0. Introduction

The following is an introduction on how to read this page and what the different parts of it represent.

Definition

Definition consists of the description of the rule in clear text. It tells you about the background of the rule, most important aspects of it and how it should be interpreted. Reading this part is usually enough to grasp an overall the idea about the rule.

Examples and extras

Examples and extras are lists of additional information about the rule, like how it is used in specific situations or in game examples that involve the rule.
This part often includes uncommon situations that didn't quite make it up to the Definition section above.
What NOT to do

What NOT to do is quite self explanatory. Here we present common misconceptions about the rule, misunderstandings and common errors that come up in reports against other players.
This section is a specific warning on what should NOT be done, breaking these can lead to lengthy bans.
Information

Important change regarding the rule or any other additional information will be added in these blue information sections.

1. Community and Forums

Definition

DayZRP is a established and mature role playing community. As such, we require our members to behave maturely, politely and with respect towards one another. This rule covers all rude and offensive behaviour that is not allowed in our community. This rule includes but is not limited to actions like griefing, trolling, spamming, advertising, insulting others, being racist or otherwise unpleasant to fellow players. Treat other players the way you would like to be treated in a role playing environment, have fun and remember that it is only a game.

Do not flame or flame bait. Discuss matters in a polite way, but do not resort to name calling, provoking or trolling other players. Show other members respect and act maturely. Offensive jokes and memes, "banter" or otherwise acting disrespectful in the community will not be tolerated. All content shared through DayZRP services, including forums and TeamSpeak should be Safe For Work.

Examples and extras

If you have any doubts about a certain action that may be conflicting with this rule, please ask a Game Master or an Administrator before executing the action.
Always follow the sticky templates! Some forums require all new threads to be posted with a filled in template. Please use those, as it makes staffs job much easier to handle. Threads not following the template will often be ignored.
Search before you create a new thread, but do not revive old threads without a good reason. Your question or topic may have already been discussed, if so it is advised to re-use the old thread if you want to post something informative. It is however forbidden to revive or "necro" old threads with messages that bring nothing new to the thread, i.e. with messages like "lol" or "i like this".
Do not poke staff members on Team Speak without a good reason. We are usually very busy and pokes only distract us from our work. The best way to get attention from a staff member if you need assistance is to join the "Waiting for Staff help" channel or send a normal text message.
Please use your website username on TeamSpeak at all times.
Read FAQ before asking staff members any questions. There is a good chance the answer to your question is already there.
No animated gifs or interactive widgets in the signatures, including embedded videos or sound.
User titles, avatars, signatures and post contents may not imitate or try to replicate official staff warnings/statements, awards, badges or other perks. They also may not mention, promote or glorify players that have been banned from DayZRP.
Custom profile fields may only contain relevant information to that field. For example, In Game Name field may only contain your current In Game Name, nothing else.
If you recognize or come in contact with banned players on any DayZRP services (including game servers and TeamSpeak), you have the obligation to report them to a staff member. Failing to do so may lead to punishment for harbouring a banned player.
What NOT to do

Do not post in report discussions with messages that bring no new information to the report or are not part of the general discussion in the thread.
Do not post in formal reports unless you were directly involved in the situation surrounding the report or were asked to by a staff member.
Do not post in ban appeals unless you are asked to by a staff member.
There are too many examples of what not to do to list here. If you question whether or not something you wish to do is within the rules or not, chances are that it's not.
2. Cheating and exploiting

Definition

DayZRP has a zero tolerance policy for cheating, exploiting or any attempt thereof. We honour all VAC and BattlEye bans. Anyone caught using third-party modifications that give you an advantage over other players will be instantly and permanently banned. This includes any other multiplayer competitive games outside of DayZRP.

You may not under any circumstances exploit broken game mechanics or bugs to your advantage.

Examples and extras

If you know someone who is using third-party modifications and you do not inform the staff team you may be banned along with that person for harbouring a cheater.
What NOT to do

Do NOT post reports about cheaters publicly. If you see someone or suspect someone cheating please contact a GM or an Admin personally as soon as possible.
3. Punishments

Definition

After receiving a punishment you are entitled to create one (1) ban appeal. If the appeal is unsuccessful no more appeals can be created or will be considered. The only way to try and appeal that is to contact one of the administrators directly and provide new information that proves your innocence.

All punishments for breaking rules are open for discussion within staff. We do not have a set standard for each rule breaking, instead we choose the punishment based on different factors. We have a standardized list that we follow, however higher rank staff members are free to deviate from it in any way they see necessary:

7 day standard punishments

Trolling
Lying in a formal report
Kill on Sight

5 day standard punishments

Bad RP

3 day standard punishments

Attempted KoS
Unreasonable demands during hostage situations
RDM
Baiting
Bad initiation
Combat Logging
Ghosting
New Life Rule violation
Metagaming or Powergaming
Punishments can only be appealed by the person who received them. For example a friend cannot post a ban appeal for you.

Examples and extras

Modifying factors to punishments include but are not limited to:

Aggravation - this can be used sparingly where behavior is truly abhorrent and the standard will not do.
Extenuating Circumstances - many cases have circumstances that can justify the removal or reductions of certain parts of a punishment.
What NOT to do

You may only appeal the most recent punishment you received. You cannot appeal a previously made decision in order to avoid receiving a permanent ban.
4. Staff authority

Definition

Administrators are authorized to use any means necessary to catch rule breakers as long as does not affect the community, gameplay, role play or community image negatively. Administrators are authorized to override any decision made by lower staff ranks or community vote.

Administrators are allowed to punish players for actions not covered on this rule page, as long as they consider the action or players behavior to be damaging to the community, gameplay, role play or community image.

Administrators decision can only be appealed directly to Rolle by providing clear decription of the event along with explanation why the decision was not fair.

Staff members receive staff strikes for not following the staff guidelines, bad behavior or other actions that may harm the community. 1 staff strike equals a 50% warning and the warning does not expire automatically. If one receives 2nd staff strike the person is automatically and permanently kicked from the staff.

Examples and extras

If you have any complaints about staff members it is best to contact Rolle directly and explain the situation. Do not create public threads accusing the staff or making assumptions without actual proof.
A player might be punished for several rule breaks, but the combined warning points will not be enough to cause a permanent ban. Administrator reviewing the case can apply permanent ban on the member regardless of that if he considers that the player does not show regard for the rules or role playing on the server.


DayZRP Game Rules

Table of contents

1. Role playing
2. Killing on Sight
3. New Life Rule
4. Power- and meta- gaming
5. Combat logging or ghosting


Updated 2016-02-01

1. Role Playing

Definition

You are required to role play a character at all times. No OOC events or communication may take priority over your role play. You may not speak OOC using ingame voice. Use the "//" prefix to indicate OOC text communication.

Your character must follow our lore and his back story must fit well within the current situation in Chernarus. The magic word is nzkogmmw. Your character must behave realistically and appropriately to the different situations you participate in.

Always prioritize role play over rule play.

What NOT to do

Do not focus on out of character gains to the detriment of RP.
Do not attack another person or group without a valid in character reason which would justify a hostile action.
Do not ignore attempts to role-play.
Do not act in a way that indicates no value for your characters survival.
Do not force another person or group to attack you to gain revenge rights.
Do not impersonate another individual or group in a way that will cause IC or OOC harm to him, his group or their reputation.
We employ a zero tolerance policy towards those who engage in racist, rape, immature or otherwise abusive role play. Such actions are grounds for permanent removal from this community.

2. Killing on Sight

Definition

Killing another player must always be justified by the role playing and the actions specified in this rule; there are several situations where you can kill another player:

You have to make contact with the target before initiating a hostile action against it. You must make your hostile intention clear and unambiguous and state each demand before you can harm the victim(s) for non-compliance.

You can take revenge for a hostile action taken against you for 2 hours from the time hostile action was taken, as long as it does not conflict with the other rules.

You may only share KoS rights when you meet both of the following conditions:

You are within 500 meters of the hostile situation at the time of occurrence
You were recently a part of the involved parties group.
Those who control the freedom of their victim(s) must do everything in their power to keep their victim(s) alive and in relatively good health. The victim(s) may only be killed if they do not comply with demands after a reasonable time or if they pose a direct threat to them.

Victims may also be executed if there have been several hostile incidents like firefights or torture between the parties in the past. Execution rights can only be used once per individual and incident. Executions do not count as hostile incidents that would be ground to gaining more execution rights. Examples of how execution rights can be used can be found in the newcomer guide.

When attempting to rescue a hostage, you must be able to contact the hostage in teamspeak for negotiations. Hostages may be killed if rescuers don't stop shooting after demands have been made and a reasonable time has elapsed.

Examples and extras

Bandits have a duty of care to their victim(s) unless execution is justified and role-played, when needed you are expected to:

Leave the victim(s) with a realistic chance of survival.
Providing sufficient food and drinks to allow the victim(s) to survive while in your care and for a reasonable time after or - if near a nearby area with food and water - you can direct them to it.
Defend them from external threats (like zombies).
Always confirm your target; if uncertain about a players identity it's better to hold fire than to risk a KoS.

Remember that just because you have KoS rights, doesn't mean you can or have to use them. Keep in mind all other rules when using KoS rights, for example roleplay taking priority over ruleplay and No Value For Life (NVFL). Think about if using KoS rights is viable in the current situation.

When initiating on vehicles it is required to use both voice and text chat to avoid misunderstandings.

What NOT to do

Do not bait other players into situations where you can take revenge for their actions.

Do not kill any hostages immediately when an attack starts.

3. New Life Rule

Definition

When you die you lose memories surrounding the event that led to your death - that means running back to your body or the area after dying is forbidden. However, you keep the knowledge about your group, friends, enemies and other people that you've met before that event.

Examples and extras

If you die, you are not allowed to return to the area within 1km radius of the location where you died before a bare minimum of 90 minutes has passed.
Do not recover gear or otherwise disturb your body or the body of those involved in the situation leading to your death.
Server restarts do not affect the NLR timer, you can not go back to the location where you died even if there is a server restart in between.
Do not take revenge for a hostile act that happened before you died, including but not limited to the person and/or group that killed you.
Do not announce "I got killed by X from Y" or "Those guys killed me last time" to your friends. Your character does not remember the events leading up to his death.
4. Power- and meta- gaming

Definition

Both of the following are disallowed.

Powergaming refers to forcing an action, condition or belief upon another player's character beyond what the games mechanics allow.

Do not force any permanent status effect on other characters without explicit permission. This includes forcing them to eat human meat, scarring them in a visible place, removing body parts or otherwise permanently harming them.

Metagaming is a broad term generally used to define any strategy, action or method used in a game which transcends a prescribed ruleset, uses external factors to affect the game or goes beyond the supposed limits or environment set by the game. Metagaming is when a player receives information that they otherwise should not have received in any reasonable role-play way.

Examples and extras

Examples of powergaming:

Telling other players they have been hurt or even killed without that actually happening in game.
Permanently killing someone else's character without their permission.
Examples of metagaming:

Using or giving any information about your killer or location of your body after you are dead, surrendering, handcuffed or have had your "radio" removed through emotes.
Using information posted on the forums, acquired in TeamSpeak or any other similar way to your advantage.
5. Combat logging or ghosting

Definition

The staff of DayZRP judge that people who log out in order to avoid retribution for their actions or as a method to avoid imminent player interaction will have combat logged.

You cannot log out when another player wishes to communicate with you. If you are already in the presence of others and need to log out it is generally good form to ask them to type their permission in direct to ensure that you are not impacting their RP by doing so. Break line of sight with those you committed a hostile act against and wait a minimum of 30 minutes from the time you broke line of sight before logging out. If there is a chance that you might have to leave the game within 30 minutes, do not engage any hostile actions against other players.

Switching between servers (aka ghosting) to gain any kind of advantage over other players or to gain items/abuse game mechanics is strictly forbidden.

Examples and extras

If for any reason the player cannot take these steps to log out, and logging out would cause a possible combat log report, it is suggested that you go AFK to avoid depriving your pursuer (if any) of their right to seek revenge for a reasonable time. However, do so with caution: being AFK presents its own dangers.

What NOT to do

Do not abuse multiple servers to gather loot.
Do not use multiple servers to position yourself unfairly for an attack on a person or camp.
Do not log into or near an ongoing hostile situation and use this advantage to interfere in the conflict.