Running a server

Roles and permissions

Roles decide what people can do in a server. Give a role permissions, give members roles, and use channel overrides to make exceptions for particular channels. This page explains every permission, the role order, overrides, private channels, and reaction roles.

How permissions add up#

• Everyone in a server has the @everyone role. By default it can Send Messages, Read Message History, and Connect to voice.
• A member can have several roles. Their permissions are everything any of their roles allows, added together.
• The owner always has every permission, whatever their roles.
• Administrator gives every permission and ignores every channel override.
• Channel overrides can then allow or deny particular permissions in one channel. See Channel overrides.

Every permission#

Creating and editing roles#

• Server Settings
• Roles

1. Click Create Role.
2. Set a Role name and Color. Members' names show in the color of their highest colored role, unless they picked their own name color.
3. Optionally tick Display role members separately from online members to give the role its own section in the member list.
4. Tick its Permissions.

You can only give a role permissions you have yourself. That stops someone with Manage Roles from creating an Administrator role and handing it to themselves.

The role order#

Roles are listed highest first; drag them to reorder. Position matters:

• You can only create, edit, reorder, delete, give, or remove roles below your own highest role.
• You can only kick, ban, or time out members whose highest role is below yours.
• @everyone is always at the bottom.

Giving someone a role#

Right-click a member (in the member list, a message, or voice) and choose Roles, then tick the roles to give them. You can also do it from their profile card while you're in the server: click Edit (or Add, if they have no roles yet) next to Roles to open the same list. Only the owner can change the owner's roles. The Welcome tab can also give one role to everyone automatically when they join.

Channel overrides#

Overrides change permissions in one channel only, on top of the server-wide ones.

1. Open the channel's settings (right-click, Edit Channel) and go to Permissions.
2. Pick a role on the left, or click Add Member for one person.
3. Set each permission to Allow, Deny, or neutral (inherit from the server). Reset to Neutral clears them all.
4. Click Save.

Which permissions can be overridden depends on the channel type: text channels have Send Messages, Manage Messages, Mention @everyone, and Read Message History; voice channels have Connect, Mute Members, and Move Members; all channels have Manage Channels.

Who wins#

• An override for a specific member beats overrides for their roles.
• Between roles, an explicit Deny beats an Allow from a different role.
• Administrator and the owner ignore overrides entirely.

Private channels#

To make a staff-only text channel: @everyone, Deny Read Message History; your staff role, Allow Read Message History and Send Messages.

Reaction roles#

Let members pick their own roles by reacting to a message, for things like game roles, notification pings, or pronoun roles.

1. Post a message explaining the choices, naming one emoji per role, for example "React with the game controller for game-night pings, or the megaphone for announcement pings".
2. Right-click it and choose Reaction Roles (needs Manage Roles).
3. For each choice, type an emoji, pick a role, and click Add. Up to 20 per message.
4. Click Done.

Members who react with one of those emoji get the role; removing the reaction removes it.