You stab when;
1) You and your current ally are winning as a team. i.e. The two of you have over 18 dots together (not necessarily in your favor... see item two)
2) Your team's current victims hate your ally more than you. This is usually set up by letting your ally do the invading and possibly even letting them get 1-2 more dots than you.
3) Your ally has left the 'back-door' open.
Then you stab... you stab hard with all your resources and you cripple them as much as you can. The only thing to take into account other than the above is the stalemate lines.

Y'all are making it wa more complicated than it should be.

You stab, when your aly brings less utility than his nonexistence (or weakened state) would. That calculation should include - among others - other players' thoughts, the ease of which you can accomplish this, the length of time part or all of your resources will be occupied, potential payoffs either way, and whether or not you play PPSC.

Hydro - you make good points, but your way sounds more complicated than mine.
Stab you later.

if you think it's a good idea to stab:
1) get a friend who won't judge you
2) spell out the plan to them and ask them to remember the basic idea
3) have about six drinks
4) once you're good and slightly buzzed, have them repeat the idea

works 80% of the time guaranteed.

So we're back to playing those google hangout games PE?

I'm way too loyal to one or two people in each game. I work with one person and the rest I'll have them play against each other while I expand. I'm more of a manipulator than a stabber.

Will a stab of my ally now materially increase my chances of a solo in a way that will not be equal or greater at a later point? If yes, then stab; if no, then don't. The trick is the accurate assessment of what will materially increase your chances. A stab should result in at least a short term gain in SCs, but that may not necessarily increase your big-picture likelihood of solo. It very well may decrease it.

I have no problem stabbing if it may get me the win and won't cost me the draw. But I never stab to reduce the draw and I never stab if my victim could throw the game.

@Draug....you don't say....lol

a G+ game would be cool

Yes Krellin. And the last time I stabbed you, I secured the solo. Didn't I?

stab immediately when you sense trust the moment you sense trust

trust the moment you sense trust: stab immediately

@PE If we do a G+ game I'll have to find the drinking rules though and everyone would have to be willing to get drunk off their ass.

One more reason I don't even consider the G+ games. Drinking and diabetes in general don't go together. Drinking to excess and diabetes can hospitalize the drinker.

I am almost literally always willing to get drunk off my ass, so there's one. So long as I don't have to drive anywhere...

@Draug Well the rule is 1 drink of whatever per supply center you have. So if you just play badly you'd be ok. But if you just wanna join and watch you wouldn't have to drink then and it's still fun.

Is that every turn? Good lord, I'd get alcohol poisoning from that much Scotch and/or vodka!

Interesting thread.

As much as we'd like to consider ourselves purely strategic and rational being, the simple feeling of loyalty and morality keeps us allied with people when maybe we shouldnt.

I've been thinking about this ever since I donated somebody a 17/17 draw - and I didnt mind a bit. One other instance came recently in my SOW game, when I was included in a four-way draw for no other reason than that I "contributed to the game". The OP seems to imply that not stabbing is a weakness somehow, but is it?

I guess the central question is: does our humanity obstruct us from being better players?

Here's the game that got me thinking about: http://webdiplomacy.net/board.php?gameID=91572#gamePanel

I could of gone for a solo since Turkey had stopped supporting his line awhile before the draw. But I didn't since we had worked together the whole game and I had never seen a T/A alliance last so long in a gunboat before.

That is quite something. Rum and Bul all open.

So do you regret it?

I think most folks on this site stab too early at first opportunity collapsing the game to a 3/4 way draw when they may have been able to wait a little longer and stab for an actual solo.

Hear hear

It depends. If we're going to play a non-anon game later, then my official answer is "all the time, I always let all my allies into the draw."

Otherwise, the answer is no.

Hey Yonni, shall we play a non-anon game soon? Not like, right now, but you know, soon.

@Minister A little since I know Austria has a horrible survival rate in gunboat and I did well in that game. Just hated to stab after working together all game.

Well, to paraphrase a Cherokee legend, it's up to you which wolf to feed :-)

Generally speaking I will only stab once stabbed, this does depend on the game of course
but I prefer to simply destroy all who stab me, If I ignore everything else and focus purely on the person who betrayed me I find it very easy to punish those stabbers

The goal of the game is to win , not ?
So a stab must never be personal , but the solution to win .You only have to wait till the right moment to do it ( and if you wait to long you could be stabbed yourself of course ) , and if the moment don't come to stab to make sure you win , than don't .
If 2 or 3 ppl work together well and raise equal than mostly it turns out on a draw , but if the working allies aren't in balance .

my moto :
"Just play to win , just play to have fun , play smart ,stay loyal or stab your ally , never quit ...... whatever , but remember i rule : IT'S ONLY A GAME !!!"

I often find that the positions I'm in that it is more beneficial to give the illusion that I'm going to stab my ally to my ally's enemy than it is to actually stab them. You can really sneak a bunch of centres from the weak guy in one go with that trick, and nobody hates you except the guy who was already a guaranteed goner.

Basically, I enjoy giving the impression that my alliance is about to break apart any given turn while in fact keeping it strong. If it would win me the game in the turn I did it, I'd definitely actually stab my ally if he left himself open. Stabbing your ally can cost you the game though, often once you sink the knife in it's difficult to pull it out to defend yourself from other threats.

Celticfox:
"But I didn't since we had worked together the whole game and I had never seen a T/A alliance last so long in a gunboat before."
I can beat that: gameID=12882.
Mind you, we periodically fake stabbed each other. It was a devious time, but it worked to the end.

@JECE Goodness how did you not stab Turkey at the end? Just goodwill and future reputation?

@JECE That's beautiful but that was a press game. Mine was a gunboat game.

milestailsprower: We had so many times to stab each other that I didn't see the point in messing up that cooperation at the last moment. You have no idea how much insane back-room planning and public farces went into our 2-way draw. The more we got away with our scheming, the more meaningful that implicit trust became.

Celticfox: Ah, I didn't notice that your game was no-press. But still, it took a hell of a lot of press to pull that. We didn't do it the ordinary way.

@Celticfox,

At the risk of sounding condescending, I'm tempted to assume that you have some kind of kindness/nurturing instinct to respect or protect the people that you care about rather than, say for example, attempting to maim them and waging war on their territories.

And I admit that if you properly backstab a 12-year old, you can expect to face plenty of profanity and tears.

Might I suggest setting up a game with some of the older/mature players? For example I'll point out this game: gameID=128876
Where I got stabbed probably three or four times in rapid succession, and then spent most of the game cowering in a corner (of Turkey).
And I was laughing most of the time because I'm tough and find backstabbing hilarious.

Yeah, try gaming with some older folks who have a sense of humor about this sort of stuff, and maybe you'll feel a bit more comfortable stabbing, stabbing and stabbing away!

@ Al No no I can stab if needed, but it's when I've allied for like a whole game that I hesitate. Believe me I have no problem attacking people I care about. Ask Mr. CF if he ever posts on here if you don't believe me. I'm killer in games I play against him.

@JECE I bet it was and yeah I wouldn't of ruined that cooperation either obviously.