Welcome to the Embassy

The Embassy is a blog about the boardgame Diplomacy.

I'm not going to get into the game itself on this page - you can find out about it online easily enough.

This blog is about my thoughts and comments about the game. I've played it for a number of years now and it truly is the king of games. Well, I think so and that's what counts!

I play Diplomacy online on the site Playdiplomacy. Playdip is the biggest online site for Diplomacy but by no means the only one. At some point I'll post about Dip sites.

I intend to write blog posts in a series in an attempt to keep the length of posts to a minimum. This may mean that I don't complete a topic all in one go but that's fine, I think. It'll keep you coming back for more, won't it?

You're free to comment on posts, just don't advertise. I'm not interested in your adverts, just your thoughts.

And, if you're interested in adding content to the blog, let me know. Happy to receive posts, too.

There are growing lists of Dip links under the menu icon - where to play online, publications (zines, blogs) and resources, as well as a list of Dip apps.

Tournament Scoring - Part 5: Other Scoring Systems

There are, perhaps, three other types of scoring system: Placement or Rank scoring, hybrid systems that seek to combine DSS and SCS, and Tier scoring systems. I want to have a look at each system. Placement or Rank systems Essentially, these are Supply Centre Scoring systems with the addition of bonus points. I'm going to have a look at some more regularly used systems. Again, here is the map I will use as an example: England - 12 SCs Russia - 9 SCs Turkey - 8 SCs Italy - 5 SCs France , Germany and Austria-Hungary were eliminated, with 0 SCs each. C-Diplo In a drawn game points are awarded for: Participating in the game: 1 (for an online tournament, I'd only award this for participating and not surrendering). Each SC held at the end of the game: 1 . The player that 'tops the board' (has the most SCs): 38 pts. The second placed player (second highest number of SCs): 14 pts. The third p...

The Embassy Journal

You know, I have realised that I probably bang on too much. What can I say? I like the sound of my own writing (my voice, until laryngitis kicks in when I begin to sound like Barry White, is slightly too high pitched and squeaky). This led me to realise that I should probably be looking at different ways to put out what I want to put that's longer-winded than the long-winded stuff I publish here. And so The Embassy Journal was born. This is my zine, written to accompany the blog, but with articles and a smattering of other stuff. You can get it from the link above, which will lead you to the first issue (March 2020). Let me know what you think. All issues will be published on The Embassy Journal page on this blog, where you can also find subscription and contribution info.

The Ethics of Diplomacy - Part 8: Gamesmanship

This is a sticky one, frankly. If you want to win a game of Diplomacy what isn't allowed? Some of the stuff that isn't allowed should be obvious and I've discussed much of it in previous posts in this series. That leaves things that you can do to win that are questionable and, in the final analysis, come down to personal choice. How far are you prepared to go to win at Diplomacy ? That is probably what defines whether you think something is "gamesmanship" or not, and whether you think it is acceptable. Slow Play Some players in the online game are what I call Pussycats . They want to play as quickly as possible and they want to move the game on. Some will hassle through Public Press. "Has everyone finalised yet?" "Who hasn't finalised?" "Come on - FINALISE!!!" Now this, itself, is something that becomes annoying. If you join a game with certain deadlines, you need to expect to play to those deadlines. If you...

The Embassy

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