The following document presents the guidelines the community commits itself to adhere to. The goal is to create a nice atmosphere in the community for discussion, development and gameplay, and to handle disturbances transparently, following a clear set of rules.
The guidelines and rules are defined by the community for the community. They're not fixed, but improved in a continuous process, where existing rules are reviewed, new ones can be added and obsolete ones can be removed. All guidelines are published on GitHub, and everybody is encouraged to open issues and have constructive discussions about changes.
There are two types of entries in this document. The majority are guidelines, which means they are not strictly binding. However, every member of the community is advised and encouraged to stick to them.
Furthermore, there are some rules. Yes, rules can be annoying, but experience shows that in a game, some are necessary. They're kept to a minimum.
Note: rules must follow the RFC 2119 keywords. This makes it easy to identify them in this document, and doesn't leave space for interpretations. Keywords must use BOLD UPPERCASE markup to help users identify them quickly.
The language used for global project communication should be English. This language is widely used within the global open-source community, as almost everyone has learnt this language as their main resp. next to their main language.
Communication in the forum should be done in English as well, so that everyone can participate. We don't mind bad English at all, as long as we can understand what you mean.
In-game, it is recommended to use English, too. Otherwise, some players are always excluded from discussions, which they might take as offense.
These rules are the core of our in-game community. Please read carefully. Violating users may be sanctioned, depending on the severity of the violation.
The rules are used by moderators and the team to administrate the game. They serve as a playbook for moderating activities.
These rules only apply to users using the official Blue Nebula master server. They are split into player rules and server rules and moderation rules.
These rules affect everyone who is playing on servers listed on the Blue Nebula master server. Third party master servers are not goverened by these from Blue Nebula's point of view, but they're free to use these as well.
Players SHOULD use English for communication. This is the game's main language, and most players understand it. It is fine to discuss in other languages, but if there are non-speakers, please try to not exclude those by using a different language.
Players MUST respect other players. Insults are part of every shooter's gameplay and are allowed, unless they are harassing, racist or alike. Players SHOULD however try to remain calm and use non-offensive language.
Players MUST adhere to server-specific rules, unless they violate these guidelines or law (both the player's country's as well as the server's country's). The scope of these rules is ruled in the Server rules section. If players disagree with rules or they consider them to be unlawful, players SHOULD leave immediately again.
Players MUST respect administrative decisions, and SHOULD NOT try to circumvent them. Changing IP addresses to evade bans or mutes is not permitted. They SHOULD NOT start an in-game argument about actions taken agains themselves or other players (this involves changing names while being muted etc.).
Players MAY post a complaint against actions of moderators if they believe they did not violate any of these rules on the forums. Such complaints MUST be precise and there SHOULD be evidence, e.g., in the form of a demo recording or screenshots. The Blue Nebula team MUST hear both sides. Whitnesses MAY post their point of view, as long as it is objective. Actions taken by the team in either way SHOULD NOT be disclosed in public. There are exceptions for this rule, though. It is up to the team to decide whether or not to disclose them, depending on the case.
These rules apply to all servers that want to be listed on the Blue Nebula master server. Third party master servers are not goverened by these from Blue Nebula's point of view, but they're free to use these as well. Servers which connect to our master server are assumed to agree with these rules. In case of violations, they might be removed from the server using bans. However, we will try to contact server owners first and start a dialog. Bans are the last resort only.
The major goal of these rules is to make sure players, especially new ones, are not confused by non-default gameplay. Given our observations, we are concerned that this might scare off users or give them a wrong first impression of the game. We try to make sure that experiments are possible, but this is communicated appropriately to the users. Right now, only the serverdesc and servermotd are available for this, but we plan to add additional functionality to help with this.
Servers which modify the gameplay noticeably MUST declare this so it is visible to players from the server list (1) . The Blue Nebula defines a list of changes which are clearly considered as a modification. This lead will also contain items which are considered to not to modify the gameplay and therefore safe to set. This list is subject to regular reviews and may be modified to include more items. The more extensive the list is, the safer it is for both sides. Modifications SHALL be announced by the team in advance, and server owners SHALL receive a chance to change their servers. We do not require prior permission or reviews of any kind, but encourage server owners to share their work. They might inspire us to improve the game with their ideas!
Servers which host only a subset of the modes SHOULD declare this so it is visible to players from the server list (1) .
Servers which host only a single mode MUST declare this so it is visible to players from the server list (1) . They SHOULD furthermore inform users on connect (2) .
Server owners are encouraged to share experiments by adding their servers on the list. Those servers MUST declare this so it is visible to players from the server list (1) . Experimental servers MUST make sure they take appropriate measures so incompatible clients will not connect (e.g., by increasing the protocol version to a value which is higher than what is used in the latest development version of Blue Nebula).
Servers CAN set up their own rules. Those rules MUST be available in English at least. They MAY be available in additional languages. Servers MUST clearly communicate such rules to players (2) . Rules not mentioned there MUST NOT lead to moderative actions against players by any party. Custom rules do not have to be enforced by the global moderation team, however they MAY enforce them.
Servers MUST NOT act unlawfully. This just creates problems for the server owners, the players and might also cause trouble for Blue Nebula.
Servers MUST NOT spam messages excessively. Periodic messages are fine, though. We suggest an interval of at least 3 minutes.
Server-side defined text (i.e., the serverdesc) MUST NOT be offensive, and SHOULD be "safe for work".
TODO: add definition for NSFW (no insults, no sex-related words, no violence for a start I guess)
Servers MUST NOT disable the global moderation. Moderators MUST be permitted access, and they MUST be granted the permissions the master server assigns to them when they authenticate.
(1) As of yet, server owners MUST use the serverdesc (i.e., the server name displayed in the server browser) for this purpose. This description SHOULD be as precise as possible (for example: "XYZ's experimental server", "XYZ's custom server", ...). (In the future, we will add a badge system that will make this easier).
(2) Servers MUST inform users about this in their servermotd (the message displayed to people who connect to the server).
Blue Nebula hosts a global moderation system to protect regular users from abuse. Moderators are subject to special rules. As mentioned in the preamble: they MUST consider these rules to be a playbook for how to use and not use their permissions. It's a good idea to have a copy around while playing the game!
Moderators MUST only take action when players violate a player rule. They MUST warn players in advance, to give them a chance to stop bad behavior. Moderative actions are considered a last resort.
Moderators SHOULD get a demo to be able to prove their point in case there's a dispute about a specific action. This is only possible when a server has recording of demos enabled.
If more than one moderator is connected to the same servers, they SHOULD discuss actions beforehand. The rule "when in doubt, for the accused" applies (i.e., no moderative action is taken when there is no majority for a specific action). We trust moderators to be objective towards players. They MUST NOT privilege friends or similar.
The following rules affect development only. Users can skip this section unless they intend to add content to the game.
Development MUST take place in English. Code, issues, pull requests, documentation etc. need to be done in English. This is standard in most open-source projects. Developers are free to create issues for problems they've been carried onto in different languages, however they are responsible for the communication with the reporting user and need to translate questions from both sides for each other.
Code contributions MUST be licensed under the existing license (i.e., the zlib license, please see the licensing remarks in the repository for more information). All code MUST comply with the DFSG. Code contributions MUST follow a coding style. This style is defined by the developers internally, and SHOULD be publicly available.
All content (i.e., media) added to the game MUST be licensed under a compatible license, which complies with the DFSG. (This rule does not apply for existing content.)