Global Rules

Administration
Global Rules	Rules - Main	Silicon Policy	Antagonist Policy	Space Law	Standard Operating Procedures	Staff Policy	Policy Configuration

Summary/tl;dr

These rules apply to the Citadel Station SS13 servers, its discord community, and any other games/services we directly host.

• Github operates under the Contributing Guidelines document hosted on the codebase and is moderated by codebase maintainers, but most of these are applicable regardless.

0. Don’t be a dick, we are all here to have fun, do not intentionally ruin other people’s experience. Don’t toe the line when it comes to rules, don’t rules-lawyer to ruin someone else’s day.
1. This server is 18+. If we suspect you to be otherwise, you will be removed until you can be proven to be 18+. This is a legal requirement. Willingly harboring a minor will be punished with a permanent, unappealable ban.
2. Do not do anything illegal for you, or anything that is illegal in the United States, where we are hosted. Use common sense. (Threats of) Doxxing/blackmail/real world threats of any kind will result in permanent removal.
3. Do not spam or otherwise abuse chat privileges of any kind to flood the channel. Also, this is an English speaking server. Other languages aren’t banned, but no lengthy conversations in such.
4. Respect each other, avoid prolonged flame-wars, try to keep things civil and avoid holding grudges ad infinitum. Don’t be toxic. We do not ban words, but bigotry/racism/legitimate discrimination towards race/sex/gender/orientation/similar whatsoever is strictly forbidden.
5. Listen to admins, never lie during an admin investigation. We are here to improve everyone’s experience here, not to work against you. Do not avoid or refuse to respond to admin tickets. If you need a moment, or have questions/concerns, say so.
6. Do not exploit bugs to the detriment of others.
7. Keep official communication where they need to be - don’t DM staff outside of emergencies, use role pings where possible, use discord support tickets and forum ban appeals as needed. Staff do not make under the table deals.
8. Don’t be a creep. No means no. Don’t involve others in sexual content of any kind without their explicit OOC consent. If things are getting too heated in a sexual manner and someone asks you to use a more private form of messaging to roleplay, respect that.

Misc: - Your IP/CID are not publicly revealed. - Private roleplay logs are just that, private. Round action/attack/radio/admin button/similar logs, however, are expected to be provided for investigations to players if requested in an incident. - Your account is your own responsibility, no ‘my brother did it’. Don’t let anyone else use it, you will be held responsible for anything done on your account.

Golden Rule

• We are all here to have a fun time. Treat other players the way you wish to be treated, and remember that once again our rules are not 100% exhaustive; Players are expected to be mature enough to realize when they should be toning behaviors back to avoid ruining the enjoyment of others. Conflicts will happen, but try not to make it too personal.

Community Guidelines

• You must be 18 years or older to be here. No exceptions.
• This is an English speaking community. On the game servers especially, you must have a solid comprehension of English of around the 12th grade level in terms of US education. Other languages are tolerated but lengthy conversations should be taken elsewhere.
• This community has adult content, and there are some forms of it you may find unappealing (public displays of affection, lewdness, etc). Understand that you may run into it now or then.
  • However, we never tolerate unwanted sexual/fetish advances, and users are expected to respect requests to take said content out of public view (whether in a NSFW channel, or a private location when in the game).
  • A good measure of what content is applicable to this rule would be whether or not you/others would be comfortable saying it in a public location in real life.
  • See Rule 8
• There is no possible way to have every situation outlined in a rule book. You don’t want to read a rule book the size of a graduate thesis, and we don’t want to write one. Have common sense; Do not rules lawyer in a way that will ruin other players’ enjoyment of the game/community, or otherwise make yourself detrimental to the general enjoyment of everyone else. Toeing the line too much on a policy will be treated as breaking it.
• Evading a ban is grounds to have the ban reapplied with further penalties.

1. You must be 18 years or older to be here

This is a legal requirement due to us being a community with adult content. We reserve the right to request age verification if we suspect you to be otherwise, for any reason.

• A ban placed for suspicion that you're underage is permanent, with the only valid method of appeal being successful age verification. No exceptions.
• Actively knowing that a minor is playing on the server, but refusing to report it for any reason, will result in an immediate, unappealable ban. This will also be paired with a report to the NCMEC.
• If you are found to have been present in the community while underaged, you will be banned for as long as you have been present while underaged.
• For the above clause, what's considered time spent in the community is up to head admin discretion. As a rule of thumb, this generally excludes time spent banned for pending age verification.

2. Do not engage in or promote real world illegal activities

• We operate under United States law.
• Threats of real world harm, blackmail, doxxing (sharing non-public identifying information about community members) will result in removal from the community.
• Obey the ToS of any platform Citadel hosts its services on while on those platforms, including but not limited to BYOND, Discord, and GitHub.
• Anything linked or promoted to server-facing identity (read: your on server characters in their flavor text/OOC notes/character information, your discord profile) may be scrutinized by administrators for legal liabilities.
  • tl;dr We reserve the right to police things like linked F-List profiles, art, etc, if we believe it to be hazardous to server health, e.g. if someone implies their character is underage or links themselves to such content in any shape or form.

3. Do not spam

This applies to all areas of the community. The following is generally not allowed: - Spamming in its purest form: Message flooding to prevent any meaningful conversation - Politics/Political debates - Flooding things like sounds/visuals that are meant to be completely obnoxious for other players to perceive (“earrape”, videos of seizure-inducing images for the sake of it, etc). This applies to in game and out, if it is making people uncomfortable don’t do it. - Instrument spam counts under this.

The following should generally be treated with discretion: - Debates on historical/popular drama like world wars, mental disabilities, so on and so forth - Baiting other users into arguments to derail a conversation - Lengthy discussions regarding other servers, especially if involving drama.

We do not wish to censor topics; That is not the point of this rule. Keep some discretion in mind when talking about things that will potentially result in a long, off-topic debate, especially if people are already talking about on-topic matters in a specific channel/discourse.

4. Be respectful of each other

Remember that we are all here to have a good time as a community. Don’t make things too unpleasant for others. Keep things civil in discussions, do not resort to extensive personal attacks over a disagreement; It makes things harder for everyone involved and is the opposite of constructive.

Bigotry/Discrimination Clause

We do not inherently forbid specific words or language for the most part, but it is up to the administration to determine if you are being disrespectful. There are times where everyone can be “in on the joke”, but if someone feels offended or attacked, it should be obvious not to double down on the topic. - Bigotry, or otherwise seeking to demean others based on race, gender/sex, orientation, or likewise is not allowed. - Real life racial slurs are prohibited from usage.

Grudging

Try not to be too emotionally invested in a game - especially when it comes to SS13. The round-based nature of the game means that you have a potentially/mostly new slate every few hours at most, and it’s not worth it to be worked up for too long over conflicts or perceived injustice in a previous round, and it is not acceptable to attempt to ruin others’ enjoyment for it.

A final note

With all the above said and done, keep in mind that there are degrees of severity to these things. While we will not tolerate attempts to drive out players through toxicity, a certain amount of “thick skin” is required at some point. We are not here to protect your feelings from the smallest slight, nor to get involved in every personal argument whenever someone gets rowdy. At some point it may be better to let go of a perceived slight rather than to escalate continuously until a small disagreement becomes a boiling kettle.

tl;dr Don’t be a dick, jerk, or creep.

5. Be respectful to staff & Staff investigations

Staff are here to (try to) keep the place fun for all. In turn, we ask that you work with us instead of against us. Remember that if there are problems to contact us, rather than keep silent until things reach a boiling point. With that said, here are some things to keep in mind: - Administrators are not omniscient. Just because we aren’t doing something about some issue whether in round or otherwise does not mean we do not care. - Due to that, it is important that you bring grievances up to administrators where necessary, instead of keeping silent and assuming someone will care eventually. Do not perpetuate bystander syndrome. - However, remember that it is the administration’s job to uphold the rules, not you. You should not go out of your way to attempt to punish people for perceived rulebreaks. - Do not impersonate server staff if you are not server staff.

Tickets

• Never ever lie to administrators in an investigation. This might seem obvious, but we are going to outline it anyways. Lying makes it many times worse. Seriously.
• We should also not have to drag the information out of you piece by piece. Give the full story whenever you can to assist us in doing our jobs in a fair manner. Please do not attempt to misrepresent the situation towards your favor.
• If you disagree with an administrator’s decisions, follow it anyways and contact them in staff forums channel on discord or open a forum complaint/appeal explaining your side of the story. If you get told to stop doing something, stop doing it and dispute it in the proper channels.
• If you need a moment to breathe/otherwise collect your thoughts, tell the admin PMing you that. When we ask “do you have a minute” we actually do mean if you have a moment. We just ask that you reply when reasonably possible.

Ticket disconnections

• The standard procedure for intentionally disconnecting/otherwise completely refusing to cooperate with admin tickets/investigations is to ban the person in question until they are willing to explain their side.
  • In many cases this means the standard “appeals must be done on forums” and a discord ticket may suffice, as the reason of the ban isn’t an actual ban rather than a disconnection ban.
• Admins understand that sometimes these things can happen at random and not every ticket disconnection is intentional/malicious. Admins will attempt to wait for the player to reconnect, or in cases where possible/doable, to contact the player over discord before assuming the worst.

6. Do not abuse bugs

Do not use bugs whether in game or otherwise to disrupt others’ access or enjoyment to SS13 or other services part of the community. Do not use said methods to obtain or share private information about players/administration. Do not publicly share exploits if they are dangerous to server operation. They should be privately communicated to staff (especially code maintainers) so they can be patched.

• Obviously, there is nuance to this rule. Administrators are to consider how disruptive, dangerous, and/or malicious an act is when enforcing this.
• For example, there are occasionally funny but unintended interactions within SS13. Things like “I dropped an abstract object that should be deleting itself when I try to drop it” are far different, from say, spawning a singularity in the brig with a href exploit.
• Obviously, if an admin tells you to stop doing it, stop doing it.

7. Proper channels of communication for administration issues

Ban Appeals

Ban appeals should be done over the forums. It is acceptable and encouraged to ping the staff of the server you were banned from in #player-bulletin-board in Discord once to direct attention to your thread.

Player Complaints

• In game issues on SS13 should be immediately adminhelped regardless of an administrator being present.
• Do NOT wait until the end of the round to use in-game adminhelp! It results in more work for us and a lengthier waiting period.
• If no administrators respond to your message in a timely manner, make a support ticket on Discord or ping administrators to assist on the server.
  • It does not matter if admins are logged in, if they do not respond to your ticket after a good few minutes (especially if you ahelp again as a reminder) you should assume they are AFK and ask for someone on discord by pinging the relevant role once.
  • Do not spill in round information in a public channel. Make a support ticket using the bot in #admin-help for a private staff-only channel.
• If the round has already ended, open a support ticket on Discord and request assistance using the template.
• If the problem spans a multitude of rounds or a large period of time, it is recommended that you use a complaint thread on the forums.
  • Example: Repeated behavior that breaches server rules, or behavior that wouldn’t be a problem on its own but is when repeated to a great degree ad nauseum.
  • Ping staff in #player-bulletin-board to direct attention to said thread.

Statute of Limitations

While we are not going to state a hard timespan for when things stop being an ahelpable issue, we’d recommend thinking it over carefully when it comes to opening reports regarding very old issues to the span of above a few days, regarding whether or not it’s really worth it to pursue.

Staff Complaints/Disputes

• Use #staff-forum on Discord to communicate with staff over issues.
• Forum complaint board exists for grievances over administrator decisions in game. They will be dealt with in a timely manner by Head Admins.
• Ping Head Admins in #player-bulletin-board to direct their attention to your thread.

Discord

• If there is an issue in a Discord channel, you are free to ping a Staff role to direct attention to the channel
• Personal issues/harassment complaints should be done in #admin-help with a support ticket on Discord.

DMs

Do NOT DM administrators personally over complaints. Use the specified channel. - The only exception is if you are DMing a Head Admin over a sensitive issue that should not be said in public. - This also applies to disputes with Maintainer decisions on the codebase.

8. Don’t be a creep

We are a community with adult content. With that in mind, never harass people who are unwanting of such with advances related to such.

• OOC consent, obviously, is required for anything regarding these topics.
• Emphasis on this! If these things become an issue, administration may ask for proof that said consent was given. We do not want anyone to feel uncomfortable being here; Players should never feel pressured to partake in these things.
• If someone says to stop, stop.
• Vore is considered adult content.
• Do not involve people who do not want to be be involved in these things. In the context of roleplay, this means that if something is getting particularly spicy, you should probably consider taking it to a private area, especially if someone asks you to.
• Common sense is huge here, you should be able to tell if something is too sexual for public areas.

More information on these things will be available on the server rule pages for SS13, as there are things not as applicable outside of the game. ## Additional information

Account responsibility

You are responsible for your own account while interacting with a platform we use. This includes your BYOND account, forum account, and GitHub account. Unless we have verified information regarding your account being breached or otherwise compromised, you are responsible for all actions taken on your accounts.

Information privacy

• Administrators are expected to not reveal in general private in game details (roleplaying actions/details) or who plays a specific character without the consent of said person if it is not already common knowledge.
• Your connection information (IP/CID) is kept private other than in investigations of ban evasion involving trusted administrators from other servers considered to be trustworthy/well standing.
• The full details of Admin-pms and support ticket will generally be kept private by us unless permission is given by the person being talked to.
  • We reserve the right to comment on tone/attitude in disputes and insert snippets as needed, but it is generally not acceptable to share full text without a pressing reason.
• You may share the interactions you have with admins in the community, including full text, unless directly specified otherwise.
  • This is for transparency reasons. Discord and in game rules apply if you are sharing said interactions on Citadel servers, so be reasonable with this.
• All player appeals and complaints are publicly visible on our forums. This is also for transparency reasons
• Out of game communications with administrators over DMs or otherwise must be specifically requested by you to be private for these to apply. Administrators don’t administrate 24/7, and they are not required to treat conversations with people outside of official channels as administration-related unless it is requested and is in a DM.

In-game logs

Only verified staff have access to in game logs via in game tools to access them. Only head admins and hosts (server remote access) have raw/bulk access to logs.

• Private roleplay should never be shown/exposed to the public.
• Public in the following means an administrator can share it freely if there is a reason to, especially in the case of runtime logs which developers require for troubleshooting.
• Runtime logs are considered public. CIDs/IPs, obviously, have to be parsed out.
• Attack/Radio logs are considered semi-public.
• Admin action logs excluding the following: {notes/bans/admin PMs/adminchat/adminsay} are considered PUBLIC. Administrators are free and encouraged to hand these out on request, especially regarding complaints on admin conduct/round intervention.
• We do not hand out swathes of log information without a good reason. We may hand out parsed (IPs, CIDs, ERP/related private content removed) logs on request, especially in the case of complaints.

Age Verification

If an administrator believes a community member to be underage, they may restrict the member’s access to the community and request they follow these steps to verify their age.

For appeals of bans placed for underage suspicion, vouches from other servers are only considered if the server in question is one that's publicly known to be as strict, or stricter, than we are in regards to age verification. The server in question also has to have a history of consistent enforcement of their age verification policies to be considered a valid vouch. (Note: Very few SS13 communities fit this bill.)

All permanent staff positions are required to be screened using this process to receive their proper permissions/rank.

1. Take a single photo with all of the following things visible:

• A valid government picture ID with date of birth visible
• Your face
• Your hand-written Byond ckey or Discord tag (on a piece of paper or otherwise)

You are encouraged to black out all identifying information not required, including your eyes, bridge of your nose, and any fields on your ID that are not your face and date of birth (which are required for verification)

• Use full color fill (FULL OPACITY/ZERO TRANSPARENCY) in an image editing program to do this. Do not use blur, mosiac, or other forms of obfuscation as they do not fully destroy the data rather than transform it.

2. Submit the image to a head admin for verification, usually over Discord.

• Delete the image after confirmation of age.
• Age verification information will NEVER be saved
• We may communicate to the head administrations of other adult-oriented SS13 servers if we determine someone to be potentially underage, and if we then verify such a person is no longer/not actually underage.