Quote Originally Posted by katank
I think part of it is preprogrammed. Inverness was also just a barren wilderness town for me and I kept being offered Templar guild or St.John's guild there. I rejected a few times and finally accepted but hoped that they would show up in one of my frontline castles instead. Shipping elite knights for several turns to the front is quite annoying.
I have st johns chapter houses everywhere. The way they work the more you support them, the more they will support you and offer the guild in other cities. Also its possible to get a HQ from only 1 guildhouse but would probably take forever, you'll get the HQ much quicker if have a bout 5 or 6.

As for the main topic it seems to go in sequence. If you reject one, it will offer you another one next. Also the beside thieves guild, you will most likeley get an offer for what you did most in most cases. If you asassinated 20 characters you'll get a lot of offers for asassins guilds, build a lot of merchants and you'll get merchants guilds. Ignore the thieves guiols as you'll capture plenty of them in your campaign.