ANAGRAMS (1) [HR:Sep02]
Some amusing Diplomacy-related anagrams:
"The Game of Diplomacy" -> Employ magic of death.
"The Abyssinian Prince" -> Brainy, nice thespians; Piranha by insistence; An inane, bitchy pisser.
France-Austria-Russia: Saucier anus farts air.
DIPLOMACY.AZ (1) [HR:Dec92]
Diplomacy AZ is phun,
Especially when it's all done!
Proof-reading's a chore,
And a terrible bore,
And printed, it must weigh a ton!
[Gets more and more pertinent with each issue!!]
DIPLOMACY DEFINITIONS (1) [Mike Guest and Bill Michell, 1988]
Ally: Someone who has misheard you.
Close Ally: Someone who you are blackmailing.
Bad Player: Someone who can't lipread.
"Think Ahead" Player: Someone who diplomes before the countries have been picked.
Paranoid Player: Someone who insists on being there when his drink is being poured.
Good Player: Someone who seems to win every week, but does it so quietly that no-one seems to notice.
Demilitarized zone: The Black Sea
Confidence: An Austrian who bothers to draw up a seat, or an Italian who asks what 4+1 is.
Optimism: Russian F(GOB) - Swe in Fall 1901
Trust: A weapon to use only when all else fails.
DIPLOMACY EMOTIONS (1) [HR:Apr92]
Satisfaction: That your moves went off as planned.
Delight: That your backstab worked.
Glee: The opponent you stabbed was also stabbed by someone else.
Gloating: Seeing an opponent who critically stabbed you get crushed.
Exultation: When it's you who delivers the coup de grace.
Bliss: 18 supply centres.
Anxiety: Wondering how many of your neighbours are plotting against you.
Fear: Finding that it's all of them.
Desperation: Trying to get their neighbours to stab them.
Despair: When they insist on fighting each other.
Exasperation: Just when you've fought off 2 of your neighbours, the third comes barging in.
Frustration: Getting a build when all your home dots are occupied.
Vexation: Getting a build when someone else is occupying your home SCs!
Shock: Getting unexpected support from another player.
Loneliness: Exile in Iceland.
Sympathy: What's that?
DIPLOMACY QUOTATIONS (1) [HR:Apr92]
1. Diplomacy dichotomy: Getting stabbed is as much fun as sucking lemons when you have the mumps, but stabbing someone is as much fun as switching his chocolate bar with one of Ex-Lax.
2. Famous last words of a Diplomacy player: "But you promised...!"
3. Playing Diplomacy is like juggling knives on a greased floor. Make one slip and you'll get stabbed.
4. The Ultimate Compliment: "I'm glad I'm not your neighbour!"
DIPLOMAT (2) [SS:Jan95]
1. A diplomat is a man who can convince his wife she'd look stout in a fur coat. Anonymous.
2. A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age. Robert Frost
3. How is the world ruled and how do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read. Karl Kraus (1874-1936)
4. A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you'll look forward to the trip. Anonymous
HELL (1) [HR:Apr92]
There is a special place in Hell reserved for Diplomacy players. It's called Carebearland. Everyone is forced to play cooperative games, with no lying, cheating, double-dealing or backstabbing allowed!
HYORK [PG:Nov93]
'Tag' used by Dick Martin, Bob Olsen and other early-80s Dipsters to denote sardonic laughter. Example: "Your mother was a simple-minded antelope, hyork hyork."
LIE (1) [MB:Jun80]
The telling of an untruth is one of the most overused diplomatic procedures, yet sometimes is unavoidable. The value you hope to gain from the lie must be balanced against (1) The chance of it being discovered too soon, (2) The loss of credibility (3) the possibility that the same result could be accomplished, albeit more slowly, in a more "diplomatic" manner.
LIFE (1) [HR:Oct02]
Those regular, recurring events that are usually unavoidable and serve only to interfere with the playing of Diplomacy. Eating, sleeping, family (especially children) and work are the worst offenders. Paradoxically, work also brings in the money that is required to maintain the ability to play Diplomacy...
LIGHTBULBS (1) [MN:May94]
How many Diplomacy players does it take to screw in a light bulb?
John Doucette:
Seven, unless they're named Loeb, then it takes nine.
It depends on the variant of the lightbulb.
Two, but it takes them a week to negotiate it.
Only one, if you give him Hall of Fame points for it.
One can do it, but it takes years, and a one-way lightbulb is much more satisfying than a three-way one.
Timothy Ferguson:
A: It doesn't matter how many you have to change the bulb, none will trust the others to hold the chair steady.
(taken from a rec.games.diplomacy post, 26th May 1994.)
LIMERICKS (1) [HR:Dec92]
In Diplomacy to be a winner,
one must be a terrible sinner.
The teller of lies,
Grows to a frightening size,
While the virtuous only get thinner.
PLAYING TOO MUCH DIPLOMACY (1) [BJ:Sep95]
You Know You've Been Playing Too Much Diplomacy When...
You're lying in bed (half asleep) with your significant other. Your hand is resting on her (or his) stomach. You consider moving said hand to a 'more sensitive' area, but decide that you can't because:
A. You can't remember the 3-letter abbreviation for that province, and
B. That move will never succeed without support anyway.
QUOTATIONS (1) [MN:Feb93]
"The principle of give and take is the principle of diplomacy-- give one and take ten." - Mark Twain
"The sign of a good negotiation is when both sides walk away aggravated." - Kevin Gershan
"If you had had the decency to lie to me, we could have worked together". Steve Hutton, as Turkey, to Robert Lowes, as Austria, during the finalists' tourny at Can-Con 1988. (From Passchendaele 70, October 1988.)
"Any time two allies stab a third, at least one of those allies is making a mistake." (Michael Sany, RGD post 2nd March 1996.)
RETREAT FROM PORTUGAL (1) [MB:Jun80]
Diplomacy's rarest manuver. Needs more skill than has ever been had.
RUSTY BOLTS (1) [MN:Apr93]
An exercise in irony on the hobby and its members. They were first ran, originally intended as a one-off, by Ken Bain in _NMR_! from 1982-1985. In 1986 Nick Kinzett took them over. Each year there were ten different categories, although the categories changed from year to year.
Example categories: The Chris Tringham Nearly Famous Award for Upstart of the Year, The MidCon Tony Wheatley Award for Being Who They Are, The Forden's Epitaph Award for the Least Regretted Fold or for the Most Eagerly Awaited Fold, R.J. Walkerdine Award for the Most Boring Topic of Correspondence, The Gary Piper Award for Tact and Diplomacy, Fairy Sopwith Award for the most absurd game of 1985, The Andy Blakeman "Protest in Earnest" Award for Redundant Prose, Wright-Donley Award for the Most Spectacular Con Attendee, The Mike Benyon Brass Award for Delay or the Least Plausible Reasons for it and The Nick Kinzett award for Anything Not Yet Mentioned.
In 1988 and 1989 the winners received real Rusty Bolts! [Mark Nelson, your humble AZ creator, has won a couple of them.]
SMALLEST ISSUE EVER (1) [JM:Jun92]
John Walker published an issue of _The Alamo City Times_ that measured 2 inches by 2 inches!
TERMINAL TUNISITIS (1) [MB:Mar82]
The result of a country being permanently reduced to a sole unit, usually an army in Tunis or Portugal. It may survive there a long time. [HR:Oct02] This gives the player the chance to deluge the others with silly press, since s/he doesn't have to worry about strategy...
What the...?!
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