Hello everyone, as we head into February we have a few things to go over.

hiatus start

Our species hiatus is beginning, our current timeframe for this hiatus is planned until end of April.
However, if things continue to go smoothly, this time could be shortened and end sooner than planned- but I cannot make any solid promises on that front. We are going to be doing our best to make this go as well as possible!

During this hiatus, the following will be effectively put "on pause"

- Prompt Submissions
- Tide Pool Submissions (prompt only- surrenders are okay!)
-MYO / SB  Submissions
- Design Updates
- Site Events (such as Easter)

Any art created by users over the hiatus duration will be counted after the hiatus has ended!
Please don't worry about your art not being submissable for sanddollars, we will still count them after the hiatus ends.


During the hiatus, we as staff are going to be focusing on: 

- Updating site assets (prior announcement)
- Fixing masterlist entries (prior announcement 1 | 2 | 3)
- Updating the site to Lorekeeper v3 (Fundraiser)
- Adding new site features
- Re-Working the Sand Bank payouts
- Continue cleaning up and updating any old, outdated information on the site and discord server.

Staff applications

As mentioned in our last newsletter, staff applications are now open! 
These will be open until the end of day February 21st, (11:59pm EST) and we will have new staff members contacted by the end of the month.

All characters featured on the Moderator Application are all staff-owned and currently hidden from the masterlist. Just do the best you can!

Webdev Applications link

Moderator Applications link

Please note: Being a staff member is entirely a voluntary position, you will not be paid for this job using real-world currency.
However, staff members will be "paid" monthly with currency specifically to staff, and this is calculated entirely based around activity.
You will also recieve some paid opportunities as a member of staff (adopts, breedings, sea breeze salon, ect...) 

With this in mind, you will not be expected to be overly active, we understand everyone has other obligations and priorties outside of the community and we respect that entirely. You will never be let go from the team for minimal activity in a month, unless there's prolonged periods of time with zero activity at all without prior communication to the rest of the team.

Staff Applications are only open to folks who are 18 years of age or older, DO NOT submit an application if you are under 18.

This includes submitting applications "just for fun," only apply if you are of age, and are serious about applying.

voiding / unvoiding rule updates

We have made a few changes to our voiding and unvoiding process going forwards, please read everything over carefully!

While we still want users to be able to void/unvoid their dogs freely, this can be a lot of unnecessary work for staff in the case of an owner repeatedly voiding and unvoiding the same characters in a small timeframe. Voiding is still meant to be a last resort, as it’s the complete removal of your character from the species. We encourage users not to void impulsively and to think it over first, as voided characters cannot be used or advertised in our server or on site.

With this in mind, we are implementing a cooldown of 6 months when it comes to the same owner voiding and unvoiding a character- meaning that if you are the one to void a waterdog, you must wait 6 months in order to unvoid them again.
If any users are caught evading this rule by trading characters to someone else to unvoid, and then having them be traded back, they will be given a strike. Likewise, after a character is unvoided, six months must pass from the date of the void before the same owner can re-void them.

In addition to this time limit, we are also placing a limit on the number of characters that can be un-voided at a time, with a maximum of 5 characters at once. After this maximum is reached, users must wait 3 months before they can un-void any more characters that they themselves, have voided.

A reminder that this un-voiding limit WILL NOT affect those who obtain already voided characters. This is to curb instances of mass voiding and un-voiding by the same owner. You will still be allowed to mass void characters, although it is strongly discouraged.

We are implementing this change to encourage users to weigh the pros and cons of voiding, and to prevent an unnecessary workload on staff. We thank you for your understanding and continued support!

User customs rule update

In years past, we have never offically allowed community members to advertise custom designs (for money) in the discord server / community spaces.
However, we'd like to make an amendment to that ruling...

Members can now advertise customs / design concepts- whether for real-world curreny, items, trades, ect.. in the server and other similar spaces. However it must be made 100% clear that these designs are non-official, and users would still need to obtain and provide all the proper items in order to make the design official. 
The designs can also be appraised for how much they were bought for when submitting them to the masterlist (with proof of purchase amount.) 

We know we've had a lot of questions in the past regarding our stance on this topic, and we're happy to say we will be allowing users to take waterdog design concepts/customs for real-world currency with the above rules in mind.
Any advertisments that do not state the designs are still non-official / will need the correct items provided, will be asked to have their wording changed, or post will be removed. 

Thank you for understanding! <3

Sea Breeze Salon update

We have a new update for the Sea Breeze Salon, where staff members can now provide users with a Self-Breed design. Similarly to staff breeding batches, but will be more along the lines of user created Self-Breeds.
This update is for members who might want a breeding design from a staff member, but don't want to have multiple designs to choose from / want to be able to pick their own artist.
This also works for the members on staff who might be interested in creating breeding batches, but find the idea of making multiple designs from one set of parents too daunting or overwhemling.

• User must provide a Self-Breeding Slot in order to purchase.
• Follows the same rules as normal SB's, cannot pass down mythical traits.
• Can get a cat or big cat self-breeding with a small fee added on, dogs are still the default otherwise like a normal SB slot.
• Cannot get a mix breeding unless the user has the proper item for it, like SB's and Breeding Batches work normally.
• User can provide a species potion to change the species of the child from the parents.
• Parents must have useable SB slots available to be used, unless a SB Restoration Slot ticket is provided.
• Comes with a free "dice roll" which adds on one extra trait the parents do not have (trait has the chance to be either rare or legendary rarity.) Users can opt out of this if no extra traits are desired.
• Can add on an additional dice roll for $5 extra, up to two rolls for a total of 3 extra traits.
• Base price is $40

Make sure you talk with your desired artist beforehand / see if this is a feature they offer and have open on the Sea Breeze Salon pages.

starfish raffle

https://waterdogworld.com/character/PRZ-8329


This month's starfish raffle design was created by faileh and tickets can be purchased at Archie's Emporium under the "Raffle Tickets" tab for 25 starfish each.

Last Month's raffle for has been rolled and the winner is PurrOpal congratulations!