The Adventurers Guild operates in the Covenate and Silverhold, and accepts all races except full-blood elves. Guild members are excluded from Covenate restrictions from male wizards, sorcerers, warlocks, and druids in Covenate lands. However, most guild members are humans along with a few dwarves, and very few wizards or non-witch casters remain in their ranks.
For the Adventurers Guild, character levels are understood in-character. Members of the Guild are generally able to judge each other's power levels by a combination of the gear one wears, their build, their deftness, and their confidence. Character levels are recognized as in-character power levels and used to decide one's Guild rank and position in the food chain. Higher level members may not see lower level members as worth their time. Additionally, official ranks are gated by level.
Ranks are apprentice (Level 1-4), journeyman (Levels 5-9), and master (Level 10+).
Apprentices must already be somewhat skilled fighters with solid weapons and gear. Despite this, apprentices are required to work under a journeyman on all jobs until they reach Level 5 - and thus journeyman rank themselves. This is to keep apprentices from getting themselves killed while they build their personal prowess and combat experience. For an apprentice to go on a mission without a journeyman requires approval from a Guild officer (Radagorn, Balon, or Theo) who will assess if the mission is simple enough to be handled by a capable apprentice without leadership/protection from a journeyman.
Said journeymen are veteran, highly-lethal Guild warriors (and a handful of witches/mages), far above the skills and capabilities of an average fighter. Guild journeymen often bear expensive weapons and gear they have collected over years of adventures that enable them to take on smaller jobs on solo or with a single companion. The Guild vouches for its journeymen and does not give the rank out lightly.
Masters are legendary champions of the Guild, renowned across Etelel and Silverhold - currently only Guildmaster Theodore and Master Radagorn hold master rank in the Guild, though Balon Steelarm, a dwarven warrior and cleric in Halefjord, is highly trusted to lead the Guild there. It is also an open secret that Sophie Thornhallow, a highborn witch member of the Guild, aspires to achieve the rank of master one day.
Party contracts are formed at taverns; the bounty for and any loot from a job is traditionally divided in shares according to rank - one share for each apprentice in the party, two for each journeyman, and three for a master. Some parties may have other arrangements for items of power. The Guild requires dues and bars openly illegal activities.
The Guild is tasked with aiding law, order, and safety across the Covenate and Silverhold. They are needed because, in the Covenate, nobles have been weakened by wars and the Ruling Coven, and in Silverhold, a few independent city states have no common military to hold back the goblins and monsters of the Trollwild between their walled towns. Guild members always have work available in Etelel or Silverhold – scouting bandit camps, hunting monsters, escorting caravans and ships, and so forth.
The Adventurers Guild does not generally operate in Aerelen. Though the Guild and its members are not a formal enemy of the elven kingdom, non-elves remain unwelcome there with few exceptions.
Critical official jobs are assigned by designated senior journeymen, like Balon Steelarm, or a master adventurer, like Radagorn. Other official jobs and private jobs are posted on bounty boards in Guild-run or Guild-associated taverns. Additionally, Covenate Guard liaisons and officers, like Captain Hans or Lieutenant Thomas, may contract Guild adventurers with work to maintain the peace or otherwise support the Ruling Coven and its Academy for Witches. Other jobs, especially the illegal kind from wary private parties, may be conducted under-the-table - information brokers like Margaret often arrange such unofficial work on the side.
Anything openly illegal is not sanctioned by the Guild. However, as long as Guild members don't get caught, no one is interested in looking too hard at their activities - they provide a crucial service and their state employers (the ruling bodies and policing forces of Etelel and Silverhold) have no interest in losing productive mercenaries lost over a small misunderstanding. The other side of this is that many of the private parties who contract 'adventurers' do so on an under-the-table basis and are explicitly looking for thieves, sellswords, or even assassins who operate with discretion. If discretion is not exercised, however, and Guild members get caught committing serious crimes, they have no official protection from the law and may be quickly disowned from the Guild.