Rules

[Coldfire]

I'll be the first to admit they look long, and they sort of are. Sorry for that. The point was to make them very thorough on each point they covered. There aren't very many of them, though. They're just bit on the longer side because of the explanations.

General
1... We only require one account per member. You may make one account per character if you prefer, but it is not required. As for account names, if you have only one, it can use whatever name you want, whether it be a character name or the name you want us to know you by. However, for simplicity, if you choose to make one account per character, please use your character’s name as the account name. As a sidenote, as long as you can keep all of them active, you may have as many characters as you like.

2... No disrespect to any member, whether they are new, staff, or established members, will be tolerated. This includes no racism, sexism, flaming, trolling, or any other manner of rude comments. Staff members are not beyond this. If you have an issue with one of the staff members, bring the issue to the attention of another staff member so that it can be dealt with immediately. We ask that until an issue is dealt with, you politely ignore the troublesome member or staff member so as not to make things worse, in case it was simply a misinterpretation.

3... Minimal swearing will be allowed, but only minimal. In no instance should this swearing be directed at another member. Swearing between characters is allowed; however, as long it is not excessive. A couple swear words now and then are not going to hurt anyone, but repetitively swearing multiple times in every post is far from necessary.

4... We don’t require any prior roleplay experience here; we really don’t care if you’ve got experience or not. What we want to see is effort. It’s a little cliché, but as they say, it’s the thought that counts, and that’s what we go for here. Of course, you can’t just post one-liners; that’s hardly any effort at all. We require a minimum of 150 words in each post. There's a word count built into the site via coding for your convenience. If you’re having trouble, try heading over to the Random Roleplay board. You can type up a post on any topic that comes to mind and is easy to write about to get your creative juices flowing. If that doesn’t help, just leave it and try again later. I’m certain the member you are posting with would prefer a quality post over one that’s filled with little things that don’t help anyone reply. If it’s been a few days, perhaps talk to the other member and see if you can’t work something out to get ideas going again. Maybe they’ll be willing to add a paragraph that will help you – you never know, so trying can’t hurt, right?

5... I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait for your character to be accepted before you can roleplay with them. Don’t worry too much over this; as long as you put effort into your application and followed all the minimums and details provided to help you fill it out right the first time, there shouldn’t be any problems. You should get feedback on your finished application within twenty four hours. You can post a work in progress application if you want, however, please keep in mind that when you do finish, we may not notice right away and it may take longer to get accepted. To avoid this, feel free to post a reply in the application you posted letting us know you’re done, and we’ll get to it as soon as possible. Same goes for pending applications – let us know when you fixed something, or we won’t know you’ve fixed it yet. Honestly, we won’t bite if you send us a message or mention something in the chatbox either. We understand the urgency you might feel to post with your new character.

6... If you have an issue with what is being asked of you to fix within your application (should you be asked to fix something) we ask that you try not to explode in anger. Handling it in a responsible, mature fashion will get it sorted out much more quickly and will make us all the more likely to be understanding as to your issue. If you just tell us that “it isn’t fair” and that your application is “absolutely perfect the way it is,” that isn’t going to help anyone. Just ask why you have to change that, if that question hasn’t been answered already, or explain to us calmly and precisely why you did what you did. We aren’t heartless – if it makes sense and it’s a decent reason, we might just leave it be.

7... We encourage you to be as creative as possible; avoid flawless characters especially. This doesn’t mean randomly give your dog wings or anything, but don’t be afraid to try something new or to suggest something to us. If you happen to think of an awesome plotline that could be used for the whole site, let us know! We love to hear feedback, as long as it’s constructive. Flaming the site helps no one and it doesn’t tell us what we should change. Constructive criticism, on the other hand, will help us improve the site, which is what we all want.

8... No powerplaying or godmodding, please. No one likes to be told how their character is going to react by someone else, and no one's character is perfect. They'll get hurt and sick and they won't be liked by everyone or hated by everyone. Life just doesn't work that way, so neither do we.


In Character
1... We all love liquid time, and it is most certainly allowed, but please use it in moderation. More than three posts per character at any given time is too much. You need to be able to keep a vague timeline, at the very least, to prevent too much confusion.

2... Anyone may lead a pack, whether male or female. However, keep in mind that there will be limited pack areas. Once they are taken, all new characters must either join a pack or stay as a loner. Loners may live in groups, of course, but there is no definite hierarchy. The members of that group may construct a pack-like base, but it is not necessary. The difference is that loner groups are, by necessity, smaller than packs. Packs can be any size, however groups are to have a maximum of five members. Dogs under one year old do not count as part of this five, however. For example, you may have a group of four loners. One of these loners has a litter of three pups. Until the pups are one year old, they may all stay as part of the group. Once they turn one, however, two or more of the group members (not necessarily the pups) will have to leave. This can be settled through any means, whether that be discussion among group member in character, fighting among characters, or just a decision made by the players themselves.

3... Pack leaders are chosen through auditions. The character must already be created as part of that pack and accepted by a staff member before the audition can be judged. Auditions will be posted in the auditions board if there is a space available and will be judged mostly on the creativity, realism and detail put into the roleplay example, though other factors will be taken into consideration. Seeing as there are limited packs, each member may only have one pack leader at a time. At that time, they are free to categorize pack members however they see fit and even make up pack laws if they wish. These specifications can change when there is a new pack leader and are specific to that pack only.

4... Any dog must be at least one year old to breed, whether they are male or female. Litters of pups will be partially decided by the staff members. More specifically, a staff member will tell you how many pups were born, their genders (which will be based on the ratio of males to females at that time), and if any have birth defects, such as blindness. There will be ways of securing each through abilities which can be purchased in the shop, so don’t fret too much. It is possible for you to have the perfect litter without anyone telling you otherwise – you just have to work for it first!

5... Fighting can occur anywhere and in any gender combination (male against male, male against female, female against female). Any dogs that are under one year old, however, while in a fight will be considered as participating in play fighting. In other words, if your dog is under one year old, they cannot fight for anything. Fights may be for mates, resources, territory, pups or pack members. Fights that have nothing to be won will not need to be judged. However, if there is a prize of some sort for the winner, besides pride, then you must have a staff member review it and decide on the winner. Fights are not structured here; no real fight is ever structured, with the exception of wrestling, so structuring it makes little sense. Therefore, just contact a staff member when you are finished. Fights will be judged based on realism, detail and thought put into posts, creativeness as well as the actually injuries each party received. There will be a very specific scheme that is to be followed so that judging by different staff members is as consistent as possible.

6... At no time are you allowed to kill another character without express permission from the member who plays that character. This permission must be sent to a staff member and clearly state that the member gives permission to your character to kill his or her character and in which topic this will occur. They must also state a reason why. A real reason meaning something such as the member has too many characters but doesn’t want to see this character adopted because there is some emotional attachment or something of that sort.