Discover
Three sets of rules shape your assistant: Guardrails decide which questions it answers, Response Guidelines decide how its replies sound, and Scenarios tell it what to do in specific situations.
Plan & access: Startups, Business or Enterprise Pricing & Plans. Administrators edit them. They are part of every Captain account, on every paid plan.
| Rule set | Use it for | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Guardrails | Keeping the assistant on topic and away from off-limits questions | "Do not give legal or medical advice." |
| Response Guidelines | Tone, length and structure of replies | "Keep replies under three sentences. Be friendly, not formal." |
| Scenarios | Step-by-step handling of a situation, optionally using a custom tool | "When a customer asks for a refund, ask for the order number, check it with the order lookup tool, then hand off." |
Set up & try
Before you start
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An assistant. See Create and connect an assistant.
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For scenarios that call your systems, a custom tool. See Custom tools.
Add guardrails and response guidelines
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Go to Captain, open the assistant, and go to Settings.
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Open Guardrails or Response guidelines.
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Click Add a guardrail or Add a response guideline, type the rule as one short sentence, and click Create.
[Screenshot: captain-5-g3-add-guardrail.png]
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To add rules from the examples, type in the box under the examples and click Add and save (↵), or press Enter.
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To change a rule, click its pencil icon, edit the text, and press Enter.
Add a scenario
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Go to Captain, open the assistant, and go to Scenarios.
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Click Add a scenario and fill in:
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Title: a short name, for example "Refund request".
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Description: when this scenario applies.
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How to handle: what the assistant should do, in plain steps. To use a tool in a step, type @ and pick it from the list, for example Handoff to Human or one of your custom tools. If the scenario should end with your team, add the handoff as the last step.
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Click Create.
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To change a scenario, open it, edit the fields, and click Update changes.
Test it
In the Playground, ask one question each rule should catch (for example an off-topic question, and a refund request). Check the reply follows the rule.
Get value
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Start small: three to five guardrails and guidelines. Add more when you see a real problem in conversations.
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Write rules as instructions to a new team member, not keywords.
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Guardrails are instructions to the AI, not a filter. They make off-topic answers much less likely but cannot rule them out, so keep the Handoff message clear.
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If a tool used in a scenario is disabled, that scenario may stop working. Chatwoot warns you before you disable it.
Troubleshoot
| Symptom | Likely cause | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Assistant ignores a rule | The rule is vague or conflicts with another | Rewrite it as one clear sentence; remove conflicts |
| Scenario never runs | The situation description does not match how customers ask | Describe the situation in customers' own words |
| Scenario stops halfway | Its custom tool is disabled or failing | Check the tool in Tools |
| No Scenarios item for the assistant | Account is on Hacker (free), or, on self-hosted, Captain is not turned on for the account | Upgrade, or ask your Super Admin to turn on Captain |
More causes: Troubleshoot Captain.