Diplomacy Dreams

[NOVA Green]

OK--- amazed that I was never contacted to participate since I played what I believe were the last (2) games that Muon2 hosted on Atlas and was consistently on the end.

So please somebody provide links to the rules and current maps, etc...

If there is a (24) hour TO time per move, might seem like a bit of speed chess on meth, especially considering all sorts of different time zones, time to do the whole behind the scene negotiating etc... which after all is what made it a bit different from even your standard early War Games from back in the dayz... (Thinking of you Avalon Hill with much love...).

I understand that France is open and it is 1901 build... if so am extremely interested so long as I don't need to be on a (24) hour gaming mode.

[NOVA Green]

OK with me...

Muon2 had various links to how to post moves plus game rules when he was GM.

Might be helpful to share...

Also not sure where maps are posted?

Muon was great at posting regular maps so that players could make moves...

I would be happy to represent the French 3rd Republic Tradition of 1901 under the new leadership of the Democratic Republican Alliance and the Popular Liberal Action parties with individuals such as Raymond Poincaré combined with more French Nationalist politicians, and apologists for the Monarchy such as Jacques Piou and Adrien Albert Marie de Mun.

So think I can live with the 48 hour moves and 24 hour GM response period, as are apparently all of the existing players.

Count me in after sharing the links to the rules and maps and then I will confirm via PM and then the clock kicks off?

Cool with everyone?

Really looking fwd to playing in another Diplomacy Game after quite a few years!

[NOVA Green]

Thanks for covering for me, guys. Hell of a day at work today and I am only now getting the chance to check in.

Nova, if you can let me know tonight if you're in, I will start the clock at 9:00 PM EST tonight and 1902 will begin tomorrow at the same time, since Builds are still 24 hours!

So if I get this right, basically if I join the game right now and send you my build orders now, then Spring 1902 will begin at 9 PM EST 3/7/24 and there is now a (48) hour clock to post one's moves, meaning the next set of moves would have to be posted by 9 PM EST Saturday 3/9/24?

Part of the downside of being on the West Coast is that some days I don't get home from work until after 6 PM PST meaning effectively not really an ability to adjust my orders for almost (24) hours.

Still count me in and I'll PM you my build orders ASAP...

[NOVA Green]

FRENCH PRESS RELEASE:    3 Novembre 1901

TO: All Great European Powers      À : Toutes les grandes puissances européennes

By now you are all aware of the monumental shift in political power in our country with the rise of the Alliance Républicaine Démocratique, and a significant change in our Senior Cabinet to reflect changing political attitudes within our country.

Vous êtes désormais tous conscients du changement monumental du pouvoir politique dans notre pays avec la montée de l’Alliance Républicaine Démocratique et un changement important au sein de notre Cabinet supérieur pour refléter l’évolution des attitudes politiques au sein de notre pays.

Any previous political, economic, and military agreements undertaken by the prior Government are currently considered void until renegotiated.

Tous les accords politiques, économiques et militaires antérieurs conclus par le gouvernement précédent sont actuellement considérés comme nuls jusqu'à leur renégociation.

France is a country of peace and has no interest in starting a War of Aggression against any other European Power, although we understand there might be certain "sensitivities" regarding certain prior military adventures in recent decades.

After all, the La IIIe République, came about as a direct result of a failed war with our Germanic cousins, the era of Napoleon Ancient History.

La France est un pays de paix et n’a aucun intérêt à déclencher une guerre d’agression contre une autre puissance européenne, même si nous comprenons qu’il puisse y avoir certaines « sensibilités » concernant certaines aventures militaires antérieures au cours des dernières décennies.

Après tout, la IIIe République est le résultat direct d’une guerre ratée avec nos cousins ​​germaniques, l’époque de l’histoire ancienne de Napoléon.

We just hosted all of your delegations in Paris the other year at our exposition international and in good faith of continued positive relations with all of you, here are some film cans and movie projectors to reminds you of the glory of the 1900 Exposition Universelle.

Nous venons d'accueillir toutes vos délégations à Paris l'année dernière lors de notre exposition internationale et, en toute bonne foi de relations positives continues avec vous tous, voici quelques boîtes de pellicule et projecteurs de cinéma pour vous rappeler la gloire de l'Exposition Universelle de 1900.

We trust that you understand that although our intentions are absolutely non-hostile, we are more than willing to defend our interests if attacked.

Nous espérons que vous comprenez que même si nos intentions ne sont absolument pas hostiles, nous sommes plus que disposés à défendre nos intérêts en cas d’attaque.

The new Government has significant influence from the followers of Léon Gambetta, whose Father after all is from Genoa, Italy.

Raymond Poincaré, currently leads our Party, although there are significant divisions between our two factions, France will always stay united against any foreign invaders.

Look forward to all of you coming to Paris in the very near future to sample our food, wine, and naturally cultural amenities as well.

This will be a good opportunity to meet the new French Cabinet and President in person.

Le nouveau gouvernement bénéficie d'une influence significative de la part des partisans de Léon Gambetta, dont le père est après tout originaire de Gênes, en Italie.

Raymond Poincaré, dirige actuellement notre Parti, même s'il existe des divisions importantes entre nos deux factions, la France restera toujours unie contre tout envahisseur étranger.

Nous espérons que vous viendrez tous à Paris dans un avenir très proche pour goûter à notre gastronomie, à nos vins et, bien sûr, à nos offres culturelles.

Ce sera une bonne occasion de rencontrer en personne le nouveau Cabinet et le nouveau Président français.

We look forward to meeting you in person over the Month of January 2002 in Paris for talks.

[NOVA Green]

In order to accommodate Nova's schedule, I would have no objection to moving the adjudication time back to 10pm EST, as was originally proposed.

We'll see what he says, I have no problems doing either one. I am sure he will appreciate you being willing to do it for his sake!

Sorry just got back online after watching the 2024 Presidential State of the Union Speech.

More than happy to accept a 7 PM PST (10 PM EST).

Don't want to create needless strife for other posters schedules, but don't believe we have any current players in international time zones (Or Alaska or Hawaii), so appreciate a little bit of flexibility just in case there is an attempt at last minute negotiations regardless of if they might disadvantage or promote strategic goals.

Thanks all for the flex, since I would imagine with the accelerated move timeline it would likely be even more difficult to attract players from countries outside the Western Hemisphere.

[NOVA Green]

4/7 orders received, a little over two hours until the deadline!

I sent my provisional orders in a little bit ago shortly after getting home from work.

Should be noted that there might be issues impacting connectively to Talk Elections, with the issue first noted impacting Chrome browsers.

It could potentially impact players submitting orders, let alone finalizing diplomatic agreements.

You might want to do a straw poll and see if any other members of our Diplomacy game are having similar issues.

What I mean by this is at minimum if you have received no orders whatsoever for an individual player as a result of this, might be best to postpone posting movements.

Should be noted that this may have also impacted diplomatic communications, although granted in our "Diplomacy on Meth" turn arrangements, which I did agree to, this is perhaps a secondary concern.

[NOVA Green]

I also had some issues with the site, so we'll extend the deadline for tonight's orders to 10:00 PM EST on Wednesday, March 13th!

I was wondering why I wasn't seeing the map.

Seriously though Georgia Moderate was one of the few early Atlas posters to comment on the issues, and I even worked a Diplomacy pitch into the thread.

Seriously glad we are back up and running.

I was panicking when I came home from work and thought it was down and didn't want to eff up the game for everyone else bcs my orders were late with some PC issue!

[NOVA Green]

The die is cast and which way will the winds blow...

[NOVA Green]

The die is cast and which way will the winds blow...

And the metaphors are well mixed…

He's an old-fashioned guy, GM. Very allegorical.

Hey I resent that slightly considering by my reconning GM at 10+ years of life on me, although I will turn (50) this coming Fall.

[NOVA Green]

The die is cast and which way will the winds blow...

And the metaphors are well mixed…

He's an old-fashioned guy, GM. Very allegorical.

Hey I resent that slightly considering by my reconning GM at 10+ years of life on me, although I will turn (50) this coming Fall.

Much closer to 20 than 10, in fact.

Naturellement, I would have considered it rude to disclose any approximation of your age without your personal consent, but this does explain the Diplomacy Game maps you played in HS that involve not only different rules, but also even Italian provinces.

I would imagine one of those would fetch a considerable amount of $$$ on the internet these days, especially if in VG condition including the box and the map...

Would be interesting to play a retro Diplomacy with the 1st edition map and rules...

*** scratches head and attempts to consider what that might look like ***

[NOVA Green]

While we all wait with baited breath for the GM's uploading of the Spring '03 orders, here's an old school classic country song which was effectively main stream at that time regarding something involving about how many minutes to go...

[NOVA Green]

Alright, I don't know where IBNU is at, but I'll call a hiatus for tonight and see if he reaches out to myself or any of you guys tomorrow.

Sorry for the letdown, folks.

Well you definitely run a much looser officiating style as GM than Muon2.

Although we don't want to lose a player, at some point there needs to be a natural balance between giving players a long leash when it comes to the rules of the game, versus enabling players exploiting the gap.

Not sure I totally agree with the decision to create a hiatus, and this is someone who came from the perspective to allow some additional time from (24) hours to (48) hours for military movements.

We all get it that people might have individual circumstances in their real lives that might create issues, or for all we know there might have been some weird Chinese cyberattack that happened, but we need to consider the precedent that players do not meet their deadlines as agreed upon rules now allows any of us to follow in that path.

If IBNU has a legitimate reason for their lack of a response, I might be willing to give them a "Hall Pass" this time around.

Quite frankly we should have backup player lists in the event that individuals unexpectedly "drop out" prior to declaring their intentions.

This is something I have seen previously on Atlas Diplomacy games and the reality is that when people drop out unexpectedly create massive game imbalances, and yeah none of us want to see that.

Still, it is extremely disrespectful to other players and quite frankly allows manipulation of the rules, regardless of other players time zones.

I just received a PM from the Liberal Hack a few minutes ago...

I'll accept it if he posts orders immediately and then we can all talk about the whole time zone scene, considering he is Singapore....

[NOVA Green]

I'm really really sorry for the timezone mishap; I meant to send my order last night and then thought to wait until today morning in-case any messages meant I had to change plans but totally messed up and missed my chance.

Promise y'all it won't happen again.

So perhaps we should all agree to follow the GM's original adjudication and allow an extension until Tomorrow, which in my humble opinion is more than reasonable considering the individual circumstances.

Also, might add that in the event that the (48) hour move limit is too restricting for those in massively different time zones, we might want to consider altering the move limit and/or shift the time zones to accommodate Diplomacy players who might be in places where Day and Night are very different than us Diplomacy game players in the USA, where after all there are very few time zone differences...

[NOVA Green]

In the email judges I used to play on, there was a deadline after which you were marked late, followed by a grace period.  If a player went past the grace period, the judge automatically kicked them out of the game, or if a player was late too many times without a valid excuse (like power was out for a week due to a hurricane - I saw that happen to a player once) the GM had the option to replace them.  So how about a policy like this going forward:

1. If a player is late more than 3 times (feel free to suggest other values) without a valid excuse, you should seek a replacement.

2. If a player is late more than 24 hours (feel free to suggest other values) without contacting you or this thread, you should seek a replacement.

3. You could also choose to poll the other players (privately if you wish) in the above situations to see how they feel about replacing someone.  It is always disruptive to replace a player.  But the final decision should be the GM's.

Thoughts?

Addendum: it's perfectly reasonable to request deadline extensions for sudden emergencies or known absences (I'm probably going to request one myself soon for a medical procedure), and these should be granted unless they're excessive.

Honestly I think all of Georgia Moderate's ideas are solid, such as posting the UTC, creating mechanisms in the event that player's are consistently late in posting their moves / orders without having a significant emergency life event situation in order to prevent such behavior from becoming disruptive to the game.

Certainly in this situation it is clear this was an honest mistake, compounded by the whole time zone gap, which as I noted when I was first considering joining the game a potential issue if I was unable to  get my orders in because of my work schedule.

I had assumed the other players were on EST, but as IBNU pointed out when I posted that he is totally on a completely different time zone, which can create its own unique set of challenges for a player, especially when attempting to respond in real time to what might be potentially major game changing developments, negotiations, etc...

So 7:00 PM Pacific Time / 10:00 PM Eastern time in Singapore would be 10 AM Pacific time and 1 PM Eastern time, which understandably might create issues in terms of being able to respond to fast moving developments, considering the players one is trying to reach out to might not be available because of work schedules, etc...

Muon2's GM Diplomacy rules (If I recall correctly) was that if a player did not submit their orders in a timely fashion that would mean the country had no movement at all, and everything defaulted to a HOLD.

This in an of itself, could be problematic, since in both of my previous Atlas games we had some players who had stuff going on in their personal lives who ended up dropping out without telling anybody until after the next turn's map was posted, and it disrupted some of the game play and even potentially recruitment of new players, since effectively the lack of movement created imbalances.

But yeah... I'm sympathetic to some / all of GM's suggestions for this game, or any others you might choose to host, plus certainly I think in this particular case there shouldn't be any negative sanctions, unless we adopt a limited "grace period" policy in which case a minor strike for submitting orders an hour (or whatever it was) after posting deadline would be accrued against a finite tally or perhaps three total (Or whatever makes sense), before maybe doing the Muon2 rule which would freeze all military moves and revert to a HOLD pattern.

Personally, and as the GM will attest, I will frequently post my military orders via PM well in advance, but note that they are provisional until the posting deadline.

That way, I know for example if something were to occur on my way home from work like an accident or something like that which might prevent me from hitting the deadline, at least I have my initial orders in on time to fall back on.

I don't want to make this about any individual player, since this is not my first Atlas Diplomacy rodeo, and there are a couple other players in this current game who have also seen firsthand the impacts caused when players leave the game without posting orders, difficulties recruiting new players who might end up inheriting a messed up situation caused by lack of a "Hiatus", and quite frankly would not want to lose a committed player because of a genuine and accidental mistake.

My two cents.... or maybe call it twenty cents worth and we obviously got a bunch of other players who have not yet publicly weighed in.

[NOVA Green]

I can also believe IBNU may have been thrown off by the US switching to DST last Sunday, since Singapore doesn't do DST.  These transitions can be a real hassle in international situations.  (I work with people in North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia, in countries that have mostly different (or no) DST schemes.  Keeping track of the time differences between all of us becomes quite interesting at this time of year.)

Good point....

Considering that in the mix, my opinion would be to simply accept the orders and move on in this particular situation without any sanctions, and allow the GM to issue policies (with player input) regarding late order posting that strikes the right balance between maintaining a level gameplaying field for all, reduces the chance of game instability caused by previous GM's automatic HOLD policy if orders are received late, does not use excessively punitive measures for what is an honest mistake possibly compounded by time zone changes, maintains a consistent player pool, but also ensures that everyone feels comfortable that we are all held to the same standards and expectations, while also simultaneously recognizing that we are simply all human and sometimes s**t happens.

[NOVA Green]

I can also believe IBNU may have been thrown off by the US switching to DST last Sunday, since Singapore doesn't do DST.  These transitions can be a real hassle in international situations.  (I work with people in North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia, in countries that have mostly different (or no) DST schemes.  Keeping track of the time differences between all of us becomes quite interesting at this time of year.)

Good point....

Considering that in the mix, my opinion would be to simply accept the orders and move on in this particular situation without any sanctions, and allow the GM to issue policies (with player input) regarding late order posting that strikes the right balance between maintaining a level gameplaying field for all, reduces the chance of game instability caused by previous GM's automatic HOLD policy if orders are received late, does not use excessively punitive measures for what is an honest mistake possibly compounded by time zone changes, maintains a consistent player pool, but also ensures that everyone feels comfortable that we are all held to the same standards and expectations, while also simultaneously recognizing that we are simply all human and sometimes s**t happens.

This is possibly a record for the longest single-sentence post ever.

Simply entertainment value while we all await with baited breath at 7:10 PM Pacific Time the posting of the face of Europe after the Spring '03 campaign.

I did actually get a 780 SAT score in English you know, but alas sometimes my inner Hunter S. Thompson gonzo journalism instinct kicks in as I madly pound my keyboard without proofreading...

[NOVA Green]

I like the grace period/three strikes/24 hour late ideas that GM brought up. Obviously nobody else has offered their take on the situation yet, but suffice it to say I don't want to kick IBNU and I'll adjudicate this turn tomorrow just to give everyone else a chance to give their ideas or opinions.

When I make the adjudication tomorrow, I'll lay down which of these ideas will be rules going forward. I will also boost what NOVA said about sending his provisional orders in early, that has been the case and it is very helpful to me that he does that. That way if the worst does happen, I have some kind of legitimate orders he has issued that I can use to process the turn.

Naturally the downside of this is that it does allow additional players to negotiate beyond the "end of turn".

Still so long as moves are considered "baked in", now that all (7) players have submitted results this will allow you additional feedback from others regarding a consistent policy before you do a "rules clarification", I suspect this is something that all players will appreciate, despite the fact that I for one are really "jonesing" for another hit of Diplomacy adrenaline!

[NOVA Green]

Order Results:
   
Austria:
Austria: A Gal S A Ukr - War
Austria: F Ion C A Gre - Apu
Austria: A Mos S A Ukr - War
Austria: A Tri H
Austria: A Ukr - War
Austria: A Vie S A Tri
     
England:
England: A Bel - Bur / Bounced with Gas (1 against 1). Dislodged from Ruh (2 against 1).
England: F Eng H
England: F Nth C A Yor - Bel / Dislodged from Hol (3 against 1).
England: F Nwg H
England: A Yor - Bel Convoy path failed.
       
France:
France: F Bre - Eng / Bounced with Eng (1 against 1).
France: A Gas - Bur / Bounced with Bel (1 against 1).
France: A Mar - Pie
France: A Pic S A Ruh - Bel
France: F Spa (SC) - Mao
     
Germany:
Germany: F Den S F Hol - Nth
Germany: F Hol - Nth
Germany: A Mun - Tyr
Germany: F Nwy S F Hol - Nth
Germany: A Ruh - Bel
Germany: A Sil S A Lvn - War
     
Italy:
Italy: F Tun - Ion / Bounced with Ion (1 against 2).
Italy: A Tyr - Ven
Italy: F Tys S A Ven - Rom
Italy: A Ven - Rom
     
Russia:
Russia: A Lvn - War / Failed.
Russia: F Stp (SC) H
 
Turkey:
Turkey: F Aeg - Gre
Turkey: F Bla S A Sev
Turkey: F Eas S F Ion
Turkey: A Gre - Apu / Convoy path taken: Gre;Ion;Apu.
Turkey: A Nap S A Gre - Apu
Turkey: A Sev H

We are now in the Fall 1903 RETREAT Phase. IBNU has until 10:00 PM EST / 2:00 AM UTC on Saturday, March 23rd to provide retreat/disband orders for the following units:

F Nth
A Bel

Ummm... unless I am mistaken shouldn't their be a similar requirement for Russia?

[NOVA Green]

Sorry... my bad.

It was a "retreat / Disband" gig, so had assumed that other players losing control centers would have to make difficult decisions as well.

Haven't played for a couple years and did not consult the rules before posting.

[NOVA Green]

Venice has armies from 5 different countries on its borders. Don’t think I’ve ever seen something like that before.

Technically should only be either (5) countries including Italy in and within the borders from Venice, and the photo should only include (4) individuals behind the sofa (Assuming that Venice is the individual sitting and meditating on the sofa).

[NOVA Green]

And a brief clip from Casablanca:

Les Jeux sont faits...

[NOVA Green]

Note to everyone: I will be undergoing a medical procedure on Friday and will be unavailable after the morning hours.  If I don't answer you during that time, that's why.  If there's a deadline that falls on Friday night and I have orders due for it, please extend it by 24 hours.  Thanks.

I think that I can speak for everyone here is the primary concern of your health and successful recovery from impacts associated with the procedure.

I would suggest that since this will not impact the Fall '04 orders, we extend the subsequent retreat and build orders by at least (24) hours at minimum, or until we hear back from Georgia Moderate confirming his situation is in a medical position to play.

Thoughts All???

NOVA

[NOVA Green]

So again time for a bit of a Johnny Cash countdown...

This one is a live movie one, as opposed to the live audio concert in Folsom Prison, where the crowd went a little bit wild.

Not sure if Merle Haggard at this one or not wearing Levi prison denims.... (Union Manufactured in the USA).

[NOVA Green]

Hey y'all - wanted to raise that I'm about to hit finals season here which may make my continued play a bit more difficult. I'm happy to continue for the time being, but was wondering if anyone had any interest in subbing for me in the near to medium term (next 1 to 2 weeks). Not a crisis now, but wanted to raise for the future.

Happy to hand over whenever a replacement is found

I believe Scott has a friend.

Also, it's a difficult sales pitch since Germany has barely two weeks to survive (In real time and not game time obviously).

But in all seriousness now that we are entering the Mid-Game phase, I suspect that perhaps moves and communications between players might be shorter and more obvious than in a Diplomacy "Early Game" situation.

Part of the reason I was slightly reticent initially about accepting the role was the (24) Hr move timeline. This was extended to (48) hours after all existing players had weighed in and the GM put it up for a vote.

Certainly, I would not support a further extension simply to accommodate one existing player's temporary schedule simply because of Finals, unless there is unanimous consent.

I must say that however I have always tended to prefer longer hours between moves than in the current game, and in this game in particular, with an international time zone shift might well have made it much harder to communicate in a timely fashion.

An alternative proposal, again with unanimous consent, would perhaps be we extend the movement turns to (72) hours.

There is a fine balance between the old Muon2 "Weeklies", versus a (24), (48), and (72) balance.

Bit like playing on chess.com for (30) Min games versus (3) hr games.

But yeah the right thing to do IMHO is that at minimum we agree to continue playing, while a potential replacement can be found and extend the timeline slightly if YPESTIS25 and all the other players are game.

Thoughts Diplomacy Nation?

[NOVA Green]

Order Results:
   
Austria:
Austria: B A Bud
     
England:
England: R A Ruh
England: R F Wal
England: R A Yor
     
France:
France: B F Bre
France: B F Mar
France: B A Par
     
Italy:
Italy: R F Tys

After the deadline was missed for the second time by England, I looked at the board set up and determined that the units which should be disbanded are the ones not on the final English supply center. Please excuse the late update.

This brings us to the Spring 1905 ORDER Phase. The deadline for orders is at 10:00 PM EST / 2:00 AM UTC on Wednesday, April 3rd.

I believe this was a fair decision, which if anything benefits the player.

Actually twas just thinking earlier about what a GM should do in that scenario, and my thought would have been, a random GM selection using a D4 just like a Dungeons and Dragons table game for certain rolls.

If anything this should advantage the player.

Obvious question is does this trigger the eviction of the player from the Game?

(Don't believe this was clearly defined, but naturally going through an attempted recruitment of a replacement player process is warranted when it appears that although the player might have given up on the game, there are likely to be very few replacement players willing to take on England looking at the current map).

Therefore, although I am sure you have sent a PM to the player in question, I would humbly suggest that unless that instead of an automatic eviction we move to an automatic HOLD, rather than attempt a replacement player?

Would hate a technicality to be a hiccup, since after all every Diplomacy Game I have played on Atlas frequently runs into various formal or informal dropouts.

Thoughts rest of Atlas Diplomacy Nation?