I confess I am of the same mind as YCHTTon this one Mercy; in the changes / Help section:

"December 22nd, 2015
...
All takeovers are now free."

That is interesting, because poor aman2000 was defeated after taking over his CD in the game below and his score was affected.

https://vdiplomacy.com/board.php?gameID=34615
https://vdiplomacy.com/hof.php?gameID=34615

And that was earlier this year.

But in FTF play (at least in the european hobby I once was a part of) people who suicided was frowned upon and not welcome to the hobby. It is as you say a thin line but there are clear cases of not trying to survive. You should play to 1) win, 2) draw, 3) prevent someone else from soloing, in that priority. Anything else is a playing style that just makes you a less fun opponent. You wouldnt be welcomed to my invite games...

@vixol: hear hear! I'd go further; it would be regarded in the circles I played in in same light as "writing paper" in poker... You did that and none of us would ever play with you again. It's poisonous and selfish.

@vixol and Chumbles -

I am interested to know how you guys would handle the following situation:

Turkey is on a roll, rapidly eating up Austria and Russia, and is dangerously close to getting on a solo run. Germany and Italy notice this, and coordinate a defense to block Turkey from getting the all-important spots from which to solo. However, France, having killed England, decides he's going to attack Germany, despite the warnings from Germany and Italy that this will lead to a Turkish solo. In desperation, Germany abandons his eastern defenses in order to "suicide" into France.

Would this not be a classic example of "I'm going to suicide into you and allow a solo unless you get your head out of your a$$ and let us stop the solo"?

I can agree completely that sometimes people (far too often on vDip sadly it seems) either just stop playing, or keep attacking one power while getting gobbled up by someone behind, not even listening to anyone's attempts at Diplomacy. I find those leave a bad taste in my mouth as well. But surely there are some situations where suiciding is a legitimate tactic is there not?

Does the Diplo community not have a concept of BadWrongFun? Is that not considered to be a thing here?

Define BadWrongFun. Too me, neta/multi/press violations/rule exploiting like refusing to unpause is BadWrongFun but chainsaw/suicide is a perfectly valid tactic and actually isn't fun for the guy doing it as he is desperate to wake up the idiot attacking him before it is too late.

Suicide tactic, BatWrongFun or whatever is irrelevant to the original post by Chumbles, if I understand correctly. He was complaining about people taking over positions to fix a situation not directly related to the game and how to avoid those people. I do not know how to fix it except by not letting takeovers affect your ratings and score but I am sure someone has a clever idea.

TL;DR I think it is relevant, because you are trying to define what the proper way to have fun is. But on point: a way to prevent CD takeovers at game creation is a good idea. Can it be implemented?

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BadWrongFun is someone else having fun in a way that you consider to be the "incorrect" way to have fun (Not a disregard for the established rules of the system). It is a term that I believe comes from the TableTop RPG community, where one group of players doesn't enjoy the way another group of players plays, because the first group's playstyle is obviously superior. The term was then coined to draw attention to, and subsequently mock, this behavior.

I like to think I am a fairly active member in this community, but I am guilty of exactly the BadWrongFun you are describing here. I do not always fight for what others would consider my best interests, I enjoy the site rankings. I love odd games with weird rules sets, and I adore the various Win Conditions, including the dichotomy of play between WTA and PPSC. The effect Taking over CDs has (i.e. not an adjustment to rating but adjustment game limit) is the only reason I have taken over the Cds I have taken over, and I see it as a wonderfully well built punishment (I NMR'ed, thus degrading the quality of game for my fellow players, so, as penance, I take on less than Ideal positions to improve the game experience for other players, until My debt is deemed repaid.)

I think the person in the OP did not take their punishment seriously, and that is very unfortunate, but it concerns me a great deal if we are to set about defining the right way to have fun, as my brand of "fun" is not likely to be the officially endorsed version.

All that aside, is it possible to prevent CD takeovers at game creation, making it a closed game at the outset? I assume a password does the trick, does it not?

Really this site needs some sort of ability to push notifications somewhere on an app or via email to remind people

Thank you gjdip; spot on.

@Caerus: speaking as one who has fun by gently taking the piss out of the worthy wordy amongst us, I wish I could have my "BadWrongFun" (what an abomination that car crash of a term is), but apparently the mods are quite capable of censuring it, even though it doesn't impact on any game. But they appear to lack either the means or the motive to fix an egregious bastard whose sole admitted reason for standing in is to suicide ASAP in order to repair his RR. I am NOT referring to when a player responds to a stab with a chainsaw attack.

@drano: Of course there are some situations where suiciding is a legitimate tactic! The case you specced demonstrates that. In a non-gunboat game it's a good way to demonstrate to an erstwhile ally that it would be a good idea to negotiate! At worst you can ensure he doesn't benefit from his perfidy.

"All that aside, is it possible to prevent CD takeovers at game creation, making it a closed game at the outset? I assume a password does the trick, does it not?" The former was something I suggested when this thread was still vaguely on topic. The latter would only meet that case should a password be required of the stand in, but I strongly recommend that it should be possible to opt to prevent CD takeovers at game creation. That way everyone would know where they stood.

Caerus wrote :
"All that aside, is it possible to prevent CD takeovers at game creation, making it a closed game at the outset? I assume a password does the trick, does it not?"

NO ! A password does not do the trick at all. We have seen, here, in a game protected by a password with a CD, a player posting publicly the password in the forum and asking for a replacement player ! And some other player in that game found it great ! Even though it had been *explicitly* agreed, before the game begun that it was an invite game and that the password would not be given to other players, unless we agreed before.

It is always the same story : some players who will not benefit from a CD will feel the necessity to find a replacement player. In the game I am talking about, the player who gave the password publicly in the forum had just been eliminated but he did not want that the player who had eliminated him could possibly take advantage of the CD.

The only way to prevent players from taking over CDs in a game is to have the possibility to create games with that option.

But eliminating CD replacements on an absolute basis means a player who profits from the CD can rest comfortable in his solo run. A better way would be to set a minimum RR and/or experience level for CD takeover even if the game had none.

I believe that you already cannot take over CD's in games that you do not meet the minimum RR requirement for. However, if the number of games you can join is limited because of a low RR, then you will still be able to take over CD's (so long as there are no minimum RR requirements for the specific games that you do not meet), which allows you to play more phases and thereby increase your RR faster.

...and suicide out of the game ASAP "and thereby increase [their] RR faster.

In my opinion, it's a free country so anyone can play however they like, although they stand to lose vDip and webDip points, but if they don't care about that or sportsmanship we can't force them. I for one would not take over any CDs unless the country in question is in a fantastic position if there were greater costs in doing so as has been proposed by some here, and I think this will make most CDs remain CD, so any country profiting from it unfairly will just continue doing so. You might think that the guy taking over a CD suiciding into you is unfair to you, but if people were deterred from taking over CDs then that will be unfair to others, so CDs in general just serve to add unfairness into the game and in general should be discouraged more than they are now. What makes this game special is that the rules are simply and easy to understand, and there are no doubts to any decisions made. If we add significant subjective judgment in deciding if someone appears to be breaking the rules, then that will be the ruin of everything. I should be free to move my units however and wherever I want as long as I can, for whatever reason, even if there is none, and the rest is up to the game of diplomacy.

Well having an 'no-takeover' option in game creation would also prevent the 'accidental takeover' situation that we hear about from time to time in the mod forum as well. Definately a patch to an issue.

@ingebot: my idea is simplicity itself - just prove a no stand-in option; a random substitute will be by their very nature a random event. If you were playing a freeze-out game of poker and someone had to go, that seat would be vacant. You'd regard it as insane if a random passer by sat down and started playing with the departed guy's chips!

And I particularly feel that gunboat games are prey to the suicide lunacy.

@Chumbles. The problem with the poker tournament analogy is that the abandoned seat only looses their chips to blinds and antes. A CD position is ripe for stealing chips. It is as if the abandoned stack kept being siphoned off by his neighbors and the TD allowed it. Yes, I play semi-professional poker and stealing chips the way a power steals CD centers would get one banned from play.

I'm fine with just an option to create games without CD takeovers. However, I'm not sure but isn't that addressed if you change the NMR policy?

@Drano:
There are as I said cases where the line is hard to draw. But that doesnt mean we need to allow all cases of suiced. There are for example cases where killing somone is self defence, that doesnt prevent our contries to outlaw murder.

I would actually try to hold the line rather than try the suicide strategy, and hope that France got the picture.The potential outcome would be the same, but keeping trying to prevent the solo has a greater chance of stopping it than suiciding would.

@vixol - Win, draw, lose trying to stop the solo with your allies, screw over anyone who tries to cut you out of the draw by giving the solo to the honest enemy. This is the order of Diplomacy. :-)

@vixol -

Sounds like we're generally on the same page, although I disagree with your statement that trying to hold the line has a greater chance of stopping a solo than "suiciding" would. It all depends on who your opponents are. Being blunt, a lot of people on vDip simply aren't good enough to recognize solo threats. By continuing ot hold the line, you'd give them a false sense of security that would make them think that the solo isn't an imminent threat, and as such, they should continue attacking you. "Suiciding" on them makes the solo threat blatantly obvious, and should shock them out of their chosen path. Or at least, that's the general impression I've gotten out of a lot of people on this site.