Roleplaying Rules & Etiquette
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Roleplaying Rules & Etiquette
Hello! For the enjoyment of all roleplayers, we ask that our roleplaying rules are followed.
Roleplay Etiquette
While these points are strong guidelines rather than rules, we strongly advise that our members follow them. Repeatedly breaking roleplay etiquette may result in a warning from staff. Leaders may deal with those who do not follow roleplay etiquette as they wish, IC.
- Godmodding, power-playing, spotlighting, and meta-gaming are strictly prohibited. Members who engage in these activities will be ignored and possibly banned.
- The member who currently roleplays a Clan’s leader will have the final say in what occurs in their Clan.
- Prophecies and omens may not arise without the Clan leader’s explicit permission. If a prophecy or omen involves multiple Clans, the permission of all of those leaders is required.
- High ranks must be earned. In order to qualify to fill a high rank vacancy, a member must meet the following criteria:
- They have been a member of this site for at least 90 days.
- They are an active participant in this community, defined as posting roleplay content at least three days out of the week.
- They have no active strikes against their account, and have not been suspended in the past 90 days.
- They have demonstrated their ability to handle two or more active characters at the same time, without allowing any to fall into inactivity. - OOC chat should be kept to a minimum to avoid roleplay disruption. When posting OOC chat, use (), [], or {}. Please remember that roleplay threads are not chat rooms.
- If your account is younger than 14 days, you are not permitted to be a major character in any prophecies, omens, or events that have a significant impact on the plot.
- Members are allowed to have 3 active Clan characters to start. These characters may be in one Clan or multiple Clans. Dead characters count as half a character. Members may apply for more active character slots once their account is older than 14 days. Approval is given on a case-by-case basis. The amount of extra slots given is also determined on a case-by-case basis. Leaders, deputies, and medicine cats take up 2 character slots. Dead leaders and dead medicine cats take up 1 character slot, while dead deputies take up the normal half slot. Members may have as many outsiders as they wish. No member may have more than 15 active Clan characters at any time, unless explicit permission is given by senior administration.
- This site’s Clans exist in a world entirely separate from that in the books. Characters from the books may not appear, nor may any events from the books appear or be referenced. These Clans have their own afterlife.
- Cats may be straight, gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, curious, or any similar type of sexuality. Cats may align with any gender identity you wish, but may not undergo actual sex changes. There’s no possible way that feral cats could perform sex changes on each other. This includes voice alterations; a FTM cat will still have a naturally feminine voice, for example, but may speak differently to try to sound masculine if they wish. Human characters in off-topic roleplays may undergo sex changes, as long as descriptions of them are kept PG-13.
- Unrealistic appearances are not permitted. Unless your character comes from outside the Clans, they may not be purebred. Unrealistic coat colors or patterns are also not allowed. For example, a cat would not have a four-leaf clover pattern on their coat, jewels on their body, or pink fur. Eye colors should be kept realistic, as well. Kits do not have to genetically match their parents, but should look similar enough. Fertile ginger cats are allowed, and calico cats do not have to be predominantly female. Names should follow standard Warriors naming conventions. Items or concepts that a cat would not know about are not permitted for use as names or parts of names unless that cat is a kittypet (i.e. Diamond, Plane, Jewel, Dinosaur).
- Cats cannot kill other characters without the permission of the other character’s roleplayer.
- Respect the lore of these Clans’ afterlife. Spirits only ever visit leaders and medicine cats, and do so sparingly. If, for some reason, a non-high rank needs to be visited by a spirit, approval from the leader and staff must be obtained.
- To keep all the Clans chronologically aligned, everyone must follow “site time”. Days may pass independently in each Clan, but moons may not. The current moon will always be displayed on the portal. Each moon lasts for two weeks in real time. Senior administration are the only ones permitted to perform time skips, and will do so periodically to keep roleplay moving.
- Queens must be pregnant for two moons. Kits will not be apprenticed until six moons. Warrior apprentices must train for at least three moons before earning their warrior names. Medicine cat apprentices must train for at least five moons before earning their full names.
- Cats may not become queens or fathers until they are at least twelve moons old. We recognize that real cats can become parents much sooner, but given the ways Clan life works we feel twelve moons is appropriate. Cats may not be mates with a cat who is younger than twelve moons. Roleplaying any type of sexual grooming is absolutely prohibited and will result in the permanent suspension of your account. Apprentices may have crushes on each other. Kits may not have crushes.
- Queens may not have more than five kits per litter without leader permission. Leaders are forbidden from allowing litters larger than five more than once per season (four moons).
- Keep roleplay semi-realistic and descriptive. Cats should not perform acts that are incredibly unrealistic, such as dodging every attack, walking on broken legs, winning every battle, or performing incredible feats of agility or stamina, as examples. Mary-Sues and Gary-Stus are not allowed; every character should be flawed to some extent. Roleplay posts should generally contain at least four lines of roleplay. Constant one- or two-liners are very hard to work with. Please use correct spelling, grammar, and capitalization.
- Lower-ranking characters are encouraged to attend as many Gatherings as possible, but are not required to. Gatherings take place once per IRL month at staff’s discretion, and will last for two days to give everyone sufficient time to participate. Notice will be given at least 3 days in advance, typically 5-7 days.
- Leaders and deputies MUST participate in officially scheduled battles. Official battles can be organized by Clan leaders here, and require staff approval and the consent of the leaders of participating groups or Clans. Staff encourages leaders to create official battles once every other moon, but leaders are welcome to do so more frequently within reason. Battles that are entirely within one Clan, such as against a fox family, do not require official status. Official battles are always scheduled by staff, in accordance with Clan leaders, deputies, and medicine cats. We will try to find three times that work for the majority of high-ranking participants. Then, these three times will be presented to all members of the relevant groups/Clans. Members will vote on the time that works best for them. The majority time will be set.
- Lower-ranking members MUST participate in at least every other official conflict. Failure to do so may result in your characters being killed off or re-assigned. Official conflicts are very important to the overall plot, hence this rule. Official battles will last for 48 hours to provide everyone ample time to participate. At 48 hours in, the outcome will be determined based on in-RP performance. Staff will supervise all official conflicts. Each official conflict will have its own thread. These threads will be locked at the conclusion of the battle.
- If members wish to start a non-Clan group, they must apply here. If members wish to introduce a new Clan, they must apply here. To introduce a new Clan, at least 20 active members must indicate their interest.
- Upon joining a Clan, a cat must accept a Clan name.
- Coups are not allowed unless explicit permission is given from senior administration.
- If your plot is not small enough that others can avoid it if they do not wish to participate, it needs leader permission.
- A Clan kit escaping or wandering off for an extended period of time is considered a medium-impact event and, as such, requires leader permission.
- If a kit somehow winds up in a battle or other violent confrontation, that kit is not allowed to fight back. They are too small, weak, and untrained to do so. If no cat is within a reasonable distance (several tail-lengths), that kit will die.
An apprentice cannot win in a fight against a warrior unless there are extenuating circumstances (ex. the warrior is already badly injured) and both roleplayers agree. An apprentice can only kill a warrior by accident or through extenuating circumstances (ex. by jumping them in their sleep). - Apprentices cannot fight, swim, climb, or hunt until properly trained. If your character has only been an apprentice for half a moon, don’t roleplay them as if they’ve been training for three.
- Once a character has spent an adequate amount of time as an apprentice, their mentor can request an assessment from the leader. Each leader may determine their own requirements for apprentices. The leader will determine a time when they, the mentor, and the apprentice can all be online to complete the assessment. If a member fails to show for an assessment, they will be allowed one reschedule. If they are a no-show again, their character may be punished.
- An attack or appearance by an animal that is not a cat, such as a dog, fox, badger, or hawk, is considered a medium-to-high impact event and, as such, requires leader permission.
- When a character breaks Clan rules, the leader or deputy will decide their punishment. It is at the discretion of the leader or deputy to punish the offending character as they see fit. If a member truly feels the leader or deputy has made an unjust decision, they may appeal it once to the staff. Please only file an appeal if you have already discussed your concerns with the leader.
- A leader may exile a cat if they see fit. Again, if you feel this decision was made unjustly, you may appeal it to staff once.
- If a character repeatedly breaks Clan rules to the point of severe disruption to the roleplay, the staff may suspend the account associated with this character. If this occurs, the offending character in question will be killed off. If this issue persists after the member’s suspension expires, they will be permanently banned. Breaking Clan rules is fun and can create interesting scenarios for the plot, but when done to an extreme it ruins the experience for everyone else.
- In any instance where a dispute arises and the leader is unsure of how to resolve it, or is unable to reach a satisfactory resolution, they may contact staff for assistance.
Roleplay Etiquette
While these points are strong guidelines rather than rules, we strongly advise that our members follow them. Repeatedly breaking roleplay etiquette may result in a warning from staff. Leaders may deal with those who do not follow roleplay etiquette as they wish, IC.
- Try to respond to roleplays within four days. If you are participating in a time-sensitive roleplay, respect the response time set by the organizer. We understand that everyone runs into busy times in their life, and that's completely okay. However, we do ask our members to keep in mind that extremely slow responses can affect others' ability to write their characters' stories as desired. If you are hosting a time-sensitive roleplay, such as a patrol, please give at least 24 hours for each participant to respond. If you are the host of a time-sensitive roleplay, we encourage you to bump participants once if they have not responded within the established time, and then move the roleplay on without them.
- If a member does not state a bump policy in their mini profile or signature, assume their bump policy is the standard 24 hours.
- If a roleplay is listed as closed or private, do not participate in that roleplay without asking for permission first. The only exception to this is if a high rank must intervene IC for an emergency.
- Do not commit your character to a relationship with another player's character (i.e. parent, mate, mentor) and then neglect to follow through on that relationship.
- Before beginning a plot, seek the consent of all the participants. For example, if you wish for your cat to be killed on a patrol, ensure that all the participants of that patrol are aware of your intent and consent to being part of this plot. Choices you make for your characters can and will have consequences for others!
- Do not tag someone unless you are actively roleplaying with them or need to get their attention for some other reason.
- If there is an established posting order or prerequisites to meet before posting, follow them. For example, you may not have your cat participate in a Gathering until your Clan's leader makes an arrival post.
- While we do require that all members make an effort to post at least four lines of roleplay per post, everyone may have different styles of roleplay beyond that. If you do not like someone's roleplay style, it is within your right to not roleplay with them. However, we ask that you be respectful and polite about it.
- When roleplaying characters with mental disorders, disabilities, or other ailments, please do your research first to ensure those characters are being portrayed sensitively and appropriately. Staff may intervene if we feel a character is being portrayed in an insensitive manner, whether intentionally or not.
Cherry~- Site Owner
- Posts : 39
Join date : 2022-09-08
Age : 23
Sapphireshine likes this post
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