I found a copy of the 25 proposed extreme personalities from the earlier game. I've copied the earlier posting below, but to give it context, here's what I recall was discussed:
- Choose a relatively balanced board
- Review the extreme personality list and knock out any that the players commiting to the game feel don't work. In addition discuss possible updates/new inclusions from players on other extreme personalities and get agreement to the group on the list (the idea behind this is people playing can't complain about who they get if they've approved all the list earlier on.)
- You need to find someone on VDiplomacy not playing but can be an independent person who allocates the extreme personality. The independent person uses something like http://www.random.org/integers/ to randomly allocate the roles. They then PM each player to let them know who they'll be playing.
- Commence the game and let the silliness begin. Gameplay is normal although understandably you're playing to the character's motivation rather than the traditional Dip drive to win/draw/survive.
So here were the 25 stereotypes that were discussed for that game:
1. Wanna-rule-the-world dictator.
2. Believes non-existent players are about to attack him and others
3. Trying to seize a totally obscure part of the board without regard to normal gameplay
4. You think you're a major religious figure - Jesus/Buddha/Mohammad/your own cult etc
5. You think you're the megalomaniac historical figure of the country you represent - Hitler, Napoleon, insert name of relevant crazy person who's run that country before (Killer, Diplomat and Drano both supported in the forum. Discussion on if we draw that, should one be forced to fight like that person too? I mean it's all fine and dandy if someone's pretending to be Hitler, but if they then make an alliance with France, where's the "crazy" part you know? So Hitler would form an A/I/G (or attempt to) etc)
6. You think you're a famous entertainer - you pick who it could be, past or present eg Elvis, Lady Gaga, member of the Village People, etc (suggested that you could be the whole group of the Village People, etc)
7. Vendetta - Make up a reason to hate a particular country and weave it into a story. Try to get the rest of the board to help you gain your objective. Kinda goes with the fixated on a specific part of the map idea.
8. Paranoid - This person doesn't really trust anyone and will stab/protect from stabs that either don't exist, or wouldn't make sense to go through with because everyone's "out to get them".
9. Extremist group - Your crazy extremist group has grabbed control of the government. Think Westboro Baptist Church if you're a christian nation, or Al Qaeda if you're Turkey. Or it could be as silly as PETA or Greenpeace seizing a nation's leaders
10. Self-loather: The character actually hates his country/loves another country more eg he's English but wants to be French: he emulates another player, their culture etc and does everything he can to support that country. How does he deal with a stab? Who knows? That's the fun part of being crazy.
11. Grossly incompetent character who always f^cks up. Basically you'd put in your orders the way you planned, but would then have to deliberately go back and screw up one of the orders. eg
France (the f^ck up) wants to:
A Marseilles -> Spain
A Paris -> Burgandy
F Brest -> MAO
Has to (randomly?) screw up an order so F Brest->Picardy instead. Basically you have to choose the stupidest move possible (maybe there's a stupier move than that as you could easily pick up Belgium that way, perhaps he just holds?
12. The bully - someone who feels he's bigger/ stronger then he really is, boasts and make more aggressive only moves.
13. The pacifist - doesn't start any wars, but fights whoever hits him first (I think this could work, but its not really crazy as such)
14. A person who just randomly supports others with no indications of alliances or trade offs, that will at least keep the game moving (discussion on two personalities: always lies and always tells the truth. But as this may get picked up on relatively quickly, another alternative would be the overly helpful character - overly pleasing & help others out all the time even if it makes no sense eg let's say France has a fleet in Belgium & helps out England by supporting an attack from NTS to German holland while a French fleet in EC supports a german fleet in Denmark attacking NTS.
15. Mr. Prissy – although no game-changing crazy like the others. Unless we stipulate that "mr. prissy" must ALWAYS be guided by the person who is loudest and most intimidating towards them (thereby making mr. prissy feel scared and afraid of that person), it shouldn't be a personality.
16. Giver-upper - immediately when he loses an SC, he abandons the front and moves on.
17. Color Man - a person who would rather spend moves coloring territories their color rather than capturing SC's, obsesses over "neutral" non-SC territories, such as North Africa, Syria, Finland, Bohemia, Clyde, etc. if we were to do 1897
18. Pirate Pete - Swears all the time, builds at least 1 fleet when he can during the builds phase doesn’t move to any inland SCs or territories: must stay on the coast. Tends to raid coastal SC’s and sees no issues moving on,
19. Military Man - Will build armies no matter what (sorry England), speaks in clipped military like tones and behaves like he’s in the army
20. Moocher - Will build alliances based on food, not by different deals which are being made (eg France allying with Italy or England for a fine dinner or a tea break with French bread.
21. Nuke Inventor - Will always try to convince his allies that he will develop nukes in the near future. He constantly keeps explaining what his scientists are doing and the physics of a nuclear weapon.
22. The Horse Trader - basically bandied together & strikes deals to swap territories with players
23. Barking mad - you take on the persona of an animal. You can still speak human language but you take everything from your chosen animal perspective. Open to discussion if you can swap & change animals during the game. Alternatively you could only speak in your species' native tongue eg you bark, woof & pee everywhere the whole game. Could be interesting in diplomatic conversations
24. The Mirror - in 1901 you behave totally rationally like normal Dip player, then in 1902 (grab a dice or do some kind of random allocation of the other 6 players) and then act like & take on the same traits as that randomly selected player. 1903 rolls by, see who you'll randomly be next turn. This way you have to do your best to imitate the style/personality you think that player has.
25. Irrational lover/hater - randomly select a player in 1901 & go to war with them with full bravado (even if you're England & you just drew turkey) then in 1902 randomly go to war with another player while sucking up to the guy you just attacked the previous turn. Serious craziness if you get the same player back to back with messages swapping between love & hate
Note: these were from an early list (the final list was lost in the mists of time when the OliDip.net server shut down) so apologies if some are too similar (eg 1 & 5)
It's a sad, sad day
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