Although this option is not available in face-to-face games, it does partially make up for the fact that you can't sneak a peek at your opponents orders, or move the markers on the board when no one is looking, and other face-to-face strategies.

Holding hands with your wife: Is it cheating on your mistress?

Playing to Win: Acceptable Strategy or Inconsiderate of Others' Feelings?

Diplomacy is cooperative.

Diplomacy should be ONLY cooperative.

Go play tiddlywinks if that is what you think Diplomacy should be.

Drugnar convinced me.he is rigth.

Another convert. Now go stab your ally for a win!

Tiddly winks is not cooperative.

Draugnar's stock answer to every diplo question is everything is acceptable.

So who here who thinks there is some kind of etiquette to be followed when trying to get the best outcome has ever read the cover of the rulebook? The game is about winning whatever it takes. Read the box and read the rulebook. Be enlightened to the truth of this game we love and loathe. No treachery in diplomacy would be like no sword fighting in the Highlander series of movies, shows, and books.

"Every other word out of their mouth is "cheating.""

Actually nobody used the word cheating here until you did.

Just because something is legal doesn't mean it isn't bad practice.

I get it that there are people here who think nothing is bad practice. Whatever, good for you.

Public press against a particular tactic is *perfectly acceptable* and in keeping with the game too, so deal with it.

@Putin33 @"Drugnar" In the game of Diplomacy, anything that is legal and works is Good Practice. ¡GOOD PRACTICE!

The point is entertainment. There are people who like to destroy any kind of entertainment value out of the game just because they can and they think you're supposed to act nasty in diplomacy.

If it werent for ethical conduct in diplomacy treachery wouldn't be novel or interesting.

I will say this about the public press stuff. The mods have made it clear that claiming the game didn't execute correctly or that another player or players are cheating is against the rules as it causes them more work. I disagree as they could easily say "unless an official request to look into a problem comes from the person who had it, we will not look into it" but I respect that decision none the less. Beyond that, screaming "Morons! Russia is about to solo" or some such in Public Press is perfectly acceptable.

There wouldn't be ethical conduct in diplomacy if it wasn't temporarily convenient.

Is there something that is not acceptable to scream in Public Press?

And the game listed above complaining about the CDs was anon, so it may have been new players each time. You don't know for a fact that it wasn't a new player.

People are generally bad liars here and think you must stab immediately all the time so the non-cooperative types are really just obnoxious to play with.

You should stab when you sense trust

Tendmote gets it!

By the way, that ^ is unacceptable to scream. ;-)

I was terrible at Diplomacy when I was a kid. When you're a teenager, your mind is quite likely still struggling with the information that you're learning about the adult world (which is teeming with moral ambiguity) against what you were deliberately taught by adults in the child's world (things like "Don't Lie, Don't Cheat, Don't Steal").

However the sort of ethics that is taught to people in Kindergarten is not meant to serve as your moral beacon through your adult years. It's meant to make you a more manageable child. Once you've outgrown the need for constant supervision, you've also outgrown the need for a child's moral code as well.

Diplomacy is not designed as a contest of intelligence, nor of strategy really either. Diplomacy is not chess. In chess, attempts to distract or harass your opponent are seen as unsportsmanlike. In Diplomacy, attempts to harass or confuse your opponent are the pinnacle of gameplay.

Henry Kissinger is seen as a paragon Diplomacy player because he's intelligent, straight-forward, gentlemanly or honest, but because he's the sort of guy who would volunteer to give your sister a ride to the hospital and then make a point of groping her somewhere along the way.

I'm glad that young people play this game, and have opinions about it, but for many of you Diplomacy can serve as an introduction to the adult world. Underhandedness is everything. People who are both principled and successful are admired by adults because they are so rare. If you give Machiavelli's works a close reading he takes great pain to outline the importance of making personal (and interpersonal, heh) sacrifices to achieve that which is most important.

What an overwrought way of saying you think anything goes in diplomacy.

It must be horrible to be miserable like Putin at this most wonderful time of the year.

Anything that's doesn't take advantage of the site features or break laws goes in diplomacy.

Didn't Calhamer himself say it was OK to literally move pieces on the board as long as nobody noticed?

Putin33, anything does go in Diplomacy, as in life.

That's the point. There is no moral high ground to stand and judge the world from because morals are subjective.

The concept of gentlemen, honor, truth are all forms of manipulation and anyone who buys into them is being used.

Just because people here play by such values doesn't mean everyone else has to.

Honestly I think it's worse if a player alters his moves to take advantage of an NMR