The Embassy

During my internet downtime a couple of weekends ago, I spent some time 'designing' a new map to use for the blog.  Well, not really designing but recolouring an existing map.  Here's the base map: Now, I know from here it isn't very clear, but it doesn't really need to be.  It's the colouring that I've changed.  Here's the colour key: England France Italy Germany Austria-Hungary Turkey Russia Sea spaces Neutral spaces Armies Fleets This produces a gaudy map, I know, and it isn't anything like the traditional map colour-wise, but it's at least clear, I hope.  Not much use if you're completely colour-blind, but I'd hope if you don't easily differentiate between similar colours, this should work for you. Anyway, that's it.  Just a bit of info that, from today onward, this is the map I'll be using.

In this series, I'm going to take a brief look at the seven powers in the game of Diplomacy.  This will be not much more than a brief introduction to each power, looking at their position on the board, their neighbours and the pros and cons of playing them.  More detailed strategy will follow in future posts. England - not Britain, or even the UK, mainly due, I suspect, to the ignorance of the fact that a significant proportion of the UK population are distinctly unimpressed with being called English - is a tricky power to play well . If you take a look at her position on the board, you can see that she is described as a corner power. Her immediate neighbours are France, Germany and (stretching a point) Russia.  These are the powers she comes into contact with at the start of the game. The unique thing about England is that she has two fleets and one army at the start.  This isn't really that surprising as, to get into contact with another

In this series, I'm going to take a brief look at the seven powers in the game of  Diplomacy.   This will be not much more than a brief introduction to each power, looking at their position on the board, their neighbours and the pros and cons of playing them.  More detailed strategy will follow in future posts. France is often called a corner power, although it isn't really in the corner of the map.  I prefer to call it an edge power but I'm not going to argue semantics. If you draw France, then you ought to be hoping to do well.  She can quickly get into two SCs, and may grab three at the start of the game (if she's lucky... or unlucky depending on your viewpoint).  She has only three other powers that she needs to communicate with in depth, although there really isn't any power that she can afford to short change when talking. France has two potential weak spots that need a lot of negotiation over, however: Burgundy and the English Channe

I play Diplomacy because I enjoy the game.  I don't always enjoy playing against the people I'm in a game with, and I sometimes get wound up by the people I come across within Dip communities.  But the game is great - the King of Games indeed. It is a game which comes with a certain amount of stress.  It's a game , though, and in the end it should be something from which you can walk away.  I don't mean quitting an on-going game - that's abhorrent unless it's the most difficult of circumstances.  I mean it's something where you can close the message window, close the game, close the forum, and get on with every day life. But it is also true that a game can get frustrating when players exhibit attributes that don't fit in with your personal ideas about how to play the game.  So I want to end this series with some advice about how to deal with this situation. What it boils down to is that players can, within the rules, do whatever they like.  S

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing  Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. Finally, the people who really shouldn't be playing the way their playing no matter what.  Sorry, but none of the people here ought to be playing Diplomacy . The Davian Davian behaviour in animals is, basically, necrophilia.  Davian behaviour in Dip players isn't quite as strange, but it isn't great, either; it's still flogging a dead horse. There are times in Dip games where the game is over.  Usually there are two sides: sometimes it will be a Grand Alliance stopping a single player from winning; other times there may be two opposing alliances preventing each other from making progress.  The key to this situation is that, without someone doing something stupid, the game has ended.  These are deadlocked games. A Davian is a player will who refuse to en

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing  Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. Yes, stubborn players are frustrating.  Equally frustrating are those players who seem to be insane.  These tend to be the players who play erratically.  They do make for an interesting game, though. The Hippo I didn't know this until comparatively recently, but the hippopotamus is one of the most aggressive animals on the planet - certainly one of the most unpredictable and probably the most dangerous.  You - maybe it's just me - think of them as being gentle giants, wallowing peacefully in African rivers.  Nope; when roused you'd better be about half a mile away. In Diplomacy  a Hippo is a player who is aggressively acquisitive and opportunistic.  "See a centre, grab a centre," is her motto.  It doesn't matter who the SC is stolen from, and it often

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing  Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. Diplomacy can be frustrating - just when you think you're in a position to do well, something goes wrong.  That ally that you've been trundling through the game happily with stabs you and it all goes to pot. More frustrating are those players who do something that doesn't seem to make sense.  These are those player who are so stubborn you'd expect them to be bent over at a children's party with some little guy stabbing them with a long pin that has a bit of grey material dangling from it. Or that could just be wishful thinking... The Armoured Duck I think it was Richard Sharp who first called this player an Armoured Duck.  I may be wrong but he certainly uses it in his book The Game of Diplomacy   (it's in chapter 2 under the heading "Revenge&quo

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing  Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. Having discussed Dippyists in the previous post, I'm going to move on to pseudo-Dippyists, those who play Diplomacy but not the way it was meant to be played. I'm not going to get to hung up on saying more here... read on. The Carebear I mentioned Carebears in a previous post .  Carebears are players who follow the philosophy of Drawmongery.  Drawmongery is a philosophy that places a draw on equal parity with winning.  I'm not going to go into this as being a perverted philosophy here because I'm going to analyse it in another post, but it is.  Extremely perverted. Here, we're talking about Carebears, the players themselves and the way they play.  What can you expect from a Carebear? Well, they're lovely... in a playing sense.  They're not bad p

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing  Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. In this post we look at those players who display positive attitudes to the game, players who play in a Calhamerian way.  Well, sort of... most of them. There aren't many holds barred in Diplomacy and a general rule is that if you can get away with it, then you can do it.  On the whole, though, there are certain ideas that players ought to be carrying into Diplomacy. A Dippyist, by the way, is someone who plays Diplomacy ... Yes you'd probably already worked that out but I thought I'd make it clear.  Just in case. The Bagger After the US Civil War, people travelled from the northern states to the southern to make money from the reconstruction process.  These people were given the derogatory name of 'Carpetbaggers'.  Here, I've simply whipped the carpet

I thought it might be fun to have a look at some types of player you're likely to come across when playing Diplomacy .  Well, OK, it's not all fun in this series... but I'll do my best. Not every player will fit neatly into one or the other category.  Some will exhibit different types of play in the same game.  They're the dangerous ones because you never quite know where you stand with them! The general rule to remember is that, no matter what is right or wrong that is only your opinion and you can't do anything about players who play in a different way.  Everyone is free to do what they want to do in a game, within the rules.  The only thing you can do is call them out for it and beat them soundly. At the game.  Beat them soundly at the game.  There's no need to physically slap them around.  As tempting as that might be. The challenge is what you will do to deal with these types of player.  I give my thoughts on that at times but you have to make y

A variant is a game of Diplomacy where the rules or context are different from the standard game as designed by Allan B Calhamer.  There are three types of variants: context variants, map variants and rules variants. Context Variants Context variants are those games that are played with a wider context.  They may be tournament games, other scored games, or remote format  games.  These aren't often recognised as variants as such, as variants tend to be within the other two types discussed below.  But the context the game is being played in will have an impact on how some players will play the game, and so they are certainly a variation of Dip. Maybe they should be called "variations" rather than variants but does it really matter? Map Variants Diplomacy has been adapted to different maps, or boards.  Not surprising as the general idea of the game, pitting competing powers against each other in a localised region and time in history, can be adapted to any number

In Diplomacy, you - the player - are in control of your own units and, ultimately, you can do with them what you like.  Nobody can tell you how to play the game, assuming that you're playing within the rules.  This means that the different approaches to the game that players show can't be outlawed. In this post I am going to discuss three philosophies behind the way people play Diplomacy. I think that if everyone followed the same philosophy I do, they'd enjoy the game just as much as playing to their own philosophy.  Actually, I think those who play a certain way would enjoy it more.  But I would, wouldn't I?  If I didn't like the way I play, I'd be particularly stupid to keep playing that way! There is only one principle that everyone should be following: have fun.  Diplomacy , no matter how competitive, is a game and games are meant to be fun.  If you're not having fun, then you need to change your approach or change the game you're playing. M