Contacting DMs

Any player can get in situations when there will be need of an assistance from a Dungeon Master (DM). Remember to always keep your requests polite and be patience when asking for assistance. You can request assistance, report rule breaks, offer compliments and recommendations, or ask technical or story questions.

In Game

You can send a message to the DMs in game by switching your chat to the DM channel, found by clicking the box to the left of the text bar. You can also type /dm prior to your message to send it to the DM channel. If you are looking for assistance, it is also recommended you turn on your DM Badge via the text command -badge dm so you are flagged to be reached out to.

In Game contacts are best for the following:

• General Questions.
• Rule Clarifications.
• Character issues. (Bugged Crafting Points, etc.)
• Informing the DMs prior to a Raid
• Head model PC edit
• Tail/Wing (For Tiefling/Red Dragon Disciple/5%).
• Requests to spruce up an outing or occasion. Remember a DM may not be available.

Please remember DMs are not DEVELOPERS. Suggestions about areas/content should be posted on the forums. Make sure your messages are clear, polite, and to the point. Make sure to state what you need assistance with or as much context as possible in a single request. For a few examples;

Note: Players will not see the text appear in Chat window, since only DMs can see what is written on DM channel.

It is preferred to include reason for request in your short message.

Examples

Good Examples, Short and clear for intended purpose;

• "Hello there, I was hoping to get clarification on the Be Nice rule, I might have witnessed something strange! It involves the character Bilbo Baggins and Fox McCloud."
• "I'm stuck in a wall on the Surface Server in [Name of area]."
• "This character is headed towards the Cordor Iron Mines with a party if a DM is available to partake and add some fun."

Bad Examples, vague and unhelpful;

• "Anybody there?"
• "Anyone got a few minutes?"
• "I just got killed! I'm angry!"

DMs will deal with the requests according to their urgency and how long each requires. For example: "Stuck in wall", rule breaking and "quick question on alignments" would likely be handled before PrC quest. If player gets no reply, then it is recommended to try again in 10-30 minutes. Keep in mind that no DM can be online at that time or that they can be occupied with some other of those 74 players on server.

"If you have a legit DM question, "I am stuck", "My fixture is stuck in the wall" and such, just keep trying, every ½ hour or so. It will not be considered spamming the DM channel. It's our job to fix those issues. If we are on, we'll normally answer if we got time or not." - Qizzia

Be patient. Especially if asking help with a complex situation or a minor request. It may take few days before they are completed. Contact over the Astrolabe Help Page is encouraged for most issues you are unable to reach out for a team on a particular day.

Astrolabe

The Astrolabe Help Page is generally the best method for official communication. Do give the team time to respond, upwards to a week depending on the topic, before requesting an update. Tickets are used for automated systems which DMs can fulfill remotely using staff tools, making these generally quick and streamlined. If the opinion you are looking for is not under New Tickets, instead use the New Request/Report button instead. Further options are available, from questions, general requests, and reports. This requires you to login via your forum account to use, with the same username and password as the forums.

• Use the File Upload for adding screenshots. External hosting is not always reliable.
• Use the drop downs to pick the subset of the report, and fill out the subject line.
• The Description section comes prefilled with useful formatting and information.
• Reports regarding Rule Breaks or other violations.
• Event Requests, inquiries, updates particularly those requiring more work.
• PRC application requests.
• Player praise/RPR watch.
• Ban Appeals.
• Concept Questions.

Support Ticket

Many requests have been automated via the Support Ticket System and are generally faster for DMs to handle.

• Retake a level
• Alignment Shift
• Redeem Class Token
• Change Soundset
• Change Portrait
• Name Change
• RPR Evaluation
• Relevel Token

Writing a Good Incident Report

To help us on the DM team be able to quickly and efficiently investigate reported rulebreaks:

• Screenshots can be very useful, but DO NOT use Discord-hosted screenshots in your report. Discord is not designed as an image-hosting service, and these links break quickly. Use the image upload option. Put another way: if you send all your evidence in Discord-hosted screenshots and we can't completely resolve the case before the link expires, we no longer have any evidence!
• Provide approximate dates and times with your timezone. Time doesn't mean anything without a timzeone.
• Provide specific location information when relevant. Use the "-area" command to get the name of the map you're in.
• Provide a list of character names for everyone involved, including your own. Disguise names are fine.
• Provide context when relevant. A one-off encounter between strangers can be quite different than the tenth encounter in a feud.

You do NOT have to have all of this information to submit a report, and we do look into every report that is submitted. But the more of this information you can provide, the less time it will take for us to get a complete picture of what happened, and the more likely we will be able to respond accordingly in a timely manner.

Poor Examples

A) I was wandering around with some friends when a group of orcs attacked us and killed us without provocation.

B) The screenshot speaks for itself: (discord image link)

Good examples

Aragorn (me), Legolas Greenleaf, and Gimli son of Gloin were running through Rohan (East Emnet) when we came across three disguised orcs: "Smelly", "Stinky", and "Yucky". None of us had seen them before as far as I know. They attacked us without any interaction and killed us (see attached screenshots). This all happened between roughly 10 pm and 10:05 pm GMT on 1 Jan 2024.

E-mail

E-mail is another method to contact the DMs, and is the only access of communication for those also with forum bans. You can use the email arelith.dm@gmail.com for this method. Ban appeals and general questions is the recommended topics for this method if the Astrolabe Help Page is not an option.

Misc

Bugs/Errors/Module Problems

• Bug reports should be posted on the forums in the bug section.
• Sensitive bugs (Exploits, duplication, etc) should be sent to the Contributors group via a forum PM.

Discord

• Discord is mainly used for the community to interact with each other outside of the game.
• Discord is fine for general questions which may be fielded by other players or staff, however all official requests, reports, or communication should be done by other means.

Requests for PRC tokens

Revised by Titania

PRC Token requests are only needed for assassin, harper, and shifter. It is highly recommended you use the Astrolabe Help Page, rather than ping in channel/e-mail. PRC Tokens are usually completed within twenty-four hours. If you do not receive an approve, deny, or follow up questions in that time frame, please add a reply requesting for an update, or ping the channel.

Shifters take slightly longer, as they are kept to limited amount, but we do our best to have these done within the week.

When player witnesses rule violation

• If possible, take screenshot or note the time and names of those involved.
• Ensure that it is indeed a rule violation by rereading the rules in your Journal.
• Player can try to send POLITE short tell to offender. Some players can be new to server and not aware of all server rules. If you disagree on interpretation of rules, it is often wiser to submit the case to DMs, rather then argue at length in tells and spoil the game for both of you.
• Try to contact a DM in game.
• If you can't get one in game, send it to a DM via the Astrolabe Help Page or e-mail Arelith.dm@gmail.com. Do not post about the incident publicly on forums! It will be locked and/or deleted!

"Please include the character names of whomever was involved, including the rule-breaker, the victim(s) and any witnesses; also, any screenshots you have of the event typically help." DM Watchtower

• If you have exhausted that path and do not feel as if the situation was handled fairly, send a PM to the head DM, via forums.

If the complaint is about the DM, please only contact the Head DM, and not Active DMs.