I'm more disturbed by the fact that someone on staff was allowed to openly insult a user's ability to draw or not. That is unacceptable as fuck.

i'm not someone who really participates much in the whole CW world - i made exactly three pairs of tights many years ago (and i don't even like them anymore because i realize i made the lineart too thick) and i don't buy nearly as many CWs as the people who are really into it, but i do end up seeing a lot of the discussion and issues around CWs and it fills me with so much secondhand frustration.

tbh, i think in general staff's attitude toward CW policy changes is kind of unreasonable, and sometimes outright nasty. it always comes down to "yes we acknowledge that people unilaterally think this rule is stupid, but we don't care and will never ever change it, unless we feel like it, but we don't." arbitrarily stritct restrictions? inconsistent approval standards with clear favoritism? irrational decision-making with no justification? um, fuck off and stop asking about it or you'll get a warning :)

like... who actually cares if something "looks like eyes" or replaces a body part or whatever? there's no rational reason for most of these restrictions, but if there are going to be certain limitations on what people can make, they should absolutely NOT be anything vague or open to interpretation, because then you get different people coming to different conclusions, or the same person seeing similar items months apart and making a different decision for each without even realizing.

CWs should be, you know, a fun feature that allow users creativity and freedom - especially considering they're the site's primary source of income - but of course, this conversation comes up all the time, and the response is always the same.

but...that old school tv isnt even that old how are they deciding its not allowed now?! Also, I saw that noodle bowl as a floating bg item too, even with the shadow, so its sad it cant be on site :c,

okay but that ci is literally everything love it xD.

Also I'd really appreciate it if we got a reply/ plan of action put in for the pricing category issue. It's been mentioned to death and theres been barely a reply if any. Horns and animal ears should in no world cost the same amount as a wig.

I fully agree with, like, every point raised here (I've definitely been willing to pay 700 CSC for horns both before and after the pricing structure changes but MAN do I agree that it's unnecessary)

Not to call anyone out about the TV heads specifically, but it does feel very icky that a member of staff can submit head replacement CWs and no one else can, despite there not being a clearly stated rule about it, and despite limb replacements that do or do not hide the underlying limbs having been "never really against the rules" (source)

I also don't understand why the halo-style items that could absolutely be used to replace the HA's head are okay either if head replacements aren't allowed. I get that that's not their intended use, but makeup items, even ones that are NOT intended to mimic closed eyes, are being denied because they supposedly, plausibly could be used for that. Off the top of my head and with a quick glance in the wardrobe, there are at least 4 halo items (some with recolors) that could potentially be used this way.

In my opinion, either ALL items that hide the HA's head should be allowed or none of them should. And, just in my personal opinion, I think it'd be unfair at this point to decide that none of them are allowed going forward and to have another ridiculous set of hoops to jump through like anyone trying to submit mascara.

This reminds of work, where one person in a somewhat authoritative department tells one (1) person that "the way you were doing this whole time isn't the way it's supposed to work", but fails to tell the rest of us, and now we're all confused (usually turns out that the way we were doing it all along is correct - go figure!).

And they pull this shit all the time because this department can't ever just have everyone meet up, make a decision, and tell the rest of us what they actually want. It's frustrating for everyone.

Also, is the only person approving things? Because I also feel like more opinions are needed on whether something can truly be a closed eye replacement or a head replacement/mask. Sometimes you just need to bounce things around, but you can't do that on your own.

[preview=Romero Shipwreck Watchman Rattle] [preview=Romero Shipwreck Plastic Jelly]

Can anybody see the black line art in either of these items? Because I can't.

You can't make a rule like no colored line art and then break it CONSISTENTLY. There are SEVERAL items (especially in the romero lines) that don't have black line art. Either fix your own standards for official items, or remove the restrictions for the rest of us.

This 'do as I say, not as I do' attitude is only going to drive more people away.

The rules have never been clear, and me naively hoping that that would change over time is why subeta has not nor i think will ever get a penny from me for cws. it's been literal years, and the conflicting information and favoritism even I can see from my barricaded little corner of the site would be funny if it weren't so bad.

the new info about a staff member having their items approved then denying others for breaking "unspoken rules" is very disturbing and way too reflective of what I have to deal with irl at work, so hey, even more reason not to support anything about it with my actual, real money. :')))))

I don't understand why the noodle bowl was rejected!! How is a TV head not a head replacement? You are preaching to the choir, dude. The inconsistencies in the rules and what's acceptable and non-acceptable drive a lot of us up the wall, myself included.

At the very least, we should be allowed to file tickets to ask if certain concepts would be allowed? It's not the same as pre-approval there are still a multitude of reasons to deny the item (quality of art etc) but it would make sense to know it something is a fruitless struggle before someone puts the effort or money into doing it. What is and isn't allowed shouldn't be a secret only for staff to know and for us to guess?

This is what bugs me the most, actually. CWs are held to a higher standard than official site art, which is ridiculous. Or, which is worse, is that Subeta is so overworked and/or careless that artists don't go through any sort of oversight before releasing stuff.

Personally my biggest issue is the unclear rules. Its really frustrating, especially when a commissioner pays an artist to make something and ends up not even being able to submit it because it goes against an unstated rule. Like, that's super unfair and sorta a disrespect of people's irl currency ( u know what people spend their life and work their asses off to earn. ).

Like even if they kept direct cw consultation from being done through tickets, staff could still maybe acknowledge that what we're questioning isn't in the rules and then ammend the public rules or guidelines to address that point? Like a

"Hey we've seen that youre having an issue with something CW related and the answer you're looking for isn't in the guidelines right now but check back in a few days and staff will have shed some light on this point!" Would I guess be more productive than going "Hey we can't help you through tickets sorry, go ahead and spend that dough and try to submit the item. :^ ) then we'll reject it. "

Like a clearly outlined CW guide would probably fix a good chunk of CW related gripes. Like the queue speed? If people don't have to go back and edit cws multiple times because they now have a clear guide of what and what not to do, Id assume that would speed up the queue because less of a burden on staff?

idunno. when it's my personal items that don't get accepted I really don't care much but when it's a commissioner that has their concept rejected it, is really hard to see ngl.

thank you for putting forth the effort to reply. that alone is a sign of good faith on behalf of staff.

honestly? in regards to the first question, a straight up list of everything that you as the person in charge of the cw queue look for in approving or denying a cw would be necessary. clearly the current standards aren't uniform, so put your attention into addressing this: x is unacceptable, y is approved, so on, so forth. make them uniform, and if you plan to train more queue staff, train them on your standards. this will continue the cycle. if you're worried about one big long page of text, separate each item or category type: body, shoulder, head, hat etc. you can put this under a spoiler, or have something similar to a layout like the quest shop, where each tab has a different piece and information/restrictions about it.

second: I would advise you to more forward rather than backwards with rules regulation. There are so many amazing cw ideas out there that are being blocked by ancient restrictions that are constantly disregarded anyway. example: Artwork replaces features and/or edits the avatar base, as you said. body mods literally do this. theyre huge in the cw market, encourage creativity, and make HA creation more fun. this rule is vague and pointless and even the cw staff can't figure it out, so oust it.

that's my two cents, anyway!

I appreciate that someone on staff responded...but....

It kinda sounds...not so vaguely threatening when you say things like "There's also the fact that if rules are collected, reviewed, revised, and rewritten, it may cause things that were previously accepted on the old scattered set of rules to no longer be acceptable..."

I mean, I hope you can see how that could come across as "welp, if you like the freedom you have now, are you suuuuuure you want the rules codified?" I'm deeply and sincerely hoping that was not intended.

The ship for "avatar base edits" has sailed. Saying that the noodle bowl isn't allowed for this reason when there are hundreds of cat, fox and rabbit butts on this site doesn't make any sense. And since there actually are other CW head replacements, it really isn't fair.

If nobody can articulate why the TVs are okay and the ramen bowl isn't, it's going to keep looking like favouritism. Is there an actual problem? If so, what is it? Is somebody just...bothered by the idea of a food item as a head replacement? And if so, is that really a good reason to deny it?

If the staff cannot articulate what it is they think people are going to do and make a rule against that, they need to work on that, because there are innumerable CWs out there that are avatar base edits, but some types of avatar base edits (booties, leg mods, arm mods) just fly right through the queue, while others (animal masks, eye makeups for male-presenting avatars) are put under incredible amounts of scrutiny.

For example BitterLimeParakeet has been given 50 shades of heck about making her mask straps visible on her bird faces, when the dog and cat muzzles in Steamworks don't have visible straps.

This makes me nervous because I desperately want to release a makeup that blurs out the ear lines on the avatar base--people should be able to wear cat, wolf, fox and rabbit ears with short wigs without having to have 2 sets of ears showing.

I don't understand what the big deal is about closed eyes, and I don't think anyone else does, either. They're not obscene or anything. We'd really all like to know why this particular thing has been chosen as the line in the sand, the hill you want to die on, to the point where CWs that aren't intended to represent closed eyes are denied because someone might think to use them that way.

You can make an avatar that has no eyes at all simply by hiding the eyes under the base and not equipping an eye item, which is much much creepier than having a closed-eyed avatar could ever be.

Similarly--

If there are fandoms that you are going to disallow tributes for explicitly, nobody should have to pay an artist $35 to find that out. There should be a list.

I bought one of hell's premade designs and now nobody can submit that design because I bought it. My $$$ and hell's time have been wasted.

Hussie has since really made it quite clear that his objection is to people creating their own 100% Homestuck merch depicting his characters, not to people making random orange horns for avatar sites, and I feel quite strongly that if I'd never mentioned HS and just sent the orange horns in without mentioning it, they'd have been accepted.

(It's not a good idea to make people feel like they're being punished for honesty...you know?)

Thank you for reading this thread and responding. It really means a lot after all our discussions that have appeared like they were thrown into the void.

As for your last concern raised, 'There's also the fact that if rules are collected, reviewed, revised, and rewritten, it may cause things that were previously accepted on the old scattered set of rules to no longer be acceptable': It's kind of hard if not impossible to provide feedback until we can see for ourselves what those things are, so IMHO having the rules explicitly spelt out would be the first necessary step. It would also help with transparency, because providing feedback based on guesswork on our part wouldn't really help either staff or ourselves.

I'd also love to know your opinion (and perhaps other staff's behind the CW scene too) on some of our offer to volunteer to help compiling CW rules and/or guideline. I'm sure we as artists and CW releasers have had our fair share of denials to contribute to a denial guideline. has written a guide that was used as the official guide on the Battle page, so I'm very keen to know if a similar community or user-based effort can be encouraged and used as far as CW is concerned. It will help save you a lot of time and work having to dig around as well, and potentially will not distract you too much from queue revising. Your final review and approval is still needed before the guide can go live, but it will surely be much less of a chore for you.

@ saint I appreciate you answering but in the end, I think it would be incredibly appropriate for some of the senior staff to take a look at the complaints and suggestions that are made about the custom wearables in general, since they do provide such a large chunk of the site’s income. Up until now we’ve only heard from you, and if I’m not mistaken (and I probably am), you were initially hired to help with queue. Does the rest of staff not responding mean that you will be the sole person responsible for the CW scene? We are glad that you answered, but there are certain things mentioned here that would need more input from staff in general, not just a single voice. This isn’t meant as an attack on you at all, since I do think it’s unfair to expect you to be the face and the focal point for this whole mess.

That being said, there is a worry that it is a single person’s understanding of the rules that will define how it works in the future. I would still like an answer as to why the TV heads were allowed in the past? As you said, it was your understanding of the rules that led to the noodle head denial, and yet it hadn’t been an issue previously? I’m sure you can understand how it looks, as the TV heads were submitted by a staff member with no problem, and now that we as users want similar items, they’re being denied? This my major gripe, because it seems like it was your own personal understanding of a rule that lead to the denial, not because it was something that staff as a whole decided on.

Furthermore, "artwork that changes or edits the avatar base".... that is literally what body mod cws do? What makes the animal booties different from an object head? I’m genuinely confused, because does that mean all body mods (including booties and such) will be removed, as you mentioned that revising rules could mean that previous items would need to be removed?

As others have said, I would also suggest revisiting what is allowed and not allowed in general with cws. This is def the option that prob wouldn’t happen, but I think staff is also aware of how stagnant the cw pool is becoming, and so we should be thinking of ways to inject new life into it.

I would also like to revisit the cw ticket to address a concept question : revising rules will take some time, so I do think it should be possible to somehow ask concept questions in the mean time.

edit here: I’m checking the cw rules page again and there..... is literally nothing about base edits.... Maybe I’m just blind but like?

For a long time "animal butts" were an accepted body mod in a time where it was adamantly stated in the rules that it was not allowed. Subeta realized the potential and started making their own official animal butts ( etc) and it was all allowed and everyone proceeded. Subeta started making it's own official bodymod/pose changing wearables ([item=Delish Vir Sleeves (Base 3)] etc), realized the potential, and opened it up to cws being allowed to do it. Now subeta has started making head replacement/objectheads ( etc) because they realized the potential. The next step is to allow cws to do it too. You already have allowed it with the tv heads, having head replacements in official items and only SOME cws is just unfair - coming from someone who regularly uses my copy of .

As work is done on the next version of the wardrobe they are chopping up the limbs to allow you to turn them off and use body mods properly. Why is the head supposed to be a big deal? As it stands you can even use a full background and make an ambient avatar with no human at all. This is just arbitrary.

I'm sorry for pinging since you've probably gotten a bunch of pings to this already, but this is in reply to your post:

You mentioned that the noodles were denied based on the rule: "Artwork replaces features and/or edits the avatar base" That rule is nowhere to be found. I looked in the rules page, and in all of the FAQ and guides in the forum. If i missed, please direct us to it.

I'm guessing you're quoting a "denial reason" as you said, which would mean that is something you, as staff, can select for denying an item. It's not something we, as users, can see. I'll also guess that that denial reason is there because of the old rule "You may not submit any images that edit the avatar base or replace features in any way. This includes repositioning arms or legs, but also restricts drawing original facial features. You may submit clothing that enhances these features such as makeup that works with existing base eyes or lips." - Pulled this from the subeta wiki, which is outdated.(that is a link)

That rule has since been updated, as seen here: "At this time, we will still not be accepting user-made mouths/lips, noses, and eyes. The rules for base edits have been rewritten on the CW submission page to reflect that this is the only base edit no longer allowed (as long as the other CW rules are followed, of course)." (that is a link)

if facial features are the only base edit not allowed anymore, then object heads are not against the rules, and the 'denial reason' you can select should not be used for that.

Further, you have said yourself that base edits are allowed, since that is what the 'body mods' are. (also a link) And, "Artwork replaces features and/or edits the avatar base" directly contradicts the official submission category "All base edits", which shows it's an obsolete denial reason and it should be changed. I would suggest replacing it with "Artwork replaces facial features", which is the actual current rule.

Sounds to me like it's time for staff to revise and reconsider all the rules. And that it shouldn't all be left on one person's shoulders.

So much has changed from when CWs started. So many rules have been updated, but only in part and that's what's leading to situations like these.

I get some things will never be allowed or what ever, but this "Only okay for some people" favoritism stuff has to stop. I'm absolutely sick and tired of hearing people say "Well I gave it a shot and it was accepted!" when 95% of the people who look at that item are convinced it breaks rules. And then when someone else submits something similar it's denied because "Oh ooopssieee!"

TBH I'm getting really salty sally about all the silence / only partial responses / claiming ignorance and I doubt I'm the only one. It would be honestly a breath of fresh air and really appreciated if we could get some transparency with staff on all the issues that have been raised in the last year or two. Would also be really sweet if I don't see an influx of weird denials because I raised concerns today too. =/

ok, so here's my opinion: if ANYTHING has been approved while technically breaking some unstated or unclear rule, that rule should no longer exist.

"well if we look at this rule/reason for denial, it might mean previous items are no longer allowed, and then what are we supposed to do? remove items that have already been approved?" no, what it means is that it's a bad rule and should be null and void. simple as that.

(this isn't municipal politics. it's drawings people make on a website. for fun.)

i'm late to the party and i haven't caught up on the new posts, but i just wanna. have a small complain

because like, the horse mask rejection has stuck in my craw for forever because there's at least one other cw mask that covers the head completely, so like... things that were clearly masks/headpieces were acceptable at one point? so why did that change, and why wasn't that posted anywhere?

items in question

[preview=Ceremonial Mask of the Sun Dragon]

Quote by frederick

idk speaking as a consumer/mostly uninvolved third party, similar to the object head debacle it's just... very :S that it was (apparently) decided behind the scenes that certain kinds of items were not ok after examples had been submitted + approved. it's just very discouraging to be chatting with someone working on items like, "oh you can probably do x, because y is in the wardrobe and the concept is the same!" only to find out that y item is An Exception for reasons no one can point to.