Disciplinary action may be taken against players for a multitude of reasons, and may range from short-term suspension from specific activities, to indefinite bans from the whole community. Suspensions in the Kingdom can come from 3 sources – Monarchy, Board of Directors, or Propagation.
The Code of Conduct describes several items that would motivate disciplinary action, and can be found in whole in the Rules of Play:
- Speech that would cause a reasonable person to fear for their property or safety.
- Physical violence outside of the normal bounds of combat conduct.
- Sexual harassment or inappropriate sexual contact.
- Theft or willful destruction of other peoples’ property.
- Repeated unwillingness to follow game rules.
- Creating a hostile environment detrimental to the enjoyment of the group as a whole. This includes engaging in online or in person harassment.
- Violating the Amtgard Youth Policy which can be found at Amtgard.com. Or in the Annexure at the end of this document [the Rules of Play].
Disciplinary bodies can issue suspensions for reasons including, but not limited to, these listed items. Following legal advice, it is the policy that even when CoC items are relevant, the item number is not included in the suspension announcement.
Firstly, Monarchy suspensions can be issued by any level (Kingdom, Grand Duchy, local Chapter), as described in the Rules of Play (“Code of Conduct”, page 4), but usually happens at the Kingdom level. A Monarchy ban requires the agreement of the Monarch and at least one of Prime Minister (PM) and Guildmaster of Reeves (GMR). This trio is sometimes referred to as the “Disciplinary Committee”. By default, suspensions issued by a Monarchy level apply to all subordinate levels, e.g. a suspension from the Kingdom Monarchy applies to all Kingdom events and all chapters in the Kingdom, and a Grand Duchy Monarchy suspension applies to all the parks within that Grand Duchy. Suspensions from lower levels may be overturned by the Monarchy at a higher level.
Secondly, the Board of Directors also has the power to issue suspensions – these are usually done to remove the liability presented by an individual, and is not necessarily directly related to the Code of Conduct. Board-level suspensions are determined according to the rules established in the Kingdom Bylaws: a 5/7 supermajority vote by the boardmembers during a closed meeting, after the individual has an opportunity to present a defense. Usually, suspensions issued by the Board of Directors are indefinite in length, with the opportunity to appeal after 1 year.
The Board of Directors often requires a different threshold to act than the Monarchy, so sometimes may issue a matching suspension, of same or different terms, after the Monarchy does. In this case, the Monarchy ban is said to be elevated to a BoD ban. In other cases, the Board may remove a BoD-level ban, while an individual is still Monarchy-banned: in this instance, the decision to finally restore the individual has been devolved to Monarchy. All Kingdom Monarchy bans automatically trigger a review by the Board, who may or may not choose to take action.
Thirdly, suspensions may propagate from other Kingdoms, as described in the Rules of Play (“Code of Conduct”, page 4). These usually affect players who are physically located in other Kingdoms of Amtgard. By agreement of the Interkingdom Circle of Monarchs, all suspensions for Code of Conduct violations (except CoC 6) from any Kingdom automatically propagate to all other Kingdoms. As per the Rules of Play, under certain circumstances, it is possible for the Kingdom Monarch to waive a propagating ban from another Kingdom.
The Kingdom of the Rising Winds maintains a comprehensive list of suspended individuals. Issuance, revocation, elevation, and devolution of suspensions are announced on the appropriate public channels when they occur.
Disciplinary procedure and requirements can be found in the Amtgard Rules of Play, as well as the the Kingdom of the Rising Winds Bylaws, Corpora, and Disciplinary and Appeal Policy. These 4 documents can be found from this website’s rules and documents page.
Note: the terms “suspension” and “ban” are used interchangeably.