Sourcebans: How to add a Ban Sourcebans is a powerful database that allows us to control access to our servers. Here, we can restrict access to our servers via bans of determinate length. Whenever someone attempts to connect to our servers, Sourcebans compares their unique Steam ID to bans found in our database. Long story short, if it finds their Steam ID in Sourcebans, they're not allowed to connect. This brings a tremendous amount of power and responsibility to your fingertips. We trust you with the ability to restrict access to the servers with the expectation that you will not abuse this power. The purpose of this tutorial is to show you how to ban people through the Sourcebans web admin panel. It will allow you to ban people without them being connected to our servers and without requiring you to be in game. PART 1 : Looking up Steam ID using HLStats To ban a person, you must first know their Steam ID. Since a player may be offline when you need to issue a ban, you can easily acquire this information using our own Hlstats. If you already have the Steam ID, skip this step and go directly to Part 2. 1) Go to our Hlstats page. Here, you'll be able to find all the information you need to ban the player. 2) Click on “search” in the upper left hand corner of the screen. 3) Type in the person you're looking for. In this example, I'm searching for a guy named [EGC] Free Bacon For Scudworths. If I only could remember his [EGC] tag, that's alright. The more of a name you know, the easier it is to find the person. Click “Find Now”. 4) In this case, it only came up with one result.. we know for sure that this is the guy I'm looking for. In the case of multiple results, you might have to search through several people. Click the name to bring up a profile. 5) Here's his profile. Highlight and copy the “Steam:” field. You'll need that number later. You'll also notice I've circled “chat” in the bottom right hand corner. Clicking this will show you his entire chat history. This can be used to verify that you have the right person. 6) Yep. It's definitely the right guy. Let's ban him. PART 2: Banning through Sourcebans 1) Head to our Sourcebans database, found at the following address: 2) Click on the (Login) link at the upper right hand corner. If you need your password, please PM Turtle on the forum with your current email address and he will send you a password reset link for your Sourcebans account. 3) Once you log in, it should say Welcome (yourname) in the upper right hand corner. You'll also notice that several menu options have now appeared. The one we are concerned with for adding a ban is the “Bans” option. Please note: use the link circled in red. The “submit a ban” option is for players to recommend a ban. 4) Once inside the ban tab, you're going to need some information about the player in order to ban them. If you have this info, enter it here and click “Add Ban”. If not, go back up to the section in part 1 “Looking up Steam ID”. Nickname: Their name Ban Type: Keep this at Steam ID Steam ID: The most important value: a unique number tied to each Steam account. Ensure there is no blank space after the Steam ID. IP Address: Leave this blank. Ban reason: Select from the list or create your own (Other reason) Ban length: Guidelines will be established for how long a ban stands. Generally, racism is an automatic perm ban. 5) After you click “Add Ban”, this window will pop up. Let it finish searching, then click “Okay”. Your ban has been added! 6) The player you just banned will now show up at the top of the list for “Latest Added Bans”. Click on that person's name to bring up the ban information. 7) Highlight all the details for the ban and copy it to your clipboard (control + c). You will need to post this information in the ban section of the forums. This shows the community that we're serious about our rules, increases search engine exposure for those banned, and also helps in case of a ban dispute. 8) Post your message in the Bans/Appeals area of the forum, and you're done!