The World Is Dark: Diplomacy

[thewamp]

Spring 1901

From their distant thrones and offices the leaders of Europe survey their domains. They can all sense it. The old peace has fragmented. Change is in the air. Some among their number will rise to power, while others will fall into obscurity. War is coming, spies are planted, deceptions and falsehoods will come. Because from their distant thrones, they can only see so much. The world below is dark and only the flames of war can light up Europe.

The World is changing... they can feel it in the air... and so on and so forth...

The map, once more, for your benefit (EDIT: and now spoilered, there you go neftran). Enjoy it, because it's the last one I'll post before the game ends.


http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc197/elektrotek85/StandardMap.jpg


And the players...

Austria - viggo
England - Blood_Lord
France - Neftran
Germany - metagaia
Italy - Qualia
Russia - Moody the Wise
Turkey - Meshakhad

In order for me to confirm you're in the game, everyone should check in, preferably in character. Now get discussing and diplomating.

A note:
spying orders should be formatted as such:

England spies on France (for england to learn the french orders)
England - counterintelligence - France (for england to learn who france is spying on)
England spies on Switzerland (for england to learn the current SC count of each player

Attach them to the bottom of your orders.

Order Deadline to be set once everyone has checked in

[metagaia]

--urgent telegram to Kaiser Meta Gaia--

Reports have been received of a secret organisation butchering all the spies in Europe. Our last spy in London was reported dead a few hours ago, and his posthumous reports indicate that this is happening Europe wide. A new era of darkness has begun, so I humbly recommend that this is the time to strike.

Speak out to your allies and use them as your eyes and your ears, we have but one master spy remaining, so use him well, he cannot be everywhere at once. The time is waiting Kaiser, a new era for the fatherland has begun.

Spymaster Killallhelm.

OOC: Checking in as requested, anyone wanting to reach me will probably receive a faster reply at [email protected]. Good luck everyone!

EDIT: Germany blind... hoo boy this could be brief...

[Blood_Lord]

England checking in.

This is a bit funny to me, seeing as I've played many a dip game, and most of them as England, not necessarily out of love. Will see how blind England plays. Probably no change actually. England is remarkably similar in initial moves blind or not.

Post forthcoming, but PMs will be sent before I set about with initial post.

[Neftren]

Checking in as France.
Edit: Can you please spoiler the map? It's stretching my screen.
Oh and one question: Will you be providing us with a complete listing of every move so that we may do our own maps? Or do we just shoot in the dark and hope we're right?

[Moody the Wise]

Mozza Russia iz here. Zis vill be interesting. I only veesh Vexen vere here, so ve could have epic rematch of A Great War!

[thewamp]

Oh and one question: Will you be providing us with a complete listing of every move so that we may do our own maps? Or do we just shoot in the dark and hope we're right?

It's blind... so obviously you'll know your moves. I'll let you know how those turned out, if any units directly interacted with your units or SCs, I'll let you know, and you'll have whatever your spies tell you. Other than that, you've got to just do the best you can. But that's the point.

[Qualia]

His Holiness, the Pope wishes to convey his formal greetings to the peoples of Europe, and assure them they he will be willing to provide them with spiritual guidance as they enter a new century.

Go in Peace


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

OCC Italy checking in

[Meshakhad]

Sultan Meshakhad checking in.

[viggo]

King Viggo of Austria reporting for duty

[thewamp]

Well everyone's here...

Spring 1901 Orders Due Sunday at 2300 Hours, EST (GMT-5)

EDIT: Also, a minor break from the written rules that shouldn't affect anything but semantics.
If you submit a set of orders like the following, I will consider only the last order for a given territory (on a line-by-line basis)
Example:
F nap - ion
A rom - apu
F nap - tys
A ven - pie

In these orders, I would ignore F nap-ion, because it was overwritten from F nap-tys

The reason is that in adjudicating orders, jdip (the program that I use) will adjudicate in this way, as I've just found out in flames of war, I can't be counted on to reliably notice this (once people have 8-10 or more SCs).

If anyone has any issues with this, let me know. It's pretty much just a semantics issue to improve reliability of me.

[thewamp]

This is your 24 Hour Warning
Get those orders in...

[thewamp]

Spring 1901 Results are Out
Blood_Lord, yours will be out as soon as I can send you PMs

Obviously there are no retreats
Fall 1901 Orders due Thursday at 2300 Hours EST (GMT-5)

[Moody the Wise]

[SIZE="5"]
Obviously there are no retreats


Aww, so my supported attack on Marseilles didn't work?

[metagaia]

Ok, Given that Blood lord is banned (and having read some of his posts on other threads it did have an air of inevitability about it) Are we looking for a new player for England? I have his email address and could contact him if people really want to try and continue the game with him. And I know that you can't tell us the orders obviously, but can I confirm that he did submit orders before the deadline?

Edit:
Will submit some press tomorrow, promise!

[Meshakhad]

Turkish Legions Invade [CENSORED]!
The Sultan's Legions launched a devastating invasion of [CENSORED]. Nothing stands in their way of total dominion, save the crude and incompetent [CENSORED] armies.

[metagaia]

Die Berliner
German army spots nobody!
Die Berliner can exlcusivly report that the German army has run into no-one in the first half of this year!

Puzzled tanks drive around in circles waiting for something to shoot but so far the enemies have proven more elusive than a polite Frenchman. Journalists from all over Germnay decided to take photo's of some lovely trees instead, to make the papers look more cheerful.

"We know they are some armies out there," says General Stew Peed. "But we suspect they have develped optic stealth technology, so we can't see them."

Germans predict that as a result of the lack of opposition, the war should be over by Christmas.

[thewamp]

Ok, Given that Blood lord is banned (and having read some of his posts on other threads it did have an air of inevitability about it) Are we looking for a new player for England? I have his email address and could contact him if people really want to try and continue the game with him. And I know that you can't tell us the orders obviously, but can I confirm that he did submit orders before the deadline?

Edit:
Will submit some press tomorrow, promise!

Okay, so it's a bit of an iffy issue... I don't think we're even allowed to have him, banned, participating in a game that's on the boards. I'm not sure though. In any case, assuming we're not, we've got a backup England, but Blood Lord was banned before he could contact me... you can infer whatever you like from that.

Point being, I'm going to ask to do something pretty unorthodox here. Since it's a blind game, I'd like to give England the chance to retroactively issue moves. This could affect existing moves, depending on whether or not adjacent powers issued moves that would be affected. If you're okay with that, cool. If not, you've got 24 hours to protest (though a single protest and I won't do it).

Anyway, I'm going to wait 24 hours and then contact the new possible England. If you all are okay with the above proposition, I'll ask the new England to immediately and without discussing anything submit Spring 1901 Orders. If not, he'll come in in the fall.

Either way,
I'm postponing Fall 1901 Orders till Sunday at 2300
to give time to deal with this.

[metagaia]

Yeah, new player is probably easiest.

If Blood Lord was an NMR then I would say definitly with regards to the new moves. With regards to giving him alternative moves if some were submitted I am a little torn. My moves would not change regardless of who plays England, but France's and Russia's might, and I would definitely want their opinion before going ahead.

I would say it's ok, but obviously you need more input than that.

It sounds a little arrogant I know, but I would rather not negotiate until the new England has submitted their moves, so anyone who PMs me from this point will not receive a reply until that point. It seems fairest to me.

[thewamp]

Sorry, I meant to make it clear: England NMRed. That was what "he never got in contact with me" was meant to imply.

[metagaia]

yeah, sorry about that, just wasn't 100% sure, definitely support England getting their own orders then.

[viggo]

protest!!!!!

i care not

[Meshakhad]

Go ahead. Give England their moves.

[Neftren]

Apologies for the late French orders. We had some technical difficulties.



(If you're interested, my Harddrive went haywire and I had to do a complete reformat and install all three of my operating systems again.)

[Moody the Wise]

Go ahead and give the new England a chance at Spring 1901 orders. However, I would also like to say that I'd prefer to be able to talk with this person first ... maybe we could have a quick (day or two) redo of the first season?

[metagaia]

Go ahead and give the new England a chance at Spring 1901 orders. However, I would also like to say that I'd prefer to be able to talk with this person first ... maybe we could have a quick (day or two) redo of the first season?

Hmm, it will benefit some people more than others. I can imagine Austria, Italy and Turkey not caring less, while The Kaiser, President and Tzar diplomatice furiously.

Also, even though it is blind, your unsuccessful moves and spying give quite a lot of info over what people intended. So I would say just go with the original idea myself.

[thewamp]

England has been contacted and if he's in, he and I will post in the thread confirming, once I have his Spring 1901 orders

Also, heads up, a pair of people asked me if I could do this and it sounded fair:

The concept is, two people want to send each other simultaneous messages. They each send me the message and once I've received one message from each person, I pass on the messages. Of course, it'd be really easy to play the other person by sending a message containing nothing, so I'm not sure how this really gives anyone an advantage (which is why I allowed it in the first place). Since it seems to give no advantage, I'm going to do this unless someone objects, but I posted it here to let people know I'd do it in the future. One objection though and the concept is sunk. You have 24 hours to object.

I'm equating this, in live diplomacy terms, to two people writing on slips of paper and passing them to each other simultaneously.

[thewamp]

Jamin is the New England!
For all those whom his orders affected if any and for all those who spied on England, if any, updated Spring 1901 Results have already been sent.

So yeah, you can all get back to that diplomating. Sorry for the hickup and hurry, hurry, hurry. Orders are still due Sunday

[thewamp]

This is your 29 Hour Warning
Because there's no way I'm going to be online at 11 on a saturday night...

[Qualia]

Pope issues plea for peace

His Holiness, the Pope, has issued a plea for peace as tensions rise across Europe. Whilst the balkans continues to act as a powderkeg, there have been rumours of a 'night of the long knives' in the British Government and many are unsure who holds power over the United Kingdom.

[Jamin]

Greetings Nations of the World. After our old leader was outed because of foul manners I King Edmund am now running England. Anyone and everyone is welcome to treat with us.

[thewamp]

Hey, Turn in Orders!
Sorry for the delay, mondays are nightmares for me, I've just discovered. Anyway, you all need to hurry up and turn in late orders. There's just a few too many sets missing and it would kind of be stupid to adjudicate now. So I'm going to postpone at least another 3 hours.

[thewamp]

Fall 1901 Results are Out

Just a reminder about builds: you are allowed to spy during this phase too. You are not allowed to spy during the retreat phase though. Also note that starting now and lasting the rest of the game, I will have a retreat phase whether or not there are any, simply because I don't want to give any extra information away. If you have a retreat, you have already been informed. Same goes for builds.

Retreat Orders due Tuesday at 2300
Builds due Wednesday at 2300
Spring 1902 Orders due Saturday at 2300

[thewamp]

Oh yeah, heads up everyone:
viggo told me to tell everyone that his computer went screwy and he can't reach the internet. However, his phone can deal with IM. His sn is vincethewiseguy, so if you want to reach him, that's where he'll be.

This is your 24 Hour Warning

[Meshakhad]

COUP IN TURKEY
Today, the Sultan Meshakhad was overthrown by Byzantine loyalists. They also revealed that the Sultan's real name was Abdul, not Meshakhad (the name of the true leader of Turkey). The Emperor Meshakhad has renamed Istanbul to Byzantium, and declared a New Byzantine Empire.

[thewamp]

Hey, sorry for the delay on builds, I couldn't get onto the boards. Dunno if everyone had that problem, but anyway, I'll send builds back either late tonight or early tomorrow

[thewamp]

This is your 27 hour warning for Spring 1902 Orders

[Jamin]

Just saying that I King Edmund still am open to messages you might want to send

[Qualia]

His Holiness the Pope has been offering prayers for the safety of the Turkish people as the Byzantine Empire returns to Turkey. His Holiness has let it be known that he approves of the change in leadership and hopes that the scourge of Islam can be pushed from europe.

[thewamp]

Okay I really need those several players who aren't submitting orders to start doing so
Anyway, going to wait a bit longer so that there's actually a point in adjudicating.

[Meshakhad]

The forum keeps eating my orders.

[Jamin]

Hooray the long night is over

[thewamp]

Okay so that sucked. Board death.
Spring 1902 Results are Out
And please, please get orders in on time. I'm absurdly busy this semester so I'd rather not stress about this and I don't want to be flaky and disappear... so help me by getting orders in on time.

Retreats due by Thursday at 2300
Fall 1902 orders due by Monday at 2300
delay so that there's time for people to notice the boards are back.

[thewamp]

This is your 24 hour warning

[thewamp]

Sorry for the delay. Today was unimaginably ****ty, so there will be a slight delay while I stop feeling so ****ty. Then I'll adjudicate. Should be within the next 2 hours.

[thewamp]

Well Crap
My computer's fan just died and I really don't want to use it and have it overheat and hurt something else. I'm on a friend's computer right now. Anyway, sorry and I'll adjudicate ASAP

[Qualia]

No problems - hope you get it sorted out.

[thewamp]

Fall 1902 Results are Out
I am so very sorry about the delay. Fan is fixed though, so that's good.

Retreats due Friday at 2300
Builds due Saturday at 2300
Spring 1903 Orders due Monday at 2300
Remember to spy

[thewamp]

Winter results are out

[Moody the Wise]

Three cheers for the wamp!

Have I mentioned how great this guy is? I know from (ultimately failed) experience how hard this sort of variant is to run.

[thewamp]

This is your 6 Hour Warning
sorry it's not much of a warning.

[thewamp]

There is a slight delay. You might have noticed. Orders back in about 6 hours.

[thewamp]

So after that massive forum delay...
Orders back tomorrow morning, once I'm not dead tired. Assuming the forums are still here then.

[thewamp]

Spring 1903 Results are Out

Sorry about the delays. Stupid boards

Retreats due ASAP
Fall 1903 Orders due Saturday at 2300

[thewamp]

This is your 9 hour warning

[thewamp]

I'm sorry, there was a delay while I got the last orders in and now there will be a delay while I sleep. Saturday was a terrible time for an orders deadline, since these take more time to adjudicate. Lesson learned. Anyway, orders back in probably ~13 hours

[thewamp]

Fall 1903 Orders are back
Remember to submit spying orders!

Retreats due ASAP
Builds due Tuesday at 2300
Spring 1904 orders due Friday at 2300

[Jamin]

Remember to submit spying orders!



he means me

[thewamp]

Spying orders back momentarily, sorry for the delay.
This is your 26 Hour Warning

EDIT: Effective at the end of this turn, we're going to move onto a very regular schedule. Turns will be every friday, retreats will be due every Sunday, builds will be due, when applicable, every tuesday. Can you all try to actually get orders in on time in that case? I'm having lots of no orders sent in-ness

[thewamp]

Delay, because I have only 1 set of orders
Seriously, can you please get them in!

[Jamin]

Yeah guys get em in

[Moody the Wise]

Mine are in ... I think. The message shows up in my sent messages. If you don't have it, let me know, I can send it again.

[thewamp]

Mine are in ... I think. The message shows up in my sent messages. If you don't have it, let me know, I can send it again.

I think I'm going to start sending confirmation messages just so people know their messages have gotten received. Anyway, waiting on one last confusion. Orders should be processed tomorrow. I'm really sorry for the delay.

[thewamp]

Retreats due ASAP
Fall 1904 Orders due Friday at 2300
Remember to spy, please get orders in on time!

[thewamp]

This is your 10 Hour Warning

[thewamp]

Fall 1904 Results have been out
Retreats due ASAP
Builds due Monday at 2300
Spring 1905 Orders due Thursday at 2300

And really, *really* try to get those in on time. I'm gone over the weekend, so...

[thewamp]

This is your several days warning
but it would have been a 16 hour warning if I hadn't just found out that I'm leaving a day earlier than I thought I was... anyway, I can't process orders until monday and I'm terribly sorry. Please get them in by 1700 on monday. That's a ton of extra time, so it shouldn't be difficult.

[thewamp]

Sorry for delays, I'm blaming them on the boards being down.
Spring 1905 Orders are Out
Retreats due ASAP
Fall 1905 Orders due Saturday at 2300
Remember to spy!

[thewamp]

Fall 1905 Results are Out
Retreats due by Monday at 2300
Builds due by Tuesday at 2300
Spring 1906 Orders due by Friday at 2300

[thewamp]

Due to the boards being down and me responding late,
Spring 1906 Orders are now due Monday at 2300

[thewamp]

Sorry for the delay, I've finally gotten in all the orders. Adjudication later today.

[thewamp]

Wow, this is getting ridiculous. I got pretty sick, so I'm going to bed now, but I promise, promise I will have results at some point tomorrow morning.

[thewamp]

Spring 1906 Results Out
(finally)
Retreats due ASAP
Fall 1906 Orders due Sunday at 2300

[thewamp]

This is your 7 Hour Warning

[thewamp]

Fall 1906 Results Are Out
And mostly on time too!

Retreats due ASAP
Builds due Tuesday at 2300
Spring 1907 Orders due Saturday at 2300

[thewamp]

Gah! Sorry for delays! Spying results in the morning, first thing.

[thewamp]

Build Orders Back (finally)
Spring 1907 orders due soon!

[thewamp]

This is your 3 Hour Warning
But considering how little of a warning that is, just get them in ASAP

[thewamp]

Finally got all the orders, results back tomorrow afternoon.

[thewamp]

Spring Results are Out!

Retreats due ASAP
Fall 1907 Orders due Sunday at 2300

[thewamp]

Er... well, everyone missed that deadline.
Okay, this is your 24 hour warning

[thewamp]

Gah, sorry about delays. Results up in the morning

[thewamp]

Success, finally!
Retreats due ASAP
Builds due by Sunday at 2300
Spring 1908 Orders due Wednesday at 2300

[thewamp]

Builds, Builds, Builds!
send them in!

[thewamp]

Please, send in orders!

[thewamp]

Orders back tomorrow.

[thewamp]

Orders back tomorrow.

Or not, since several PMs that I thought were orders weren't. Submit orders!
Also, this could go a lot easier, if you were all willing to PM me your emails. If you are, I'll only send emails when orders are overdue.

[thewamp]

Okay, so as much as this game is kicking and screaming, it's doing it very quietly. By which I mean it's dying and/or dead. I can't get people to submit orders and frankly, I'm not being as on top of things as I should be. Would anyone miss this if it died?

[Moody the Wise]

Okay, so as much as this game is kicking and screaming, it's doing it very quietly. By which I mean it's dying and/or dead. I can't get people to submit orders and frankly, I'm not being as on top of things as I should be. Would anyone miss this if it died?

Not particularly. I've felt like it's been dying for a while. I appreciate all the effort, and it was a lot of fun for a while. But now you know why spying variants tend to crash and burn.

[Qualia]

It was an interesting experiment, but I think the 'dark' element made people reluctant to post colour in case they gave information away, and I seem to have misplaced a unit or two. The lack of banter made it easier for people to drift, which is a shame.

Thanks for the effort you put in.

[Jamin]

I would be ok with quiting