This article outlines our general guidelines & recommendations for good manners, etiquette and general best practices on our server. While you will not necessarily be penalized if you fail to follow these recommendations, it is strongly encouraged that you make an effort to observe them at all times in order to create a harmonious and respectful gaming environment for all players.

This article covers the following:

Common Recommendations

for chat and the server as a whole.

1. Read these recommendations and the server rules and learn them carefully.
   Ignorance of the rules is not an excuse for violating them.
2. Users should show mutual respect for each other.
   This is the main point we are emphasizing for player conduct, encompassing all the other points of these recommendations and the server rules.
3. If you have trouble with software working on the server, report it to admins via the forum, or whisper to any logged-in admin on the server.
4. If you have a conflict with another person on the server, try to understand him and explain your point of view.
   Don’t insult anyone, that doesn’t helps you to explain your point and it never helps people to repsect one another.
   Violates the server rules or these recommendations is not grounds for insulting other people.
5. You can complain about somebody disturbing your interests to the administration privately.
   Be ready for admins to investigate both you and the offender.
6. You can discuss something or somebody you see as a problem on the public forum.
   You may withold the name of the specific person if it’s possible to understand your point without identifying him/her.
7. Assert things only if you are 100% sure they are the truth.
   If you find that you’ve accidentally insulted or slandered someone, apologize to that person as soon as you see you were wrong.
   This helps you to keep youself honest and helps him/her to respect you.
8. If somebody else has a good idea, make sure to give them credit when mentioning that idea to others.
   That will help for mutual respect between you and the idea’s author.
9. Have respect for administration and more experienced people, as long as they themselves accord these rules and your good faith.

Playing Recommendations

while joining and playing games.

1. Always obey the game creator/host.
   Do what he tells you unless it contradicts these rules, recommendations and your own conscience.
   If he asks you to be a watcher, you must accept or leave the game.
   Recommendations for watchers listed below.
2. You can pause the game if you need to, but don’t leave it paused for long periods of time (more than 1-2 minutes)
   Don’t pause the game if you can play – have respect for your fellow players. Extended pauses are very annoying.
   It is polite to let everyone know you’re back and give warning before you unpause.
3. Don’t unpause a game paused by another, unless the pauser requests that you do so.
4. You can ask for a SS if you think somebody is hacking, but don’t do so without reason.
   Making excessive requests for screenshots to inconvenience others is annoying and disrespectful. However if someone asks for a SS from you, you must provide it.
   Read about how to request and post a SS here.
5. Don’t attack your allies.
6. Don’t occupy territory your ally just cleared for himself.
   It’s considered rude and annoying to attempt to build anywhere in your ally’s base, except under certain circumstances.
7. If you are in a multiplayer game and are about to have your last building/unit destroyed, you may request to be allowed to stay and watch the remainder of the game (assuming your allies are still playing and the game is not yet over.)
   If you’re allowed to stay, it’s important to behave as if you were no longer in the game: remove shared vision from everyone, stop talking and do not assist your allies in any way. Act the same as a watcher, except you should surrender and exit ptomptly if your team loses.
8. If someone asks you to leave their building so they can stay and watch, it is polite to do so.
   If it is a new player, just be sure to tell him to unvision all players and not to speak.
9. If you have obviously lost a game, exit the game promptly.
   Forcing your opponent to destroy all your buildings & units in order to end the game is annoying and disrespectful. Respect your opponent and his time.
10. If you are lagging in a game and others, including your allies, ask you to exit, do so even if you take a loss.
    A laggy connection is your own problem and should not be allowed to ruin the game for others.

Watching Recommendations

when joining games as a watcher.

1. Always obey the game creator/host.
   Do what he tells to you unless it contradicts these rules, recommendations and your own conscience.
   If he asks you to be a watcher, you must accept or leave the game.
   If he asks you to play, you must accept or leave the game.
2. Ask to watch immediately after joining the game.
   Then you won’t have to answer any questions like “s9”, just type “watcher?” If the game host accepts, you’re watching.
   Set your race as the opposite of the players. If all (or most) of them play orcs – set human.
3. Obey all the players in the game. They’re doing you a favor by allowing you to watch their game. Do what they ask.
   Remember, the best watcher is an invisible watcher. You shouldn’t help or disturb anyone who is playing. So, keep your peon as out of the way as possible — don’t let players even see it if possible. Do not interfere with the game in any way.
4. After the game begins:
   Click on the”Allies” tab in the top right of the screen and set “Allied Victory” and “Allies” to everyone in game.
   You can do this at any point during the game, so it is recommended to set Allies+AV as soon as the game starts. If you wait and forget to do it, the ending of the game could be delayed after the losing team has left. This is annoying and disrespectful to your hosts, and they may not be so gracious next time you ask to watch.
5. About shared/allied vision:
   There are 2 options for game types: Top vs. Bottom (TVB) and Melee.
   If you watch a Melee game, vision is switched off to all players by default, so, you are done. Never switch it on and you will be okay.
   If you watch a TVB game, your team will see your peon and thus your starting position, but your opponents won’t. This unbalances the game. You need to do 2 things:
   • Set vision to all players.
   • Unset vision to all players.

   After you this, you can move your peon. Don’t move it until you unset vision to everyone, othewise they will see additional explored territory. Remember, the watcher’s main responsbility is to be completely invisible.
   (For TVB only) If you know the number designation of your starting position, send a message to all players telling them where you started. Example: if you appeared on position 5 on GoW, write a message that simply says “5”. Then your allies will know that you’ve told the opponents where you started.

6. Move your peon from your starting position to an out-of-the-way location.
   Select the most unobstrusive location that is also close to your starting position.
   Sometimes watchers will hide somwhere and build, just for fun. This seems okay while that corner is not visible for the players, but it is strongly recommended that beginning watchers don’t build anything at all. Watching the other players will give you insight and help you improve your skills, so it’s important to pay attention.

Hosting Recommendations

for creating games.

1. Make sure you are able to create/host games that others can join. You will need to configure a real IP address and forward ports 6112-6119 properly, otherwise, nobody will be able to join the games that you create. This is a simple, one-time procedure that is important for newbies to do so they can host their own games.
   Read the Warcraft II Hosting Latency Fix guide.
2. Communicate with other players in the lobby in order to arrange games. Request opponents and/or allies in the public chat, or make sure there are enough players waiting for a new game. Make suggestions for the maps you would like to play.
   Otherwise, you may find yourself waiting indefinitely for somebody to join your newly created game.
   The most common maps on the server:
   • Garden of War, speed even faster (ef), high resources, type: melee or top vs bottom.
   • Garden of War BNE, speed fastest (f), high resources, type: melee or top vs bottom.
   • Chop (several variations), speed fastest, type: top vs bottom, use map settingsDefault speed/res for other maps: ef or f/high
3. Host games yourself or use the host bot if your connection doesn’t support game hosting.
   Learn about the host bot
4. Wait while others join your game.
   • Balance teams as much as possible when hosting TVB games to make them fair. This means don’t put all the newbies on one team and the pro players on the other; make sure each team has a variety of skill levels.
   • Ask someone to be a watcher if there’s an odd number of players or it’s not possible to balance the teams.
   • Don’t gratuitously boot/ban people, unless you know it’s a player who flaunts these recommendations and/or the server rules and will ruin your game.
   • Always try to explain to people why do you dislike playing with them if you choose to boot/ban.
5. Make sure everyone in a game understands the teams and who will be watching (if anyone).
   Also make sure any watchers know the procedure for watching.
6. It’s time to play Warcraft II! You may now start the game.

Updated 2014.07.28