These rules are in effect starting today.

ANONYMOUS TIPSTER
The staff has come up with a solution to make the Daily Prophet not quite as controversial, but still effective in maintaining our historical accuracy. First off, the anonymous tipster will be a staff played NPC (non playable character) account that will send an anonymous owl to your character who is in danger of not complying with the historical setting. They'll tell them that they are in danger of being put into the Prophet (as they are a good hearted and well meaning employee there) and should be much more careful of their behavior. You'll also be PMed and informed that your character has a letter. If your character does not change their behavior, they'll be put into the Daily Prophet. There will only be one warning per character. The rules regarding disclaimers in posts is still in effect. If there's a disclaimer that contains good reasons for them not to be seen/heard, then it will not be placed into the Prophet.

If your character is in the Prophet in a negative light and disregards the warnings, the anonymous tipster will give up and leave them to the dogs.

Now, here is where your input comes in. We have started a poll only based topic in Charmer's Chit Chat where you can vote on what you think the consequences for being tattled on in the Prophet are. The choices are the following:

A.) Your character will also be bumped down a social class. For each consecutive negative article, she'll be bumped down until she reaches the lower class. Your plots and threads will need to reflect this change in her lifestyle. After she reaches the lower class, she has all the freedom in the world to act however she wants, as no one will care about her behavior. She is able however, to drag others down with her, so those involved with her will need to watch out. Those who refuse to play their character as having been bumped down a class will be issued a warning.

B.) The staff would issue OOC warnings only and leave IC consequences alone. After three warnings, the player would be asked to leave in order to find a more suitable time setting for their plots and characters. Unfortunately, the nature of the board means that there will be lapses with regards to what is and what is not okay for the period, and while a quick PM might see some things fixed, a lot of the time it is a plot point that is the culprit, not an accident. Repeat offenses/blatant disregard for the setting (gay sex on a cow on the high street at noon during a parade, for example) would lead to character/player suspension or even bans, which feels a little harsh. The upside to this however, is that the Daily Prophet will be reserved for member and staff use only - rather than IC consequences. You will only be able to send in articles about your own characters with permission from everyone involved.

You can vote for this here.

ADOPTABLES
Seeing as how we've had a few issues regarding wanted characters and who is able to do what, so we've come up with a record keeping system. Adopted characters will have their request form copied to a separate storage thread by a non-involved staff member. This way, all members can review it and remind themselves what the requirements for their characters are. Adoptables belong to the person who adopted them, but they must adhere to the requirements originally set forth in the ad from the person requesting them. The adopter has the right to decline additional requirements added on after the character has been adopted. The requester has the right to take away the adopted character only if they aren't adhering to the original requirements that are preserved in the storage forum. If you do not have a wanted ad, you must send something in to the staff to have posted up in the storage forum that the adopter has already agreed to.

The storage thread is here. If you have an already adopted character from a while ago but want the requirements stored away, stick them in the maintenance thread and the staff will post them up. If you have a character that has been adopted and needs the information to be moved to the storage thread, post in the maintenance thread with the link to the post.

BABIES
Seeing as how we have an extremely high rate of multiple pregnancies and births with little to no death rate, we're implementing a system to help balance things out a little better. There will be a thread in the plottage forum where everyone who is interested in having a multiples pregnancy will need to post to gain permission. Those with single baby pregnancies are not required to post, though they can if they want to have a die roll to reflect realism of health defects, death, illness, negative effects on the mother, etc. Those who want to have twins will need to ask permission in the thread where I will use a die roll. If you get a 2, you get healthy twins. If one of the parents was a twin, if you get 2 or 4, you get healthy twins. If you get a 6, you get twins but one person dies during the birth (you're able to choose whether it's one of the babies or the mother.) If you get the remaining number of 1, 3 and 5, you'll have just one baby.

The Multiples Pregnancy Permission thread is here.