I have been relentlessly attacked over the last 2 weeks once my points got over 10k. I requested aid from my guild, but to my surprise, I was told they could not help me and advised I need to get better defenses (the people who are attacking me are seriously thousands of points ahead of me) or "long play" my resource buildings out so they cannot be plundered. <snip> How come we cant aid our guild brothers and sisters?
First, welcome to FoE! I remember when I first began playing and was attacked the first time. I had no idea why I was attacked, if my city and/or troops had been damaged in any way, etc. and was pretty bummed out so I do know how you feel. However, to your point, while some "rules" are fairly standard in most guilds (ie. motivating/polishing guildmates x number of times/week, etc.) others vary widely. I enjoy reading guild profiles and have seen some that state "If you attack a member of our guild, our entire guild will wreak havoc upon you" or words to that effect. In order to do that, however, members of the "avenging guild" and the attacked member's guild have to be in the same neighborhoods.
On the other hand, I have also seen profiles that state if a member is attacked they, as a guild, will not get involved which sounds like the stance your guild has and, very likely, a lot of guilds even if not explicitly stated. However, that doesn't prevent a stronger guildmate in one's neighborhood to help out if they choose. Back to when I started - I joined my guild within days of starting to play FoE and one of my new guildmates was #1 in my neighborhood with me being either last or in the last five. We began chatting just due to being in the same "hood" which turned into him becoming my first friend in FoE as well as a mentor for me in those early days. When I began getting attacked and plundered I mentioned it to him in passing. To my surprise, a few hours later he sent a message to me telling me that one of the attackers "had just lost his xyz goods." He regularly PvPs for Tower Tournament points but won't plunder unless someone doesn't put up a defense appropriate for the city's era.....orrrrrr, if someone plunders one of his guildmates.
After a couple of days one of the attackers sent a friend request to me and the other stopped attacking. We were in the same neighborhood for a long time and I was rarely attacked and never plundered while he was there but, in the meantime, I was learning the game - learning the basics of how the military units work, how to set up a decent defense, etc. I'm not always able to "collect on time" due to my schedule but having a good defense will deter a lot of the repeat attackers, especially if they lose a few units.
I don't plunder but I have talked to people who do and a few tips I was given by them were:
*DO have a defense. In the past I used the logic of "If you're going to attack me at least you won't get many points" and did not put up a defense which then defaults to 2 Bronze Age spearmen. Apparently this angers plunderers and they will keep coming back.
*Put up the strongest defense you can. Even if your army can't win, plunderers want easy targets so they can move on to the next person. Having to wait for units to heal slows them down.
*This is one I wouldn't have thought of: If you are not sure you can absolutely collect your goods on time, set them to 4-hr. intervals. Plunderers want the most goods they can get per fight so if all they get is 5 goods,
especially if they also lose a couple of units, they will pass you up next time.
My main city is still in an early age but I began participating in PvP, became better at both attacking and defending, have learned what units make the best defense per era and now my city is rarely attacked and when I am I'm not plundered. Things will get better! I found that trying to outwit plunderers was fun all by itself.