I have been a dom enthusiast for a long time and have experience being on the dom team of a dom-heavy flight. These are my suggestions for how dom teams in general, but especially Arcane (based on what I've heard) can improve. Hope this helps.
1) Committees for different aspects of dom
It's difficult for one person to do all the work themselves, so you will need a few people for each aspect of dom. One dom lead (or non-lead person who's super involved and okay leading a program) will be the point person for each committee. This means that any questions pertaining to this aspect should go to this person and they are in charge of integrating their part with all the other parts of dom.
For example, one person is in charge of rounding up artists and getting art made. It is their responsibility to determine when art is needed (to give artists enough time) and what art is needed for each push. They will maintain a pinglist for artists, ping them when it's time for graphics for a new push, keep track of who said they would do what, and then, say, a week out from the push, make sure everything is done and that other artists can take over if someone else flaked out.
Other aspects of dom that need a point person (that I can think of off the top of my head) include the following. Take some time to figure out what point people your team needs and what that person's responsibilities are. If anyone is no longer able to be the point person, it is their responsibility to say they need help. Sometimes two point people might be better, and some of these might be simple enough to be someone's "second job."
- Dom bank: This person makes sure the bank spreadsheet is up to date and that the flight has enough money for hosting PBs, festivals, and other dom events. They should make sure the flight has enough money for upcoming events and if not, should work with fundraisers to make sure fundraising goals are reached. The bank funds should be split among different people for safety reasons.
- Raffle team: The raffle team's biggest job will be for the flight festival and any battles. Other than that, they might host IF raffles for smaller pushes or similar. There should not be too many raffles in a year to avoid burning out this person as well as people in the flight who donate items. This person's job is to determine what prizes are needed for upcoming raffles, solicit donations, and work with fundraisers to raise funds for other needed items.
- Fundraising: There should be someone making sure the flight is bringing in money to use for future events. There are a WIDE array of possible fundraisers you can run on FR, so this person may need to work with other leads in case they need graphics, spreadsheets, etc. This person can also guide other flight members in running their own fundraisers and act as support for that.
- Communications: This person is in charge of IF/OOF communications, which includes maintaining and pinging the flight's dom pinglists as well as being in contact with DW and reserving DW posts. This person also maintains dom info threads and makes sure the links, dates, etc. are all up to date and does coding for push threads, etc.
- Spreadsheet whiz: This doesn't necessarily need to be its own position, if there's enough spreadsheet knowledge among the rest of the dom team. But there has to be someone (or ideally a few someones) who is good with spreadsheets. If your team doesn't have this, you can ask other dom teams for help. Personally, I would like to see more dom teams helping each other.
- Graphics: As mentioned previously, there should someone who wrangles artists and keeps them on track so that graphics are planned and produced on time for pushes. This person might also run foddart and/or work with skin artists for special events.
2) Scheduling and delegation
Now that you have your point people, you need to figure out what needs to happen when. Most flights already have pushes planned out, so take a look at your calendar and figure out how much time each team member needs to do their job. Let's say you have a push in 6 weeks. Make sure that the graphics and spreadsheet people get a headstart so they're not crunched at the end. Allow buffer time for mishaps. An example schedule might look like:
Week 1 - ping to announce push, ping artists to sign up for needed art, check bank status, plan and implement fundraisers over next few weeks if needed Week 2 - fundraising Week 3 - send reminder to artists Week 4 - recruit attendants for PB, prepare attending spreadsheets Week 5 - all art turned in; find replacements for missing art, code push threads Week 6 - push begins!
So, we pinged the whole flight in Week 1. This includes invitations to help if anyone wants to participate. Over the next 6 weeks, any interested flight members should be put to work. If they want to fundraise or do art, the point people should help them with whatever they need. Now that we have committees with defined responsibilities, we can delegate more easily and determine which areas need more support.
3) Improved communications
Communications with flight members should be regular (at least monthly) as you are most likely always either planning for a push, in the middle of a push, or fundraising for a push. It's easy to set up a general dom pinglist as well as pinglists (plus Discord roles) for each committee as needed. General dom pings should include information about upcoming pushes and what's needed for these upcoming pushes, as well as any preparation/fundraising events happening in the meantime. A lot of dom stuff happens outside of pushes! If it helps, you might have a regular date for dom pings, and skip only if nothing is happening.
Make sure you have a single dom thread you can point to where all information is concisely displayed and relevant links are organized. The FR forums can be confusing, but they don't have to be. If I switched to your flight right now, I should be able to easily find your main dom thread and quickly learn about what I can to immediately start helping with whatever is needed. Make sure opportunities for anyone to help are clearly displayed.
4) Fundraising
Fundraising should pretty much always be happening if you want to be a competitive dom flight. During WvE, Water spent over a billion treasure. This doesn't mean you need to raise that much, because during a battle you get back some money through exalting, but your bank should probably be at 500 million treasure or more to be in good shape for a battle.
If you're not looking to battle any time soon, it doesn't matter as much. Pulling off a good festival raffle or a chill PB to buy first place for your flight is not that expensive. At the very least, though, you should have a few regular fundraisers so that you're breaking even. I can provide more fundraising advice if needed but each flight seems to have their own things going already so I won't elaborate more.
5) Building dom skills/morale
It's not enough for the dom team to know what's going on. Flight members should be as involved as possible too. I highly recommend these three things for morale:
1) Don't let people use their own funds for attending. I am flabbergasted that some flights don't distribute bank funds for attendants to use. How are people supposed to get involved if they think they have to spend their own money? The whole point of the dom bank is that it's collective funds to be used for events.
2) Buy your flight first place with a PB at least a couple times a year outside of your fest. A chill PB will not cost you more than say, 20 million treasure (partially because of exalting money). This is a very small price to pay to keep the flight happy. It is very frustrating to be stuck in a flight because you love the lore/community/whatever but you can never expand your lair or get discounted scrolls. If your flight members know they can get their needs met at least a few times a year they'll be much happier!
3) Don't leave people on the forums out. It is sad when I see dom forums described as dead. They shouldn't be. There are many reasons people don't want to be on Discord; some minors may not even be allowed. There should not be ANY information that is exclusive to Discord. This has the added benefit of making sure everything is well documented in the forums so it's easier for new people, casual players, etc. to join in and to go back and look stuff up.
In order to pull off PBs and raffles (and especially if you want to be competitive in a battle), you need attendants who know what they're doing. Having a couple PBs every year is great to refresh people and get newbies some practice. Recording can be optional if people want to practice for an upcoming raffle. Encourage people to try attending even if they're apprehensive. You want as many as people at least familiar with it, so that when you're in a crunch, you have more people who can hop in. Make sure your attending process is as easy as possible so people don't feel as intimidated and can process dragons quickly.
Nurture your base of heavy exalters! These people are valuable and we don't want to lose them all to Earth lol. Even during chill profit pushes, have some incentives, like a badge for exalting 1000 levels or a mini raffle, or a scavenger hunt game. You can encourage them with these things even outside of pushes! I also highly recommend having a level 25 lending or even giveaway program so that it's easy for new/casual players to participate. Again, if someone even has some familiarity with coli, it'll be easier for them to jump in later when they may actually be needed.
Keep the lines of communication very open and very transparent. No hidden bank or raffle sheets. It comes across as sketch. These aren't DoD secrets, they're pixel dragons. It's okay if randos know how much money your flight has. Your flight members have entrusted you with their hard earned money and items for the purpose of putting on dom events for them, so make sure they're very aware of how those assets are being spent. Many people find dom leads intimidating. Try to alleviate that by making it seem less like an exclusive club. You want people to be comfortable approaching you and asking you things, and you want to give the impression that anyone who's interested can jump right in.
Hopefully this is all helpful! I'm sure there's a bunch of stuff I forgot, but hopefully this gives some idea of how to improve things.
Suggestions for Arcane Dom (and other struggling teams)
1) Committees for different aspects of dom
It's difficult for one person to do all the work themselves, so you will need a few people for each aspect of dom. One dom lead (or non-lead person who's super involved and okay leading a program) will be the point person for each committee. This means that any questions pertaining to this aspect should go to this person and they are in charge of integrating their part with all the other parts of dom.
For example, one person is in charge of rounding up artists and getting art made. It is their responsibility to determine when art is needed (to give artists enough time) and what art is needed for each push. They will maintain a pinglist for artists, ping them when it's time for graphics for a new push, keep track of who said they would do what, and then, say, a week out from the push, make sure everything is done and that other artists can take over if someone else flaked out.
Other aspects of dom that need a point person (that I can think of off the top of my head) include the following. Take some time to figure out what point people your team needs and what that person's responsibilities are. If anyone is no longer able to be the point person, it is their responsibility to say they need help. Sometimes two point people might be better, and some of these might be simple enough to be someone's "second job."
- Dom bank: This person makes sure the bank spreadsheet is up to date and that the flight has enough money for hosting PBs, festivals, and other dom events. They should make sure the flight has enough money for upcoming events and if not, should work with fundraisers to make sure fundraising goals are reached. The bank funds should be split among different people for safety reasons.
- Raffle team: The raffle team's biggest job will be for the flight festival and any battles. Other than that, they might host IF raffles for smaller pushes or similar. There should not be too many raffles in a year to avoid burning out this person as well as people in the flight who donate items. This person's job is to determine what prizes are needed for upcoming raffles, solicit donations, and work with fundraisers to raise funds for other needed items.
- Fundraising: There should be someone making sure the flight is bringing in money to use for future events. There are a WIDE array of possible fundraisers you can run on FR, so this person may need to work with other leads in case they need graphics, spreadsheets, etc. This person can also guide other flight members in running their own fundraisers and act as support for that.
- Communications: This person is in charge of IF/OOF communications, which includes maintaining and pinging the flight's dom pinglists as well as being in contact with DW and reserving DW posts. This person also maintains dom info threads and makes sure the links, dates, etc. are all up to date and does coding for push threads, etc.
- Spreadsheet whiz: This doesn't necessarily need to be its own position, if there's enough spreadsheet knowledge among the rest of the dom team. But there has to be someone (or ideally a few someones) who is good with spreadsheets. If your team doesn't have this, you can ask other dom teams for help. Personally, I would like to see more dom teams helping each other.
- Graphics: As mentioned previously, there should someone who wrangles artists and keeps them on track so that graphics are planned and produced on time for pushes. This person might also run foddart and/or work with skin artists for special events.
2) Scheduling and delegation
Now that you have your point people, you need to figure out what needs to happen when. Most flights already have pushes planned out, so take a look at your calendar and figure out how much time each team member needs to do their job. Let's say you have a push in 6 weeks. Make sure that the graphics and spreadsheet people get a headstart so they're not crunched at the end. Allow buffer time for mishaps. An example schedule might look like:
Week 1 - ping to announce push, ping artists to sign up for needed art, check bank status, plan and implement fundraisers over next few weeks if needed
Week 2 - fundraising
Week 3 - send reminder to artists
Week 4 - recruit attendants for PB, prepare attending spreadsheets
Week 5 - all art turned in; find replacements for missing art, code push threads
Week 6 - push begins!
So, we pinged the whole flight in Week 1. This includes invitations to help if anyone wants to participate. Over the next 6 weeks, any interested flight members should be put to work. If they want to fundraise or do art, the point people should help them with whatever they need. Now that we have committees with defined responsibilities, we can delegate more easily and determine which areas need more support.
3) Improved communications
Communications with flight members should be regular (at least monthly) as you are most likely always either planning for a push, in the middle of a push, or fundraising for a push. It's easy to set up a general dom pinglist as well as pinglists (plus Discord roles) for each committee as needed. General dom pings should include information about upcoming pushes and what's needed for these upcoming pushes, as well as any preparation/fundraising events happening in the meantime. A lot of dom stuff happens outside of pushes! If it helps, you might have a regular date for dom pings, and skip only if nothing is happening.
Make sure you have a single dom thread you can point to where all information is concisely displayed and relevant links are organized. The FR forums can be confusing, but they don't have to be. If I switched to your flight right now, I should be able to easily find your main dom thread and quickly learn about what I can to immediately start helping with whatever is needed. Make sure opportunities for anyone to help are clearly displayed.
4) Fundraising
Fundraising should pretty much always be happening if you want to be a competitive dom flight. During WvE, Water spent over a billion treasure. This doesn't mean you need to raise that much, because during a battle you get back some money through exalting, but your bank should probably be at 500 million treasure or more to be in good shape for a battle.
If you're not looking to battle any time soon, it doesn't matter as much. Pulling off a good festival raffle or a chill PB to buy first place for your flight is not that expensive. At the very least, though, you should have a few regular fundraisers so that you're breaking even. I can provide more fundraising advice if needed but each flight seems to have their own things going already so I won't elaborate more.
5) Building dom skills/morale
It's not enough for the dom team to know what's going on. Flight members should be as involved as possible too. I highly recommend these three things for morale:
1) Don't let people use their own funds for attending. I am flabbergasted that some flights don't distribute bank funds for attendants to use. How are people supposed to get involved if they think they have to spend their own money? The whole point of the dom bank is that it's collective funds to be used for events.
2) Buy your flight first place with a PB at least a couple times a year outside of your fest. A chill PB will not cost you more than say, 20 million treasure (partially because of exalting money). This is a very small price to pay to keep the flight happy. It is very frustrating to be stuck in a flight because you love the lore/community/whatever but you can never expand your lair or get discounted scrolls. If your flight members know they can get their needs met at least a few times a year they'll be much happier!
3) Don't leave people on the forums out. It is sad when I see dom forums described as dead. They shouldn't be. There are many reasons people don't want to be on Discord; some minors may not even be allowed. There should not be ANY information that is exclusive to Discord. This has the added benefit of making sure everything is well documented in the forums so it's easier for new people, casual players, etc. to join in and to go back and look stuff up.
In order to pull off PBs and raffles (and especially if you want to be competitive in a battle), you need attendants who know what they're doing. Having a couple PBs every year is great to refresh people and get newbies some practice. Recording can be optional if people want to practice for an upcoming raffle. Encourage people to try attending even if they're apprehensive. You want as many as people at least familiar with it, so that when you're in a crunch, you have more people who can hop in. Make sure your attending process is as easy as possible so people don't feel as intimidated and can process dragons quickly.
Nurture your base of heavy exalters! These people are valuable and we don't want to lose them all to Earth lol. Even during chill profit pushes, have some incentives, like a badge for exalting 1000 levels or a mini raffle, or a scavenger hunt game. You can encourage them with these things even outside of pushes! I also highly recommend having a level 25 lending or even giveaway program so that it's easy for new/casual players to participate. Again, if someone even has some familiarity with coli, it'll be easier for them to jump in later when they may actually be needed.
Keep the lines of communication very open and very transparent. No hidden bank or raffle sheets. It comes across as sketch. These aren't DoD secrets, they're pixel dragons. It's okay if randos know how much money your flight has. Your flight members have entrusted you with their hard earned money and items for the purpose of putting on dom events for them, so make sure they're very aware of how those assets are being spent. Many people find dom leads intimidating. Try to alleviate that by making it seem less like an exclusive club. You want people to be comfortable approaching you and asking you things, and you want to give the impression that anyone who's interested can jump right in.
Hopefully this is all helpful! I'm sure there's a bunch of stuff I forgot, but hopefully this gives some idea of how to improve things.