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twelve, on 07 March 2012 - 12:07 AM, said:
My damn work internet blocks most sites I'm trying to get to to learn how to play Diplomacy? Is there a cribs sheet someone could put together for me that would explain how to play the game? How does resolving all the moves and attacks would be especially helpful.
Essentially, on the board, Diplomacy is about mathematics and occupation.
A map has a number of supply centres (usually represented as dots). Each supply centre grants you one unit. England starts for example with an Army in Liverpool, a Fleet in London and a Fleet in Edinburgh. Each zone is usually abbreviated to 3 letters (Edi = Edinburgh, MAO = Mid Atlantic Ocean, Sil = Silesia, StP is St. Petersburg, et cetera).
Each piece can do one move: Fleets can move over sea zones (armies can't) and into coastal provinces, but can't move inland. If you can build an uninterrupted chain of fleets from one coastal province to another, you can transfer an army over it (so for example, to get an army from Liverpool to Spain you'd need fleets in the Irish Sea and in the Mid Atlantic Ocean.
That is all very straightforward. Combat is resolved by 'pushing'. Essentially, every unit is as strong as the other, so for example, if Germany has an army in Holland, England has a fleet in the Channel and France an army in Picardy and all three move into Belgium, they all bounce (neither moves).
Since no-one has a majority and bounces need to be prevented (or calculated intentionally as a form of defense/ binding opponent units), negotiating with your opponents on how the map is divided and who gains which territory when and what threats are allowed around it is all part of the game. For example, a French Fleet in the English Channel threatens London, so England is unlikely to want that. Likewise, an English Fleet there directly threatens Brest, so France won't want that.
But a fleet there also offers a measure of control over Belgium, so both countries are likely to want to be able to station a fleet there: the Channel as a de-militarized unoccupied zone is thus defensively sound but perhaps hampering to development).
The main thing is to negotiate stable alliances that are profitable to all involved, then betraying your opponent for long term gains in a single unbroadcasted stroke. For example, France, Germany and England will have to decide on a few hot issues: the Channel, Belgium, Holland, the North Sea, Denmark. It is likely that two of them will strike a deal against the third, but if France and England for example work together with France focusing on the south and England on the north, Germany may call on France's other neighbour Italy, pressuring France on its unsupported land borders where England has no option to support. Likewise, if France then starts losing, England is likely to backstab France to gain a few of its centres before the Germans and Italians take them.
The way to move into it or dislodge opposing units, is by support. For example, Germany negotiates with England and supports the English fleet into Belgium while France tries to invade it again:
Army Holland supports Fleet English Channel into Belgium (A Hol S F EngCh --> Bel)
Fleet English channel invades Belgium (F EngCh --> Bel)
A Picardy attacks Belgium (A Pic --> Bel).
Resiolution is then as follows:
Army Holland supports Fleet English Channel into Belgium (A Hol S F EngCh --> Bel)
Fleet English channel invades Belgium (F EngCh --> Bel)
The English Fleet occupies Belgium, the French army stays in Picardy, the German army stays in Holland.
I can recommend reading more about the rules here (the heaven for all things diplomacy):
The Diplomatic Pouch
And here's an example game (with atrociously bad play by almost everyone involved). New builds happen in the sheet directly in autumn, which makes it a difficult watch, and pretty hard to follow):
http://webdiplomacy....hp?gameID=58803
This post has been edited by Tapper: 07 March 2012 - 09:15 AM
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