Server Management Guide

Overview

This guide is for trusted config admins — the people who help bring new Discord servers onto Village Vote and keep existing server settings up to date.

Setting up a server is a team effort between three people:

You (the trusted config admin) — you fill in the server's settings on a web page.
The Discord server's owner — they give you permission to manage their server.
The bot operator — they run Village Vote and added you to the trusted admin list.

Already set up and just need a refresher? Skip ahead to "The Manage Servers page" below.

How access works

Being a trusted config admin is not enough on its own. For every server you manage, that server's owner must personally grant you access. This protects server owners: nobody can see or change their server's setup unless they've explicitly said so.

You can only see and edit servers you've been granted access to. Everyone else's servers are invisible to you.

Some games use two Discord servers — one for chatting and one where players get their roles. For those, a grant from either server's owner is enough to manage the whole setup.

Setting up a new server, step by step

Step 1: Install the bot

The Village Vote bot needs to be invited to the new Discord server before anything else can happen. If you don't have an invite link, ask the bot operator.

If the game uses separate chat and role servers, install the bot on both.

Step 2: The server owner grants you access

Ask the owner of the Discord server to run this command in their server:

/grantconfigaccess user: @YourName

Only the server owner can run it — moderators and admins will be politely refused.
The reply is private (only the owner sees it).
The owner can take access away at any time by running the same command with allowed: False.

Tip for the owner: if the command says the person is "not currently a trusted config admin," the grant is saved but won't work until the bot operator adds that person to the trusted admin list.

Step 3: Open the Manage Servers page

In Discord, run:

/manageservers

The bot replies privately with a personal link. Click it to open the Manage Servers page in your browser.

Important: the link is yours alone and expires after a few minutes. Don't share it — anyone with the link can act as you. If it expires, just run /manageservers again.

Step 4: Add the server

On the Manage Servers page, click Add New Server and fill in the form:

┌────────────────────────┬────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Field                  │ What to put in it                                          │
├────────────────────────┼────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Chat server name       │ The Discord server's name, as you want it displayed        │
│ Chat server ID         │ The server's ID number (see "Finding IDs" below)           │
│ Slug                   │ A short web-friendly name, like my-cool-server             │
│ Chat server mod role   │ The moderator role — a dropdown appears once the ID is set │
│ Role server name/ID    │ Same as above, for the role server (if there is one)       │
│ Role server mod role   │ The role server's moderator role                           │
│ Banner paths           │ Optional — leave blank to use the default logo            │
└────────────────────────┴────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

A few things to know:

Single-server games: if the game plays entirely on one Discord server, tick "Role server is the same as the chat server" and the role-server fields fill themselves in.
The slug is permanent. It becomes part of the links players use to vote (for example village-vote.fun/votes/my-cool-server/...), so it can't be changed later. Use lowercase letters, numbers, and hyphens only.
Mod roles: after you enter a server ID, the mod role box turns into a dropdown listing the server's actual roles — just pick one. If the list can't load (for example, the bot isn't on that server yet), you'll see a note and can type the role's ID number instead.
Banners: these are the images shown at the top of voting pages. Leave them blank and a default logo is used. If you want custom banners, send the images to the bot operator and they'll tell you what to type here.

Step 5: Save, and read the check-up results

When you click Create Server, the bot saves the setup and then runs a quick health check on the Discord server: it confirms it's actually installed there and briefly creates and removes a few test channels and roles to make sure it has the permissions it needs. This can take a little while — the button will say "Creating & checking bot permissions…".

If everything is fine, you're done.
If something's off, the server is still saved, but you'll see a yellow warning box listing what needs attention — for example, the bot isn't installed yet, or it's missing a permission. Fix the issue on the Discord side (usually by moving the bot's role higher or re-inviting it with the right permissions), then have a moderator run /testpermissions in the role server to re-check.

About /testpermissions: it must be run in the role server (for single-server games, that is the only server). It first posts a readout of the server's settings — chat and role server registration, mod roles, active and dead player roles, and whether a game is active — and then creates and removes a few test channels and roles to check the bot's permissions. The readout is posted publicly in the channel and includes the server's anonymous vote password, so run it in a moderator-only channel.

The Manage Servers page

Run /manageservers any time to get a fresh link. The page shows every server you've been granted access to.

Edit — click Edit next to a server to change its names, IDs, mod roles, or banners. Changes take effect immediately; no restart needed. (The slug stays locked.)
Add New Server — onboard another server, following the steps above.

If the list is empty, no server owner has granted you access yet — see Step 2 above.

Finding IDs in Discord

Discord hides ID numbers by default. To reveal them:

Open Discord's User Settings (the gear next to your name).
Go to Advanced and turn on Developer Mode.

Now you can:

Server ID: right-click the server's icon in the server list and choose Copy Server ID.
Role ID (only needed if the dropdown can't load): go to Server Settings → Roles, right-click a role, and choose Copy Role ID.

IDs are long strings of digits, like 1473851580288602196.

Common messages and what they mean

┌──────────────────────────────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Message                                      │ What to do                                       │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ "You are not authorized to manage server     │ You're not on the trusted admin list yet — ask   │
│ configs."                                    │ the bot operator to add you.                     │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ "The Discord server owner has not granted    │ Ask the server's owner to run /grantconfigaccess │
│ you access..."                               │ for you (Step 2).                                │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ "...server ID is already claimed by..."      │ That Discord server already belongs to another   │
│                                              │ setup. Double-check the ID; if it looks right,   │
│                                              │ contact the bot operator.                        │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ "The bot is not installed on server..."      │ Invite the bot to that Discord server, then try  │
│                                              │ again (or re-run /testpermissions).              │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ "Invalid or expired authentication token."   │ Your link timed out. Run /manageservers again    │
│                                              │ for a fresh one.                                 │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Quick reference

┌─────────────────────────┬───────────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Command                 │ Who can run it            │ What it does                         │
├─────────────────────────┼───────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────┤
│ /grantconfigaccess      │ The server owner only     │ Grants (or revokes) a trusted        │
│                         │                           │ admin's access to this server        │
│ /manageservers          │ Trusted config admins     │ Sends you a private link to the      │
│                         │                           │ Manage Servers page                  │
│ /testpermissions        │ Server moderators, in the │ Posts a config readout and re-runs   │
│                         │ role server               │ the bot's permission health check    │
└─────────────────────────┴───────────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────┘