http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/resources/strategy.htm

You'll find a fair amount of this is dated, but it's a better starting point than nothing.

http://diplom.org/Zine/F1999R/Windsor/dipmap.html

This is the best single article ever written on Diplomacy strategy.

https://www.youtube.com/user/Triumvir412
http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/home.htm
http://diplom.org/Online/reference.html
http://tinyurl.com/webDipEOG

Also, for pure game mechanics, perusing the actual Avalon Hill rule book (link in FAQ) can be useful.

Thank you both! :D

Can I also ask how the rankings work? Does it depend on amount of wins or points received, etc?

Welcome to the site, Magnus. Enjoy!

Thank you Genghiz! I'll do my best.

Triumvir was a big part of learning for me too. What Valis said

@Magnus Chase

if you get wins or part of a small draw, you get points, you get a higher rank. you get POWER.

if you die, you'll always be able to keep a minimum of 100 points (although some of them can be in play, without being replaced)

The ranking system within the site is just a measurement of your points, as James noted. I couldn't tell you the exact rankings and their thresholds, but the site tracks how many total points each user has, and your position within that list (from highest to lowest) determines the rank in your profile. It doesn't really mean anything, although I guess it's got to be a bit better to see "Diplomat" (top 1%) or "Mastermind" (top 10%) instead of "Political puppet" (the default) on your profile.

There's a second rating system that's quasi-integrated into the site, called the Ghost Rankings (named after TheGhostmaker, a great former user). This one gives you a ranking based upon your in-game performance rather than your points -- you 'wager' a portion of this ranking by default in each game you play (at the same fixed rate for each user), and your performance in the game (win, 2-way draw, whatever) determines how much of that ranking you get back. So basically, successful performances help, bad performances hurt, playing against good players (according to the ranking) helps, playing bad ones hurts. This ranking used to be used for invitational games and ego contests alike -- truly the greatest rewards of a Diplomacy career. (Bear in mind that the Ghost Rankings don't track you if you don't play; you get dropped off after a certain amount of inactivity. If you want to see yourself climb on this, keep playing!)

I would recommend ignoring the on-site ranking for certain. Invest your points and play games, you'll have fun and get better as you go. You'll eventually grow your points stockpile and be able to afford higher-pot games against more talented players. If you really care about where you stack up, use the Ghost Ratings to monitor it.

@"So basically, successful performances help, bad performances hurt, playing against good players (according to the ranking) helps, playing bad ones hurts. "

I know you said basically, but i think this is basically wrong.

If you play good player and lose, you will not lose as much ranking, if you play against bad players and win, you will not win as much ranking. So the ghost rating assumes you are some median amount of good, and rewards you for beating better players, beating weaker players still rewards you, but not as much cause it already thought you were better than them.

And vica-versa for losing to better/worse players...

^good clarification, thanks ora. Refer to that OP

Greetings Magnus, Welcome to WebDiplomacy. Here's an alternative way to find out how to play here, see the player names of two contributors to this discussion, Valis2501 and President Eden ....well both are extremely good players, so click on their player name, which takes you to their player profile page, scroll down into their previous games.... Pick a game they've won ...open it ...on the bottom left hand corner there will be Archive with Maps etc .. Click on maps and you will get maps for each move of the game.. So you can then scroll down to the map for the first move, and then work back through the game, so you can trawl through the games of the elite players and poach from their array of cunning plays and ploys, The past games of Valis should have a goldmine of useful stuff.

Good luck

The pros on the site will probably laugh at me, but HistoryGamerDotCom has a channel devoted to Diplomacy openings on his YouTube channel that I found incredibly helpful in getting out of the opening stages alive.

@ Magnus there are orders, maps and messages in that Archive thingy, so depending on how the game was set up, full press, ( all messaging options in the game ) limited press or no press there will be Archive records..so assume full press game, you can look into the message archives so I'm sure if you did that in the previous games of President Eden of Valis there's a goldmine of good stuff there

Don't look at Orathaic's homepage his first past games that are on display are shocking, possibly some grotesque satirical comedy, I'm not sure. Thankfully none appear to involve me amongst their famous and infamous cast

If I may also suggest getting familiar with all the openings including vague ones. It helps to have a solid arsenal in 1901 for any nation. Also you don't want to appear uneducated when a good player offers a key lepanto

Run away! Your all doomed!! Gaaaaaa!!!

You're*

Looking at my first game on this site, i didn't take over til 1908, and maple leaf was in it. And there were at least three players replaced... Ueah probably not the greatest example.