[1] TEXT CHAR SHEETS: We do not accept TEXT/RTF/DOC character sheets, because Initial dots and Freebie point expenditures can't be regressed & verified as they can by the Character Generator Program. 

However, you may wish to include things that simply have no space/home on the CharGen sheets, on your background text sheet. (such as Weapons, extraneous items always assumed to be carried, etc.) Please do not send *.doc's in anything newer than Office95 or RTF format. If you have a newer version of MSOffice, please convert your sheet ("Save As...").

[1] FREEBIES & PRIOR EXPERIENCE: All new characters use standard WW starting dots. (plus up to 7 freebies, bought with Flaw overages.) You may not have more than the standard freebies (usually 15 or 21 depending on your character class) without express permission from your 11th Hour ST. If you made the sheet for another channel and they awarded extra points, you must remove them. You may not add extra starting Experience  to your sheet unless your ST authorizes it for their own purposes (e.g.: bonus exp. for outstanding backgrounds or char concepts, at ST's subjective discretion). Unlike a lot of IRC games, new characters don't need extra experience just to survive, so please don’t ask for it. If your ST feels you need it, it will be offered to you.

[2] POINT EXPENDITURES SHOULD MAKE SENSE: Do not send us a "Mini-Maxed" character (one that has 4-5 dots in just a couple things, and almost nothing anywhere else.) Specialization doesn’t mean the character is devoid of other basic skills. 

Also, do not send us a character that has a little bit of everything but the package makes no sense; some kind of random mish-mash of abilities that do not fit the concept. Dots will be checked against your background, to make sure the complete character concept makes sense.

 

[3] ALTERATIONS TO YOUR CHARACTER SHEET: Do not change the dots on your sheet once the final version has been approved, unless directed to do so by your ST, or you have their knowledge & consent. You will be held to using the stats on the sheet you last gave your ST. 

When it comes time to buy dots with experience, make sure your ST approves what you buy, then make sure they get an updated copy of the sheet ASAP once you update it.

[1] PREEXISTING CHARS MUST UPDATE OLDER M/F/BG/D’s:

No Player-Created Clans/Tribes or "Web Clans/Tribes" allowed.

If it does not appear either at www.white-wolf.com or in a book they published, it does not exist. The exception to this rule was removed in March 2002. There are now NONE.

NO NPC CLASSES PLAYED AS PC’S.

You may not use character classes specified as NPC only, as PC's (example: Baali, Cappadocians/Harbingers of Skulls, etc., NPC's from a WW Book). Having a clan/tribe book issued for it does not automatically mean it is a PC-Class character. Refer to "Restricted" sections of the sub-rules pages for more specifics.

No Non-White Wolf Character Classes allowed.

We are not AD&D. We are not Cyberpunk. We are not Shadowrun. We are not Highlander. We are not In Nomine. These games are spiffy, but that is not what we play here. We are White Wolf's World of Darkness ONLY. Period. Just because some idiot with a PC was savvy enough to load a web site with conversion rules, doesn't make it balanced or legal, and we have no interest in setting precedent by accepting it. As per above, if it is not in an official White Wolf published gaming item, it doesn't exist.

No Non-Modern-Day Character Classes allowed.

No Dark Ages anything, no Bygone Beastiary beasts (modern day disbelief would kill them), etc. No extinct by the 20th Century bloodlines or char classes.

NO VENGEANCE CHARACTERS:

If your character dies, do not create a long lost  brother / cousin / clanmate / packmate [insert convenient tie-in to the lost PC] to avenge your character. We will specifically reject any newly created chars of the same clan-tribe-family as the dead char, or with BG ties to the lost character, even if the sheet is otherwise 100% legal. If such a new character or connection is not in play before the character’s death, it will not get approved after the fact. If your characters have the same contacts/allies/friends, work for the same people, are of the same clan/tribe/etc., and so on. The Op’s judgment on whether you created a vengeance character is the final word. You have to convince us it is not.

- OBSOLETE TYPES: Any Clan, Bloodline or other character type that was  phased out by White Wolf canon in the most current edition (e.g.: Ravnos, Ahrimanes, Tremere Antitribu, White Howlers, etc.) 

- BAHARI (LILITH): Not all Bahari were Kindred, so this is listed here instead.

- "Secret Society" Chars: (such as Inquisition, etc.)

- Promiscuous bisexual female chars run by male players. (Legal or not, we all know why you do it, and it's OLD. Get your Cybersex elsewhere if that's why you're here.)

- Known "Combat Whore/Sword Jocks," trying to run yet another warrior.

- Infernalist-type characters of any sort not covered elsewhere.

- OOC/IC MIXING: Any PC's written up between OOC/IRL friends, or Boy-girlfriend/Spouse teams, who can only function as a pair or a unit. Whose backgrounds are so inextricably linked, that if something happens to one character or player, we lose the pair or entire group automatically. 

Give your PC an existence outside of your friend's PC, or they will not be accepted. Should one of the pair or party die or vanish, you are expected to continue to RP. Your friend or SigOther can write a new character. 

If your sole purpose here is to only play with your friends and no one else, start your own channel, leave ours alone.

OUT OF ELEMENT CHARS: Some types just wouldn't logically be in this City (for cultural or geographical reasons, for example, like Rokea, Mokole, etc.).

MISFITS BY DESIGN: Also, bear in mind that the Laws are enforced, both Supernatural & Mortal. You can choose a legal character that may not be safe here at all IC, because they are an outsider by design. 

We do NOT guarantee your safety or compatibility IC; that is your responsibility as players to handle through RP. If your ST feels the character is going to attract more than the usual ration of IC hassle, they may point this out and suggest that you alter it, but they may not forbid you playing it... but neither will they protect other PC's from turning on you if you bring in someone they would naturally loathe IC.

Power levels for starting characters will be explained in detail in on the rules page for the individual genre you are playing.

Starting characters will be just that. You may have as many dots as the book allows for new characters in your genre. (Example: Kuei Jin at Dharma 1, Garou at Rank 1, Kindred just post Sire's release, etc.) 

We do not run the sort of game where NPC's eat all the new guys, so don't ask for extra dots to "help you survive." They are not needed.

Characters that were legal PC chars prior to 3rd Edition. 

You are responsible for finding out what you need to redo for 3rd Edition. Chars created in older editions, even NPC's, must revise their sheets to 3rd Edition standard, especially if White Wolf specifically published something that makes it necessary (such as the demise of the Tremere Antitribu or Ravnos, or the reworking of Temporis, etc).

Effective January 2003, characters grandfathered in, prior to then, will remain approved, provided that the player revises their char sheet(s) to be 3rd edition compliant.

Characters from Dalnet players who previously left our channel (while in good standing) will be subject to re-approval by current rules before being reaccepted (this doesn't apply to banned players or confiscated chars; they are forfeit). Characters who had not asked to be grandfathered in before January 2003 are no longer accepted in the game and their fates at ST discretion to explain away.

Several players have played with us since before the 11^th Hour as a channel even existed. Those characters are part of our collective history and they have earned their powers in RP over several years. 

Such characters end up as NPC’s eventually anyway (in the third definition sense). We work extremely hard to run a story where a mortal can play alongside a grandfathered NPC and not feel bullied or taken advantage of OOC (IC is of course another matter, and subject to the other char’s ethics, not the player’s.)

To counterbalance their existence, we have tight ST controls on powerful characters to provide an environment where everything from a mere mortal to an Elder can RP fairly and with a sense of balance and hope of accomplishment. Also, many of the characters this applies to are slowly being phased out of play anyway.

NB: This exception does NOT overrule the 1,200 Exp points Max cut-off, nor are you excused from additional char sheet review as stated earlier. If your character was grandfathered in, you still are responsible to make sure it meets the other guidelines on this page such as Exp cap, no FF on it, legal expenditure of dots, etc.

[A] Whatever you bring into this story, play here, use here and create here, stays here (be it Characters, storylines, channels/locations), unless and until you have cleared your slate with an ST.

Putting a character or story into play is automatically agreeing to this policy. If you cannot handle this policy, then please don't bother to submit a character here. 

When players just leave suddenly, and their PC's had no reason to, it screws up the game for everyone else. All we ask is you clear out your business with an ST before you go. If you do not, the ST's will decide the dispensation of your PC. 

[B] CHARACTERS & COPYRIGHT LAW:

Your characters are NOT copyrightable! 

Copyright law protects unique works only (characters are not unique works), and only protect you if you actually apply to get, and are granted, said copyright from the US Copyright Office in Washington, DC. 

To all of the whiners and bad sports who have been hounding us about the above rule violating your "copywrite" [sic], the laws which prove we are correct are clearly stated at: http://www.loc.gov/copyright/ . 

White Wolf owns all legal rights to this universe, just as you can't copyright something you did in Star Trek, Star Wars, or anything else made in a world someone else owns, without the owner's expressed consent to allow you to hold it. White Wolf grants exceptions for authors who write White Wolf novels, for example, but players do not fall under the aegis of any such law. 

A PC for this game is impossible to be a unique work, as it cannot be expressed or played without using terminology and formatting that White Wolf owns; therefore, the Copyright Office would never grant you rights to own it in its complete state. And, what you would retain after removing every snip that White Wolf owns, wouldn't be much information at all. Pretty much just a concept. No stats, no powers, nothing.

We have on file emails from White Wolf staff stating that they personally  consider such things as a PC, or a Character Sheet & Bio, as legally a "Derivative Work," but only for their own purposes regarding whether or not White Wolf would sue players for infringements. By actual US Copyright Law, a PC does not even legally qualify as a derivative work, according to the criterion set forth by these laws. It is simply White Wolf being nice about it, to sow goodwill within their fan base, but that doesn't make it a law. It just makes it a rescindable option.

As quoted verbatim directly from the WW Web site on the matter:

"You may list a personal copyright for your characters or graphics you have created for your site, but keep in mind anything that is derivative from our works is still owned by us. Two simple examples: If you make a character from clan Gangrel, that is not your character and could never be used without our permission. If you make a logo that has a clan symbol as a portion of it, you could never publish that piece of art without our permission. Even without this copyright on your homepage, that law still applies, so make it easy on both of us and post it :-)" 

 

(From  http://www.white-wolf.com/darkspiral/signup.html )

So in closing, there is no such law or White Wolf policy that precludes our rules above. White Wolf staff have, in fact, fully endorsed and encouraged our policy (of "what plays here, stays here"), in writing. The only entity that owns anything in the eyes of the courts, in this game, is White Wolf.

[C] Cast of Characters you will need to know for this game:

We do not identify the race or true nature of PC's in public. That information should be earned in RP. The names of some key NPC's have now been moved to the Sub-rules page for their genre. 

Your character may not automatically assume to know the names on these rosters, unless you either earned it through RP, or specifically included it in your background. If you feel your PC should begin play knowing some key characters in your genre, speak to your ST about it during the creation process and include details of why in your background.

[D] POSITIONS OF POWER OR TITLE:

Players are encouraged to RP out competing for any open slots, as well as for any slots occupied by an NPC, *IF* your char feels they can best that NPC IC and earn it. Positions of Status for PC's will be awarded for worthy RP and OOC responsibility, not just given to the first player to ask. Please be realistic in your pursuits. 

Players who wish to occupy titled positions such as the Prince's Council or any other Genre equivalent will need to be available to role-play at least a couple times a week, and/or answer emails normally within a 24 hour turnaround time. If you cannot keep this schedule, please do not apply for any positions of authority as it delays other players waiting on your responses.