Creating a game and gathering players¶

A player creates a game on the game panel, and the bot posts a gathering card in the game gathering channel. On the card, players sign up, ban nations and press “Ready”. When there are enough players and everyone is ready, the game is started.

Participants¶

Game creator — picks the game mode and type on the game panel and immediately becomes the first player of the gathering.
Player — signs up for the gathering, bans nations, presses “Ready”, and can kick a player, cancel the gathering or start the game.
Moderator — can kick a player, cancel the gathering, add a Steam link or start the game, even if they don't play.
Bot — posts the gathering card, updates it after players' actions and removes a gathering where nobody has pressed a button for 3 hours.

Steps¶

sequenceDiagram
    participant G as Game creator
    participant B as Bot
    participant O as Other players
    G->>B: presses “FFA” or “Duel” on the game panel
    B-->>G: sends the message “Choose game type”, visible only to them
    G->>B: presses “Vanilla”, “Patch” or “KEK”
    B-->>G: posts the gathering card in the game gathering channel
    Note over B: the game creator is the first player of the gathering
    O->>B: press “Join | Leave”
    B-->>O: adds them to the gathering card
    G->>B: presses “Ready”
    O->>B: press “Ready”
    B-->>O: puts ✅ next to each ready player
    Note over B: enough players and everyone is ready — the start buttons turn on

Game mode. The game creator presses the “FFA” or “Duel” button on the game panel. FFA is a free-for-all game for 3–6 players, Duel is a game for two. The bot sends them the message “Choose game type”, which only they see. See Game panel.
Game type. Within 60 s, the creator presses “Vanilla”, “Patch” or “KEK”. The LEK type isn't available for new games. The message with the type buttons disappears.
Gathering card. In the game gathering channel, an animated waiting icon appears first, and a moment later the gathering card, where the game creator is already the first player. If the game panel is in another channel, the bot sends the creator a link to the card that only they see. The link disappears after 60 s.
Signing up. Other players sign up with the “Join | Leave” button. If you need more players and the server has notifications set up, a participant of the gathering can call them with the “Notify gathering” button. See Gathering notification.
Bans. Each player can ban nations with the “Bans” button: up to two in FFA, up to three in Duel. Bans are optional and don't block the start. See Bans.
Steam lobby. A participant of the gathering or a moderator can add a link to the Steam lobby to the card with the “Steam Link” button. See Steam link.
Ready mark. Each player presses “Ready”, and ✅ appears next to their name.
Start. When there are enough players for the mode and everyone is ready, the “Start with Draft” and “Skip Draft & Start” buttons turn on. At the start, the gathering card disappears and the bot creates the game thread in the game history channel. See Starting a game.

Gathering card¶

The gathering card is a bot message in the game gathering channel that shows who is in the gathering and their bans. At the top of the card are the name and avatar of the game creator. They stay there even if the creator leaves the gathering or gets kicked. Below is a title with the mode, type, number of players and state, for example “FFA Patch 4 🚦Gathering”. In Duel, the title has no number of players: “Duel Vanilla 🚦Gathering”. The game has no number yet; it gets one at the start. The card's color bar is yellow.

Under the title is the line “Autodelete in …”. See Cancelling and autodelete.

Then come the players, from the highest rank to the lowest. Next to each player you see:

✅, if the player pressed “Ready”;
rank stars, one per rank (a player of rank 0 has no stars);
the player's mention and name;
under it, a “Bans:” line with the emoji of the nations they banned, if they banned any.

Everyone sees each player's bans on the gathering card. More about stars: Ranks and stars.

If a Steam link was added to the gathering, it sits at the bottom of the card as a separate block.

Gathering buttons¶

Under the gathering card are nine buttons in three rows. The first row is “Join | Leave”, “Kick” and 🗑️. The second is “Bans”, “Ready” and “Start with Draft”. The third is “Skip Draft & Start”, “Steam Link” and “Notify gathering”.

“Join | Leave” — signs you up for the gathering, and pressing it again signs you out. Anyone on the server can press it.
“Kick” — removes a player from the gathering. See Kicking a player.
🗑️ — a button with no label that cancels the gathering right away. See Cancelling and autodelete.
“Bans” — opens a nation menu that only you see. Only gathering participants can ban. See Bans.
“Ready” — puts or removes ✅ next to the name of whoever pressed it.
“Start with Draft” and “Skip Draft & Start” — start the game. Both are off while there are too few players or someone isn't ready. See Starting a game.
“Steam Link” — adds a link to the Steam lobby to the card. See Steam link.
“Notify gathering” — calls players through the notification channel, if the server has notifications set up. See Gathering notification.

Who can press the gathering buttons: Participants and moderators run the gathering.

Kicking a player¶

The “Kick” button opens the menu “Choose a player to kick”, which only you see. It lists all players of the gathering except you. Choose a player, and they disappear from the gathering card together with their bans.

You can kick the game creator too. The bot doesn't message the kicked player. They can sign up again with the “Join | Leave” button, but they come back not ready and without bans.

If the server has the event log turned on, the bot records there who kicked whom. See Event log.

Cancelling and autodelete¶

The 🗑️ button with no label cancels the gathering right away, with no confirmation. The card disappears from the game gathering channel. The game gets no number and doesn't go into the game history. If the event log is turned on, the bot writes “🗑️ [Gathering] Game Cancelled” there.

A gathering where nobody has pressed a button for 3 hours disappears on its own. The bot deletes the card from the channel and tells no one. Pressing a gathering button restarts the 3-hour count, even if the card doesn't change afterward, for example when the “Bans” menu is opened and closed. The bot recalculates the “Autodelete in …” line only when it updates the card, so a gathering can last longer than that line shows.

You can't cancel a game this way once it has started. You scrap it with the “Cancel game” button in the game thread. See Scrapping a game.

Steam link¶

The “Steam Link” button adds a link to the Civilization V lobby in Steam to the gathering card. The button opens a window, always in English, titled “Set Steam Lobby Link” with a “Steam Lobby Link” field.

The link starts with steam://joinlobby/, followed by three numbers separated by slashes. Paste only the link into the field, with no other text. If the link looks any different, the bot replies in English, “Invalid Steam lobby link”, and the card doesn't change.

An accepted link appears at the bottom of the gathering card as a separate block with the caption “link added”. A new link replaces the previous one. After the start, the link stays on the game card in the game thread. There you change it by sending the new link as a separate message. See Game thread.

This applies on a server connected to the CivBot site: in a game in progress, the saved link is on the site too. A participant of a game that started no more than 48 hours ago sees a “Join the game” button on the game page. It opens the lobby of this game's players, or the saved link if there is no such lobby. When a player presses this button and Steam shows a different lobby of the game's players, the site records it as the game's new link, and the game card in the game thread shows that one too. See Game page.

Rules and exceptions¶

FFA takes 3–6 players, Duel exactly 2¶

When the gathering is full, the “Join | Leave” button doesn't add new players. You can start FFA with 3 players, Duel only with two. These limits are the same on all servers. See Starting a game.

One player takes one place in a gathering¶

Pressing the “Join | Leave” button again doesn't give a second place. It signs you out of the gathering. A player's bans and ready mark disappear from the gathering together with them.

A new player arrives not ready¶

There is no ✅ next to a new player's name. Until they press “Ready”, the start buttons are off for everyone. A player who left or was kicked comes back not ready in the same way.

Each player marks themselves ready¶

The “Ready” button turns ✅ on and off only next to the name of whoever pressed it. Nobody can mark another player ready, not even a moderator. A moderator who isn't playing in the gathering gets the reply “You are not allowed to perform this action.” when they press “Ready”.

Participants and moderators run the gathering¶

The “Join | Leave” button is open to anyone on the server. Only participants of the gathering and moderators can press the other gathering buttons. The bot answers everyone else “You are not allowed to perform this action.” The “Notify gathering” button opens its window for anyone, and the bot gives this answer after the window is submitted. The game creator has no special rights: any participant can kick a player, cancel the gathering or start the game. Who a moderator is: Players, moderators and admins.

The bot writes the gathering card in the server's language¶

The gathering card and the button labels are in the server's language. The bot shows the “Choose game type” message and the “Choose a player to kick” menu, which only you see, in the language of your Discord client. See Bot language.

Gathering events go to the event log¶

If the server has the event log turned on, the bot records game creation, players joining and leaving, kicks, gathering notifications and gathering cancellations there. A gathering's autodelete doesn't go to the log. See Event log.

What can go wrong¶

The bot replies “Game creation already in progress...”. The bot is still creating your previous game. Wait a few seconds and look in the game gathering channel.
The card isn't in the channel where you pressed. Gathering cards appear only in the game gathering channel. If the game panel is in another channel, the bot sent you a link to the card that only you see. It disappears after 60 s. The “Info” button on the game panel shows the game gathering channel.
The start buttons don't respond. The gathering has too few players for the mode, or someone isn't ready: there is no ✅ next to their name. Ask the players without ✅ to press “Ready”. If you need more players and the server has notifications set up, call them with the “Notify gathering” button.
The bot says you have no access to the action. When you press a button, the bot replies “You are not allowed to perform this action.” You aren't signed up for this gathering. Sign up with the “Join | Leave” button and try again.
The bot replies in English, “Invalid Steam lobby link”. The link looks different. Copy it in full, from steam://joinlobby/ to the last number, and paste it with no other text.
The gathering card is gone from the channel. If the game started, look for its thread in the game history channel. If the gathering was cancelled or nobody pressed its buttons for 3 hours, create a new game on the game panel.
The bot says the game has ended or was deleted. When you press a button, the bot replies “This game has ended or was deleted. Create a new game.” and turns off the card's buttons: the gathering it belongs to no longer exists. Create a new game on the game panel.

This page was translated with AI and checked against the bot's terms.