Norse_Harold's rules for 0 A.D. games

Norse_Harold's rules for 0 A.D. games
Last revised: 2021-10-09

In order to ensure that everyone has fun, here are the rules for games that I host. These rules apply to players and spectators.

Additional players who have chosen to apply these rules to games that they host: Yekaterina.

Summary

1. Get along with the other players.

2. Play the game fairly.

3. If you are a spectator, avoid disrupting the game. Also, request permission if you need to speak a language other than English in global in-game chat.

4. Do not blame other players for a setback or failure in the game.

5. Don't resign or leave early in order to grief your team.

6. If you must leave, send a global message in the game stating the reason. Don't leave too many times.

7. In team games you are expected to act like a teammate.

8. Be honest about your level of skill during team assignment.

9. Follow the Terms of Service, Terms of Use and Privacy Policy that Wildfiregames has established for lobby games. WFG terms take precedence over these terms.

10. By connecting to games that I host you agree to follow these rules.


Long Version (the binding text)

1. Get along with the other players. Do not abuse them, insult them, or yell at them. For example, the word "noob" is an insult, and it is not allowed in games that I host.

2. Play the game fairly. Do not cheat, glitch, ghost, grief, exploit, hack, DoS, etc.

3. If you are a spectator, avoid disrupting the game. Also, request permission if you need to speak a language other than English in global in-game chat.

It is necessary to have players speak English so that I can verify that spectators are following the rules, especially the rules against ghosting and abusing other players.

On a case-by-case basis, I may allow trusted people to briefly speak a language other than English in order to have important information translated for people who don't understand English well.

On a case-by-case basis, I may allow off-topic conversations if all players agree, especially if the game is paused while we are waiting for a player to rejoin.

4. Do not blame other players for a setback or failure in the game. After the game is finished, I encourage you to review what happened in order to improve your tactics. But, no one wins a blame game. There are no mistakes in games that I host. There are only opportunities.

5. Don't resign or leave early in order to grief your team. If your game crashed or your cat knocked your cable modem off the shelf, rejoin as soon as possible. After the game, troubleshoot what happened, in order to prevent it from happening again.

After a few minutes with the game paused, if you still have not rejoined then we will vote on whether to restart the game, or unpause and continue playing.

6. If you must leave, send a global message in the game stating the reason.

If you know that you will be unable to rejoin before the game is completed, you are encouraged to transfer your resources to teammates or auto-queue units with orders to continually attack an opponent. But, this is optional.

Abuse of this rule will be punished. Don't leave too many times.

7. In team games you are expected to act like a teammate. This applies even when you have friends on the opposing side. You can withdraw from defending a teammate if you feel that it is the better strategic choice. But, it's not okay to engage in passive aggression with your teammates, resign, blame your teammates, and then lie about what really happened.

8. Be honest about your level of skill during team assignment. This helps us balance the teams reasonably well. If you are playing under a smurf account and you say that your rating is 1200, but another player says that your rating is more like 1900 because you made a skilled player run crying, then you will be balanced according to the information that we have available. You're encouraged to play under your normal account. I don't plan to proactively police WFG's rule against duplicate accounts unless there is gross misconduct or ban evasion.

9. Follow the Terms of Service, Terms of Use and Privacy Policy that Wildfiregames has established for lobby games.

If any of the rules that I have established for the games that I host conflict with the terms of agreements that you have made with Wildfiregames then the conflicting terms of Wildfiregames' agreements shall prevail. If any part of the rules that I have established is held to be unenforceable then that part is removed, and the remaining rules survive.

10. By connecting to games that I host you agree to follow these rules. These rules may be revised from time to time.


FAQ

Q. Rules? This is an outrage! You can't make rules!
A. Playing on a person's server is a privilege, not a right. The person hosting the server doesn't need a reason to remove you from the server. Lookup the definition of a privilege and a right, and read about contract law. You can think of this as a contract. If you don't agree then disconnect from the game that I'm hosting immediately.

Q. How do rules help facilitate a pleasant gaming experience for everyone involved?
A. Players who want to play the game the way it was intended and help everyone have fun will usually like rules that protect the game experience for everyone. Some players approach the game with extractive goals or with intent to play a different game from what others expect. This ruins the experience for one or more other players, hence needs to be prevented with rules.

Q. I won't follow the rules that you set. What are you going to do?
A. Please don't join the games that I host if you don't plan to follow the rules. Here are some examples of punishments for rule violations.

o Kick or ban from the current game

o Ban for a period of time

o Observer slots disabled

o Depending on the severity, report of your misconduct to Wildfiregames and/or authorities for enforcement

Q. I thought we were friends! I'm insulting other players, and now you're warning and banning me?
A. If you are punished for a rule violation, it does not mean that I dislike you. Please come back after the ban expires. These rules will be enforced even on my friends.

Thanks for reading and supporting an enjoyable experience for all players.

ChangeLog
2021-10-09
o Thanks for the suggestion from PrincipalityOfZeon that some of these rules might be perceived as attempting to override the terms of Wildfiregames' agreements. Rules 8 and 9 were revised as a result.
o Thanks for the suggestion from KnightWhoSayNi and SPACECOMMANDER that languages other than English might be necessary under certain circumstances. Rule 3 was revised as a result.
o Thanks for the suggestion from Yekaterina that spectators must not disrupt gameplay with chat spam, but off-topic conversations may be allowed under certain circumstances. Rule 3 was revised as a result.
o Thanks for the suggestion from KnightWhoSayNi that there should be a limit to how long the game is kept paused if a person leaves the game without saying anything. Rule 5 was revised as a result.
o Thanks for the suggestion from AUTISTICUS that players should try to transfer resources if they must leave, and there should be a limit to how many times a person leaves on an emergency basis over the long term. Rule 6 was revised as a result.
o Rules 3 and 4 were revised for consistency of grammar, and in order to use simpler sentence structure.

TL;DR: Read the 10 numbered points in the Summary above.

Free use of this text: This document is released under the Creative Commons CC0 license, which is essentially public domain. To the extent possible under law, Norse_Harold has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to "Norse_Harold's rules for 0 A.D. games". This work is published from: United States.