A consortium of enormous Cities that survived the Burnout through sheer mass. In the decades since, their alliance has come to dominate most forms of heavy-industry. While the Clans survive with cunning and brutality, the Guild is ruthlessly methodical. 

Pre Burnout: Rillerman is a communications officer attached to a large squad/division of the US Army that is operating out of a private airstrip/airport owned by Andolous in Northwest Illinois

Burnout proper: Rillerman and Andolous join forces with several defectors to lure away their division so it gets caught up in a conflict and dissipates. This strategy succeeds.

Realizing how dire their resource-situation is, Rillerman starts contacting over surviving groups. Most notably Verdance and the Endells. 

With the arrival of Tara and the Agribine, Rillerman and Andolous make plans to transfer to Chicago— which is almost entirely uninhabited. 

2031-3, Andolous leads an effort to strip, process, and trade metal and concrete in Chicago and Detroit. Rillerman is politicking an uneasy alliance between Chicago, Omaha, Cincinnati, Minneapolis. 

2034-39 With the Hungry Years in full swing, Rillerman solidifies the Cities in a state of co-dependence. Each will specialize in a basic industrial resource: steel beams, rolled steel sheets, concrete, wire, and workable alloys from scrap. The cities will trade these resources between themselves and then with Clans for everything else that they might need.

With the creation of the WestRange Federation, the Spring City Triumvirate becomes a member of the Guild

Andalous leaves to try to develop a City in Kansas City with experts from the Triumvirate. They fail and die in a violent revolution of what will become Nexus. 

2040-45 The Guild’s industry stabilizes, but the system is increasingly threatened by Clans attacking their logistics. Development begins on the Dreadnaughts and culminates in what the Guild believes will be their salvation: crushing the opposition with super-vehicles. 

2045-53 A tightly controlled arms-race between the Guild’s Cities, which are each developing their own Genus of Dreadnaughts, and the Clans who are incubating the Siege-Companies required to compete. Throughout all of this, Formers gains influence in the command structures of most Cities, as well as a handful of the Siege-Companies— most notably the Pale Horses. 

2053-2055 Maxwell Lewis’s successful defeat of the Blue Column and Regime’s growth lead to a partial merger of him and the Guild. Many new leaders believe that they will finally be able to unite the country under a single power. 

2055-67 After Verdant Night, Formers drastically reduces their expansion-programs and the number of active agents in America, for fear of the V-Ronins, Singing Road, and Lotus Mcleer. The Guild has tried to find a working balance with the Great Clans and to maintain cultural uniformity with its Dreadnaughts. However, all of this hinges upon a continual flow of strip from the West Range Federation…