Privacy policy

Effective 29 September 2026 · Last updated 29 September 2026

Contents

1. What information do we collect?
2. How do we use your information?
3. Will your information be shared with anyone?
4. Is your information transferred internationally?
5. How long do we keep your information?
6. How do we keep your information safe?
7. Do we collect information from children?
8. What are your privacy rights?
9. Controls for do-not-track features
10. Do we make updates to this policy?
11. How can you contact us about this policy?

1. What information do we collect?

In short: a commander name, a scrambled key and your counted matches for the highscores; while you host, what another player needs to find your match; and ordinary server logs. No account, no email address, no real name.

The website

petalwar.com sets no cookies, runs no scripts and contains no analytics, advertising or social-network trackers. Like every web server, ours record requests, including your IP address, the time, the page and your browser's user-agent string, so we can keep the site running and investigate abuse and faults. These operational logs are short-lived and are not used to build a picture of you.

Your commander name and the highscores

The first time you play, the game asks for a commander name. It suggests a made-up one, such as Commander-4821, which you can replace before you continue. Once a name is chosen, every match you play under it, against the AI or against another commander, is followed by our server so it can count towards the highscores:

• When a match starts, the game sends the mode (Skirmish or Together), your commander name, your commander key, your side, your faction, the game version and, in a Together match, the match code. The commander key is a random number your game made on first use and keeps in its settings. It is not derived from your computer or from you, and our server stores only a scrambled (hashed) form of it.
• Every 30 seconds and at the end, the game sends the state of the match: the match clock, how many petals and how much Heartbloom health each side has left, their unit count, tech tier, matter and energy, and whether the match is decided or you left.

From this we keep a record of each match, the result it settled on, and a list of names with the hashed key that owns each one and when it was first used. The highscores and commander profiles publish your commander name, ratings, experience and rank, wins and losses, and your recent counted matches with the opponent, factions and rating changes.

Your IP address is used, in memory only, to limit how many matches one address can open in a minute. It is not stored with your matches.

Play Together

• Hosting a match. While you host, your game registers the match with our relay: the match code, your name, your faction, the game version, the port it listens on and the private (local network) addresses of your computer. The relay holds this in memory while the match is open and forgets it when the match ends. It is shown to games on the same public network as you, and to anyone who has the match code, so that they can join.
• The relay. When two computers cannot reach each other directly, our relay passes the game's network traffic between them for the length of the match. It keeps none of that traffic and logs no names or addresses.
• Your local network. A hosting game answers searches from other Petalwar games on the same local network with its name, faction and match code.
• What the other player sees. The player you play with sees your commander name, faction and colour, and the lobby chat. Chat lines are carried between the two games and are not sent to or stored by us.

Until you choose a commander name, the game goes by a made-up one. It never sends your computer's user name or network name to other players, the relay or your local network.

The update check

When it starts, the game downloads a small file from petalwar.com that lists the newest published version, so the title screen can tell you when there is one. This request contains no information about you beyond what any download does: your IP address and a user-agent naming the game build and your operating system version. It is covered by the server logs described above.

mssgs, if you connect it

If the mssgs app is installed on your computer, Petalwar looks for it locally. Nothing leaves your computer until you choose Connect in the game. After that, Petalwar tells mssgs what you are doing (in the menus or in a match, your faction, the map, the result and an invite to join your match), and mssgs shows it to your friends as its own settings and privacy policy describe. mssgs is another service of Deverence Group B.V. and is hosted in the EU. You can disconnect it at any time from the game.

On your own computer

The game keeps its settings on your computer: volumes, key bindings, the map you chose, your commander name, your commander key and, if you connected mssgs, its sign-in token. It also writes a technical log there, which includes your computer's name and user name, your matches, codes and lobby chat. The log stays on your computer and is only sent to us if you choose to send it.

What we do not collect

We never ask for your real name, email address, date of birth, phone number or payment details. The game contains no advertising, no analytics or telemetry, and no third-party tracking. It does not upload crash reports. It does not access your camera, microphone, contacts, files or location.

2. How do we use your information?

In short: to run the highscores and Play Together, to keep them fair and working, and nothing else.

• To provide the Game. Counting matches, publishing the highscores and commander profiles, keeping a name with the computer that first used it, and letting two commanders find each other and play. Legal basis: performance of our agreement with you (the terms of service).
• To keep the Game fair and safe. Checking that a counted match really happened, settling disputed or abandoned matches, removing cheated results, limiting abuse and protecting the services against attack. Legal basis: our legitimate interest in a fair game that works.
• To fix problems. Reading a log you choose to send us. Legal basis: your consent, given when you send it.
• To comply with the law where we are required to. Legal basis: legal obligation.

We do not profile you, we do not make automated decisions that have legal or similarly significant effects, we do not use your data for advertising, and we never use it to train artificial intelligence models.

3. Will your information be shared with anyone?

In short: we do not sell anything to anyone, and the list of people who touch your data is very short.

We never sell personal information, and we never share it for anyone else's marketing. We share data only in these situations:

• Everyone who visits petalwar.com. Your commander name and its highscores and profile, as described in section 1.
• Other players. What a player you meet or can find through Play Together sees, as described in section 1.
• Service providers. The companies that host our servers and infrastructure, acting on our instructions under a data processing agreement, and operating within the European Union.
• Legal obligations. Where we are legally required to disclose information, for example in response to a valid order from a competent authority.
• Protecting people and the services. Where it is necessary to investigate or prevent fraud, abuse or a threat to someone's safety, or to establish or defend a legal claim.
• Business transfers. If the business or a part of it is ever sold or merged, data may pass to the acquirer, who would remain bound by this policy.

4. Is your information transferred internationally?

In short: no. Everything stays in the European Union.

Our servers and infrastructure are in the Netherlands, inside the European Union. We do not transfer, store or process personal information outside the European Economic Area, and we work only with providers and sub-processors that operate entirely within the EU and are subject to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

This means your data is not subject to foreign government access requests under laws such as the US CLOUD Act or FISA Section 702. If you play from outside the EEA, your information is processed in the Netherlands, and it is protected by this policy and the GDPR wherever you are.

5. How long do we keep your information?

In short: highscores for as long as the boards exist, Play Together only while a match is open, logs briefly.

• Commander names, counted matches and their records are kept for as long as the highscores exist, because the ratings are recalculated from the full history of matches. You can ask us to remove yours at any time (section 8).
• A match in progress is kept until it is settled, and then becomes part of the records above.
• Play Together registrations are held in memory while the match is open and are gone when it ends; relayed traffic is not kept at all.
• Operational server logs are kept only as long as they are useful for fixing faults and protecting the services, and are then deleted.

Backups are encrypted and rotate on their own schedule, so deleted data can remain in a backup for a short time before it is overwritten; until then it is isolated from any further use. We may keep information longer where the law requires it or where it is needed for an active dispute.

6. How do we keep your information safe?

In short: with appropriate technical and organisational measures, and by holding as little as possible.

The website, the highscores and the relay are reached over encrypted connections (HTTPS and secure WebSockets). Commander keys and match tokens are stored only in hashed form, so the stored data cannot be used to play as you. The relay has limits per connection and per network. Access to production systems is limited to the people who need it, and backups are encrypted.

No transmission over the internet and no storage system can be guaranteed to be completely secure, so we cannot promise that a determined attacker will never succeed. We do our best, and we will tell you and the supervisory authority about a breach where the law requires it.

7. Do we collect information from children?

Petalwar is for players aged 13 and over, and players aged 13 to 15 should have the consent of a parent or guardian, as our terms of service explain. Playing needs no personal information, but a commander name is public, so we recommend choosing one that is not your real name. If you believe a child under 13 has played under a commander name, write to devs@deverence.com and we will remove it.

8. What are your privacy rights?

In short: the full set of GDPR rights, with one honest limitation.

If the GDPR applies to you, you have the right to ask for access to your personal data, to have it corrected or erased, to restrict or object to its processing, and to receive it in a portable form. Where we rely on your consent, you may withdraw it at any time without affecting what happened before.

The limitation. Because there are no accounts, the only way we can tell that a commander name is yours is the commander key in your game's settings. When you ask us to remove or export a name and its matches, we will ask you for that key, or for other details that only the player can know, before we act on it.

To make a request, write to devs@deverence.com with the commander name it concerns. We answer within one month.

What you can do yourself

• Choose a commander name that is not your real name, or not choose one at all: matches then do not count towards the highscores.
• Change your name in Options. A new name starts its own record on the highscores; the old one stays until you ask us to remove it.
• Disconnect mssgs in the game at any time.
• Delete the game's settings and logs from your computer; the settings also hold your commander key, so keep a copy if you want to keep your name.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. In the Netherlands this is the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (autoriteitpersoonsgegevens.nl); elsewhere in the EEA you may contact your local authority, listed at edpb.europa.eu. If you are a resident in Switzerland, the contact details for the data protection authorities are at edoeb.admin.ch.

9. Controls for do-not-track features

Most browsers offer a Do-Not-Track setting. No uniform standard for honouring it has been agreed, so like most services we do not respond to it. This makes no practical difference on Petalwar, because we do not track you across websites or apps in the first place.

10. Do we make updates to this policy?

We will update this policy as the game develops and as the law requires. The date at the top always tells you when it was last revised, and the new version applies as soon as it is published here. If a change materially affects you, for example a new kind of information the game sends, we will point it out on the website and in the game rather than leaving you to spot it.

11. How can you contact us about this policy?

Questions, or a request about your data, can go to our Data Protection Officer, Dominique Henkes, at devs@deverence.com, by phone at +31 10 300 67 78 (ext. 2), or by post to: