Valiant Hearts is a roleplay forum designed for ease-of-use. The staff team has a singular primary goal. This goal is to get characters created and in-play without being overwhelmed by lore and an exhaustive application process.

Reading the entire guide is not needed. In fact, you only need to read things within the “getting started” section of the guidebook to get started onsite. Valiant Hearts is centered on being an inclusive roleplay community, accommodating all RP styles, post speeds, and character builds.

If you have an idea, talk to a staff member and see if your idea works with our lore. The answer isn’t always yes, but most of the time, it is!

• LGBTQIA+ friendly.
• Polyam friendly.
• Disability friendly.
• ESL friendly.
• No word count.
• Community is active.
• Many canon roles and franchise roles available.
• Original characters encouraged.
• Custom classes/specializations.
• Voting on big site decisions.
• No micromanagement.
• Simple D&D dice system used for combat.
• Choices matter and can change the world.
• Many want ads and connections.
• Site shop is active.
• No experience with the games is needed.
• Easy-to-write application.

• Valiant Hearts is a 3/3/3 site, and players must be 18+ to write with us here. Characters can be 16+, but characters under 18 cannot be in mature threads.
• VH uses OOC accounts.
• OOC account names should match your discord name.
• IC accounts can follow the naming convention you’re most comfortable with. We don’t have any rules regarding whether your character has ‘First Name, Last Name’, ‘Last Name, First Name’, ‘First Name, Title’, ‘Title, First Name’, etc. We just ask that your names are reasonable. Your character is also welcome to just have a first name.
• Joining the Discord server is mandatory. This is where a lot of our plotting happens, and announcements and polls go live here first.

Activity checks are done once every month at the end of the month. Every character is required to have one post minimum every month to be considered active. We do a link gathering style AC, you'll post on an AC thread, all your characters in one post, and post your character's name with their link(s). If you have any questions regarding how AC works, please reach out to one of us. I promise we don't bite.

You have 4 skips per year to use, you can only use one skip every four months, if you miss more than that, the staff team will check in with you to see if you're interested in writing with us, and we may require you to lower your character count until you can prove your activity.

While the staff team understands that sometimes people need to take a hiatus, it is not fair to other members who are active for someone to take a hiatus every time we have an activity check.

If you require a longer hiatus, the staff team will re-open your canon or franchise roles to be up for grabs, but will not actively advertise (with some exceptions) for these roles to be picked up again. If, after six months, your long-term hiatus ends and you are unable to return in a timely manner, then the team reserves the right to advertise the positions.

If you are on a long-term hiatus like this, we expect you to understand that we will give away major characters to an interested party should they ask.

This is effective as of 03/12/2023. We're willing to work with members, but inactivity is not something that we want to foster.

ABSENCES: Are shorter-term "aways" from the site. Less than a month in length. Typically, if you go on an absence, you are expected to meet the AC unless you ask for a skip.
HIATUSES: Are longer-term "aways" from the site. More than a month; we allow up to 6 months of hiatus by default. If you require longer, you need to let us know and discuss an action plan for your return to the site.

You can use an AC skip while on absence or without a posted absence. You just need to ask Bach for a skip no more than 4 days prior to the end of the current AC (basically you are free to ask for a skip in a given month, as long as you ask between the 1st and the 26th). You do not need to use AC skips if you are on a hiatus.

On Valiant Hearts we encourage members to get to know one another and hinge their activity on the activity of others, so that the site's activity is shown through the activity of its members. Due to this, we will no longer be accepting activity responses where a person has begun a thread with one of their characters and responded with another character that they write. This goes against the core value of activity check, which was voted into order by the memberbase of Valiant Hearts.
Added: 7/29/2024

We have two types of characters on site. Major Characters and Supporting Characters. While all characters are responsible for one post a month to cover Activity Check. Those with Major Characters have a little more to take into consideration.

Major Characters

Major Characters are directly important to site plots. Some examples of this type of character would be:
Kings/Queens/Rulers of Kingdoms
High House leaders in Tevinter
Leaders of major/large organisations.

(So Demetrius Arvina, Archon of Tevinter is a Major Character, while Madeline Wulff, Arlessa of a small town in Ferelden would not count as one.) As far as what constitutes a major/large organisation it would depend on what larger site plots the organisation you’re leading is into. While the Forsaken is a tiny organisation located in a single city, the leader would be considered supporting, but the leader of say, the Vultures, that operates in all of Antiva and is actively both trying to take down the Crows and support the royal family, would be considered major. Only two major characters allowed per player, more can be acquired through gold and consistent roleplaying with your existing characters.

Supporting Characters

Supporting Characters do not directly impact important site plots. These are primarily characters whose plot development only impacts the roleplayer’s stories.

Added: 8/21/2024

We do have more expectations of activity put on Major Characters, simply because these characters directly impact board plots. This is a bit more objective compared to our old Activity Check rules, but we feel it will better foster boardwide activity for everyone involved.

*Players are only allowed two major characters,
*Participate in a quest or event, whether it’s IC or OOC or both, every 3 months. This can mean by participating directly in an event, or perhaps running small quests ideas for the area/organisation in question.
*To run a kingdom or organisation major event every 6 months
*Consistently meeting Activity Check requirements

[b]Note[/b]:If you're not comfortable running events or quests, you can submit ideas to the staff team, that the team can run for you. Or you can even co-host with a staff member, if you'd like to try running a quest or event.

Added: 8/21/2024

• We prefer you to host your images through our personal image hosting site. You can find the site here. If you have any questions regarding the site, please message someone on staff on the discord server.
• We have canon roles onsite that are open for the taking. If interested in a role that isn’t listed on the canons page but could feasibly be a canon role, just let a staffer know and we’ll add it to the list.
• Please be aware, Valiant Hearts does not allow the following to be written onsite: rape, pedophilia, child abuse and beastiality. We do allow implications in history of such things, but it will never be written on the site.
• As of 10/22/2023 our members voted for a 14 day reservation period for wanted ad holds, face claim reserves, canon reserves and franchise reserves. This reservation period may be extended once after the initial reservation date.

• Valiant Hearts is a roleplay that uses a decentralized storyline, so any character can have as large or as small an influence on the site plot as the roleplayer may wish. This is regardless of organization ties or their canon status.
• Custom post templates are not in use here, and will not be allowed. There are no templates in use in the posting areas of the sites to promote ultimate accessibility.
• We’re here to write a story, but fight threads can be drawn-out, boring, etc. Due to this, we’re encouraging creative liberty in fights. You can use dice if you want them, and we have a dice bot on the discord, but it is not required. We ask you to use sound judgment and respect others when writing with them.

• We ask for face claims to be signed models, actors/actresses, musicians, etc. Exceptions may apply on a case-by-case basis.
• Certain races on VH are typically POC, due to the lore behind the areas and Bioware's own statements. Such as: Elves (typically Native, Asian, other POC faces accepted), Kossith (typically Indian, Black, Native, other POC faces accepted), and Aberrations (due to the variance in background, any POC face is acceptable).
• Certain kingdoms on VH are more likely to have characters with POC faces, such as: Arlathan (see: Elves), Rivain (typically Black), Tevinter, and Antiva.