Set up Ascend AI.

Before you begin

You need a Discord server where you have Manage Server or Administrator, and an Ascend account. Sign in with Discord from your dashboard.

Have something for it to answer from: the questions your members keep asking, with your answers. A streamer's schedule and sub perks, a product's setup guide and known issues, a shop's shipping and returns policy, a course's deadlines, a club's next meet, or a server's rules. Ten lines is enough to start, and you can add more at any time without adding the bot again.

Add Ascend AI to a server

Open your dashboard. It lists the servers you manage; pick one without Ascend AI and Discord shows its own consent screen with that server already chosen. Authorize, and you land on the server's dashboard with the bot in place.

The standard install asks for four permissions: View Channels, Send Messages, Embed Links and Read Message History. That is what it needs to read a question in a channel you turn on and post the reply. It does not ask for Administrator or Manage Server.

Some modules act in your server: removing messages, changing roles, locking channels. Those need more permissions than the standard install, and Discord only grants them through a second consent screen. When a module needs one, its card in Modules says so and offers Grant permissions. Nothing extra is granted until you approve it there.

Find your way around the dashboard

Each server has its own dashboard at /ascend-ai-bot/dashboard/<server id>. The sidebar is grouped the way you work with it:

• Overview: getting set up, recent questions, what needs your attention, and your modules at a glance.
• Channels: where it answers, who can ask, where it hands questions over, and per-member limits.
• Persona: its voice, and its avatar and banner in this server.
• Knowledge base: the documents it answers from, how strictly it sticks to them, and its reference channels.
• Conversations: each question a member asked, the reply, and how it got there.
• Activity log: what the bot and your staff have done, from moderation and giveaways to knowledge edits and setting changes.
• Modules: everything else it can do, switched on one card at a time.
• Members: what it has recorded about people (XP, away messages, booster roles, remembered preferences), which you can export and delete.
• Billing: the plan, question packs, promo codes and the subscription.
• Settings: game plugins, and the danger zone for turning it off or removing it.

Write the knowledge base

Its answers come from the documents you give it. Open Knowledge base and choose Add document: a Name, an optional Tag, and the Content in Markdown. Or Upload a Markdown, text or PDF file and it becomes a document. It answers from a new or edited document on the next message.

Keep each document to one topic, with headings and short paragraphs. It looks up the passages that match a question rather than reading whole files, so focused documents give sharper answers. Members never see a document's name or tag; those are for you.

• On and off: switch a document off to stop using it without deleting it. Handy for a seasonal policy, or an event's rules you bring back later.
• Version history: every edit, delete and restore keeps the version before it, and you can restore one from the document's menu.
• Limits: your plan sets how many documents and how many tokens the knowledge base holds. The page shows Documents and Tokens in use against them.
• Checks on save: each save passes an automated content check, and a flagged save is rejected and not stored. Repeated flags pause saving for a while.

Turn on channels

It only reads channels you turn on. There is no server-wide listener. Open Channels and, under Where it answers, give each channel a mode:

• Off: it doesn't answer here.
• Answers: it answers questions as they are asked. Best for a help channel.
• Mentions: it answers only when someone mentions it. Best for a busy general channel.
• Ambient: it picks out real questions without a mention. On the Pro plan.

How it answers

Members type in plain language in a channel you turned on. No command is needed. It finds the passages in your enabled documents (and live game data, if a plugin is on) that match the question, and replies. The reply starts as a short status and is edited into the answer. Replying to one of its answers asks a follow-up.

Answers are written by Claude Haiku 5.5, a model from Anthropic. Your documents are the source; the model writes the reply from them.

It is picky about what it answers:

• It skips filler such as "ok" or "lol", and anything shorter than Shortest question it answers.
• It skips messages that mention another member, so it doesn't join a conversation between people.
• When your documents don't cover a question, it says so rather than guess, and points the member to your Support channel if you set one.
• A reply that contains a member's own account data is sent by DM and is not stored in Conversations.

Tune it

Persona sets how it sounds. Voice is one of Direct, Casual (the default), Professional or Playful. It changes the phrasing, never what it knows. Appearance gives it its own avatar and banner in this server; only the server's owner can change those.

Knowledge base sets how strictly it sticks to your documents:

• Strict: only your documents, reference channels and live game data. Anything else, it says it doesn't have that here.
• Focused: adds game plugins and simple assistant replies. The default.
• Balanced: adds light general help when your documents don't cover it.
• Open: answers from general knowledge too, still preferring your documents.

Reference channels

Also on Knowledge base: pick up to ten channels it reads as live knowledge, such as #rules or #faq. It reads their topic, pins and recent messages, refreshed every few minutes, and they don't count toward your document limits.

Who can ask, hand-offs and limits

The rest lives on Channels:

• Who can ask: leave every role unticked and anyone can ask. Tick roles to limit it to them. Admins can always ask.
• Support channel: where it sends members when a question needs a person.
• Mod channel: where it posts notices for your staff, such as questions it handed over and warnings as the server nears its monthly questions.
• Questions per member per day: keeps one member from using up the server's questions.
• Shortest question it answers: messages shorter than this are ignored.

Manage it by chat

Server admins can run Ascend AI by mentioning it and saying what they want, in the channel, in plain words. Only the server's owner and members with Administrator or Manage Server get these tools; the check is made in code on every message, so nobody else can talk it into anything. Knowledge base by chat and Settings by chat are on from the start. Every other module adds its own requests once you switch it on in Modules.

• Knowledge base: "add this to the docs: …", edit or delete a document, list them, undo the last change, or ask it to tidy the knowledge base up.
• Settings: the channels it answers in, the channels it reads, who can ask, how strictly it sticks to your documents, its name, colour and voice, and the support channel. Ask it to show the current settings first.
• Modules: welcome and goodbye messages and roles on join, leveling and level roles, starboard and extra boards, auto-responders, sticky messages and announcements, join-to-create voice, stat counters, reaction and button roles, logging, join gate, antiraid and antinuke, automod rules, suggestions, giveaways (start, end, reroll), bump reminders, the ticket blacklist, and moderation history.
• Moderation: warn, time out, kick, ban, purge, slowmode, lock a channel and more, asked for in plain words. A high-risk action (a kick, a ban, a purge, a lockdown) is not run straight away: it posts a summary with Confirm and Cancel, only the person who asked can press them, and their permissions are checked again at the click.

Game plugins

Game plugins are for gaming servers, and every other server can skip this section. A plugin lets it answer from game data as well as your knowledge base. Plugins come with your plan rather than as add-ons: Community includes VALORANT, Pro includes all three. Switch the ones your plan includes on or off in Settings, under Game plugins.

• VALORANT: live player ranks, match history, and an agent reference.
• Dota 2: a curated reference for hero roles, item builds, map timings and economy.
• CS2: a curated reference for map callouts, utility lineups, economy and weapon stats.

Commands

Asking a question never needs a command. Commands are for doing things: running a tool, posting a panel, taking a moderation action. A command tied to a module works only while that module is on. Staff commands check the Discord permission the action needs, and destructive ones ask for confirmation first.

Server commands

/ascendEveryone · Always on

Run any available Ascend AI tool in natural language.

/ascend-warnStaff · Always on

Warn a member and record the action.

/ascend-timeoutStaff · Always on

Time a member out for up to 28 days.

/ascend-kickStaff · Always on

Kick a member after confirmation.

/ascend-banStaff · Always on

Ban a member after confirmation.

/ascend-purgeStaff · Always on

Delete recent messages after confirmation.

/ticket-panelStaff · Support tickets

Post or refresh the support ticket panel.

/userinfoEveryone · Info commands

Show details about a member or yourself.

/serverinfoEveryone · Info commands

Show details about this server.

/avatarEveryone · Info commands

Show a member's avatar.

/membercountEveryone · Info commands

Show the server's member count.

/roleinfoEveryone · Info commands

Show details about a role.

/pollEveryone · Utility commands

Start a poll with up to 10 options.

/quickpollEveryone · Utility commands

Start a quick thumbs up or thumbs down poll.

/afkEveryone · Utility commands

Set an away message until you speak again.

/embedStaff · Utility commands

Build and post a rich embed as the bot.

/pinStaff · Utility commands

Pin a message.

/unpinStaff · Utility commands

Unpin a message.

/pinsEveryone · Utility commands

List pinned messages in the current channel.

/webhook-sendStaff · Webhook relay

Send a message through a webhook with a custom name and avatar.

/8ballEveryone · Fun commands

Ask the magic 8-ball a question.

/coinflipEveryone · Fun commands

Flip a coin.

/rollEveryone · Fun commands

Roll dice such as 2d6, d20, or 4d8+2.

/chooseEveryone · Fun commands

Pick one of the options you provide.

/roleplayEveryone · Roleplay actions

Do a roleplay action, such as a hug or a pat, as text and emoji.

Tool commands

These run the same tools as asking in plain language, as discoverable commands. Each group is one command with subcommands, such as /knowledge add. Most staff subcommands take a details field where you describe what to do.

Modules

Everything beyond answering questions is a module. Open Modules in your server's dashboard, switch a card on, and open it to set it up. Cards that need a permission the standard install doesn't grant say so and offer Grant permissions.

Plans and billing

Ascend AI is priced per server, with no seat fees. There are two plans you can buy from the dashboard. Community includes one game plugin. Pro adds every plugin, Ambient mode, and higher limits on monthly questions, server size and knowledge-base room. Community is $9 a month or $90 a year. Pro is $20 a month or $200 a year. Enterprise starts from $149 a month, billed annually. The Ascend AI page compares the plans; limits are on Billing in your server's dashboard, which is also where you change plan. Billing is monthly or yearly.

For a very large server, several servers on one subscription, or invoice billing, there is Enterprise: from $149 a month, billed annually, set up with you rather than bought from the dashboard. Talk to us to start.

• Question packs: if the server runs out of questions in a month, buy a pack instead of changing plan. A question pack is $5 for 1,000 more questions, and it lasts 90 days. Pack questions are used after the monthly cap. Packs can be bought once the server has a paid plan.
• Cancelling: Cancel subscription sets it to end at the close of the current period, and Resume subscription undoes that before then.

Promo codes

Have a code from Ascend? Open Billing, enter it under Promo code and activate it. Codes are single-use and start the plan on that server right away.

Turning it off

Settings, then Danger zone, covers stopping replies, removing Ascend AI from the server, cancelling, and what happens to your data. To stop it answering in one channel, set that channel to Off on Channels.