We have decided on a more fair system for warnings, for more consistence.
How the warning system works
Warnings decrease by 10% per 24 hours. An user with 10% warning or more is added to watch list, and an user with 70% warning or more is automatically muted until his warning goes down under 70.
Basic Warnings - Those are the base warning amounts, they vary according to the offense.
- Bump whacking (blaming people for bumping when it is on-topic and relevant/good) - 10%
- Bumping, if not relevant - 10%
- Excessive use of foul language (regular posts containing swearing, or a posts with too much swears on it) - 20%
- Excessive multiple posting (triple/quadruple posting, regular double posting, etc.) - 20%
- Abuse of the report system (regular and irrelevant reporting, spamming report system, etc) - 20%
- Excessive off-topic posting (regular off topic posting, ignoring moderator warnings, etc) - 20%
- Continued harassment of other users. - 40%
- Offensive behavior (including inappropriate jokes, racism, sexism, homophobia, etc.) - 40%
- Spam (includes image spam, word spam, letter spam, emote spam, etc.) - Warning depends on intensity.
- 10% for spam limited to one post/PM
- 30% for several posts/PM's of spam within the same thread
- 60% for several posts/PM's of spam within different threads
- 100% for forumwide spam. May also earn a permaban.
- Insults, flaming, trolling, threatening (including uses of racial, sexual, etc... slurs) - Warning depends on intensity.
- 40% for one post
- 80% for more than one
- Multiaccounting - 100%
- Posting illegal material (torrents, pirated material, warez, copyrighted material. Exception done for Robot Arena 1/2 copies) - 100%
- Explicit sexual content - 100%, may also earn a permaban
- Account/password foul play (giving your password to another user, trying to access/accessing another member's account, trying to guess other passwords, etc.) - 100%
Important note: Anyone who reaches 100% warning will get an automatic one month ban.
The staff reserves the right to add offenses to this list at any moment. We'll keep you updated for any new offenses that are added.
Advanced Warnings - This is added to a basic warning, and depends of your previous warning/ban status, as well as context.
- Add 10% to a (basic) warning for every warning received in the previous 30 days. This is to make sure repeat offenders will quickly be punished.
Example : Someone flames someone else, then it happens again one week later, then another week later. First warning is 40%, second warning is 50% (40+10), third warning is 60% (40+10x2).
- Add 20% to a (basic) warning for every ban has received in the previous year. Similar to the previous rule, this is to discourage the people coming back from a ban to continue what they got banned for.
Example: After a one-month ban, someone gets a warning for excessive off-topic, then one week later, a warning for a single post flaming. First warn is 40% (20+20) and second warn is 70% (40+20+10)
- +10% or -10% warning, up to moderator's discretion, depending on the warned user's behavior and context surrounding the warning. The moderator must provide valid reason for it, you may not cancel a warning with this, and this is entirely optional. This is to make the system somewhat more flexible.
Banning Rules
As said before, a one month ban will be AUTOMATICALLY applied if an user reaches 100% warning, either due to different warns adding, or by getting a 100% warning.
One month bans by getting 100% warning offenses are cumulative.
Whenever someone earns 2 months of ban in total (either by two different one-month bans or one 2-month ban) or more, the staff may consider a permaban. This will be done at our discretion, although we will communicate it to the community and the concerned member.
A permaban may also be considered in the case of forumwide spam or sexual content, regardless of how much ban duration you got, or in the case of an obviously new member getting very high levels of warning, to protect against troll accounts.
A permaban is permanent; however, after 6 months of ban, a permabanned user may appeal to the staff. After a discussion between the user and staff, and a discussion in the staff, the staff may decide to lift the ban. The user is put in a 2-month probatory period, if that user goes over 50% warning in this period, the permaban is reinstated and no further appeals are possible.
By the rules before, any attempt to evade bans (multiaccounts, accessing another account) will earn you another month of ban. Obviously, this may hurt any appeals you will be doing later.*
Newbie Protection
If an obviously new member earns a warning that is less than 30%, it is nullified and he is sent a written warning, and a link to the rules. Newbie protection protects only once, and it does not protect for warnings above 30%. Newbie protection also only applies to members that have been on Gametechmods since less than two weeks.
Other Rules
Any attempts to abuse or find loopholes this system will of course earn punishment.
Those warnings apply everywhere within Gametechmods, including the bot exchange, PM's, the chatbox. However, chatterbox is moderated differently : see the latter post for it.