[MN-dip] Thanks for coming out to diplomacy today

[Jeremy]

> I was wondering how you could best play this game
> under FtF time-constraints.  Were I still in college and starting a
> Diplomacy game on Friday night, I could see spending 20+ hours on the
> game.  

Rather than a fixed duration game, I might suggest a blind-voting method:  

At all points during the game, a player has a status of whether they want to 
continue playing or end the game.  Their preference is communicated secretly 
to a 3rd party (or computer), and can be changed at any time.  When the 
majority prefer to disband, the game ends.  Since the tally is secret, you 
don't know when the game will end, nor if it is even close.  

I think that algorithm would be an improvement on the random method, as it 
involves feedback from the players while retaining the element of surprise.

Jeremy

On Monday 15 January 2007 12:16 am, Chad Walstrom wrote:
> Jeremy <Diplomacy at lizakowski.com>  wrote:
> > The games might go faster as we get more experience. Everything from
> > order writing to diplomacy itself may become more streamlined.
>
> That's a given, though it doesn't address the, "don't ally with Power
> X because he's leaving at time T" problem.  I honestly don't feel it's
> very ethical to use meta-gaming[1]_, knowledge outside the context of
> the current game, to affect its outcome.  It does make the game far
> more difficult for Power X.  If the goal is to introduce new players
> to the game, and have them come back for more -- we seem to have a
> problem rounding up players -- then playing fairly should have some
> level of importance.
>
> That being said, I believe Saturday was more about having fun and
> learning the game than worrying about things too much.  We did start
> to get more efficient as the game went on.  Perhaps we were a bit too
> lax on the 15 minute deadline as the game drew on, though it was nice
> to be forgiving in the early hours so that we could get a feel for the
> pace.
>
> I made it through eight game years.  With two more hours, I'm assuming
> you made it to 1910 or 1911.  With experience and strict adherence to
> order deadlines, we could probably add another year or so to that
> number in the 8 to 10 hours we gamed.
>
> Ry4an's fourth suggestion sounded like the most promising for a single
> day's game.  We may not be in a true tournament setting, but the
> "Variable Length Tournament Diplomacy" by David Norman[2]_ does solve
> the limited-time scope problem.
>
>     'Some games will finish by about 1907, and the vast majority
>     should be over by 1911.  As players approach the winning
>     conditions, then, like in a full game, it should become the
>     objective of the other players to stop worrying about their own
>     success, and instead play to stop the leader from getting any
>     bigger. If they do not manage this successfully, then they will
>     lose, and if they do manage to stop the leader, then getting a
>     draw vote accepted should not be too much of a problem. Thus we
>     see that the perceived disadvantages of a "fixed-end" (be it
>     clock-time or game-year) are avoided.'
>
> I would be an advocate for this style of game play.  Ryan, thank you
> for that link.  I was wondering how you could best play this game
> under FtF time-constraints.  Were I still in college and starting a
> Diplomacy game on Friday night, I could see spending 20+ hours on the
> game.  As a working-class father, it's much harder to justify.
>
> I can see one large advantage to playing through DPJudge, email, or
> snail mail.  Even though a game may drag on for months, it would seem
> easier to play to a solo-win objective using standard rules.
>
> It is long past my bed-time, so good night all!
>
> Chad
>
> References
> ==========
> .. 1. Agar, Steven. "Meta-Gaming and Diplomacy."
>       http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/resources/ftf/meta.htm (14 Jan
>       2007)
> .. 2. Norman, David. "Variable Length Tournament Diplomacy". The Zine,
>       Spring 1998 Retreat.
>       http://www.diplom.org/Zine/S1998R/Norman/VarLength.html (14 Jan
>       2007)