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Limits and timers

This page gathers CivBot's limits and time spans: how many players, bans and characters the bot accepts, when its menus and messages disappear, how often lists refresh and what limits the site has. Find the row you need: it says where the limit applies and what happens when time runs out.

On this page: Game limits, Text and list limits, Gathering and game timers, List and stats refresh, Menu and command reply timers, Site limits

These numbers are the same on every server, and a server can't change them. There is one exception: the pause between gathering notifications, which the server's moderators set.

Game limits

The number of players and bans depends only on the game mode. The game type doesn't affect these limits.

FFA Duel
Players 3–6 2
Bans per player up to 2 up to 3
Nations to choose from in a draft 3 3

The “Start with Draft” and “Skip Draft & Start” buttons turn on when the gathering has at least 3 players in FFA or 2 in Duel and everyone pressed “Ready”. You can't join a full gathering. Bans are optional. Each player gets three nations to choose from when the game starts with the “Start with Draft” button.

The other game limits are the same for both modes:

Limit Value Where it applies
Nations in CivBot 43 One list for all game types; the “Bans” menu shows all 43 nations, while the draft and the “Nation Assignment” message show only the ones not banned in this game
Turns in the result 1–330 The turns option of the /game finish command and the “Turns” field in the “Finish the game?” window on the site

See Starting a game, Bans, Finishing a game and Finishing a game on the site.

Text and list limits

These limits apply to the text you write and to the length of the lists the bot shows.

Limit Value Where it applies
Message for a gathering notification up to 200 characters The “Add a message” field in the “Notify gathering” window; one line
Reason for scrapping a game up to 100 characters The “Cancel game” field in the “Cancel game confirmation” window that the “Cancel game” button in the game thread opens
Players in the leaderboard up to 15 The players with the highest rating in the current season who already have a finished FFA game in it and are still on the server
Games in the list on the game panel up to 15 The server's latest games that have already started
Nations per page of the “Bans” menu 15 Three pages for all 43 nations
Nation buttons in one “Nation Assignment” message up to 20 The remaining nations that aren't banned come in the next messages in the game thread

Both text fields are optional: you can leave them empty. See Gathering notification, Scrapping a game and Leaderboard.

Gathering and game timers

These timers apply to the gathering card, its menus and the game thread.

Timer Value What happens
The type buttons in the “Choose game type” message 60 s 60 s after you press “FFA” or “Duel”, the “Vanilla”, “Patch” and “KEK” buttons stop working; press the mode button again
The private link to the gathering card 60 s The bot sends it if the game panel isn't in the game gathering channel, and removes it after 60 s
The “Bans” menu 3 min A menu with no presses disappears, and the bans you placed stay
The menu after the “Kick” button 3 min The menu stops working, and nobody is kicked from the gathering
A gathering with no presses 3 hours The gathering card disappears from the channel, and the game gets no number
Pause between gathering notifications 3–60 min You can send this game's next notification only after the pause; without the cooldown_minutes option it lasts 15 min
The player picker menu after a nation button in the “Nation Assignment” message 60 s The menu stops working, and the assignments don't change
A game thread with no messages 24 hours The thread is archived, and the game's state doesn't change
A game after the start no limit The game stays in the “In progress” state until someone finishes or scraps it

Each press in the “Bans” menu restarts the 3 min countdown. In the same way, each button press on the gathering card restarts the 3-hour countdown: the card disappears only after 3 hours without presses. See Creating a game and gathering players, Picking nations and swapping slots and Game thread.

Moderators set the pause between notifications with the cooldown_minutes option of the /guild notifications configure command, from 3 to 60 min. If you run the command again without this option, the pause goes back to 15 min. While the pause lasts, the bot replies “This game can notify again …” and shows how long to wait. See Setting up gathering notifications.

The bot never finishes or scraps a started game on its own. A game participant or a moderator finishes it with the /game finish command or scraps it with the “Cancel game” button in the game thread.

List and stats refresh

These lists and figures don't always update right after a game: the table shows how often the bot refreshes them.

Timer Value What happens
The game list on the game panel 5 min The bot refreshes it every 5 min, and right after a game starts, finishes or is scrapped
Leaderboard 1 hour The new rating appears in the table at the next refresh
The /gametime game-time map 1 hour The bot recounts games at most once an hour

For the /gametime map to include new games right away, add the force_update:True option. See Game panel, Player stats and Nation stats and game times.

These timers apply to the menus, pages and refusals the bot sends in reply to buttons and commands.

Timer Value What happens
The buttons of the player stats card 3 min The tab buttons and the period list become inactive if nobody presses them for 3 min
The player picker menu after the “Player Stats” button 3 min If you don't pick a player within 3 min, the menu stops working
The “Select what you want to configure ...” menu under the /guild config card 3 min If you pick nothing for 3 min, the menu stops working; run the command again
The private menus after the “Channels” and “Roles” items in /guild config 60 s The channel or role picker menu disappears
The reply pages of /search games_by_players 3 min The paging buttons stop working; run the command again
A refusal to /game finish or /leaderboard show when permissions or the game number are missing, or the game isn't in the “In progress” state 20 s The refusal disappears on its own

Each button press on the stats card restarts the 3 min countdown. After 20 s, the refusals “Game ID not found.”, “You are not in this lobby.” and “Can't do this command in current lobby state.” to /game finish and “You must be a moderator to use this command.” to /leaderboard show disappear. The reply “All players must pick their nations before finishing!” doesn't disappear on its own. See Adding CivBot to a server and Bot commands.

Site limits

These limits apply on the CivBot site. The ones that concern the game thread apply on the server the site works with.

Limit Value What happens
Save size on the home page and in the “Save inspector” up to 16 MB The site rejects a larger .Civ5Save file and shows “We could not read this file”
Save size on the game page up to 15 MB The site rejects a larger file before uploading and asks you to pick a .Civ5Save up to 15 MB
Save size in the game thread up to 15 MB As on the game page: a larger file isn't attached, and the bot replies with a “Save not accepted” card
Reading a save about 10 s The site rejects a save that takes longer to read, with the same message
The bot's wait in the game thread 60 s If the site doesn't answer within 60 s, the bot replies “The site did not answer. Try again later.”
Save uploads per game 10 per player per 24 hours Every attempt in the last 24 hours counts, from the site and from the game thread, including a file that couldn't be read, and a repeat. The 11th is rejected: the site says “You have uploaded 10 saves to this game in the last 24 hours” and “The next upload is possible at …”, and the bot in the thread says “Too many uploads. Try again a little later.”
Closing a ready game every 10 min When the game is finished, a save is attached, all players are matched and there are no unconfirmed substitutions, the site closes the game by itself, usually right away. If the last of these conditions is met by something outside this game, the game closes during a check that runs every 10 min
Confirming the Discord sign-in 10 min You must give consent in Discord within 10 min of pressing “Sign in with Discord”, or the sign-in doesn't happen and you have to start again
Games in progress up to 20 The “Games in progress” block on the “Overview” page shows games that started in the last 48 hours and are still going
An unfinished game on the site 48 hours 48 hours after the start, the site shows it as “No result”, while in the bot it stays “In progress”

See Games overview, Save inspector, Sign-in and privacy, Game saves on the site and Save in the game thread.

What can go wrong

  • The “Bans” menu disappeared. 3 min passed without presses. The bans are kept, and the “Bans” button on the gathering card opens the menu again.
  • The gathering card is gone from the channel. If the game started, look for its thread in the game history channel. If nobody pressed the gathering buttons for 3 hours, create a new game on the game panel.
  • The game thread vanished from the channel list. A thread where nobody wrote for 24 hours is archived. Find it among the archived threads of the game history channel.
  • The bot replies “This game can notify again …”. The pause between this game's notifications hasn't passed yet. The reply shows how long until you can send the next one.
  • The leaderboard doesn't count a game that just finished. The leaderboard refreshes every hour: check it later. Only FFA games change rating, so the leaderboard doesn't change after a Duel game.
  • The stats card buttons are grey and don't respond. 3 min passed without presses. Open the card again.
  • A save in the game thread or on the game page was rejected because of the upload limit. You already made 10 attempts for this game in the last 24 hours. The game page shows when the next upload is possible; in the thread the bot doesn't show the time, so try later or check the time on the game page.

  • The site says “We could not read this file”. The file is over 16 MB, or the site didn't read it within 10 s. For other causes and what to do, see Save inspector.

  • On the game page the site says “This file is over 15 MB”. You can attach a save to a game only up to 15 MB; pick a smaller file.

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