I think merging webDip and vDip would be good for both userbases (and it's mostly overlapping).

vDip gets: to join a larger community and breathe some new life into it.
webDip gets: new variants, new users, new enhancements, and a larger presence for popularity purposes

Plus, it will give us a chance to bring the much-more-civilized game of Mafia to our vDip brothers.

But what about users who are banned on one site but not the other, Chaqa?

We're not looking to merge vDip with webDip at the moment, and I don't think the webDip team really wants that either. They have a large crossover in playerbase, but even if webDip was willing to take on a large number of variants, actually merging them would mean that vDip would mean the loss of quite a few variants and features anyway (including Fog of War), since the coding is not clean. Keeping those variants would make webDip hard to keep updated well (messy code does that) and would make all the other webDiplomacy implementations on the web harder for the owners to maintain and update.

*actually merging them would mean the loss of quite a few variants

Easy, Jamie. If you're banned:

- On none: youre good!
- On one or the other: youre good if one site's admins vouch
- On both: BYE BRUH

@ Chaqa: Do you think Vdip's admins will vouch for You Can't Draundle The Truth, who is apparently welcome on their site, but tried to DDoS Webdip (among other transgressions)? If they did, would that be enough for Almighty Zultar?

Vdip-webDip concatenation is. not. happening.

By consolidating, i guess what i really mean is consolidate support staff together on one site and merge best of both code bases together and have enough technical manpower to keep development going stronger then they would going in separate directions. vDip is welcome to continue to exist on life support, just don't invest any further in it.

vDip members not already on this site (which i think is not really that many non "banned" members aren't already part-timing here) are welcome to follow if they wish.

How would you deal with players with different usernames on vdip? Wouldnt that just create a ton of multi accounts

Jamiet stop being suck a dick.

I'm not being a dick - I'm trying to illustrate something which would be much more of a problem than Chaqa etc seem to realise.

Depends on why they're banned. We've had cases like Sandgoose where they've turned over a new leaf. I don't see any reason why Draug or others couldn't be welcomed back. If they act up again, just ban them again.

Draugnar will never be back and requested we never discuss it, so let's not discuss it.

He's discussing it himself over there. I don't care what he wants.

Please don't even mention his name. Zultar doesn't like it when you do that.

"OK, quick question... *If* (and I stress that if) the two sites merged, would players banned from one site be welcome or would they be told to shove off? Everyone here who was on webDip 2 years ago pretty well knows who I was and the stuff that went down (saying terminate a mod was calling for someone to kill him in their puny, oblessed with Ahnuld and never worked in the real world where terminating employ.entry is the term used for ending an association with a company), but I digress. Would good ol' Draug just be SOL and persona non grata? Or would YCHTT be welcomed to the new site?

Just curious how anyone sees that playing out. I'm not even certain the I would want to continue post-merge with "intellectual" elitists that took over at webDip, but it would be nice to know if I had a choice or not."


Doesn't seem to line up with the company line, bo.

Chaqa why are you even speculating about what would happen to banned users in the event of the sites merging, when you have been told in no uncertain terms that no such merger is going to occur?

There's been interest from many users on both sites. I want to know if it's even feasible from a userbase-support side. If it is, then maybe the staff will actually consider listening to the users for once.

It's not. I explained that on vDip some time ago.

You're the one who doesn't seem to be listening Chaqa.

As head admin on vDip - we already looked into this possibility and decided it was something neither site wanted to do.

Seems to me the resistant comes from those with comedy cubes.

Chaqa why don't you take the code (it's open source) and make your own site combining the features you like best about both sites? Then you could promote it on both and, if it is good, users from both will flock to join you.

You could call it..... WebVDipRepublic

Chaqa:

1.) We are not merging sites.
2.) Draugnar and all other banned players are banned.
3.) You have recommended decent ideas in this thread that the hated comedy cubes are actually considering and you have been asked to go into more detail on those. Please do.

There are a huge number of hurdles that would need to be overcome; and vDip have never expressed interest or asked us to consider it. So we have consequently not thought about it ourselves. And unless Oli and his admins ever ask us to do so; we will never put any thought to it.

I can't believe I'm saying these words in this order, but Tolstoy was spot on. There are a hell of a lot of things that we can do from modernizing the interface to incorporating a new scoring system or whatever, but increasing membership ultimately comes down to new people joining at a higher rate than old people are leaving. It would be really, really nice if we could a) get a real presence on social media rather than having a bunch of fringe-type groups, b) promote the site, either through advertising on sites like Facebook that track your web searches or through Google, c) work more closely with a site like vDip and visibly affiliate our sites (something that is already in the works), and d) put more emphasis on recruiting friends and coworkers and make it easier for friends and coworkers to play together without compromising our rules, which is why I think a 1v1 variant would be really, really good for us.

There's /r/Diplomacy that people could be more active on

Fair enough. As i said, i wasn't really familiar with the politics behind the scenes it just seemed like something both communities elluded to some interest in and seemed like could solve some of each others pain points. If the stakeholders don't see the value however, then that's that. Affiliation as bo mentioned may be a good alternative but i'd suggest some degree of reconciling of code and look/feel so it at least feels like sister versions with different offerings and people are welcomed (assuming not banned) to share their time between. As they get bored with one they go to the other so people aren't walking away altogether.

I do endorse the idea of tournaments that encourage visitors. I first spent time on vDip last year because of their 1v1 tournament and WebDip got a tonne of exposured due to the ODC Tournament. We had people join the tournament who had already drifted into retirement on their home site but saw the appeal in a high quality tournament with brand new competition, worked great. Unfortunately i don't think we hooked too many due partially to the tournament burn out (it happens) and some just not completely hooked on a few perceived flaws (lack of email notiifcations, lack of mobile friendliness, some prefer the tap interface over drop menus, etc). It's still a great net to cast out.