No, I understand the principle of collective contribution. Its a very socialist approach to community resources. The system works well when those who have control are good people who can be trusted with group resources.
The trouble is, no one is above temptation. Without checks and balances, the property of many is under the control of only a few. And in my opinion that's a recipe, not only for temptation, but for abuse.
And since I'm not a socialist and do not believe in the "goodness" of people (I happen to believe everyone has an inclination to sin), therefore I will not participate in such a socialist setup. I'm not saying you shouldn't; I'm not saying no one should. I'm just saying I'm not. I believe in the free enterpise system of equal partnership.
Can free enterprise be abused? Yes. Can a socialist system be abused? Yes. There is no perfect system that going to protect a guild/legion bank from abuse or theft.
As far as ranks having access, well, that's different than just having one or two people with total access and everyone else with nothing (which is what exists now). I mean, other members of the cannot even see into the guild bank let alone take out an object or two. Right now its run like it was someone's piggy bank to distribute whatever someone else deems as 'worthy.' And I'm saying that's not a good system.
As far as having new members having total access, I would agree that further safeguards would be warranted. But limiting new members only prevents the "new" joining member from abusing the bank with whatever timelimit is set up. If someone's account gets hacked, that hacker would have all the access and privileges of that person's account and there's nothing we could do to stop that.
Now you're last point was quite interesting:
Ultimately I think (and I could be wrong) that more people will be less inclined to use the guild bank if they know a valuable blue-item they donated can freely be taken by an alt toon or a brand new member.
Here is another implied problem. If a person donates to the guild bank, then shouldn't the donation be without strings attached? I mean, the person has given an item away. It sounds like your statement above is implying that a new member of the legion or an alt is "unworthy" of receiving it? If so, then who gets to decide who is worthy and who is not to receive freely donated items? What standards will be applied before approval will be met? Who monitors the "Chief FInancial Officer" to make sure favoritism isn't occuring?
Let's apply that statement to an example: Right now, our legion has many different characters. We're young, but growing. That means we also have a variety of roles being filled, but in some cases, not much redundancy. Kan, has a great Templar. Templars are used for tanking (an important role if we do dungeons/instances). But if Kan is unavailable, do we have any back up tanks? Well, we're getting some alts coming up and some are growing in level (so there should be some in the near future). But according to the statement above, if that Templar is someone's alt, even if they are a member of the legion, they're not allowed to pick up a blue shield to help that character?
I thought the point of having a legion bank was so that we could contribute materials that would help other people? But according to that statement, the legion bank exists only to help primary characters. If you roll a level 25 Sorcerer an just discover The Elect on Siel, you can't have anything from the guild bank because you're new? Or if you roll a level 19 Templar as an alt and there's a nice level 19 blue shield that would help you, you're not allowed to pick it up because its an alt?
Sorry, but I don't agree with those kinds of rules. And hence, I return to my previous statement: No access = no contribution. And even if those kinds of rules are in place, its just simpler not to take anything even for a main character. That way I won't have to worry about offending anyone for whatever unwritten rules might exist. Just bypass the whole mess altogether.
