hope you’ll find that the overall treatment to everyone here is fair. This history is meant to share knowledge of what has happened and how things evolved, some of which IS controversial and does involve decisions made by individuals that others do not agree with. It is not intended to reignite these controversies or defame these individuals, but simply to share what happened and to understand their points of view. As I believe the RAC would say: “No Drama”
If you find something that you believe grossly misrepresents you or your clan personally, please let me know and I will attempt to resolve that with you, particularly if you believe that what I said is untrue. If you find something that you simply believe is not correct, you’re welcome to say so, but I may not change it unless you can provide me supporting evidence. Like any history written largely in the third person: it is a story told by the author based on what the author believes is factual; it is not necessarily exactly what happened nor will it include every possible viewpoint.
And just so you all know: My in game name (IGN) is Zag-geek. I started clashing in January of 2014, joined Reddit Papa of the Reddit Clan System (RCS) and stayed with it until it dissolved in May of 2014 at which time I moved to Reddit Zulu, also of the RCS. I am currently serving as Co-leader under /u/zigzarlu (IGN: zigzarlu) and beside /u/iamshakes (IGN: Keith). This history was written and the interviews referenced were performed in March of 2016. I am an advocate of Fairplay, loyal to my clan, and above all: nosy as all hell.
This history includes events and references up to the time of March 2016.
Chapter 1: So it begins
Release of a Phenomenon
On August 2, 2012, Supercell, a game company founded two years Earlier in Helsinki, Finland, released its second game after its previous success, Hay Day. The new game was called ‘Clash of Clans’ and originally made available only on iOS.
The most novel portions compared to other city builder games were the multiplayer and social element. Players could not only build and upgrade their villages; they could attack other players and, more importantly, form and join clans, each with a unique chat to socialize specifically with the group of players they banded together with. The first clan ever created on Day One still exists: it is called ‘The Order’. (You can look for it by searching for clan tag: #2PP)
Although the game wouldn’t make it to Android users until October 7, of 2013–more than a year later–it had more than enough time to grow. By mid-2013, Forbes Magazine would publish an article stating that between the two games, Supercell was already raking in a staggering $2.4 million per day.By 2015, the company would be making $5 million per day from Clash of Clans alone, not counting the still profitable Hay Day and their third popular release: Boom Beach. In late 2015, Clash of Clans grew to be the top grossing game of all time on both Android and iOS.
The game released quickly after that first day in the App Store in 2012, and the adoption was rapid and widespread, with communities quickly forming. Strategy guides spawned across the internet and even in popular gaming magazines, which previously had the bastion of PC and console games. Suddenly, mobile games also were to be taken seriously in terms of both audience and profit.
The actual number of players at any given time is widely guessed at, but it’s possible that Supercell alone knows the true numbers that play it day to day…and how many of them buy gems and contribute to their profit. Supercell’s fourth wide release game as of early 2016, Clash Royale, seeks to leverage the success of Clash of Clans, reusing its characters.
/r/ClashofClans, Day 1
It was about 2-3 weeks after the launch when a redditor named /u/Flammy found out that no subreddit yet existed for the game. Going by reddit metadata, it was on August 17, 2012 around 7 am UTC on a Friday that he decided to fix that by creating one, and named it simply /r/ClashofClans. He submitted the new subreddit’s very first post. Over time, the post was only given 6 votes…though 5 of them were up. He did persist though; as he put it:
Flammy (/u/Flammy, /r/ClashofClans creator and RCS founder): The first submission was a screenshot of my base right before my 3 day noob timer ran out. A few people found the reddit on their own, so I wrote some guides for to encourage people to return. Note this is actually before I started my YouTube channel; my channel’s first clash video was a supplementary piece for chapter 6 or so of my guide.
Flammy’s guides for his “Let’s Play Series”, in fact, were very popular in the wider internet and did have the effect of causing the traffic to /r/ClashofClansto explode. Many people learned the basics of the game by watching Flammy. Back in the day, he made an effort to try answer every question asked about the game or his videos whether it be posted on YouTube or the sub, and this did bring even more people to want to come join up with him.
The Birth of a Clan System
The original clan was simply called ‘Reddit,’ and it is the first of the Reddit Clans. Reddit appears to have been made on October 19th, 2012 by /u/tholme4. And that, by the way, is controversial; nearly everyone I’ve talked to believed Flammy had created the clan, including Flammy himself. But, the post linked shows another source, and the comments by those asking to join are many of the original members. Ultimately, it is unclear if a second Reddit clan was started soon after with the same members (to me, this seems less likely) or if Flammy became leader almost immediately. (I have reached out to /u/tholme4, but he is not very active on reddit, and so far, no response.)
Flammy (/u/Flammy): I’m about 90% sure I founded the clan [but looking at the link, tholme4] very well may have founded. I do recognize many of the names in that thread as early members and some of them later turned into leaders of other clans.
While the idea of forming a clan of redditors was easy to have, Flammy recognized that there would easily be more than 50 people interested, and so he very quickly thought bigger.
I’m afraid I cannot pinpoint the formation of the Reddit Clan System (more often called RCS) any more accurately than this, but October 27, 2012 appears to be the date for the inception of the idea. “That sounds about right,” is the best agreement I can get from those who were there….and I believe it started with this post: “The Official Subreddit Clans Thread.” Unfortunately, the original text of the post was lost and it was replaced with a link to the later created wiki and a FAQ. However, this is the first post I can find mentioning that which would become the RCS, and the 300+ comments on it are primarily people looking to join the first of the Reddit Clans. It sits squarely in time between the release of Flammy’s first guide and his second.
Either way, it appears that the original post about the Reddit Clan System caused the Reddit clan to grow from quite small to suddenly thriving, because on October 31st, 2012, the second post about the clan system was made, saying that within 3 days (since the first post, though the clan was now 12 days old), ‘Reddit’ had grown to 30 players. One player in particular, /u/jack0191 wanted to be “forever known as the first member (after the boss) 🙂”. So how could I not mention him here?
Jack (/u/jack0191): From memory, Flammy was the boss. To be honest, my memory doesn’t have the specifics. What I do remember is it was immediately very active. It filled up very quickly and over the next couple of weeks a ton of Reddit Alpha Beta etc clans came about as each one filled up. I’m sure it got all the way through the alphabet in the end.
(Hey, Jack….little do you know!) Not only that, but ‘Reddit’ (#G88CYQP) still exists today, and the 7 letter clan tag does indicate this is, in game terms, definitely one of the older clans. You can find it by searching in game and looking for the red and white badge. Instructions on how to join it, along with the other Reddit Clans, is on the official RCS wikipage.
The second post on the Clan System offered 3 proposals for how to make future clans once Reddit overflowed. The option ultimately chosen was #3, which was called ever so eloquently: “Bucket O’Clans with a Single Competitive Clan.” This was, essentially, a set of socially grouped clans that were for all of the general Reddit playerbase, and one clan specifically for those that wanted to trophy push and be with those of a similar high level. At the time of the post, townhall 9 had literally just released as an update on October 27th and a “high” trophy level was anything above 1200.
Flammy would go on to implement the exact plan described in the post, which was considerably different from the modern verification process of the RCS today. I’ll again simply cut and paste Flammy’s words to describe how it worked:
Flammy: Way back when, for the first few clans, the initial idea was to have volunteers from one of the existing clans go create the ‘next’ one when the existing ones were full. This had some flaws, but worked pretty well initially. It didn’t handle allowing new people to create a clan without already being in one, which later was definitely an issue as demand for new clans outstripped our ability to organize them.
Another piece of history that may have been lost in the last few years was the naming scheme. As I mentioned, the original clan was simply called ‘Reddit’. All clans after that followed a set naming scheme with a few exceptions.
In fact, if you read the comments in that exact post, the original naming scheme was an offshoot of a suggestion by /u/Deathlui who suggested the name Reddit Gold be given to the competitive clan and then names with progressive Roman Numerals to the others. Flammy chose alphabetical names instead “which really shows they aren’t ranked if we go with [Proposal 3] (which we’re leaning towards currently)”. The idea of equality between clans made perfect sense at the time, as the goal was to provide a common quality to all members in the system. There was no desire to have members striving to be in one clan that was full while another languished. It’s worth taking note that the idea of all clans being equal is still a primary tenant of the RCS and, while there have at times been special categories, the general decision not to allow some clans special privileges over others has been alternately controversial and uniting.
Reddit Alpha, the second of the clans, was announced as up and running on November 3, 2012.
Reddit Beta was around on or before November 9th, and Reddit Charlie on November 21st with Delta and Echo very soon after.
The original naming scheme ultimately (mostly) followed the NATO alphabet – Alpha, Beta (which, yes, should have been Bravo), Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, etc with the exception of those which were common names of places (Quebec became Quantum, India became Indy) to avoid confusion or the perception that the clan was only for people from those places.
Flammy: We didn’t use every single one of the NATO pronunciations, but we did use most of them. (A few that were after specific names/locations were intentionally not used to avoid confusion over ‘Is this clan for only people from India? Or Quebec?)
After the first three, the next several came quickly, and on it went from there.
1YardStare (/u/Cainophobe, Current Co-Leader of Reddit Echo, and one of the early RCS leadership from 2012): Charlie, Echo, and Delta all formed at about the same time from members of Beta. [Echo’s] founder/then leader MrJeffK (u/Dastote) and his many alts created [many] of the first 26 or so clans. We would find and basically train people to lead other clans, then hand over leadership to them.
The “Let’s Play” YouTube videos continued to draw people and so did the expanding subreddit.
MrJeff K (/u/Dastote, original leader of Reddit Echo, early RCS leadership from 2012) : I remember Flammy talking about how crazy it was that he got 100 views on YouTube and the long chats we had about how to grow. Flammy put a lot of work into this, it’s really amazing what he was able to accomplish…
Reddit Golf was never created, reserving G for Gold. Reddit Gold, as the original competitive clan with a trophy limit, did appear, but not immediately…while the other clans began popping into existence right away, it would not be created until around the same time as Juliet, in early January 2013.
Other clashers began to notice the Reddit Clans and how quickly they grew or wanted to be associated with them, so a number of unofficial clans sprung up, many following the naming scheme.
There was definitely concern over protecting the ‘Reddit’ title. For one thing, if too many clans had the same name, the search at the time would not show all results; for another, the goal was to make clear which clans belonged to the system, and which did not. Any upstart clans with NATO names especially were seen as threats and potential sources of confusion.
1YardStare: We also had a program (I refer to it as our covert/black bag Ops section) to go in and take over unauthorized Reddit clans over. That is why the “V” clan was veteran. We also took over Whiskey that way and placed our own leadership there (previously an Echo elder).
Sometimes we had to trick them in to making us leader, other times we had to put the time in and show them we were better leaders over a period of time, but we eventually took over a few clans that had appropriate beginning letters.
Some of the take overs were gnarly, like hey let me be leader for a minute so I can send a screen shot to my friend…lol
We were trying to manage the “Reddit” search to a minimum number of clans so official clans were not excluded from those searches. Back in that period, we were battling a rash of imposter clans due to the growing popularity of the system. Having control of any clan with Reddit in the title, especially fake ones with NATO phonetic names [was important].
This story is corraborated:
MrJeffK: I remember going under cover to take over non official Reddit clans and turning them into official clans. I would join and after a while start talking about how I knew Flammy and how I could probably get him to pop in and say hello. Once he was in there, he would ask to be made leader and the he would turn it over to me.
Although it seems a bit cruel and underhanded to essentially steal clans, some were voluntary turn overs and those that weren’t were generally takeovers of clans that were poorly run.
1YardStare: Nobody got too upset, they were small unorganized clans or near death due to inexperience. Their membership benefited from experienced leadership moving in.
And the core group did work hard to make sure that the clans were well run and that the members in them did benefit once part of the RCS. Significant time was invested in developing members, checking in regularly, ensuring that rules were being followed and leadership was keeping the clan active and well managed.
In this way, they did make it through the first 25 letters of the alphabet to X-Ray which was used for a special purpose.
1YardStare: We ran reddit X-ray as a leader feeder or training camp. Many clan leaders had to show they were up to par while we took over or created a clan for them. We had alts all over, so many Echo people have high level alts as a result. MrJeffK had three alts at one point, lol
In the very first version of the official clans list that would be written in May of 2013, Echo is shown as being run by /u/Dastote as MrJeffK and X-ray by /u/Dastote as es.
MrJeffK: There were times when I was running three clans at once, Echo with my main and then others with my subs [es and P-Dog]. I can remember spending an hour or two just in chat between all three clans each day. I know I put a lot of pride in having a tight clan, that was always important to me. I get a smile on my face when I look at Echo and see some of the same names that have been there since the early days.
Later, when the end of the NATO letters would be reached, culminating in Zulu in May of 2013, names switched to letters of the Greek alphabet: Upsilon, Pi, Gamma, etc followed by the rest.
Flammy: If there is a current Reddit clan which has a name from one of these alphabets its a pretty safe bet they were created in 2012 or 2013. It is hard to tell if a clan was an original or not as there were no Clan Tags back in the day. This also made joining some of them rather hard as there could be dozens and dozens of duplicates under some of the more popular names. (And for a long while there was an issue where empty clans would appear in the search)
Looking now to modern times and the names of the original clans, new clans have long since gone away from the original NATO and Greek letters and pick names more along the lines of Pirates, Zombies, Mutiny, Arcane, Dynasty, and Storm. This was for practical reasons:
Flammy: This naming system was eventually dropped to allow 1) registration of Reddit clans created outside of our set system (once approved) and 2) we ran out of these letters too!
One other question that I’ve seen often asked, is why is the Official red and white RCS Badge the one that it is. The most common explanation I’ve seen tossed around is that it matches the reddit color scheme itself. However:
Flammy: It was the original. I picked it when I founded the Reddit clan… because I liked how it looked 😛 I also tried to pick one that I thought both looked good and wouldn’t be too popular with too many other clans to help recognition. I can’t remember if the Reddit Snoo colors influenced my choice at the time. Quite possible. Interesting idea regardless.
All of the clans followed the same basic rules (which you can find on the very first version of the wiki):
- Be polite and mature
- Be active
- Be polite and mature (especially when requesting troops)
The latter rule turned into a rule about not “leeching” – i.e. not requesting troops without also donating.
Over time, these basic rules have changed to include a specific definition of active (donating and chatting), asking players to meet the donation minimum of their particular clan and honor request messages, and to not cheat. Other than that, they remain much the same.
Maintaining the social clans for everyone was very important and Flammy and his group were very constant in maintaining that in the initial system. An example is /u/Dastote‘s comment from June 2013:
MrJeff K (/u/Dastote, speaking in June 2013): If Lvl 2 archers keep you from winning a battle, you’re not doing it right. Clan castle troops should be used as a distraction or to clean things up, not as a primary attack.
The best thing about our Reddit clan system is we take everyone and we are a very relaxed system. Don’t take this the wrong way, but if you want to implement a level requirement and place hard donation limits, you are missing the “culture” of this clan system. Run a competitive Reddit clan or start your own clan, but lets all keep accepting the noobs.
Reddit Gold, as the first Competitive Clan, had the one additional requirement: players must maintain high trophy levels. If they did not, someone else would be able to take their spot. As far as I can tell from comments here and there…I believe the original level was set at 1700, though as trophy inflation occurred in the game, this level was raised over time.
Reddit Gold later also got one other unique thing. As of February 2013, it was announced that Gold would be getting the RCS’s first feeder clan: Reddit Silver, for players at trophies above 800 to play until they reached the requirements of Gold. And yes…it was treated as true feeder, accepting players who were looking to go into the main clan with priority to do so.
For those who don’t know…a feeder is a clan for “prospective members” of the clan it feeds. It can be used as a place to try out and prove worthiness, a place to grow players until they meet requirements, or a simply as a clan holding onto the overflow until spots in the main clan appear. Keep this term in mind; it will come up again many times in this history of the RCS, and is at the heart of its biggest controversy years later.
As a side note: It is wrong to think that ‘Reddit’ was the only, or even the first clan organized by a redditor for other redditors or that ‘Reddit’ names were the only ones used…it was written in a comment on the post announcing the clan ‘Reddit’, that there was an even earlier clan. Its name was ‘Narwhal Bacon,’ and it’s entirely possible that even earlier clans were formed. Narwhal Bacon’s leader made sure that Flammy knew that, indeed, other reddit clans did exist. There is a very old clan (based on the 6 digit tag) that can be found in game by this name: #82QRLJ, that is probably the one mentioned. In an amusing but completely unrelated coincidence, the most recent arranged war (see Chapter 4 for more information) by the RCS featured two clans: Reddit Narwhal and Reddit Bacon.
100+ Subscribers to the Subreddit and Calls for New Leaders
By November 1, 2012, the subreddit reached 100 subscribers and Flammy was asking those who were interested to PM him about helping to lead the newest of the Reddit Clans.
By December 6th, the total was 300 subscribers to the sub and by the 9th, applications for new Clan Leaders were being solicited and submitted online with a more formal process – prospectives had to complete an application, submit it, be accepted by Flammy and undergo a trial period as an elder in the newest clan. If approved, the individual would become the leader of the next clan created. Obviously, the process today is far different, but this seems to have worked well for the earliest clans.
Subreddit subscribers picked up fast at a rate of about 50 a week, hitting 400 by December 22, 2012 and 500 by New Year’s Day 2013.
For any that wonder why /r/ClashofClans is treated as the home of the RCS, that’s because it very much is! Or at least, it is their origin. The creation and evolution of both went hand and hand: the subreddit was a place to share knowledge of the game, and the RCS clans were born of the subreddit to give clashers and Redditors a place to go with a group of people that together made for a nice place to play.
Chapter 2: More Formal Organization for the RCS and Growth of the Subreddit
The Subreddit behind the Subreddit
Leaders past and present of the RCS know this: there is a second private ClashofClans subreddit, that, if you happen to know what it is, is set to so that only current leaders and RCS Council members have access. It is commonly referred to as META.
It is possible however, that not all of even the modern leaders know some of the history of this subreddit or why META is set up as it is.
Clearly the organization described above whereby each clan was created from its successor, with Flammy loosely in charge, could be a bit chaotic. This META subreddit was created (creation Date: November 8, 2012) specifically to allow Flammy and the leaders to converse, and the conversations were done originally almost exclusively through modmail. If the some of the current users of the subreddit have noticed that it looks like everyone is a moderator, this is a relic of its creation; by making everyone a mod, RCS leaders could use modmail as their own private chatroom. But this did have its own issues, certainly. Imagine, if you will, all communication as one giant Reddit inbox….it’s not hard to balk at this idea.
Of course this only lasted so long, particularly as more and more clans were created and the number of leaders grew, but it did last for most of the first year. There was also a Skype chat, but once the number of leaders grew it was plagued with lag and difficult to use.
1YardStare (/u/Cainophobe, Reddit Echo Leader after MrJeff K, current Co-Leader): There was skype as long as I can remember, I had a “job interview” with Flammy before becoming Echo’s leader. That was around Jan 2013.
It worked well when we only had 15 or so clans on there, it got hairy when we started getting more than 30 people in a group chat.
The total of 50 clans was reached well before the end of of 2013. The Skype chat was transitioned to a GroupMe, which is still the preferred forum. This evolution moved immediate conversations away from the subreddit, and let META be used for more formal communications only.
Rlight (/u/Rlight, ClashofClans moderator as of mid-2013): I started the first [GroupMe] chats outside of reddit (before, in the old days, you’d just talk in modmail to the other mods). We MAY have started with Skype for a bit, but skype is not very reliable so we quickly switched to GroupMe. The [GroupMe] leaders chat…. i can’t recall when we started that up but it has been around as long as i can remember.
Leaders being in contact with other leaders has always been important: it keeps the clans as a community, allows group decisions and policing, flow down of information, and sharing of player warnings.
And, among the mods, the leaders, and among the clans themselves, the increased socialization of outside tools and the ability to share pics, links and be in multiple groups brought friendship and sharing.
yesiac (/u/yesiac, ClashofClans moderator as of late summer 2013): I think moving to GroupMe was a HUGE improvement, honestly—we started talking a lot more, becoming better friends, etc. The community really bonded from us having that reliable mode of communication. That was when I really saw a turning point in the RCS.
It didn’t take long for many of the clans to begin using similar tools internally as well, leading to more cohesive clans where many players did, and still do, form strong communities.
Please Find the Password
Very early on, Reddit Clans required a password. The main purpose of this was to make sure that those joining were, in fact, redditors. The secondary purpose was to install some degree of filter that would make the quality of the clans better than what might be found in global. At least those who found it spoke English (common language of the clans), could read and use reddit, and had some basic ability to follow simple directions.
The password has changed over time (hint: it is no longer kittens, bacon, galaxy, or shadow), but the one thing that is still true to join any RCS clan is that you must FIND THE PASSWORD!
The password isn’t really about making the RCS feel like a Secret Society or making it hard to join…it’s to get players to read the official RCS wiki with all of the core rules and tenants of the RCS and to learn just a little about the system they are attempting to join.
As put by /u/Rlight, moderator since at least August 2013 and mod until just recently:
Rlight: The main thing that we want connecting everyone together is reddit itself. Thats why we have the password. So that we can at least share the commonality that everyone is a redditor and a clasher. Additionally, the password has the benefit of getting everyone to read the barebones rules of “be civil, have fun, fair play, etc”.
When I myself admitted that I, ah….didn’t fully read the wiki the first time through (I have long ago corrected that!) I got this response:
Rlight: Of course yeah I’m sure a ton of people dont. It was never really my intention anyway. The best thing about it is that, whether they read it or not, just HAVING the password reminds everyone that they’re in the RCS.
Still though…if you are reading this as an RCS member in good standing…you HAVE read it in full, haven’t you? If not, there is still opportunity to do so.
If you’d like to see the original draft of the wiki with Flammy’s original rules and the original list of clans to get a flashback, you can find it here. It was first released March 11, 2013.
Other than the list of clans, not a lot has truly changed.
Flammy (March 8, 2016…3 years later): I just went back and looked at the current rules and I recognize about half of the current clans from a casual scan. Also the rules and guidelines remain largely unchanged from my time writing them – The sample picture (“how to submit clan password”) was taken on one of my accounts, hopefully that means they’ve done their job well without too many modifications.
Discipline in the Clans
Surprisingly, the system that had been originally set up had worked very well the first seven months or so it was in place. However, there always has to be someone to cause trouble.
/u/Flammy recalls an early incident with the leader of Reddit Alpha being unwilling to cooperate with the RCS on some matters. The solution was to simply ‘unverify’ them as a clan until the situation was resolved by a later leader reaching out. There does not appear to be a public post specifically about this incident, so it is hard to know the exact timeframe, but suffice to say, it was early. Simply removing the clan from the verified list at the time was punishment: public acknowledgement on the sub was the #1 method of recruiting for most of the clans.
The first public incident I could find that was documented occurred shortly after a the final clan in the NATO system was added: Reddit Zulu. Zulu was created on or around March 2nd with its original leader in place. However, the clan filled quickly and about 2 weeks after it was formed, 23$matt$23 (/u/ProFarmer) chose to kick all members that did not have good enough bases (levels or troops). At the time, the intent of the Reddit social clans was to allow everyone. Minimum level requirements were not allowed, and even the competitive clans were primarily discriminating based on trophies alone.
Using the recollections of Zulu’s previous clan members, this incident was handled by Flammy forcing matt to retire the leadership, while he asked members to pm him with suggestions for a new leader.
The RCS has, at other times, removed other leaders that were for various reasons, not upholding the RCS rules or values. Some have had considerably more drama than this original incident and a few names come up repeatedly among the past mods as memorable, but the precedent was set that the RCS could, and would, either remove leaders or kick out clans who were unwilling to comply with the Clan System’s rules. Whether or not this seems harsh, it was to ensure that standards and the overall vision of the Clan System were maintained. Over the past three years, leaders and clans have been removed for reasons ranging from inactivity, disobeying RCS rules, and active harassment to using hacks or methods determined to be cheating.
As for matt, he very shortly after went on to form the first Farming Clan named “Reddit Kings,”on April 27, 2013, which, by that time, was allowed to discriminate members based on meeting higher level requirements than the original social clans allowed.
Kings was an experiment in a new kind of clan along the lines of what matt had wanted to achieve in Zulu. It was apparently recognized that even though it was not in the spirit of the other clans yet to discriminate on members levels in the game, there was a demand for a clan that did.
From the wiki, : We currently have one clan [Kings] oriented at high level players who are currently farming. This single clan is currently a test case. If this is full, we encourage high level players to join Social Clans as they offer the exact same purpose and allow higher level players to assist newer players.
Reddit Zulu, meanwhile, even to modern day, remains one of the clans in the RCS that has no minimum townhall or troop level requirement and will take players at any level in the game so long as they meet other requirements for activity.
Allowing New Clans
By July of 2013, the subreddit had hit 5,000 subscribers and nearly 50 verified clans.
Verified clans initially consisted only of those officially made (or acquired) by Flammy and his crew under the original system (described in the previous chapter) who had continued to follow Flammy’s rules and had maintained an active leader base.
Unofficially made (i.e. not the alphabetical) Reddit Clans had, of course, sprung up, and were expressing interest in joining with their members. Additionally, the moderators were feeling the stress of over 100 applications a month for new leaders or people looking for new clans. The comment stream on this post declaring that the RCS was open to new clans to apply set forth the process for these self-made clans to seek verification.
The clans, whether Flammy-made or not, maintained the same structure. Three types of clans were maintained at this point (mid 2013): Social, Farming and Competitive.
- Social Clans were general clans that were required to accept anyone, regardless of trophy count. To stay in a social clan, you were required to stay active, donate at least 25 troops a week (which seems laughable to most today), only archers unless otherwise requested in chat (some clans still have an archer default, but, considering that it wasn’t until September 2013 that the game would allow you to edit the default request message when requesting clan castle troops, imposing a default troop made much more sense than you might first think), and to be polite and mature. “Polite and mature” has been interpreted different ways by each clan leader, but usually involves refraining from racism, sexual harassment, etc and not attacking other clan members in general. If mods observe signs that a clan does not meet the definition during verification, it can be rejected.
- Competitive Clans (like Gold and Silver before them) followed the same basic rules, but were allowed to require higher levels of activity, mandatory participation in pushing, and minimum trophy requirements. Competitive clans were organized at the time (mid-2013) such that to join, you had to have a higher trophy count than the 40th member. If you did, and applied, #50 would be kicked to make room, ensuring that the clan could continue to rise through the ranks.
- Farming Clans (like Kings), were allowed to impose restrictions on player level, troop level or townhall level to allow higher level players to be in clans with only higher level players if they so chose. These were born out of a conversation had in April 2013. Although social clans remained for all, there was enough demand from higher level players that didn’t wish to push trophies but did want higher level troops to justify the creation of these clans, starting with the previously mentioned Reddit Kings.
Rejuvyn (/u/Rejuvyn, previous /r/ClashofClans moderator, past Leader of Reddit Troopers): There wasn’t a particular direction we wanted clans to grow towards, the RCS was meant to be a loose collaboration and a general agreement on a baseline level of maturity and conduct. Some clans focused on trophy pushing, some focused on farming. Some claimed mastery of neither and were purely there to provide a fun and social atmosphere. Eventually, the arrival of Clan Wars further diversified the goals of individual RCS clans.
The desire for more strict minimum requirements would continue to be an issue for some clans, however, and in late October 2013–the same month that the game released for a whole flood of new players by being made available on Android–the Social Clans were allowed to become “Tier 1” (no requirements) and “Tier 2” (with a minimum requirement for Archer level). Today, for reference, clans still are separated by those with no requirements and those with a minimum levels for troops, townhall or level though the term “Farming” has long gone away and been replaced with the entirely new category of “War.” Social Clans are now simply called “General.”
Some New Mods to the RCS
With 50+ clans to loosely oversee, Flammy had begun to let more of the work be handled by others and did, over time, find additional moderators for the subreddit. Several can be seen in the old posts of the sub, but most appear to no longer be with us and have dropped off quite some time ago. Davi is one of the more prolific ones that for awhile did help actively answer questions and update the wiki.
Flammy began to get less involved and less accessible and did find some new folks who ultimately would end up taking over in the late summer of 2013. Many redditors at the time thought he went inactive or had real life take over; some thought he simply found himself involved in Samurai Siege, the game beta tested by SuperCell, but never publicly released. He would never actively return.
Flammy (/u/Flammy, /r/ClashofClans and RCS creator): I was playing less of Clash as I got later in my Junior year of university, then even less as I started my senior year. Life was busier, indeed. Samurai Siege probably actually kept me playing Clash a bit longer as Samurai Siege was a game where I could both help the devs try to improve things Clash had outstanding issues with and also learn more about the game design from the other side of the table.
I didn’t really come back ever again, partially I’m happy with what I accomplished and partially I feel that if I did inevitably some people would be disappointed and that can be hard to deal with when there are quite literally 1000s of people willing to share their disappointment… very vocally.
Among those that joined the team around that time and stayed were /u/Rlight, /u/yesiac (yes, these are the two that are still involved with the RCS in some capacity, and recently attended and reported from Clashcon 2015) and /r/Zenith1984. All of these also were Clan Leaders in their time: Reddit Light, Reddit Sierra, and Reddit Pi respectively.
Rlight (/u/Rlight, previous /r/ClashofClans moderator, previous Leader of Reddit Light): When I became a mod, I was kinda thrown into it. There were only a couple “reddit” clans which (at first) basically just required them to message the mods and be added to the list. Flammy had more or less disappeared right after I started. So I had to basically play it by ear. I tried my best to learn as I went, but so many clans were applying that I needed to do something. The very first leader/clan I verified was Zenith’s clan. After that, she was brought on as a moderator and was instrumental in helping create the Reddit Clan System as it is today. Shortly thereafter Yesiac came on board and the three of us marched forward.
Zenith(/u/Zenith1984, previous /r/ClashofClans moderator, previous Leader of Reddit Pi): I became a mod because I asked, lol. Rlight had just been added as a mod and was asking for others. I had just become involved as a clan leader (a whole other story as to how I became a leader lol) and I messaged Rlight to see if I could be of help on the mod team. He was all for it and I was added to the team. To be honest, at that point it was just Rlight and myself handling the majority of stuff, as Flammy seemed to have taken a back seat to the clash stuff.
Yesiac’s story also agrees.
Yesiac (/u/yesiac, /r/ClashofClans moderator, previous Leader of Reddit Sierra): I started playing Clash of Clans in mid-April 2013. At the time, I joined the (now abandoned) clan Reddit Theta and eventually became an Elder. I left Theta in early August to start Reddit Sierra with a few friends, and on August 24th it was verified. To the best of my knowledge, Flammy had taken a moderating hiatus around that time, since I talked primarily to Rlight. He made me a moderator on August 30th so that I could work with the team to implement some ideas I had for improving the sub.
I’d been really involved on the subreddit for a few months at that point, and I was an Elder in Reddit Theta growing increasingly frustrated at the leader’s lack of activity and wanting to be able to do more. I had a ton of ideas for subreddit improvement and wanted to get involved.
I found Rlight’s message to me when he made me a moderator. I’d been pitching a bunch of ideas and discussing improvements to the sub and he sent me that and made me terrified that I’d pissed him off.
My introduction to the team did not exactly go smoothly; from my understanding the leaders/moderators were not all getting along at the time, and Flammy had gone MIA to an extent. I helped switch the group from a Skype chat (which was not very effective) to the GroupMe that we use now. I was frustrated that nobody wanted to make changes to the system without Flammy’s approval, especially since Flammy was not around anymore, and there were a few fights that we eventually worked out. We slowly implemented the verification system, leader checks, rules, etc. Rlight and Zenith were moderators before I came aboard, and we added Rejuvyn later on, and the four of us were the core team for a while.
Rejuvyn, originally in Reddit Hotel, came in shortly after the other three.
Rlight (/u/Rlight): Rej came soon after that and we tried our best to manage RCS’s growth while making sure that it stayed a very high quality. As time went by that became more difficult. We struggled to make sure that the clan system maintained an ‘identity’ that it wasn’t just a collection of random clans. That we were a family. We introduced events, leader chats, and everything in between.
Once this core team was in place, more structure began to grow out of it, including more formalized processes for becoming a Reddit Clan. The first test drive of the system was by Rejuvyn himself and resulted in Reddit Troopers (added to the RCS July 31st, 2013), which would become one of the most recognized Reddit Clans throughout the game for their amazing performance once Clan Wars would hit Clash.
Rejuvyn (/u/Rejuvyn): Early on, the process was very informal. Basically, each clan leader was able to dictate how they wanted things run. The only RCS rules in place were the very fundamental “don’t be a jerk” sort of rules. Clan leader selection at the time was largely just up to Flammy.
Reddit Troopers was actually the first “self-made” RCS clan. Flammy asked me to test-drive the proposed system, and so I departed from Hotel and made Troopers. We passed the verification process and quickly grew in size (many Hotel members chose to come along with me).
Eventually, this system of becoming an RCS clan grew to be a bit more complex. A “board” of moderators (which I was a part of for a while) replaced Flammy in the day-to-day decision-making and regulation of the RCS, and as the RCS grew in size, more rules and clarified processes had to be implemented.
The process of creating alphabetical clans on overflow no longer worked as well, as other clans with Reddit in the name wanted to join the system or groups of players wanted to form their own reddit clans. A verification process was created by the mod team.
Zenith (/u/Zenith1984): [Among my most memorable moments was] coming up with and being in charge of the new way clans were added to the RCS. At the start, new clans were made when required (which wasn’t nearly as fast as it needed to be, because of the demand for RCS spots). Leaders were chosen on recommendation from other RCS leaders. As a mod team we looked at people being able to make their own reddit clan (which was a big demand at the time) and be assessed as to if they could then be classed as a RCS clan (depending on if they fit the criteria). It is memorable to me as it took a lot of refining and reviewing, before it turned into the process that it was. Some things worked, some didn’t, but on the whole the process was solid at the time (before clan wars were introduced, etc). I know the system sometimes got a lot of flack, and it was quite a strict process in some respects (we did turn down a few – only to accept them later after they acted upon advice), but it worked and the majority of the clans added during this process were quality and had some of the best leaders in the clan system.
The process was that new clans had to have a “Reddit ……..” Name. The second part of the name had specifications too (which caused some problems and disagreements with new clans lol). Once a clan had been made, the leader would message us with the details of the clan; requirements, subreddit, etc and they were placed on the prospective list. This made the clan visible for anyone on the sub to see and therefore join (aiding recruitment). Once a clan reached ~40 members they could apply for verification. Here a member of the verification team would spend a season in the clan, seeing how the clan leader ran the clan and of the ethos fit the RCS (upholding rules such as requiring the password, no racism, homophobia,etc) after that process the verification team member would report back and a decision would be made for/against verification. If verification was given, a mod would visit the clan and say Hi and introduce themselves. If verification was not granted then reasons would be given why. The clan would then have the opportunity to act upon advice given and re-apply for verification.
We would also do verification check ins. This is where verified reddit clans were required to check on with the mods every now and then on reddit. This was to make sure that leaders were checking the sub and to try and keep the community together. By not checking in, clans could lose their verification status.
Other mods would come in, including Nick (/u/Nick5483) who ran the official YouTube channel that the RCS had for awhile, and later helped with special events. He would join various clans and record replays to share with the community and also give greater exposure, bringing more players into the Reddit fold.
Coleman, /u/theviking55 also joined and became an important member of the mod team, helping to run day to day operations and also taking over the operation of special events.
Chapter 3: The Rise of the Trophy Wars
“Clan Wars” before “Clan Wars”
As more structure grew and the number of clans did too, the community was calling for more active involvement with one another.
It is in the nature of many gamers to be competitive and given the organization of the Clans, it was definite that they would want to compete with each other.
But how to do so?
Since there was no way to attack another player except during random matchmaking, the only obvious answer was by competing on stats and trophies.
WynterTwylight (/u/WynterTwylight, Alumni of Reddit November/current leader of Sierra): Even before wars were in existence, the RCS was doing its own kinds of wars (trophy pushing competitions) and those were some of the most fun I have had in this game, since everyone in the clan, and the other clans competing, were all working tirelessly for one goal, and often that brings people together.
The first trophy war was simply called “The Reddit Clans Holiday Competition,” held December 2012 to January 2013, and chaired by Flammy with the first six reddit clans. The competition was simple…greatest increase in trophies won. Echo placed first, followed by Delta, Alpha, Charlie, Beta, and the original Reddit. As far as I can tell, these were all the clans active at the time, and the first true multi-clan event in the fledgling RCS.
In general, it became common that clans would arrange to compete head to head, one clan vs. another and push as high in trophies as they could. Throughout the summer of 2013, this general format became very popular in the reddit clans. There were two ways in which this was done:
This example between Mu and Oak is an example of the more straightforward version – both clans simply agreed to push and the one with the most total trophies at the end of the time period won. This system’s biggest flaw was that if a clan started higher in trophies it started with the obvious advantage.
The second format, much more popular for social clans who did not maintain high trophies normally, was based on total increase in trophies from the start to the end of the agreed upon period, as shown in this example between X-Ray and Kappa. This had a different flaw: it was to player’s advantage to drop as low as possible just before starting so as to gain as many trophies as fast as possible once the war began, and, in the more competitive wars, many would do exactly that.
However, both options favored clans with higher townhalls fairly obviously. This did not make it easy for clans with disparity in levels to easily compete. It was /u/Rejuvyn who finally came up with a solution that, while not perfect, most certainly allowed competitions between disparate clans to occur much more fairly. This is the system he named “the Trooper Fairness System” and henceforth called TFS, which provides a handicapping method to compensate for player level so that lower level players at lower trophy levels can contribute just as much as the most advanced players who can easily get many more trophies. Its first use appears to be in a war ending October 1, 2013, arranged between Reddit Troopers and Reddit Upsilon:
JerseyDiablo (/u/MJDevil, Co-Leader of Reddit Upsilon): Upsilon also had a part in the creation of the “Troopers Fairness System” which was used for our RCS trophy push wars before clan wars were added to the game. Troopers couldn’t find anyone to push against so we worked out a plan so that Upsilon could challenge them even though they were more developed at the time TH-wise. They still kicked our butts, but the TFS turned out to be a pretty good deal.
As recorded in the post of the event:
The beauty of the system is that players will not be dropping trophies beforehand, players who were farming at sub-200 are not given an unfair advantage, and players who were already trophy pushing for whatever reason are not punished.
Even better, this encourages even the lowest town hall player to participate. Both clans saw excellent participation throughout the war from players at all levels, and the highest contributors to the Clan Contribution Total were not necessarily the highest level players! Clans with players of lower levels have a fair chance at competing with clans filled with higher level players. Participation will have a bigger impact than anything else!
Following the advent of the TFS, by the end of October 2013, the first 3-day Reddit Multiclan War entitled “The Mother of all Clan Wars” had been declared with 6 clans (Elephino, Pi, Upsilon, Mu, Spartans, and United) competing….with an ultimate win for Reddit United! And, to be fair, since this was the test bed of what would become an semi-annual Reddit Trophy Push, calling it the “mother” may not be entirely unwarranted.
These competitions have continued to modern day; below is a list of the following RCS wide Trophy Push Wars, all of which have used the TFS rules. Thank you to, /u/theviking55 (Coleman), /u/Ben189 (Ben), and /u/Rejuvyn (Rejuvyn) for putting them together:
| Name | Date | # Competing | First Place Winner | Second | Third | Fourth | Fifth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mother of all Clan Wars | Oct 2013 | 6 | United | Pi | Elephino | Spartans | Mu |
| Turkeyday Trophy Triathalon | Nov 2013 | 25 | Troopers | Whiskey | Zulu | Gold | Echo |
| Spring Spectacular | Mar 2014 | 34 | Kings | Troopers | Strike | Dawn | Zulu |
| Summer Trophy Push | July 2014 | 33 | Elephino | Strike | Xenon | Zulu | Raiders |
| 2nd Turkeyday Trophy Push | Oct 2014 | 36 | Kings | Elephino | Infinity | Dark | Zulu |
| 2nd Spring Spectacular | Apr 2015 | 29 | Elephino | Mu | Zulu | Xenon | Ace |
| 3rd Turkeyday Trophy Push | Oct 2015 | 19 | Zulu | Dynasty | Ace | Upsilon | Pi |
The Sister Clan Trials
Although other “Competitive” Clans had joined the list, the experiment with Silver and Gold was finally deemed unsuccessful. As described in the post linked in the next paragraph: “Reddit Gold faced the problem of members finding it difficult to maintain high trophy counts with little time to farm, while many of Reddit Silver’s veteran players were being let down by its mixed level player base.”
This time, instead of a dominant clan and a feeder, the plan was to make two Sister Clans, Dawn and Dusk which would, essentially, share the same membership. Both would have the same minimum requirements based on minimum experience, troop levels, and previous trophy record. But the key was that Dawn would always be actively pushing while Dusk was allowed to farm, and the members would flow back and forth between them as they alternated between pushing and farming.
The experiment, though at first successful, only lasted from February 2014 until October, by which time both clans had disbanded due to troubles maintaining members and the desire to avoid the constant pressure of pushing.
In general, the decision was not to allow clans to have feeders; a pair of Sister Clans was seen as a different option. At the time, the reasoning was that it was desired to have all clans in the RCS have equality, and a feeder clan, is, by its nature, secondary to its main, whereas sisters didn’t place one clan below the other.
When most in Global Chat said “feeder” they mostly meant a clan for those trying to get into a particular good clan but not let in because of either not enough spots or not yet being well developed. For the RCS, if a clan didn’t have room or had requirements: there was always another Reddit clan to go to that had equal recognition. Of course the nature of the game was simpler at the time.
yesiac (/u/yesiac): Most things about the game were different back then. Clan Wars didn’t exist, so feeders made less sense. They were only for pushing purposes, [and] most clans that had feeders were not part of the clan systems. RCS was the only thriving system back then….we had a system including dozens of other clans that often served a similar purpose.
So here is the reasoning we gave, from the beginning of the RCS existence, before wars happened: We didn’t allow feeders because all Reddit Clans are equal. Feeders are a temporary “training” clan for players that [are not yet good enough], and they aspire not to remain in the clan but to join the “main” one. That’s against the RCS. It’s not inherently bad; it just never jived with our system the way it existed then.
We had a few clans operate feeders secretly and those all failed for that reason. Either the feeder clan got annoyed that they were second best and tried to become independent, or they couldn’t keep the membership up when the main clan was full. They all failed because nobody wants to stay in a clan seen as not as good as the main clan.
We used to encourage clans to send extra applicants to other clans in the RCS.
Sister clans were the first alternate option, and Dawn and Dusk were not the last experiment in Sister Clans. Reddit Kings, consistently one of the RCS’s top ranking competitive Clans, was given the go ahead to set up Reddit Royals as its Sister Clan in May 2014 after the initial success of the first Sisters. This pairing operated similarly to the Dawn/Dusk relationship, except it also accounted for something new that had recently happened, that may have in part justified a new experiment by the RCS: the release of Clan Wars. Kings was intended to be the more serious of the two in wars, whereas Royals was a place for players to go practice, farm, or adjust to new townhall upgrades. Both required players to be well developed townhall level 9 or higher.
Ultimately, the RCS was uncertain of the benefits and reverted back to the idea of equal clans going against allowing other Sister relationships with the hope that RCS clans would bond with clans throughout the system rather than pair off. To avoid contention, particularly after Troopers and a few of the clans wishing to be affiliated with Troopers left–in part over the issue of feeders (See Chapter 4)–Royals and Kings would ultimately leave the clan system in March of 2015 (See Chapter 5).
The statement from Reddit Royals leader /u/CrazyFarm on that post reads: “As leader of Reddit Royals I would like to take the time to say thank you to the RCS community as we enjoyed being a part of the group for the past year. As a competitive war clan, there are some changes that we wanted to make in order to advance beyond the level we are at currently and the RCS rules do not allow us to evolve. Respecting the rules and mods, we decided not to ask for special circumstances or changes to accommodate our situation or to debate the merits our our position. Instead we have decided to step down as an official reddit clan in order move forward. We wish the RCS the very best of luck. I personally have enjoyed interacting with the other leaders and have had no issues with the mods who have been supportive over the past year.”
The moderators agreed.
yesiac: Royals [and Kings] left because we were still in discussion about allowing feeders and they didn’t want to keep waiting for us to decide. It was an amicable split.
The topic of feeders would come up again, several months later in 2015, but that deserves its own separate chapter. So be patient.
The Event Clans
While the trophy wars between clans were successful, and the competitive clans provided a spot for those who wanted to push always, there was room for something else to be added too…and what happened next was very important to furthering the building of community in the RCS.
proxidal (/u/proxidal, Leader of Reddit Zulu at the time) had an idea for something else: an event with a temporary clan that redditors would join for a short period to push as high as they could go in order to get the temporary clan as high as possible at the end of the event. This clan would contain only those interested in pushing and be of a limited duration so concentration could be at its peak.
More importantly, it would allow people to interact with each other from across the RCS, no matter what their home clan. This would do a lot to foster the “family” feel as, previously, although people might wander between clans, most interclan interaction was through the subreddit or limited to the leaders.
This event, and the clan it resulted in, was called Reddit Champs. The goal was to form a clan temporarily for one week on January 20-27, 2014 and push as high as possible. 50 people took part from Mike, Delta, Phi, Gold, Zero, Charlie, Zulu, Troopers, Omicron, Rebels, Reddit, Pi, Spartan, Elephino, Echo, Omega, Silver, Sierra and Strike and it was certainly memorable for many of them. In the end, Reddit Champs made it to #176 on the Global Leader Board!
The event was quite popular and the second incarnation was held in April 2013, again chaired by proxidal with nearly 150 players signed up, forming three clans. One important feature was that this time, the event was open to all on reddit, not just those in Reddit Clans, and while RCS was predominant, several other clans were represented. In the end, Reddit Champs achieved #49 globally, and the number of posts of new ‘Sweet Victory’ scores and fun times that were posted on the sub speaks to the enthusiasm of many of those who took part and achieved personal bests. NickLovin (/u/Nick5683, former /r/ClashofClans moderator, aka “Nick”) put together a nice video montage to commemorate the event.
A Champs 3.0, run by Nick in November 2014 after prox’s retirement had a few changes, the first of which was that trophy records were used to determine eligibility rather than first come, first served, and an initial minimum trophy count was required.
Another version of the event took place in February 2015. This time, it was called Reddit Air and had a special stipulation: Pushing with air troops (balloons, minions, dragons, lavahounds) only.
Ben (/u/Ben189, Leader of Reddit Xenon at the time) organized the 4th Reddit Champs event in July 2015 with 2 clans formed and again, almost 100 participants.