The Guidelines

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Welcome to the Kongregate forum for TDP4 Team Battle! First and foremost…

This is the first rule in Kongregate’s behavior guidelines and ultimately the source of all the guidelines below.

The second rule, nearly as important: Don’t give out your password to anyone ever. Period.

Table of Contents

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Never give your password to anyone ever: Seriously, we mean it

Clans, trolls, hackers and scammers: A guide for new users from ImpulseShadow
It's not against the rules to lie: A few additional helpful notes from wolfbill
Hello, World: How do I shot community? Advice for new users from Captain_Catface

Moderators: The different kinds and what they do
Flagging posts: Help mods help you
Spam: What counts?
Threads: How to be legendary (or at least not suck)
Etiquette:General guidelines
Trolls: Don't feed 'em
Links: Making good choices
Language and terminology: Understanding what you read
Forum search tool: Useful!
Formatting: Everyone wants to be one of the cool kids
Contact info: How to find a mod or admin

Never give your password to anyone ever

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See that picture? You’re not the snake! You’re the bird, and your password is the only thing keeping those jaws from snapping around you and swallowing you whole.

NEVER give your password to anyone. NEVER trade accounts with anyone.

1. Never “trade accounts” with someone. They’ll steal your account, and we will not help you get it back.

2. Never give your password to anyone promising you stuff. Ever. Ever ever ever. It’s a scam.
Do NOT give your password to anyone offering to make you a beta tester.
Do NOT give your password to anyone claiming they’ll give you free cash or cash hacks.
Do NOT give your password to anyone claiming to be staff.

3. Do not download game hacks; they steal your account.

4. Anyone trying to steal accounts in the forum will receive an automatic one week ban (even if you post on alts, which we can see). So don’t lose all that playing time because of a foolish decision.

Kongregate’s behavior guidelines were recently revised to be even more explicit on this point. Repeat after me: “My account is my responsibility.”

“READ THIS.”
A helpful guide for new users

Originally posted by ImpulseShadow:

Clans:
Stop making friggin new threads to ask “how i join a clanz?”
Go to a clan thread. The end, zip it, nada.

Trolls:
Did someone troll you? Read on. Frankly, we don’t care squat about that. Trolls will be trolls; there is never an excuse to slander someone. Starting a thread to rant about them in and/or name them will get your thread locked.

Hackers:
No one can tell who hacked them with 100% accuracy. It is all simply guesswork, and we don’t need people pointing names at others here. If someone hacked you, then send it to the in-game support button. Don’t post it here. You will start a flamewar and your topic will get locked.

Scammers:
This forum is riddled with threads about “dis guy scamed me dont talk to im he cheats with artifaks 2”. We don’t care. All that will happen is that you will get NO sympathy from most posters. We will promptly make your thread be filled with “Stop falling for it” posts. Life is not handed to you on a silver platter. Use your head. Why would a guy give out money? Wouldn’t he just keep it in case he goes back later? So don’t join tourneys promising cash. Heck, I recommend you stay away from tourneys. If you want money, earn it the hard way. Fight. Combo in a real match. Play a REAL CTF game. Stop asking for money from clans or because you fell for a simple trick. Adapt. Survive. Fight. This is how life is.

Bottom Line:
This forum is for discussing the game.
This forum is not for pointing out scammers/liars/cheats/beasts.
This forum is quite merciless.
I WILL flag your post for making a thread about scammers/hackers/trolls. You already have this warning and a graveyard of locked threads. Please spare yourself the grief.

A response and addendum:

Originally posted by wolfbill:

ImpulseShadow, to your every single word, you were right….However, I have a few things to add:
1st: There isnt any rule on kongregate, or in any game on it (especially in here), that says “Do not lie.”
2nd: …As long as you are not a spammer thread poster, you have no reason to afraid of the first post.
3rd: At what world, someone could just give away, something that he earned hard? Such a world cannot exist. Live with it.
4th: The “scammers” that are watching now this forum thread, should know that it isnt going directly to them, but to the people that trust them.
5th: Finally, if you got scammed, you were wrong for trusting the one that scammed you. You should learn from your mistakes.

Hello World: How do I shot community?

Originally posted by Captain_Catface:
All right. We’re playing a game. A 2D, third-person shooter. It’s just brilliant; especially if you pay. We’ve got relatively active forums; and an in-game and on-Kong chat. We have between 750 and 5000 people online almost all the time. We’re still getting new updates to the game. There are even the occasional moderators who actually do things. Overall, we’ve got ourselves a great little game, but the community sucks.

…

Next, lets talk about in-game chat: Grow the fuck up. If someone shoots you, are they a hacker? Not likely. Are they a noob? Well, you’re the one who died. Are they a f——t? There’s probably a 10% chance. Also, be aware of the barrett: If you die in one hit; and your enemy is using a long grey gun, chances are you just got hit by a barrett. They aren’t hacking. It’s a gun that will one-hit most people under level 30. Is it cheap to be using? Yes; but they paid or worked a good deal to get it. Are artifacts cheating or hacking? No. Are they a bit overpowered? Yes; but again, the user paid or worked a good deal to get them.

A hacker is someone who has, somehow, found a way to use outside programs to provide an extra advantage. Common hacks include: Multiple guns, invincibility, unlimited ammo, or auto-killers. You have to remember that they aren’t common. People can one-hit you. People can take fifty clips from your pistol. It isn’t hacking, they’re just dramatically more powerful than you are. So, before you go running your mouth: Determine whether something is possible or not. If it is, then get over it and accept that you’re probably just facing someone with a lot of money or a lot of free time. If it is not, try to take screenshots and send them to a TDP mod.

As for calling others noobs/f——ts/bitches/etc: Seriously. Grow up. You aren’t the best player in the game. You aren’t invincible. You most likely aren’t even average. You. Will. Die. But, if you spent your time fighting back; chances are you’d develop the skill and gear to be the one doing the killing. You also need to consider the meanings of these words: A noob is someone who is new to, or bad at, the game. A noob isn’t anyone you dislike, and it isn’t inherently a bad thing. We all started out as noobs. We were all running around with the default pistol. We were all getting angry that it took a few clips to get a kill. We were all being killed in one hit. As for the generic insults: They aren’t appropriate or necessary. You’re just making yourself look immature.

Now, on to the in-game and kong chats: They aren’t for spamming. If you post your combo farm once, and no one joins; it means that no one wanted to join. If you think spamming makes you cool; it doesn’t. It makes you look, again, like an immature imbecile. The next issue is language: The US servers are for English; the Russian ones for Russian; and the European ones for… Most anything but Russian. It’s also worth noting that scamming is pointless. Lets say you manage to take someone’s account: Now what. You have an account that is probably relatively weak. Good job. Now what? Are you going to steal their 10 cash? Their 1000 gold? Do you not realize that it’s faster to play legitimately than to try to steal other people’s accounts? Lets face it, the only people who will fall for such scams are noobs anyways.

Lastly, the forums: This. Is. Not. Off. Topic. It isn’t for spamming, and it isn’t for your little “NO U” fights. It’s to help others with, and discuss the game. Or, god forbid, to try to be constructive by making reasonable suggestions and pointing out glitches or legitimate hacks. It also isn’t for clans. They are not in the game. You’re wasting your time by creating them. They do not help anyone, nor do they exist other than to boost the egos of a few pathetic people. They just start pointless squabbling. I don’t need to hear in chat about how “OMG, THE AGENTS PWN DRK ARMY.” or “O NO THY DONT FGGT”. It’s ridiculous and pointless.

That is all.

Moderators

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This gets a little confusing, we know. You will encounter three types of mods here:

In-game mods are chosen by the game developers. They can’t do stuff on Kongregate, and the Kongregate moderators (see below) can’t help you with things in the game.

Kongregate chat mods have an orange M next to their name in the chat list. They can help you with chat problems like spamming, flaming, overly sexual language and so on. They can silence or ban you, so you should listen to them; they are volunteers, so please be nice to them.

Kongregate forum mods have an orange F next to their name in their forum posts, and their name is listed in the upper-right corner of the first page of the forum. They can help you with forum problems like spamming, people harassing you or derailing your thread, overly sexual language and so on. They can edit or hide your posts and lock your threads, so you should listen to them; they are volunteers, so please be nice to them.

If you have a problem with a mod or how they handled a particular situation, please don’t make a forum thread about it or them! Instead, contact them directly or contact an admin. You can report Kongregate moderators by going to their profile and clicking the link that says “report abuse.” (We read them all, I promise, though we don’t write back to everyone.)

Flagging posts

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Moderators can’t read every single post the instant it’s made. We rely on users to flag inappropriate posts. To do that, look in the blue box to the left of each post. See the link that says “flag post”?



Click it, choose a reason, maybe write us a charming note. Then send it and walk away. Don’t quote the post, don’t announce you flagged. Just flag and ignore. We will love you forever!

Please don’t spam

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Spam is anything pointless or annoying that adds nothing to the forum. A wise woman once said that spam is like porn—you know it when you see it. If you see something and think, “My oh my, that sure is cluttering up the thread,” it’s spam. One word “lolwut” or “orly?” replies? Spam. Posting a picture of a can of spam? Spam. Basically, if you see something and think it’s spam, it probably is.

Kongregate is not an image board
Ragefaec, trollfaec, foreveralone, oh my! There is a whole internet full of funny pictures and memes. While we don’t prohibit posting images, they will probably be removed unless they contribute to the conversation AND are accompanied by words. The more content you add, the more likely we are to take you seriously! A motivational poster and “u suk lol” will get removed; a small funny picture and with a paragraph of genuine discussion will probably be allowed to stay.

Quote pyramids are awesome!
Lolno. Quote after quote just to make a giant green ziggurat on the page is just another form of spam. Quote pyramids involving images are doublespam. When in doubt, remember: don’t be a jerk.

I see spam! Wut do?
First of all, do not quote the post. Second of all, DO NOT QUOTE THE POST.
What you should do is flag it and let a mod take care of it. Quoting the post, even to say “get back on topic,” just makes the problem worse. If you want to get the thread back on topic, do so! Just don’t quote the post in the process. (Also: don’t quote the post.)

What about threads?

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Since this is the TDP4 Team Battle forum, threads should focus on various aspects of the game.

Use the master threads
If there’s already a thread open on a topic, please use it rather than starting a new thread.

Bumping old threads
“Bumping” refers to posting something without value (often just the word “bump”) in order to return the thread to the top of the first page. This sort of thing gets spammy really fast. Please don’t bump threads, especially not ones that are really out-of-date. That being said! If you do have something to add, feel free to revive old threads.

This thread is inappropriate ohnoes!
First of all, do not post in the thread.
Second, DO NOT POST IN THE THREAD.
What you should do is flag it and let a mod take care of it. Posting in the thread, even to say “this is inappropriate” or “flagged,” just bumps the post back to the top of the list and gives it more attention. Bear in mind that anyone bumping a spam/inappropriate thread may receive the same punishment as its creator. The worse the thread, the harsher the likely punishment.

Lrn2Etiquette

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Here are a few expectations and traditions; observing these will help you fit in.

Alliances
If you’re going to make an alliance/clan/guild/group, make sure your thread has a well-structured opening post involving a members list, ranks, and requirements. Also, it’s never okay to spam or otherwise harass threads for other alliances/clans/guilds/groups.

Attitude
Acting like you’re smarter or better than others is no way to become accepted. Don’t try to impress us with your level, game achievements, IQ, or general badassery. Also, if you’re ever wrong, just admit it! Carrying on a pointless argument won’t win you any friends.

Literacy
Postin lyk ur typin a txt to ur bff inint cool. Occasional spelling and grammar errors are okay, but never using punctuation or proper spelling is just flame bait; ditto for typing completely without caps or IN ALL CAPS. On the other hand, commenting on every little slip-up is annoying; find the middle ground.

Read up
Please read the stickied tutorials and guides. This will keep you from asking the same n00by questions that have been asked a thousand times before, and will generally help you fit in and seem awesome.

Repartee
Don’t get butthurt (angry; mad) over stupid things. Losing your cool will make the other players lose respect.

Don’t feed the trolls

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“Troll” is an internet term for a person who wants to ruffle some feathers and make people upset. They aren’t usually evil, just extremely bored. What they want is for you to pay attention to them; ignore them and their power is lost.

Fighting back is the worst possible thing you can do: it gives them exactly what they want—attention. The best way to combat trolling is not to get in an argument with them, but to straight-up ignore them. They want to be important and to ruin your good time—don’t let them. Flag their post and move on.

An argument needs at least two parties for it to continue. If one person says “u suck lololol” and the other one ignores it, it’s not an argument. No matter what anyone else is doing, your actions are your own. This is extra-super-important because, no matter who started it, if you’re harassing someone you may be silenced for it. Don’t let give someone the satisfaction of getting you in trouble! Instead, flag the post and let us deal with it.

Choose your links wisely

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Can you post a link here? That depends!

—If it’s porn or a shocksite, absolutely not. (Kongregate’s behavior guidelines are still in effect.)
—If it’s a referral link, don’t post it anywhere on Kongregate. We know you want reward points/that next picture/to win a free time machine, but we don’t actually care. If everyone posted their links here, the forums would be totally unusable.
—If it’s not related to the game, please don’t post it here.

Language and terminology

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Kongregate is relatively lax about swearing. We care quite a bit about how people interact, though— saying “oh, crap” is an entirely different matter from telling another user they are crap. Similarly, racist or hateful terms are not allowed. Other terms you may see and wonder about:

Alt – Short for alternate account.
ITT – In this thread; a topic or activity for the thread.
Kong – Abbreviation for Kongregate.
Necro – Bumping a thread that was out of use (dead) back to life.
OP – Original post / original poster (aka the first post or person in the thread).
PM – Private message.
QFT – Quoted For Truth. Used to agree with a post, though if you have nothing to add this practice is frowned on as spammy.
Reg – Short for regular.
TL;DR – Too long; didn’t read. Post was too long for the average user’s attention span.

Forum Search Tool

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To search the Kongregate forums, go here.

Formatting like a boss

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This section was copied almost wholesale from ArcadianFire’s new user guide here. Many thanks to him for his excellent work!

Quoting posts
Kongregate has the option to quote posts, thereby making it clear precisely what you’re responding to. Simply click the ‘Quote Post’ button located below someone’s username (circled in red):

If you only wish to quote a small portion of a post, use bq. Just type “bq.” and then copy and paste the relevant portion. It allows you to quote small portions of posts rather than entire posts. It really cuts down on the length of your post, and also prevents quote pyramids from forming.

bq. Like this

Editing posts
There’s not need to post multiple times in a row. People tend to get annoyed when you do this, so knowing how to edit your posts is important. There’s a little button underneath your post count labeled ‘Edit Post.’ Use this button to make changes to your post. You can add anything you missed or change grammatical/spelling errors with this button.

Deleting posts
Click on the “edit post” option as outlined above, then look to the right of the typing field and you will see a small button labeled ‘delete post’:

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Other formatting

This guide explains everything you need to know about Kongregate’s formatting. The basic things in that guide that you should know would be…

Bold:

*bolded text*

Underline:

+underlined text+

Italics:

_italicized text_

Strikethrough:

-crossed out text-

Posting an image:

!thisisafakewebsite.com/43291/exampleimage.jpg!

Hotlinking:

"[text]":thisisafakewebsiteurlusedpurelyforexamplepurposes.com

Note: You cannot post images directly from your computer. You’ll need to first upload the file to an image-sharing website like Imageshack, Photobucket, Tinypic, Imgur, etc., then post a link to the image.

For even more formatting and html goodness, go to Hokage4345’s thread here and Aurian’s thread here.

Want some clarification for anything you see here? Need some help with some unpleasant spam or a flame war? Unhappy with something you see happening? Please don’t hesitate to contact one of the forum moderators (shown in the upper right corner of the first page of the forum) or one of Kongregate’s community admins: trickyrodent, Zshadow or IAmTheCandyman.

If you need help with any aspect of the site, you can always email support@kongregate.com.