Vaultara Entertainment
Support
A real person reads this address. Write to us about anything: a bug, a score that went missing, a name that should not be on the board, or a request to see or delete your data.
We aim to reply within 5 business days. We review every report of a name on the board within 24 hours.
What to include
It saves a round trip if your first message has:
- your username, which is the only way we can find you, and we would rather you did not send us anything more identifying;
- your iPhone model and iOS version (Settings → General → About);
- roughly when it happened, and what you had just done;
- a screenshot, if there was something on screen.
Please do not send us your password. We will never ask for it.
Leaderboards
I finished a run and I’m not on the board
Almost always one of three rules, or the run never reached us. The app says so on screen for the second rule and for a run that never reached us, and does not currently flag the others:
- The run has to be finished. All three stages. The app sends a run to us only once it is complete, so a run you left part-way through is not sent and there is nothing to rank.
- Only your first full run of the day counts. If you had already finished one earlier that day, that earlier one is the one on the board, even if the later run scored higher. A day runs from midnight to midnight US Eastern time, wherever you are. This is deliberate: it is a daily challenge, not a best-of-fifty. Once the app knows the day’s counted run is in, it asks before it starts another, and a later run’s result card says “Recorded” instead of “Counted”.
- The run has to be played on the current version of the app. When the scoring changes we mark runs with the rules they were played under and rank one set at a time, so that two different games are not compared. A run from an older build stays in your history but will not rank. Updating the app fixes this from your next run on.
- The run has to reach our server and be accepted. If the server could not be reached when the run started, the app lets you play anyway but the result card says “Saved locally” and the run is not sent to the board. If the server refused it, the card says “Not accepted”.
Screen recording, AirPlay and screen mirroring do not affect whether a run ranks, so filming or casting a run is fine.
If none of those explain it, write to us with your username and roughly when you played, and we will look at what we recorded for the run.
The board is empty
That is a real answer, not a failed load: it means nobody has posted a qualifying run on that board yet. The weekly board starts fresh every Sunday at 11:00 pm US Eastern time and fills again as people play. If it were a loading failure the app would say so, with a retry button.
When does the week reset?
Sunday at 11:00 pm, US Eastern time, for everybody, wherever you are. It is the server’s clock that decides, which means a phone with the wrong time cannot land you in the wrong week. The “first run of the day” rule turns over at midnight US Eastern time.
My score changed, or my position moved
Positions move as other people play, which is ordinary. If a score of yours changed, or a run disappeared, tell us. That is not ordinary and we want to know.
One thing that is expected: a row reading “Former competitor”. That is where a player who deleted their account used to be. We leave a nameless placeholder so that everyone below them keeps their true position instead of silently moving up. It holds no name, no email, and no link back to the deleted account.
Accounts
Do I need an account?
No. The app gives your device an anonymous identity the first time you play or open a board, and everything, including the leaderboards, works on that alone. Creating an account is optional. It takes an email address, a username and a password, and nothing else: no phone number.
Then what does an account get me?
One thing: your progress stops being tied to this phone. Without an email there is nothing to prove a username and a run history are yours, so a lost, wiped or replaced phone takes them with it. Creating an account converts the identity you already have: it does not start you over, and your runs come with you.
I got a new phone and my history is gone
If you had created an account, sign in from the Account tab and everything comes back. Signing in replaces the guest identity on the new phone, so runs you played there as a guest before signing in stay with that guest and are not merged in.
If you were playing as a guest, the identity lived only on the old phone and cannot be recovered, not by us either, because there is nothing that links it to you. We know this is a harsh answer; it is the price of an app that never asks who you are. If you would like your progress to survive the next phone, create an account now.
I forgot my password
This version has no “Forgot password?” on the sign-in screen. Email us from the address on the account. That address is how we know it is yours, so a message from anywhere else is one we cannot act on. We will sort it out by hand.
How do I delete my account and my data?
Account tab → Delete account, then type the word
DELETE to confirm.
It is immediate and cannot be undone. It removes your account and email, your username, every run you have ever played, the record of which questions you have been served, your sign-in credentials on this phone, and any run still waiting to be sent. There is no grace period, and nothing in the app or on our side brings an account back. It needs a connection, because the deletion happens on our server. (Copies in our hosting provider’s routine backups, if it keeps any, age out on the provider’s own schedule.)
This is offered to guests too. If you never created an account, there is nothing to sign back in with afterwards, so deletion is more final, not less.
Four things stay. If a run of yours was ranking, a nameless standing remains on that board as “Former competitor”, holding only a week, a score, the scoring-rules version and two timestamps (when the run was played and when the account was deleted) under a fresh random identifier that links to nothing. Ask us and we will remove that too. If we ever reset a username of yours, the moderation record of that survives. And two things stay on this phone: the age-gate answer, so the app does not ask you again, and your list of blocked players, which Unblock all on the Account tab (under Names on the board) clears. The phone’s ordinary settings, such as a daily reminder that is switched on, stay too. The Privacy Policy explains each of them.
Usernames
How do I change my username?
From the Account tab (Change name), or by tapping your name (the one with the pencil) in the bar at the bottom of the Board tab. It takes effect immediately and your existing runs keep their places under the new name.
My username was rejected
Usernames are screened automatically against a list of slurs and profanity. The check matches on text, so it occasionally refuses a perfectly innocent name that happens to contain a listed sequence inside it. It deliberately does not tell you which part it objected to: naming it would turn the field into a way of reading the list.
A name can also be refused because someone already uses it, because it is longer than 24 characters, or because it uses anything other than letters, numbers, spaces and . _ - .
Try a variation. If you think yours was wrongly refused, write to us with the name you wanted and we will look at the list.
Someone’s name is offensive
Press and hold any name on the Board tab other than your own and choose Report this name. Or open the Account tab, then Names on the board, then Report a name. Both open a report screen whose Open Mail button prepares the email; if your phone has no mail account set up, the screen shows our address to copy instead. From the Board the name is already filled in; from the Account tab you type it yourself. You can also email us directly:
Send the name and where you saw it. We review every report within 24 hours. Vaultara does not tolerate objectionable content or abusive users. A name that breaks the rules is removed and barred, so nobody can choose it again, and the account that chose it may be reset or deleted.
How do I block a player?
Press and hold their name on the Board tab and choose Block this player, then confirm. On your phone their name is replaced with “Blocked player”; their row, rank and score stay where they are, so the board still adds up. The list of players you have blocked is kept on your phone only. Blocking sends nothing to us, so we cannot see the list, and the player you block is not told. (If you choose Block and report instead, the report is an email you send us, and it names that player.) Signing out and deleting your account do not clear the list. To undo it, use Unblock all on the Account tab, under Names on the board, where the number of blocked players is shown. It lifts every block at once; this version cannot unblock one player alone.
Reminders
My daily reminder isn’t arriving
Check, in order:
- Settings → Notifications → Vaultara on your phone: Allow Notifications must be on. If you declined the first prompt, the app cannot ask again and this is the only way back.
- Focus or Do Not Disturb, and Scheduled Summary, either of which can hold it back.
- In the app, that the reminder is switched on and set to the time you expect.
- That you had not already finished a run that day. The reminder goes quiet once you have finished one that can reach the board (a run played offline does not count for this), which is the point of it.
Will you send me anything else?
No. The reminder is scheduled by your own phone and never leaves it. There is no push notification service behind Vaultara and no key that would let us send you a message, so the reminder you set is the only notification the app can ever produce. Vaultara sends no marketing and no automatic email or text messages either; if you write to us, we reply to the address you wrote from.
Playing
Does it work offline?
Only partly. A run that counts needs a connection: the questions and targets for each ranked run are issued by the server as you start, and the boards need a connection too. If the server cannot be reached, the app waits a few seconds and then lets you play anyway, on questions built into the app. That run is not sent to us and is not ranked, and the result card says so.
If the connection drops after you have played, the app saves the run on your phone and tries again for about twelve seconds while you look at the result card, and again the next time you open the app or start a run, so a momentary blip does not cost you ninety seconds. That window is not unlimited: the server will not score a run more than fifteen minutes after its questions were issued, and the app drops a saved run a minute before that, usually without a message.
The app got interrupted mid-run
A call or a switch away holds the clock rather than ending the run, and the time away is declared honestly when the run is submitted so that a genuine interruption is not read as cheating. Leaving the app does have a price on two of the stages: in Recall the question on screen is forfeited (it scores nothing), and in Sprint your runner takes a death; Lock only pauses. A notification banner or a pull of Control Centre holds the clock and costs nothing. Taking a screenshot or recording the screen costs nothing either. There is a limit to how generous any of this can be: the questions for a run expire fifteen minutes after they are issued, so an absence long enough to run past that will cost you the run.
My score looks wrong
The score you see while you play is the app’s own running total, worked out on your phone so that you get an answer straight away. The score that goes on a board is a separate calculation: the server works it out from a record of what you did, which is what keeps the boards honest, and where the two differ the server’s wins. If a total looks wrong to you, send us your username and when you played and we will look at what we recorded for the run (the stage scores, the counts and the timings) and tell you what we find. We do not keep the play-by-play record itself once a run has been scored, so we cannot replay it.
Accessibility
Vaultara supports VoiceOver, Dynamic Type and Reduce Motion. If something is unusable with any of them, please tell us. That is a bug to us, and the kind of report we most want.
Privacy and data
What do you collect?
Your scores, a random player identifier, your username, and an email address and a password only if you chose to create an account. We never ask for a phone number. There is no analytics, no crash reporting, no advertising identifier and no third-party code in the app at all. The Privacy Policy sets out the full list.
Can I get a copy of my data?
Yes. Email us from the address on your account, or with your username if you are a guest, and we will send you everything we hold in a machine-readable form. There is no charge and we will not make you create an account to ask.
I found a security problem
Please tell us privately at vaultara.entertainment@gmail.com before disclosing it anywhere else, and we will work with you on it.
Still stuck
Write to us. A short message that says what you expected and what happened instead is enough; we will ask for anything else we need.