(~) Group Rules

1- Be Respectful: Treat others the way you would like them to treat you, do not swear or insult other and their art, our group will not tolerate offensive drawing. If you were to have any problems with someone in the group please notify us and we’ll try to work things out.
2-Stay Active: Please do not join this group only to never participate in the plot line. This just takes up clan rank space and does nothing to move the group's storyline along. We can understand that members have personal lives to attend to, and this is why the Hiatus Tracker has been set up to enable anyone who cannot get online to be excluded from the activity check that may penalize them for those type of reasons. 
There isn't a too high expectations of activity- you do not need to devote all your free time online to this group. However it is expected that you have roleplayed at least enough times to meet the expectations of our quarterly activity checks (which will always center around proving that you have roleplayed at least once within that quarter of the year). 
3- Posting comments on the page: If you have any questions, or simply want to notify the group about an issue or an idea you have, please note the group instead of commenting on our profile. Sending a note to the group will be the best way to get the quickest of responses and will get things dealt with. We rather roleplays do not occur on the group's profile but instead on one of the clan's account platforms or in chatrooms. If you wish to leave the group, rather than announcing it on the front page where that will hardly get our staff's attention, please note the group so we can deal with the subject of your character's fate immediately. 
4-Don’t lie: Simple as that, don’t lie to the staff. Besides what would be the point? Do not tell lies about something someone else or an admin has/hasn’t said. Don't tell us a lie about art that has been traced/copied or was used without credit and/or permission of the original artist. Finally, don't lie to us about something you edited in the description after we mentioned it was wrong. We do not tolerate this behaviour and if you are to lie from the very start it would be very hard for us to trust you to be honest with us when/if your accepted in the group.
5-Leaving the Group: When leaving the group, whether it's temporary or permanently. Please notify the group via note as to what will happen to your cats!! 
Any member who does not notify the group of their cats' fate from this point onwards will have their cat automatically moved to the "Relinquished" folder of their clan and will be free for members to pick for any killing plots if a war victim is needed- they cannot be brought back even if in a case of owner rejoining the group! We will just assume you do not care enough about that character to have notified us of their preferred fate.

We will easily accept that members leave the group and rejoin it later with the same characters if they notified us before-hand. If that were to happen they would be moved to the "NPC" folder until their owner returns. In that case these cats will be older than they originally were when they left the group and should be counted as "vanished" during the time of their absence. What they missed out will have an impact on them on their return, as clans won't always be welcoming to deserters. However we will happily welcome a member and their cats back into the group.
If it is highly doubtful that a member shall return (whether it's a certain fact or currently undetermined) there is the option to kill off or put a cat up for adoption. If the character is killed off, a reason for their death will have to be thought up. Please still note us if that is the case. It is important to note that a cat cannot be brought back to life after they are killed off. On the other hand a character and their plotline can be carried forward if put up for adoption, whether it's by someone else who will kindly take of the cat. 

Please be aware that a co-owned cat will automatically go to the second owner if one happens to leave the group, it will be up to them to decide the fate of the cat/s in question and not the leaving owner. The decision can be talked through between both owner.

6- Warning/Complaint Notice: Any person in the group can file a complaint, whether they are member, staff or an artist notifying a potential art theft. Complaints about members are the only private notes that can be sent directly to the founder/co-founders and not the group.
When filing in a complaint please fill this in:

Your username:
The Complaint Subject:  (Troll/Art Theft/Behaviour issues/Harassment,ect…)
Date of Event:  Don’t let much time slip by since the time of the event, if you left time pass between the event before filing your complaint it will be considered invalid and ignored so don’t wait around.
Description of Event:  Give us a detail description of the event and elaborate on why you are filing this complaint. If possible link us to the event or take a screenshot (if it occurs during RP), this would enable admins to take a closer look and prevent people from lying.

Any member who receives a complaint will receive a message from the founder titled “Complaint Notice Notification”, you will receive a strike to all your characters in the Exp Tracker Journal and would be expected to have an explanation for your behaviour and apologize to the member. A second complaint received and warning sent to you would result in a second strike- in addition to the fact you no longer being able to create any addition characters, have kits with those you own and participate in group contest/event until a certain amount of time has gone by. If we receive a third complaint (either after this time has gone by since the second complaint or during your wait) we will be forced to kick you out, all characters of yours would be considered dead. Hopefully we will never need to do this… 

7-Minimum of two lines of text for each post: Trust me, it is not fun to roleplay with someone who only writes the smallest of responses. I understand people can get tired and lazy but if you really don’t feel well don’t rp that day. If you still want to have fun! Just make sure you write at least two lines. A paragraph is prefer but lines is the bear minimum. Lines does not mean sentences, just a line…like this paragraph has quite a few of them. It’s simple…a line could easily be your cat response along with a small description of an action they do…
Adding description of how your character feels about the comment another says would be also a good thing is easy! Don't hesitate to describe the ground they walk on, the smell in the air, their thoughts, their attitude to the tone of the other character's voice, ect...
8- Be initiative: Don't join the group and expect members to flock around your character begging to Roleplay with you. ASK others! Don't wait for them to come to you- otherwise you'll fall behind. If you want to rp with someone, go to one of their character's refs and ask them. Do not comment on the front page asking would anyone is interested in Roleplaying! There is a "Journal Folder" for journals for that very reason. 
9-Spam: Just don't do it…what would be the point? If you are caught massively spamming after someone repeatedly asks you to stop you will have to be dealt with.
10-No God-modding or Power-Playing: This is most likely THE most used rule in all of roleplay group. God-modding is not fun, don’t do it. Same for Power-playing. What is it? 
God-modding is where you have a character is practically 'untouchable or the best.' All of the opponent's attacks miss their mark, while all of yours seem to hit, usually resulting in major wounds to the other person’s cat, either that or your cat is the best hunter, catching all prey without hard work or any misses. This also applies to a character's skill traits and personality. No one can be the best at everything. They aren't perfect peters or marysues- they have flaws and those need to be applied. 
Power-playing is similar to god-modding where you take over another's character, momentarily narrate their actions or the impact of yours on them in your thread without asking the owner's permission before-hand. When it a fight Roleplay, we expect that you must have at least talked through the outcomes before-hand. 
It is highly recommended that when narrating an attack, use the words "Aim, Try, Target, Attempt...." to describe your character's action and only go further if given the permission to. Those words would give the opponent's roleplayer a chance to make the choice themselves as to what actions their character may do and whether they would be able to dodge in time or get hid.
We especially want our battles to be evenly matched. If you want two characters to fight and cannot decide on the outcome on your own then you ask a admin to use a random number that will decide the outcome or you could even take it upon yourselves to do this. In case of hunting, just have your cat trip once in a while.
11- No Metagaming! This has a category of it's own, as it's an issue the group has had to deal with before and is one that can be quite difficult to deal with due to it sometimes involuntarily slipping in.
Metagaming is the usage of OOC knowledge in a character's thought, action, speech or behavior. If there's some secret that no one in the clan is aware of, but naturally the owners of several cats do- this does not mean your character would suddenly be aware of this knowledge. There needs to be a logical explanation for it, which preferably takes place through RP to explain it. We will not accept anything like "They overhear them talking about; they witnessed this character doing this; They followed this character and witnessed their death even though they never were narrated seeing it in the RP". 
Further info on Powerplay, Godmoding and Metagaming can be found here: forumroleplay.com/roleplay-gui…

12-Lineart: Lineart is allowed as long as the used lineart was made directly by it’s artist (and not a thief who turns art into linearts). You MUST credit its owner at the top of your written description. If you do not know who made the artwork then do not use it, we won’t judge a person based on their artwork, this group accept any level of art skills.
We also accept traditionally drawn art as long as it is put onto the group's reference background.
13-Using someone else’s art: We will NOT tolerate art theft, any uncredited and usage of other artist’s work without their permission will result in an immediate ban/block from the group and all your characters will be killed off. You may use linearts for Reference sheet/application only if you credit the artist’s name at the top of your description.
14-Originality Stealing someone's character (even if they aren't in this group) or art will get you banned permanently. Reusing your characters from Fateclans is allowed and adoptable you bought from others are accepted (as long as you credit the artist of the original design in the description and you were the one to adopt and pay for it).
15-Pending or W.I.P Applications: Do not send in an application/reference sheet that is missing the appropriate description, please fill in everything before submitting it to the group. If you need help then ask for it in the comment/note and then provide a link.  W.I.P should always be in the title of the deviation, we won’t bother checking them until they are complete.

For anyone who's still working on their character and want an admin to help them out before attempting to join the group we have a folder specific for pending applications and wips which is open to none members. Those applications added to it would be those that are currently either work in progress and cannot be added to the correct folder yet or currently lacking in the necessary information to be accepted into the group along with it's owner. 

NOTE: None group members may NOT use their cats that are still in this folder for roleplay or event purposes!!! The reason your cat is in the folder in the first place is because you still need to work on it's description to be accepted into the group! Once you've completed the necessary guidelines we'll send you an invite and move you're cat to their clan folder. We'll take note of your cat and save their name in the master list of names (though wip high ranks will not be saved unless they are moved characters from Fateclans) please complete your app as soon as possible.

In the case of members who are already part of the group and own a leading character with completed description we will allow minor usage of these pending characters as long as you complete the app ASAP!

16- Your activity check must be completed by its due date: Please be aware group events are not the same as activity checks and it will be written in the event description whether or not you must do it. I understand that people may have had personal trouble or been on vacation, but if you know something will happen before the date, please let us know and we’ll give you an extension suited to your need (you can always give yourself a date for new extension, just warn us as well). Failure to complete several of our activity checks will get your cat 'killed' or deleted. We will accept one activity check for only one of your characters, however if it is noticed that you aren’t using one you will be asked and expected to show us the character’s progress in the group if you are to keep them.

17- No Sparkle-cats: This rule wasn’t really upheld in the last version of this group and I’m sure we can all agree it is not something many of our members appreciated. They aren’t allowed here. KEEP YOUR CAT COLORS REALISTIC! No yellow/pink/green/neon, ect… cats in this group. Bleeding eyes is also completely unnatural, we will allow strange eye colors but nothing that drastic, please keep your cat within logic. We will allow you to give your cat 'headfur' , if it’s your style we won’t stop you. However if you attempt to apply to our with a sparkle cat or cat with mutations, even if it was a accepted character in the previous group we will reject you immediately.
 18-Names: Keep names realistic, don’t go calling your cats Dragonfang or Unicornhorn, cats do not know about those creatures. We will allow cats named after metal types (such as Gold, Silver, Obsidian, Platinum, ect...) since there is some slim possibility that a cat somehow knows about these stones, odd flower names will also be allowed. 

It is important when creating a name, please ask yourself if wild cats would know what this is. If it's something more common with twolegs you probably shouldn't use it. When it comes to knowledge of twoleg words, rogues and loners that originate from twolegplace would likely know more about twolegs than clan cats do. It is key to ask yourself when creating a name if your character's mother would really name her precious kit this, whether it's by knowledge of the word or if it somehow degrades the kit in a manner.
If you are in need of ideas, a useful site for clan cat prefixes would be this one here: ailuronymy.tumblr.com/prefixes
Be sure to also check the ~Master List of Names~ to make sure you aren’t naming your character the same thing as someone else in the group, great minds think alike and this could cause issues.  

19-An admin review is not an attack Don’t act as if it is like one, some of us will be more fussy than others about the amount of detail needed on an application. We do not intend to be mean so please don’t feel like we are when we begin criticizing your character. When an admin reviews a submitted character they would be searching for how much effort you put into it.  This is a literate group and we aren't here to baby you especially if we find multiple things wrong or feel that you are simply throwing this at us just so you can be in the group.  If you were to lose your temper with an admin, as in replying with rude comments and/or harassing remarks then you will automatically be turned down from ever applying to the group, we do not allow this behaviour.

Any of the clan leader admins have a right to refute your application. In this case don’t wine, there will always be an explanation to why they did this and you will be told (either in the note or on the application itself). If we asked you to tweak your character in some way or another, it is for an important reason.  That reason is most likely why your character doesn't yet meet the requirements needed to pass. If your form is being ignored after you have made modifications it could possibly be because it still composes of major flaws, don’t hesitate to enquire kindly about what they may be and we will tell you.

 20-Do not force your character upon someone: There is always a time when someone decides that your character is made for their and makes them has an crush on yours, and they becomes lovers or turn out to be unknown kits, siblings of your cat. Sure you can both plot your character’s relationship together, but do NOT force your cat on someone else’s. You cannot have your characters take on an official mate until they are both warriors(an apprentice cannot be mate with a warrior until it has earned its name which usually occurs after 12 moons).  Please also be aware that in the world of cat felines don’t usually become official mates before having kit, however your she-cat must be at least over 12 moons old before they are allowed to mate and have kits. Up until then your cats may have a crush but they cannot pursue their feelings until warriors. You may ship characters with others without making them official.
21-Placing characters up for adoption: Whether it’s because you are leaving the group, have too many characters to keep active or simply placing kits from a characters litter up for adoption this is the general format for an open adoption.  You may only let members of this group adopt your characters. For those adopting group characters you must draw the character on your own and fill out the application on your own.
22-Character Limit: There is no maximum of cats to own in this group as long as you can handle them. However please note: You must have at least 2 cat of different clans in order for you to own more than 2 in the same clan This is to keep all the clans in equilibrium when it comes to cat numbers, while giving everyone a chance to own one of someone's cat's kits if they were to live in the same clan.
Activity-wise, it is important to note that with the clans having joined forces characters will still "belong" to their clan but can sleep for some nights in the camp of a rival clan if welcomed there. 
This rule does not apply to League cats and Loners as they do not affect the count and have no maximum. The League does not count as a clan.
23-Only 4 Clans! There will be no such thing as a forgotten clan, destroyed clan that no longer exists, clan that lives far away or anything that relates to the original book clans. If there had been such a clan we would have mentioned it in the history. The only clans in this group are: Streamclan, Shallowclan, Stoneclan and Lakeclan.