I know Melinda Holley in WVa plays in PBM and FTF, I'm not sure if she's on this site. I think I've played with maybe 3 women over the years.

It is only my personal observation. In my experience with the game, very few women other than myself actively pursue this game and others like it...all of the people I meet with in real life games are male, and I was wondering if it was the same for others on the net.

djbent and Akroma both made it into the top 10.

The MENSA group out in California had a couple of female players as well. It's been years since I played with anyone from that group. I can't remember names.

on Ghost-Rating, that is.

I hate mensa. Not out of jealously I think I could join maybe but it attracts egotists and wackos like a light attracts moths

Speaking of female diplomace players, whatever happened to Amon Savag?

@C, you have some big chips on your shoulders. BTW, I'm not in MENSA, but the group from California did run a good PBM system back in the day.

amon disappeared

Biddis was also a fairly active player but I haven't seen her in a year or so.

Back in the good old days when you had to write letters & games were normally 3 or 4 week turn arounds & printed in magazines with funny names.
They were produced via stencil in things called zines of which you were registered as players for a fee that covered postage & printing of the zine in what was known as the hobby!
In those days there were a lot of female players, usually university graduates who enjoyed writting letters & meeting other players for face to face gaming.
However, in those days we used to exchange personal information about our families & friends & it was a very social hobby.
My biggest complaint with internet diplomacy is that there is no conversation between players except about the game itself.
So you no longer develope long & lasting friendships like we did in those days.

Organizations like that just bother me because of who they attract

There are female players on the site but they are far out-numbered by the men.

I've enjoyed every game I've played w/ djbent and crazyter; they are both extremely skilled and can banter w/ the best of 'em.

Gender role expectations, a disinclination towards 'war games' or nerdy board games because of their perceived negative and anti-female natures, and mutually reinforcing activities among separate social groups. (ie. women aren't exposed nearly as often to Diplomacy-playing female friends)

MENSA was set up by a chap worried that his sister couldn't get a date because she scared men off with her intellect, and he wanted her to meet blokes at her level. As such it began as a glorified dating agency and should be given all the respect that such an institution deserves. They make decent puzzles if you like that sort of thing, but the magazine is pretty shite (at least it was a few years back... haven't seen one for a while).

As far a women on this site goes I've encountered a few that I know of but I could easily have played hundreds without knowing it. There was a player about called Jeffy who could probably tell you more. He spent most of the game is was with him in asking everyone if they were a girl... Methinks he was on a mission of love :p

Haha I'm not surprised something like that happened. But I was wondering more along the lines of gender psychology...are men just biologically geared to strategize, or is it just a matter of personal taste?

I think Friendly Sword pretty much nailed it. I think women would dominate this game if more of them played. Diplomacy would come easy to women because all they do is talk people's ears off (stereotypes FTW!!!)



Yes, that is a sad attempt at a joke...

Yes it was. Thank you for turning a semi-serious thread into a sad joke.

"Thank you for turning a semi-serious thread into a sad joke."

That's what I do best. But I still think that Friendly Sword has a valid point

Men are more analytically minded. That is true

@TomBombadil (clever name use, by the way)

He does...I apologize for snapping. I hear enough of those jokes with my live group haha.

But I agree with Friendly Sword to a point. Women don't engage actively in board games of the strategic sort, but just because I am a woman does not automatically mean that I am disinclined to "nerdy" board games. We are biologically geared to focus on defense, not offense, and I can't think of a strategy game (other than Starcraft) that has players actively think about holding down the fort rather than expanding it. I don't think it has anything to do with social expectations either; that view is incredibly old-fashioned, no offense intended. There are women in the army - there are women snipers - there are women who go to work on a daily basis - Independence has reached a point to where we don't care about housewifery - therefore, it would not much matter to a group of individuals what a woman does with her time, thereby not affecting how we play the game.

You bring up good points, but I disagree with you about social expectations. While it is true that women are in the army etc, I think it comes down to more of what is "cool". I would say that most of the people who play Diplomacy are either fairly young, or learned how to play when they were young. There is a great deal of pressure on kids, especially middle school and high school level, to participate in activities that are "cool". I don't think playing Diplomacy, or other strategy type games, is perceived as cool for either gender, but I think that males can get away with it more than females. So that causes females to avoid the game.

I have you there. I am a junior in high school, and I can tell you that when it comes to being nerdy, no one cares what gender you are, and anyone who's cool wouldn't put pressure on a nerd to try and change. In fact, they would try to associate as little as possible with them. Just because I am a woman does not mean that I am more affected by or susceptible to social norms or want to fit in more. And nerdy girls get just as much persecution as nerdy guys do - there is no real boundary between us other than millions of years of evolution.

You must have gone to a much different high school than me. And I'm not saying that women are more affected by social norms, but that playing a strategy board game is not viewed as "nerdy" for males compared to females.

So what makes it acceptable for males and not females? A woman can kill - is it any more or less acceptable than a man doing the same?

@ Tom

You think most people learned to play Diplomacy when they were young? It depends on how you define young, of course, but I always imagined a relatively even mix of ages from mid teens to death.

I also thought we were mostly made up of people who were bored sick of losing at Risk because they can't role sixes. It would be interesting to see if Diplomacy players have worse than average luck because of this :p. In all seriousness though I think the route people take on their way to discovering Diplomacy is important to look at when thinking about the gender issue. Diplomacy itself isn't a lot more attractive to men than women (in my opinion at least), but the routes to it (in my case toy soldiers as a child followed by a brief Risk addiction) are often a lot more appealing to men than women. As such I think men are far more likely to discover the game than women, hense the male dominance of the game.

I don't know what makes it more acceptable. I assume its the same reason that you have guys playing football and women playing field hockey. Its just the way it was when people more people had those gender stereotypes. Can a man just as easily play field hockey and a woman play football? Sure, but does it happen? No

Octavious, you have a really good point. I never considered events in an individuals life - I only looked at psychology and social ideals.