Purity Vanilla - Staff Guidelines
Revision 1.4 (11/07/2024)
Below is the list of rules that staff members are required to comply with. If at any point a staff member breaks one of these rules, they may be demoted or banned from the network at the discretion of the administrative team. As a rule of thumb; You should behave as though you have two separate accounts. One used for moderating and one for legitimate play. At no point should the two interact. You should finish moderating at the exact same location and in the same state as you were when you began.
Any information you have access to exclusively as a result of being staff is deemed sensitive and must not be leaked or shared with regular players. This information includes but is not limited to: player or base coordinates, player IPs or alternate accounts, private conversations and general staff discussion.
If teleporting to players for any reason other than moderating the server, you must not interact, alter or interfere with anything at a location you did not arrive at legitimately. For example: when visiting bases, you must act as though you are in spectator mode. You may only change into survival mode with explicit consent from the player. If you die or are killed at a location in survival mode you may not teleport back to retrieve lost items.
Genuine support requests should be met with an effort to help, it is important that the anarchy-style community of the server does not interfere with providing a ‘vanilla’ server experience. This carries the exception of when the player is being unreasonable, uncooperative or deliberately wasting staff time.
You may not use staff privileges to gain an unfair advantage in legitimate play to any extent. This includes but is not limited to: teleporting between locations, using spectator mode to find structures and using vanish for invulnerability.
You may not raid or grief other players’ bases. Members of a staff’s group can, assuming the location of the base was obtained legitimately (See Rule 1). In this case, staff members may travel to location of the raid but not actively participate in any way.
As a staff member, you may not engage in PvP with other players unless the opponent consents or instigates the fight. If engaged in PvP, you are barred from using your available staff commands. You must act as though you are a regular player with no further permissions.
You are required to record evidence to support player bans whenever possible. This evidence must then be shared with the banned player in an appeal ticket if requested, with some exceptions such as valid anonymous player provided evidence.
Staff Role Overview
Below are the brief descriptions of the roles of the staff team. It is not guaranteed or likely that someone starting as a trial moderator will make their way past moderator or senior moderator. It is not a progression; server administrators are chosen on grounds of exceptional commitment to the server in addition to technical competence.
Trial Moderator
Trial moderators are members of the community selected for a probationary period as a staff member, with no in-game permissions. This allows the existing staff team to make a decision on whether or not the player would be a suitable addition to the team. These players are invited to the private staff Discord area, and so are exposed to sensitive information to some degree. This makes them held accountable to Rule 1. Trial moderators are expected to be helpful and active with in the community to some extent, as well as to pass on information from the community to other staff.
Moderator
Moderators are given in-game permissions to investigate and punish players who are breaking the server rules. Moderators can teleport, use vanish, kick players and issue bans. Each moderator must be able to investigate, collect evidence, issue punishments and resolve punishment appeals themselves, with little support from the rest of the staff team. However, cooperation is encouraged and evidence for bans is shared within the staff team.
Moderators are expected to be as active as possible and committed to the community, as well as to dedicate time to in-game moderation. Additionally, moderators must be able to resolve community issues themselves in a professional nature, especially when settling a ban dispute.
Senior moderators are given further in-game permissions to help resolve tickets and community issues when an admin is unavailable.
Administrator
Admins are members of staff with technical knowledge and have unrestricted in-game permissions as well administrative access to the server itself. They are selected on grounds of both technical competence and professionalism. While they also have a responsibility to moderate in-game, they also manage and support the community and work behind-the scenes to keep the server running smoothly.
Admins are expected to be able to troubleshoot server technical issues themselves as well as resolve community issues and staff disputes in an objective manner. They are not necessarily as active in-game but are expected to be able to respond quickly to issues.
Additional information
Being a member of staff requires a level of commitment to the server. It is a voluntary position that players who have the potential to be helpful to the server may be offered. It is a flexible role; however, you will be expected to dedicate some amount of time to in-game moderation and community interaction or management.
If at any point a member of the team decides to step back, then there is no issue. However, they will still be held accountable to some of the above rules, particularly Rule 1. Additionally, if a staff member leaves the team at any time, they are forbidden from travelling to or raiding bases that existed during their time as staff. However, a previous staff member is permitted to raid or grief bases that are entirely new since they left the staff team. A previous staff member is expected to inform the current staff if they have participated in a raid as to avoid confusion over the legitimacy of the information used.
A staff member may be removed from the team if they are no longer interested in the network or the community or have lost the ability to involve themselves in it. In this case, we will always strive to reach out to the staff member to make an arrangement, however this is not possible in every case.