[MN-dip] Thanks to all who played

[Jim Swift]

I am frustrated that our hard and fast timeline has produced an incentive for
the smaller powers to purposely slow the game down in order to survive.  Win or
lose, I want to play Diplomacy.  (And yes, I want a resolution if feasible.)  If
sitting around waiting for minutes to tick off a clock is Diplomacy, then I can
go sit in traffic court and enjoy the same effect without all this effort.

I think we should remove the incentive to drag the game.  To that end, I propose
this:
1. We change the six hour timeline to be the minimum commitment.  After that,
players are free to leave with no grief.  Players can leave their empires in the
following states:
    a. Go civil disorder.
    b. Write a standing set of orders.
    c. Proxy the units to an ally.
    d. Turn the units over to an eliminated player or bystander.

2. But the game goes on as long as one player wants to continue.

3. A draw of any makeup can be declared by unanimous agreement of the remaining
players at the table who still have units or centers on the board.

4. We make a gentlemen's agreement that we will seek to move the game along.  In
other words, the speed of the game would be treated as an aspect external to the
game, not an aspect within the game to be manipulated as part of diplomacy.  As
precedent for this, I point out we already have an unspoken gentlemen's
agreement that no matter what happens in the game, we will be civil towards one
other -- our civility is external to the game and not negotiable as a point of
diplomacy.

Commentary:
Paridoxically, I think allowing that the game might go a little longer would
actually speed things up (i.e., get more turns in / have a result with fewer
powers in the draw/ finish within six hours), since nothing would be gained by
prolonging it.  It could also encourage concessions when the writing is on the
wall.

On the other hand, I realize there would be side effects -- one player not
satisfied with a three or four way result could simply force the game to
continue unnaturally until the others gave up and went home.  Especially if
there were a stalemated position.  This would be mitigated by the
drop-six-centers-on-DIAS ammendment (of which I am in favor), as the players
wanting to go home could quickly get the stinker down to six centers and call
the draw.  As a last resort, if the person wants to win the thing that bad, let
him.  I argue that's preferable to the situation we have now: "Sorry, your
six-way draw could have been a four- or three-way, but we can't spare the 15
minutes it would take."

Starting at 10am is good for me.

Jim