*a hard fought game, even :p.

PPSC is an artificial construct that has nothing to do with the game itself. Winning is best, drawing is second best, and anything after that is losing.

It may be an artificial construct but it seems to be the dominant form of the game on this site at least. I certainly know from my experience that suriving with more points than I started with feels quite different to surving with a loss or being defeated.

How are the rankings calculated, by the way? Is it done purely on points or does it take into account win/defeat style ratios?

I would see the two as more or less equivalent - based on the fact that they are more or less of similar difficulty to achieve. ...but the edge goes to the greater number of points.

@nola, As to PPSC being an artificial construct... well, so is the original game. You may prefer WTA, but obviously the question refers to PPSC games. If you play a PPSC game as if it's WTA, that is your prerogative... but it seems about as pointless to me as playing baseball as if it's cricket. They are different games.

Cue TGM on ghost ratings...

Are the Ghostratings and the percentile on the site actually the same? I didn't think so. I am also curious about the calculations for the site ranking.

Dexter_Morgan - If points were actually worth something (as in if we had to spend $100 to get them and then we could cash out), then I would agree with you. However, points are not worth anything at all, really. I would argue that the goal of any game (which is itself an artificial construct, yes, but we all agree on the game rules) is to achieve the best possible outcome in terms of the rules of that game. Points are external to the game of Diplomacy itself, and thus they are not really relevant (or at least should not be relevant) to decisions made in the game.

Clearly a draw (not losing) is better than a survival (losing).

For all those who blame the system - play more WTA and then compare - it's not perfect either and, actually, when you have good players, PPSC is the better system because:
- If you have enough points you don't really care about this, but you care more about W/D/S/L ratio and Ghost-rating
- if you're experienced enough you know that a draw is better than a survival so you'll be playing it 'the right way' by default
- PPSC has the tendency to turn people into center-farming minions, but WTA has the tendency to make them kamikadzes, and this is a bigger problem from what I've seen.

Let's face it - if you're playing WTA and the game is not going well, say you have 2-3 centers left and the biggest nation is slowly killing you - what are your options? WTA preachers say you should keep fighting till the end.... how come? Even if it is not in my interest and I can become a 'vassal' and secure a survival compared to certain death???

You always have to play for the best result on the win/draw/survival/elimination scale, regardless whether it's WTA or PPSC - and if everyone did this all games would have been PPSC.

@nola, I guess I've integrated the points into my concept of the game (at this site, of course). It's like house rules. I play to the house rules. My game changes between the two varieties of Diplomacy, as it should. Original Diplomacy, last I checked, also didn't include a World Map or an Ancient Med map... these are variants, as are PPSC games. So - when I score a bunch of points coming in second it feels good - perhaps akin to getting silver in a track and field competition... Obviously coming in first is better, but, in the game I play, second is still pretty good.

I think I prefer PPSC, by the way, for two reasons: 1) primarily because as Ivo ivanov suggests, PPSC is structured in a way that better supports playing to the bitter end of a losing game, 2) I tend to not like games where I lose 6/7 times.

Ivo's reply should be copy and pasted in the FAQ after the explanation of the difference between PPSC and WTA.

@LockeLamora, the site rankings are based on your available points. Yes, available points, not total points. So if you invest a lot of points in a game then your ranking goes down. It sort of makes sense because you might not get any of those points back. On the other hand it sort of doesn't make sense that your ranking drops just because you invest in a big game.

Ghost Ratings are completely separate from the site rankings. Ghost Ratings does pay attention to whether a game is WTA or PPSC and credits your ghost rating appropriately. So a strong second in a PPSC game is better for your ghost rating than a 4 way draw. But in a WTA game a strong second is worth 0.

So a high win record could theoretically be lower ranked than someone with the same number of draws if the person with the draws played higher stakes games? (Assuming one game at a time for the sake of argument.)

Yes for the webdip rankings since those are based on your points.

Ok, thanks for the clarification!

I'm just starting here, so my first goal is survival. As I get better I may be able to find ways to win.