Rules

These are the rules for the server and are subject to change without notice. For further clarification, also see the guide to Not Getting Banned. If you did get banned, there's probably a good reason for it, but if you disagree, you can always appeal your ban.

If you disagree with the rules as they currently stand, talk about it on the forum and maybe we can improve them through some healthy criticism and debate.

First and foremost; If you see something, SAY SOMETHING.

That means if someone violates these rules or otherwise negatively impacts your experience as a player, you are obligated as a player to speak to an admin as soon as possible, because we're not going to be able to practically respond to an issue that happened a days ago. We have plenty of active admins who can be contacted through Skype, Byond, our chatroom, and the forums.

You must be 18 or older to play

No exceptions. Even normal Space Station 13, you're supposed to be at least 18 to play many servers. No one else really enforces that, but we do.

This extends to underage characters. Do not attempt to play a character who is a child. The game's character minimum age is 17, so saying you're any lower than that will result in an immediate and permanent ban until you prove you're of age.

Obey the global rules.

The global rules are on the forum, because they cover all interaction in the community, even outside of the server.

Click here to view them.

If an admin says "refer to rule" whatever and what you find here doesn't make sense, try checking this link.

Basic common sense stuff that shouldn't need to be written

• Don't grief or troll or abuse memes. You know what this means. Don't play stupid.
• Don't break into places for no god damn reason / because you're just bored. Have an actual reason. At least be wanting to steal something worth selling. Jeeze.
• Don't randomly kill people (RDM) for no good reason. Vore is a notable exception obviously.
• Don't pressure or force people to RP in vore or sexual scenes they aren't OOCly okay with.
• Don't vore or attack someone without RP unless both parties agree to battle (or at least imply it, like a suspect running from security or resisting arrest).
• Don't powergame (having an unrealistic advantage, or abusing game mechanics to immediately robust someone while they are trying to roleplay normally).
• Don't godmod (pulling advantages out of nowhere, or ignoring disadvantages).
• Don't metagame (using OOCly obtained knowledge ICly, or telling in OOC things that happened IC during that shift).
• Don't metahate (abuse of overblown IC motives to justify picking on the OOC player behind a character).
• Don't do other dumb shit that would make people view you as a toxic player. For example, if you play asshole characters, balance it out with likable characters.
• Don't abuse global OOC with off-topic nonsense. Keep discussion in global OOC both brief and relevant, as no one wants to hide it to avoid nonsense because it's an important communication tool on an ERP server.
• Don't make stupid characters who completely don't belong in our lore (Pokémon, overpowered ex-spetznas, MLP, kitsune with magic powers, etc.)

That sorta thing. Basically, don't be an asshole.

There's probably more that could be listed, but that's all we can think of for now. If you don't already know what bad behavior looks like, you'll get a fair warning if you can't find a specific rule covering it, but make a note to remember for the future. The guide to Not Getting Banned expands on a lot of these but should not be taken as an official rulebook if it contradicts anything here.

There will always be things that are too obscure to be written down. That doesn't make them okay. If they disrupt roleplay (breaking character) or make the server not fun for everyone else, then it's probably not okay. The universal rule is don't have fun purely at someone else's expense. Every shootout, every robbery, every murder, every fight, every threat, every conflict should have some interesting quality about it to redeem it from otherwise just being shitty. All server rules and policies are based on this philosophy. If you can't have fun without intentionally making someone else's time shitty, you're not welcome in Vorestation.

If you somehow end up being one of those people who continually pisses people off but somehow constantly evades the rules, you'll be given a last warning to knock it off (because at that point we're sure you're either doing it on purpose or incapable of feeling empathy), and then you will be banned if it continues even still.

Roleplay until roleplaying stops being feasible

This rule is always difficult to explain but it's pretty obvious when it's being broken. If someone charges into a room with no words, no emotes, and no reason, and starts attacking someone, they are probably breaking this rule.

Game mechanics are meant to enhance roleplay, not overshadow it. Most of the time, interactions can be roleplayed, including combat. However there goes the old saying that "YOU CAN'T DODGE BULLETS!" which is still true, and no one is going to expect you to suddenly hold still and type out a lengthy response while an assistant is actively beating you with a toolbox.

Security is the job type most likely to run into this rule often. It's not against the rules to just run away from security, but it's also not against the rules to no-RP-robust their ass when you catch up to them. Otherwise, if you have to use your weapons, use the "aim" mechanic first, or at least roleplay up until the point where you go, "Okay, fuck it," and stun them in the ass with your baton. If your target still tries to flee while you're aiming at them, then you're not breaking the rules by shooting them. Keep in mind they are not disallowed from trying to attack you either in an effort to get away.

In the case of antagonists (who are usually played by trusted players or admins on Vorestation), they will usually give a deliberate warning shot and miss, to signal that the engagement should be fought with robust mechanics. At the very least, in the case of melee enemies (like Xenomorphs), they will roleplay before charging.

As with all IC interactions, the scenario has to be believable and realistic in the first place. Attacking others for no good reason is still covered by other rules.

OOC notes are required

When in the character setup menu, click the OOC notes button to include preferences about whatever you dislike and will never play with that character. We assume everyone in V.O.R.E. has generally open preferences but respect any particular dislikes someone might have.

Filling your flavortext is nice too but not required as badly.

If someone you are roleplaying with failed to include OOC preferences in their OOC notes or flavortext, then you can safely assume they are open to anything vore-related. (This doesn't mean ignore them if they speak up in LOOC to say they are not comfortable with the scene, obviously. That breaks other rules.)

If your ERP preferences are violated, say something

ERP stands for Erotic RolePlay. Your preferences are anything you say "do" or more importantly "do not" in regard to ERP. Everyone who plays on this server comes here with the knowledge that it is a predominantly vore themed roleplay environment. While we allow other kinds of play, they aren't the focus of the server. Within the vore mechanic, if your OOC preferences are being broken, there is a button called OOC escape. It's your safeword and your lifeline if you end up in a situation you genuinely, OOC, do not enjoy, and your partner is ignoring your OOC complaints to change course or stop. You, as a player, have the ability to get out of any situation within this last-resort mechanic at your fingers. However, it is also your responsibility to make sure that people know where your limits stand. A little heads up before the scene starts can save a lot of headache in the long run. If someone repeatedly, and deliberately violates your preferences, however, don't hesitate to bring this to an admin's attention.

If you aren't into vore at all, find another server. Everyone in this server assumes everyone involved is okay with vore. If you're not okay with playing predator or prey, or at least enjoy watching, then that's not fair to other players who are expecting everyone to be into vore in some manner or another. If you can't tolerate any kind of vore, why did you come here to begin with? And please don't tell us it's because we're the only ones who allow ERP. You can make your own ERP server. Nothing is stopping you. You don't even need our script to do it. We'll even help you.

This rule doesn't mean players can deliberately eat you because you're "violating" the rules by being non-vore only. That will get them punished through backseat admin rules.

Also, OOC kink-shaming of any kind will also be punished.

Do not log out in locked dorms

This is self explanatory. Those rooms are for smut. Not your personal AFK box. Don't be a dick.

Three strikes of repeated abuse will result in a day ban. Three more strikes will be three days. Three more days (total of nine) will be a week ban so we can be absolutely sure you get the message. Admins will keep track of offenses with playernotes and will attempt to contact you when it happens, but since you logged out, there's no guarantee we'll remember to poke you when you're next online.

If you get banned for this, it's really easy to appeal. We only want to make sure you actually read this damn rule so you know to obey it.

Stay in your own department

It's viewed as powergaming if you're doing jobs that you weren't asked to do, and godmodding if you shouldn't know how to do them at all. This applies to career assistants especially. If you knew how to do surgery or start the supermatter or build robots, you wouldn't be an assistant all the time. At least have the Head of Personnel change your job first.

Also don't go rushing to do someone else's job if the department in question has active staff. It's not fair to them if you deprive them of the job they signed up to do, even if you do have access and you do know how to do it. (E.g. Captain chasing down criminals despite a perfectly capable security staff.)

This rule is more loosely enforced during emergencies or when powering the station at round start, but still don't get involved if engineering has people--even if they fail to do their job properly. Just complain to their superiors in-character, or alert an admin out-of-character. They may be busy with things.

At least try to do your job!

If you're not in a vore scene, keep yourself busy by doing your normal job.

Vore isn't the only thing that happens on the server. If you habitually join as jobs beside assistant and don't perform your job's most basic functions, you'll get job banned because it hogs the slot from people who actually want to do the job. For example: An Engineer who doesn't start the engine or set up solars and instead runs straight to the bar for scene hunting is probably breaking this rule. On the other hand, if you got ambushed and ate before finishing your job, then that's just life on VORE and everyone will have to live without power for a bit. Just be prepared to answer admin inquiries.

In the event of something serious going on that directly pertains to your job and no one else can currently respond to it, like you're the Chief Medical Officer, and someone is bleeding to death in the lobby while you're banging the only nurse on staff that shift, you should probably zip up your pants and go help the poor bastard who's bleeding to death. You can always go back to your scene. As a rule of thumb; the higher up in command you are, the more responsibilities you have. Be prepared for them.

That being said, please don't join as an assistant all the time to avoid all responsibilities. The whole station becomes stagnant and boring when no one is doing jobs. What makes VORE Station more attractive of an option for RP than a chatroom is because there's so much to do besides vore and smut. Work together and do something interesting. Your job shouldn't make it impossible to do vore, but if you're not eating/being eaten, don't sit in the bar doing nothing all day. You're hogging job slots which is unfair and not realistic.

Don't complain in OOC when your actions IC get you in trouble

In-character actions have in-character consequences, and going out of your way to get a reaction from other crew or security means you will get a reaction out of them. So if your own shenanigans gets you in trouble, that's your fault. For non-vore crimes, if you think you have been excessively or unfairly punished or retaliated against, use adminhelp, or preferably play it off ICly and contact a lawyer, other security, the Captain, or CentCom. If your complaints reach the admins and they don't think you were treated unfairly, then you probably weren't treated unfairly, so stop complaining. Or just don't complain in the first place and enjoy the ups and downs of roleplaying in a fictional world.

Naturally, vore-related crimes are excluded from this rule - you should be granted OOC leniency if you get brigged for a vore crime. In-character, you'll still be punished as normal, but out-of-character you are entitled to a time-skip (E.g. Space Law says 60 minutes in the brig, but you really spend only 5 while everyone RPs like it was the full 60 minutes). Also we won't ever permanently fire or execute a character for eating someone, and someone trying to enforce the death penalty on you--or permabrig you--for doing vore, and you're not okay with that, then that someone will be punished by the admins for breaking common sense rules.

Don't call for help if you don't want it / Don't deliberately interrupt ERP scenes

If the victim isn't calling for help, and it's not in a public area, don't be a white knight by getting involved. Security is allowed to force scenes to move out of a public area and into a dorm, or at least into their own department, but until someone calls for help security may not stop a scene entirely. Unless security can prove a crime is happening, they aren't allowed to interfere, and this is already true for all laws under code green.

If you walk in on a scene anywhere beside the dorms, security and other staff have every right to ask questions without needing to seek OOC consent from the predator's player.

It's not very realistic for all crew to be expected to turn a blind eye to someone else's suffering, so here's some advice to avoid awkward situations like that:

• If you are predator, try to steal your victim's means of communication (headset, PDA, making them wear a gag, tying them up so they can't struggle) so they can't summon help, and don't brag about your catch if you don't want to get caught.
• If you are prey, ask your predator OOCly if you have the capability to call for help. If your predator was smart enough to take your gear away, this should only apply if someone accidentally stumbles on your scene.
• If you are prey, don't pull some hidden weapon out of your backpack and start stabbing the shit out of them from inside. If you have a weapon, or you choose to try to resist being eaten in that way, roleplay each attack until your predator gives up or you succumb.
• Don't whine if your bragging (as pred) gets you in trouble, or calling for rescue (as prey) makes someone actually try to come rescue.
• Try to actually be clever and stay hidden as predator. It's really awkward when someone stumbles on a scene by chance, so at least have a good convincing lie prepared, or use a room like a fire closet or abandoned room or other low-traffic area. If the scene is supposed to be a quick grab and gulp, you can ask anyone catching you to give you some time to progress the scene (since typing is slower than game mechanics) but avoid making them let you get away with it entirely. You still got caught after all and it's no fun for them if they're forced to turn a blind eye when it breaks character.
• If you see an unwilling scene with xray vision or thermals, you're already violating NT's privacy laws, so just keep your mouth shut because you'd rather not lose your job over it. CentCom doesn't care if you were saving someone's life because CentCom is run by cold and unfeeling bureaucratic assholes.
• If you're the AI, unless you see blood, you have no reason to assume anyone is being harmed. Follow your laws normally. If it still annoys you, you can nag the predator if the prey hasn't been scanned and call it accident prevention.

This should be painfully obvious, but just in case it isn't, if you are OOCly not enjoying the scene, and it involves ERP, then you should say something in LOOC and ask it to stop. If that fails, call an admin. This is a situation where OOC rules have been broken and admins should be alerted--not have some security officer play backseat admin for you.

As a recap: Security is absolutely allowed to intervene in unwilling scenes. If the victim is calling for help, no matter where in the station it's happening, including private dorms, Security can interfere. If the prey isn't asking for help, don't fuck with the scene. It's that simple.

Remember, if you OOCly don't want the scene at all, you should say something in local OOC. That is covered by common sense rules.

This is all further elaborated upon in the Guide to Vore.

Don't mess with disconnected or AFK players

Under normal circumstances, do not harm, vore, or otherwise inconvenience a character whose player is AFK or disconnected entirely. There are some exceptions to this rule and here's what they are. If you cannot find your exception here, don't mess with them.

• If they've disconnected more than 10 minutes, you can put them in cryosleep. If you do that, take away all of their belongings except for their jumpsuit, shoes, ID, and PDA, and return everything else to its rightful department (or don't, and risk trouble with security).
• If they committed a crime, jail them as you normally would and conduct their sentence even if they aren't connected. 20 minutes in the brig is still 20 minutes in the brig.
• Some players like to put notes in their flavortext to indicate that they're okay with getting devoured while AFK or offline. As long as you don't break these preferences, it's okay to do things to them.
• Emergencies will bypass this rule, such as taking the Captain's ID to call the shuttle because the supermatter exploded while the Captain was offline.
• When it comes to vore, this also applies to the dead or abandoned bodies of player characters. If the person you're eating is or was someone's character, OOC consent is required to eat them.

Experience is required for any head positions

If you demonstrate you lack at least a reasonable amount of experience, such as a Chief Engineer unable to start the engine, or a CMO unable to do surgery, you will be job banned from the position until you gain that experience.

The higher up the chain of command, the more scrutiny you will get. Therefore, Captain is the easiest to get job banned from. So do your job well, or play another job. Don't take a job just for the access it grants.

Don't avoid RP (unless it violates ERP preferences)

Although you can OOCly speak up if an RP makes you uncomfortable, don't abuse this privilege (eg: cryosleeping or going 'ghost' at the first sign of any trouble with security, or when the response you got from provoking someone isn't what you planned). The privilege to say "NO" is reserved for preventing vore or sexual scenes you don't like. Nothing else.

Being arrested and put into a cell and getting bored so you disconnect until your sentence is over is fine. You are not required to be online for the sentence. I'm talking about things like, you punched a security officer, and now you're trying to pretend the officer arresting you doesn't exist, or you ghosted the moment they grabbed you.

For everything else, power through the bad because you can use the bad for interesting character development that you'll later be grateful for.

Non-believable characters and fan characters are not allowed without approval from admins

Any time your character, or their actions, make absolutely no sense in the context of the situation. This can range from having magic powers to fearlessly charging into a battle you didn't need to fight armed with a kitchen knife when everyone else brought mechs. This rule includes 'fan characters'. Do not play characters from other published fiction that you yourself did not create. Only play characters you own, or created.

In a related matter, the phrase "It's what my character would do!" isn't a viable excuse to avoid punishment if you're constantly getting into trouble with security or otherwise being a constant twat. Maybe it's what your character would do, but you know what CentCom will do? Fire you. Eventually CentCom is going to decide you're a liability. That means you will get barred from using the character, and even banned from the server if you ignore this rule with multiple characters. Avoid characters who are suicidal, violent, the not-funny kind of incredibly stupid, or criminals who keep getting caught (meaning everyone knows you did it, not necessarily that you got jailed for it). CentCom wouldn't allow these kinds of people aboard the ship. Avoid doing things that would get you very quickly fired, because if you don't have a good reason for your actions ICly, it's liable to get you banned. Even if you do have a good reason, then you have to avoid getting caught.

If you're smart/clever enough to make a character who can do naughty things without getting caught, then this rule doesn't really apply to you. Just don't break the station. Or the people on the station. The rules don't say you can't be a troublemaker. Crimes on the workplace are very believable and common in real life; especially stealing. If you get caught though, you're going to get in trouble. So don't get caught! Or at least put good effort into not getting caught.

"But people eat other people on this station! How is that believable?!" Because it's normal on this station. How is Bluespace believable? Because suspension of disbelief, smartass.

Powergaming also falls under this rule. Nanobots, super strength, special powers, magic, having no fear of injury or death (unless it's willing vore obviously), none of this is allowed. Admins sometimes make exceptions for events, but that's about it. As a general rule of thumb; if you can't reasonably emulate what you're trying to do with the game's mechanics, you probably aren't allowed to do it as a character.

Lunatic characters are also covered by this rule. If you're going to play a nutjob, at least don't play a violently psychotic nutjob. Threatening to murder crew or harm other characters, or damage the station for no good reason other than "lol I'm crazy" all fall under this rule. You're not going to stab someone's eyeballs out over spilling your drink unless there was a lot of crazy buildup to it.

Bizarre names are also not allowed unless they have some backstory to go with them. Pun names are fine depending on the gimmick of your character, but a name like 'Cyber Sun' or 'Napalm Burns' or 'Dark Shadow' are really not good names and an admin might ask you to change them. If it sounds more like an edgy screen name than something you'd name your child, it's probably a shitty name.

For more information check out Character Creation.

Don't hog job slots (suicide / AFK forever)!

Players who suicide for stupid reasons, abuse the ghost function for stupid reasons, or disconnect/AFK and never come back, are at risk of being job banned. If you're getting off and don't plan on coming back at least put yourself into a cryopod, the residential elevator, or the teleporter to leave the station.

Assistants are granted some leniency, but all other jobs have limited slots, and if they fill up, and we find multiple people AFK, we're going to hand out job bans.

If you stumble on a player who has been disconnected longer than 30 minutes, help them out by shoving them into cryo.

Don't backseat admin

Threatening players with calling the admins is punished harshly. If you think they're doing something worth calling an admin over, then call an admin. Don't beat around the bush by trying to use it as leverage against them. That does nothing but stir up unnecessary conflict.

Forming an angry mob to kill suspected griefers also counts as this. Obviously if you just watched a dude kill Ian, that's IC justification to go lynch them, but don't go murder some assistant because you thought he was part of a raid attempt, or jail a player because you think he's ban evading, etc. Even when you decide to go punch an unconscious character because you know the player just got banned, don't be surprised if an admin mistakes you for being part of their troublemaking and ends up banning you too. All the admins see are more attack logs and you beating up a player who isn't logged in anymore, which breaks at least a couple of rules.

Saying "I don't know if that is allowed" or "I think that is against the rules" doesn't count toward this. That's just informative. This rule is for abusing the rules to threaten players, or try enforcing rules by telling everyone to bully them or killing them or ranting in OOC "YOU BROKE THE RULES!"

Forcing unsolicited opinion into player-admin discussions where you're not involved is also considered backseat admining. If a player is being warned/punished for rulebreaking, we don't want you jumping in to try to defend them. Unless you were directly involved, you likely don't have enough of the full story.

Don't abuse the 'Vote' function

Players are allowed to call votes for shift end or server restart under the following circumstances:

• The station was griefed/glitched badly enough that the server can't be played, and no admins can be called online to fix it. (Try calling us first via Skype please so we can investigate suspected griefing.)
• It's the middle of the shift (1 hour after start/before ending) and there's less than 10 players online. This usually means the server is in or at the end of its lowest population time between the hours of 2AM and 9AM EST.

Otherwise, please do not abuse the vote function. Players are often unprepared for a restart vote in the middle of the shift, which can create unfair results. Admins may cancel votes at their discretion.

Don't abuse the 'Ghost' function

Don't ghost out of your body without already being dead or being in cryosleep. If you're in the process of dying but want to get it over with, type 'succumb' into the chat box. If you're actually dying, it'll finish you off. Abuse of the ghost function will result in job bans.

Don't abuse the OOC channel

The global OOC channel is not for idle off topic banter. Telling someone to mute their OOC is not a valid excuse and you will more likely be punished for being inconsiderate if you tell people to mute OOC so you can spam the OOC chat with memes.

Global OOC is for things like...

• "Hey, I was typing and so-and-so ran off. Can so-and-so come back?"
• "Be right back." / "I'm back."
• "Is this machine supposed to do this? This seems like a bug to me."
• "Anyone interested in doing a foodplay scene with a hungry Unathi? ;)"

For idle banter and joking and memes, use the chatroom or LOOC and not global OOC. For serious discussions that you want input on, ask the forums. For anything that seems broken or could use improvement, use Github. For any problems you have with other players, use adminhelp or contact an admin through the forum PM system.

Admins should avoid OOCly handling issues they are ICly involved in

Here's an example of this scenario: An admin is playing John Doe. John Doe is beaten into crit by a rogue security officer Marty Stu, whom the admin believes to be randomly attacking people for no reason. However, the player behind Marty Stu believes he has good reason to attack John Doe. John Doe's player, who is an admin, disagrees. For whatever reason, the admin player of John Doe believes that Marty Stu's player should be punished for his/her actions.

Unless the admin is the only one currently in-game on the server, the admin should immediately contact another admin to join in and oversee the situation, so that it can be discussed without bias. The new admin should treat the other admin and the player as if they were normal players. Any rulebreaking should be dealt with as usual. In such cases where rulebreaking is found on behalf of the admin, a superior admin should be contacted immediately for handing down punishment, as equal rank admins cannot ban one-another due to serious problems that might cause. The head admin should also be informed of the situation and its outcome.

Admins may act based on their judgement, even if it's not explicitly in the rules

Just because something isn't written down doesn't mean "it's allowed" or "it's okay" if it ends up disrupting RP for other people on the station. This is just all the stuff we could think of. If you don't like an admin's orders, comply for the time being and contact another admin as soon as possible for a second opinion. Admins are also at liberty to judge what is an "overpowered" character. If it results in a ban, you can always appeal. It's not impossible that the admin was being unfair.

If you feel like anyone is being abusive, please speak up

Try telling the offending individual first, or tell (other) admins if you don't feel comfortable telling the offending individual directly. In both cases, do it privately. Yelling over global OOC will probably get you banned and then further embarrassed when you find out you didn't know the full story behind the other party's actions.

For example, if it's Ace you have a problem with, and you're not comfortable speaking to him directly about what you're upset about, you can contact another administrator like Joan or Ultimated or whoever else to get your point across. Just because he's in charge doesn't mean he's deaf to the good advice of his subordinates.

For everyone else, follow the directions in this forum post.

Realistically, if three or more admins have the same consensus, you're not going to win. Cut your losses if it gets to that point and accept that you probably screwed up or go find another server if you decide we're still wrong.