This is both the forum and game FAQ.
Here are some answers to some common questions floating around the forum...

Forum FAQ:
- Q: How can I change my forum avatar?

A:Avatars in this forum are linked to a global site called gravatar.
By creating an account on Gravatar (making sure that you use the same email address as that you use on the forums), and uploading your custom avatar to their site, it should automatically synchronise the two accounts within a few seconds.

- Q: How does the text formatting work here?

A: The basic formatting information is displayed to the right of the text box you use to create a post, but here are the tags again:
Create a link: <a href="">Create a link</a>
Write some code: enclose your code within ` (commonly used for quoting other users also)
<strong>Write in bold</strong>: <strong>Write in bold</strong>
<em>Write in italics</em>: <em>Write in italics</em>
And lastly:<blockquote>Write inside a blockquote</blockquote> (this entire paragraph is in a blockquote)

- Q: My threads are being closed/posts being deleted - why?

A: Likelihood is you are breaking the forum guidelines.
These are the guidelines that both users and administrators should follow. At the end of the day, it is the admin team's discretion on whether a thread/post stays or goes (based on the guidelines).
Excessive arguing about the discretion in thread will likely provoke an admin to punish, so all complaints about such matters need to be presented and dealt with in an official manner through posting an aptly named thread in the Support forum.

- Q: How can I be a good user on the forum?

A: In one sentence: follow the forum guidelines.
In more than one sentence: keep thinking whether what you say is related to the topic and is not some junk and/or designed to provoke anyone. Keep threads as 'clean' as possible and make sure than any links to external websites are not advertising products or hacks of any kind.

- Q: How can I edit the title of my own thread?

A: Click on the 'edit' button by the original/first post you made, and change the title from there.

Game FAQ:
- Q: How can I change my ingame name?

A: Your ingame name is defined in the 'config.ini' file in your Ace of Spades installation folder.
So to change it, simply go to your Ace of Spades folder (often 'C:\Program Files\Ace of Spades'), then open the file 'config.ini'.
Inside there is the line 'name Deuce' - simply change 'Deuce' to the name that you want (remembering to keep a space between 'name' and the name you choose).

If you get permission errors, then you shall need to: copy all the contents out of 'config.ini', paste it into notepad, delete the original 'config.ini', now change your name in notepad as described above, save it onto the desktop as config.ini (remembering to make sure it's saved using 'All Files' option rather than '.txt' if using notepad), then copy/paste that desktop 'config.ini' back into your Ace of Spades folder.
Step-by-step video of this process can be found here (Thanks to Andrea for the video).

- Q: What is the purpose/goal of this game?

A: Ace of Spades is an FPS (First Person Shooter) with sandbox terrain. The goal is to capture, and return to your Command Post (marked as a team-coloured '+' on the map), the enemy Intel (marked as a square in the opposition colour).
By capturing, you increase your team's score and you receive the ability, for one minute, to see all enemy movements (as red circles on the map). You have limited ammunition on your player, but you can restock your supplies at your own Command Post.
You have two digging tools, a rifle and some grenades. The pick-axe is used to gather blocks, destroying one block at a time; the spade is used to destroy three blocks at a time (destroys the block you point at, plus the blocks immediately above and below it - useful for making tunnels).

- Q: How can I play the game on linux?

A: using WINE. Details on how to do this can be found on the Wiki.

- Q: How can I play the game on mac?

A: Download: http://www.mediafire.com/?8zhioibefcxb0ak
Unzip then right-click on the app and select "view contents" to access the config.ini file.
(Thanks goes to knottycorpse for creating the original app, and Pwaa for highlighting and updating it)

- Q: How can I remove the fog?

A: You can't, and it is considered a hack if you do so..

- Q: How can I change my controls?

A: Unforunately control-changing functionality has not been programmed into the game, however Ben Aksoy (the developer) has said that custom key bindings are on the agenda for future updates.

- Q: I cannot load client.exe, what is wrong?

A: Ace of Spades works by webpage sending information to 'client.exe' to load it automatically with the correct settings. This means that you can't just load 'client.exe', you must choose a server from the play page and let it load itself.
Currently there is no GUI (Graphical User Interface), however some members of the community have created their own alternative server browsers with nifty extra features, more notable ones being listed here.

A new forum for AoS players has opened! It has its own clans section,and an index of downloads that will grow with your help.
Our goal is an easy to navigate, clan forum with all the resources available for AoS at your fingertips.
Come to http://www.SourceofSpades.betaboard.ca and register with us today!

ps. looking for help

Really needed:
- We need mods with warning- & (temp)banning-rights.
- We need a messaging system (PMs).
- We need more forum-sections.
- We need postcount-display.
- We need to be able to click the users name to go to their profile to see all the posts they have made. (You can only visit your own profile atm. Btw, this is already implemented: http://ace-spades.com/forums/profile.php?id=XXXX, problem is we don't know the id of the users.)
- We need a member-list which displays all registered members.
- The forums should be on top of the latest discussions. There are so many threads displayed on the front-page that users may miss that there is a forum-structure actually.
- BBCode would be much easier to use than plain HTML.
- We need to be able to use image-tags to post visible (thumb)images in our posts.
- We need a better quoting system.
- We need better search-capability (search for user-name, etc).
- We need threads which get marked with another color, icon, etc. when there are new posts inside which you haven't read yet.

Nice to have:
- The possibility to report certain posts to the mods.
- An onlinelist which displays all users which are online atm.
- A simple attachement system to upload small files.
- Some smileys (not too many).
- The possibility to have a small (not bloated) signature under the post-text (without images).
- Captchas or other custom questions to require human interaction while account registration.
- A notification email (or PM) if there's a new post to a favorite topic.
- The possibility to ignore all posts from a certain user.

Btw: Most of those idea could be easily achieved by using some plugins for bbPress.

How about adding a stamina-digging meter, so after digging for a while you start to dig slower and you have to either stand still for a while, or stopp digging, and the shovel takes more stamina than the pickaxe. What do you guys think??

http://www.ace-spades-community.com/

Nameservers have changed over, and I have just installed a fresh copy of phpBB. If you're not going to be an abusive idiot, you can become a Moderator. This is a forum created by the community, for the community. If Ben wants to use these forums he can, if he doesn't, that's okay too. Go on and register over there, if we all use it, Ben might consider using it as well. It'll be easier too Moderate, polls, private messages, Topic Deletion and more.