AI Configuration is where you control how Novus AI behaves and responds to members of your Discord community.
While your Knowledge Base provides the information your assistant can use, your AI configuration determines how that information should be understood, processed, and presented to your members.
A properly configured AI helps Novus AI provide consistent, useful, and community-appropriate responses.
How AI Configuration Works
When a member sends a message that Novus AI is configured to handle, the assistant processes the message using your server's AI settings.
Several parts of your configuration can influence the final response, including:
AI provider
AI model
AI instructions
Knowledge Base information
AI routing
Response behavior
Language settings
Fallback behavior
These settings work together to determine how Novus AI should handle each conversation.
AI Provider
The AI provider supplies the AI technology used by Novus AI to understand messages and generate responses.
Your provider configuration normally includes the credentials required to access the provider's API.
Without a working AI provider configuration, Novus AI may be unable to generate AI-powered responses.
Keep your API credentials private and only enter them in the designated Novus AI configuration fields.
AI Model
The selected AI model determines which model from your configured provider will process your requests.
Available models may have different capabilities, response speeds, context limits, usage limits, and provider costs.
Model availability may also depend on your AI provider and account.
AI Instructions
AI Instructions define the general behavior of your assistant.
You can use instructions to tell Novus AI how it should communicate with your members and which rules it should follow.
For example, your instructions can define:
The assistant's purpose
Preferred communication style
How detailed responses should be
Information the assistant should avoid guessing
When members should be referred to staff
How unknown questions should be handled
Community-specific response rules
Clear instructions help produce more consistent responses.
Knowledge Base
Your Knowledge Base contains information specific to your community.
Instead of placing large amounts of server information directly inside your general AI instructions, you can organize that information in your Knowledge Base.
This can include:
Frequently asked questions
Server information
Rules
Guides
Services
Procedures
Troubleshooting information
Other community-specific content
Your AI configuration determines behavior, while your Knowledge Base provides information.
AI Routing
AI Routing allows you to separate different types of questions into specialized routes.
Each route can be designed for a specific topic and can have its own instructions or relevant information.
For example, you may have separate routes for:
General questions
Technical support
Account concerns
Purchases
Community programs
Other specialized support topics
This allows Novus AI to apply more appropriate instructions depending on what the member is asking.
Response Behavior
Response settings determine when Novus AI should interact with Discord messages.
Depending on your configuration, you may control whether the assistant responds automatically in configured channels or requires a direct mention before responding.
This helps prevent the assistant from interfering with conversations where an AI response is not needed.
Language Behavior
Novus AI can assist multilingual communities by understanding and responding to messages in different languages.
Your AI instructions and language-related settings can be used to define how the assistant should handle multilingual conversations.
For communities that use separate language channels, Auto Translation can provide additional functionality.
Fallback Behavior
Your assistant may occasionally receive a question that cannot be answered using the available information.
Instead of encouraging the AI to guess, you can define fallback behavior.
A fallback response can instruct members to contact staff, create a support request, check another resource, or simply explain that the requested information is currently unavailable.
This is especially important when your assistant handles information where accuracy matters.
AI Configuration and Routing
General AI configuration and AI Routing serve different purposes.
Your main AI configuration defines the overall behavior of Novus AI.
Routes provide additional instructions for specific types of questions.
Keeping general behavior separate from topic-specific instructions makes your configuration easier to maintain and allows Novus AI to handle different concerns more effectively.
Recommended Configuration Approach
When setting up your AI assistant:
Configure a working AI provider.
Select an appropriate AI model.
Create clear general AI instructions.
Add accurate information to your Knowledge Base.
Create routes for topics that require specialized handling.
Configure when and where Novus AI should respond.
Define appropriate fallback behavior.
Test different types of questions before making the assistant widely available.
You can continue improving these settings as you learn how your community interacts with the assistant.
Continue Your AI Setup
Now that you understand how the main AI components work together, you can begin configuring each part in more detail.
Continue to Configuring Your AI Provider.