Ambient room events — openclaw

Ambient room events let OpenClaw process unmentioned group or channel chatter as quiet context. The agent can update memory and session state, but the room stays silent unless the agent explicitly calls the message tool.

For always-on group chats, combine messages.groupChat.unmentionedInbound: "room_event" with messages.groupChat.visibleReplies: "message_tool". The agent listens, decides when a reply is useful, and never needs the old prompt pattern of answering NO_REPLY.

Supported today: Discord guild channels, Slack channels and private channels, Slack multi-person DMs, and Telegram groups or supergroups. Other group channels keep their existing group behavior unless their channel page says they support ambient room events.

Recommended setup

Set the global group-chat behavior:

{
  messages: {
    groupChat: {
      unmentionedInbound: "room_event",
      visibleReplies: "message_tool",
      historyLimit: 50,
    },
  },
}

Then make the room always-on by disabling mention gating for that room. The room must still pass its normal groupPolicy, room allowlist, and sender allowlist.

After saving the config, the Gateway hot-applies messages settings. Restart only when file watching or config reload is disabled (gateway.reload.mode: "off").

What changes

With messages.groupChat.unmentionedInbound: "room_event":

unmentioned allowed group or channel messages become quiet room events
mentioned messages stay user requests
text control commands and native commands stay user requests
abort or stop requests stay user requests
direct messages stay user requests

Room events use strict visible delivery. Final assistant text is private. The agent must call message(action=send) to post in the room.

Typing and lifecycle status reactions stay suppressed for room events. The one explicit receipt exception is messages.ackReactionScope: "all", which sends the configured ack reaction; use any narrower scope or "off" when the room must remain completely silent.

Discord example

{
  messages: {
    groupChat: {
      unmentionedInbound: "room_event",
      visibleReplies: "message_tool",
      historyLimit: 50,
    },
  },
  channels: {
    discord: {
      groupPolicy: "allowlist",
      guilds: {
        "<DISCORD_SERVER_ID>": {
          requireMention: false,
          users: ["<YOUR_DISCORD_USER_ID>"],
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Use per-channel Discord config when only one channel should be ambient. Under groupPolicy: "allowlist", listing the channel is what allows it (enabled: false disables an entry):

{
  channels: {
    discord: {
      groupPolicy: "allowlist",
      guilds: {
        "<DISCORD_SERVER_ID>": {
          channels: {
            "<DISCORD_CHANNEL_ID_OR_NAME>": {
              requireMention: false,
            },
          },
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Slack example

Slack channel allowlists are ID-first. Use channel IDs such as C12345678, not #channel-name. Listing the channel under channels.slack.channels is what allows it (enabled: false disables an entry):

{
  messages: {
    groupChat: {
      unmentionedInbound: "room_event",
      visibleReplies: "message_tool",
      historyLimit: 50,
    },
  },
  channels: {
    slack: {
      groupPolicy: "allowlist",
      channels: {
        "<SLACK_CHANNEL_ID>": {
          requireMention: false,
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Telegram example

For Telegram groups, the bot must be able to see normal group messages. If requireMention: false, disable BotFather privacy mode or use another Telegram setup that delivers full group traffic to the bot.

{
  messages: {
    groupChat: {
      unmentionedInbound: "room_event",
      visibleReplies: "message_tool",
      historyLimit: 50,
    },
  },
  channels: {
    telegram: {
      groups: {
        "<TELEGRAM_GROUP_CHAT_ID>": {
          groupPolicy: "open",
          requireMention: false,
        },
      },
    },
  },
}

Telegram group IDs are usually negative numbers such as -1001234567890. Read chat.id from openclaw logs --follow, forward a group message to an ID helper bot, or inspect Bot API getUpdates.

Agent specific policy

Use an agent override when several agents share the same room but only one should treat unmentioned chatter as ambient context:

{
  messages: {
    groupChat: {
      visibleReplies: "message_tool",
    },
  },
  agents: {
    list: [
      {
        id: "main",
        groupChat: {
          unmentionedInbound: "room_event",
          mentionPatterns: ["@openclaw", "openclaw"],
        },
      },
    ],
  },
}

The agent-specific agents.list[].groupChat.unmentionedInbound value overrides messages.groupChat.unmentionedInbound for that agent.

Visible reply modes

messages.groupChat.visibleReplies defaults to "automatic" for normal group/channel user requests. Keep that default when final assistant text should post visibly without an explicit message-tool call.

For ambient always-on rooms, messages.groupChat.visibleReplies: "message_tool" is still recommended, especially with latest-generation, tool-reliable models such as GPT-5.6 Sol. It lets the agent decide when to speak by calling the message tool. If the model returns final text without calling the tool, OpenClaw keeps that final text private and logs suppressed-delivery metadata.

Room events stay strict even when other group requests use automatic replies. Unmentioned ambient room events always require message(action=send) for visible output.

History

messages.groupChat.historyLimit sets the global group history default (50 when unset; must be a positive integer). Channels can override it with channels.<channel>.historyLimit, and some channels also support per-account history limits. Set the channel-level historyLimit: 0 to disable group history context for that channel.

Supported room-event channels keep recent ambient room messages as context. Telegram keeps an always-on rolling per-group window bounded by historyLimit; user-request turns select entries after the bot's last recorded reply, while room-event turns receive the full recent window so the model can see its own recent posts. The retired Telegram includeGroupHistoryContext mode key is removed by openclaw doctor --fix.

Troubleshooting

If the room shows typing or token usage but no visible message:

Confirm the room is allowed by the channel allowlist and sender allowlist.
Confirm requireMention: false is set at the room level you expect.
Check whether messages.groupChat.unmentionedInbound or the agent override is "room_event".
Inspect logs for suppressed final payload metadata or didSendViaMessagingTool: false.
For normal group requests, keep or restore messages.groupChat.visibleReplies: "automatic" if you want final replies posted automatically. For ambient rooms using message_tool, use a model/runtime that reliably calls tools.

If Telegram ambient rooms do not trigger at all, check BotFather privacy mode and verify the Gateway is receiving normal group messages.

If Slack ambient rooms do not trigger, verify the channel key is the Slack channel ID and the app has the history scope for that room type: channels:history (public), groups:history (private), or mpim:history (multi-person DMs).

Source: docs/channels/ambient-room-events.md