Diplomacy Game 3 Organizing Thread

[Bigger]

that seems fair. I haven't played in a long time, I'm liable to make mistakes, I'd rather the Gm check w/ me

[Mattimeo]

I'd be in. Been wanting to play Diplomacy for a while, never seem to find enough people willing to put in the time...

[scooter]

Great! Roster:

1) scooter
2) Rowain
3) Twinkletoes
4) Bigger
5) Mattimeo
6) open
7) open

Still two spots open.

[Rowain]

I believe Sareln generally would check with the player in question if there was an error with order submission. I'm not sure what the most common way of handling it though, having never GM'd a game.

Depends. In competition games its strictly done as written and any error means order not done. Afterall a misformulated order can be a means to not fulfill your side of a bargain while still looking trustworthy.

In a friendly environment a GM checking with the player can be ok. Its simple depends what we want to do.

My vote would be for checking with the player but have no problem with strict.

[Mardoc]

A quick search of the internet suggests that it depends on the GM.

So for this game - I'll attempt to check with each of you on your orders, but only until the deadline hits.

That is, you can send in orders at any time, and your latest set of orders supercedes whatever came before. As long as I have time, I'll attempt to check with you that I'm interpreting you correctly. I've discovered a feature in JDIP that lets me view only orders from a single country, so I can send you a picture of your orders according to me, and you can confirm or correct.

But if you leave it too late, then you'd better get it right. I won't delay the game to verify orders.

Sound fair?

[scooter]

Sounds good to me. FYI to the players - you can also download jDip and put your orders into your own sandbox, which would let you verify that you have entered your orders correctly. It's a pretty simple program and it works well.

2 spots open.

[Molach]

I would be interested once WW13 is over, but I only played once as boardgame - hard to get 7 live ppl where I came from. So is a greens game for rookies? I did look through a couple of the old diplomacy games here.

What is timeframe for this thing? How often turns, how long to make an intelligent turn, can I play from my smartish phone (which would give me a lot more time to spare commuting)? In short, will my wife kill me for signing up for this?

[Mardoc]

I would be interested once WW13 is over

Quick, everyone lynch Molach!

:neenernee

I do admit, I'm hoping for truth in advertising from Lewwyn, the faster people die in werewolf, the sooner they'll be available here, I'm sure.

, but I only played once as boardgame - hard to get 7 live ppl where I came from. So is a greens game for rookies? I did look through a couple of the old diplomacy games here.

Don't think this is really a greens game: scooter, Rowain, and Twinkletoes have played here, and the other signups sound like they know what they're doing. But I also don't know that prior experience is a must. As best I can tell, you win or lose based on your interactions with the other players, not based on tactics. So it depends on how good you are at talking, not on how well you know the game.

What is timeframe for this thing? How often turns, how long to make an intelligent turn, can I play from my smartish phone (which would give me a lot more time to spare commuting)? In short, will my wife kill me for signing up for this?

I'd guess 98% of your interactions will be talking/emailing/chatting with the other players. 2% is the actual order giving (which is just an e-mail to me). At the start of the game, you have only three orders to give/turn, and the most you can possibly have is 17 orders/turn.

I don't know your phone, but I'd expect an e-mail or chat client to be pretty much all that you need - maybe also either a browser for the map, or a printout of one.

As for time/turn - I was going to run a poll once there's enough signups. I think last time it was 48 hours for Spring/Fall and 24 for Winter, but that's flexible.

I can't really answer the question of how much time you should spend to play a good turn, though. How long does it take to negotiate with 6 other people? Maybe one of the vets can chime in here?

[Bigger]

I have actually only played one full game of diplomacy, about 15 years ago. (live board game which ended in a draw between austria and germany, I was Russia ). I also played around with the computer game about 10 years ago, just against the terrible AI though. I lurked the RB games and have read a lot about it before. I also played several games of Macheivelli, which is the same game, just a little more complicated and set it in Italy and surrounding areas not all of Europe.

so I would probably qualify for a greens <g> but I'll play either. I also would prefer it not start until ww13 is over or nearing the end, but will play either way.

[scooter]

This game isn't really intended to be a greens game - just a normal game. I'm not sure where that misconception started? That doesn't necessarily mean you need to be experienced either - Diplomacy is simple enough that a beginner can do well if they learn the mechanics and think it through properly.

Molach - as Mardoc said, sending your turn in is pretty simple. Last year I did that from my phone pretty frequently. The bigger time sink is usually the diplomacy itself - but I frequently email from my phone so even that's not a huge thing. The one benefit is the game is pretty slow moving. If we use the same as last time:

http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showpost....tcount=166

It'd be 72 hours for each movement phase and 24 for each retreat/disband and then build phase. We'd probably cut that down to something like 48/24/24 later in the game when there's less diplo going on. We could theoretically do 48/24/24, but 72/24/24 allows the game to advance at a more leisurely pace and makes it so you aren't forced to do chats rather than emails. We could actually do 48/24/24, but the 72 hours worked pretty well, and if we find ourselves having extra time we can always cut it down.

So yeah, the orders themselves take not very long, so if you think you can exchange enough emails in 72 hours to intelligently play the turn, you'd be fine. Also, at this pace it takes a week or more to finish a year, so Werewolf may very well be over before this thing even finishes the first two turns.

Edit: Me personally, I could have played those turns in 24 hours and not 72. I may have had more time than you, but in short, Diplomacy was much less time-consuming for me than Werewolf.