i know they probably ally before the game even starts...but does it really matter if it happens before or after? and i know many of you will look at me as a n00b because i have very few played games, but ive played many times FtF. if the person is good at diplomacy whatsoever, they will backstab and make alliances to their advantage, regardless if they know the person. and im not trying to change the rules, im only wondering why it is frowned upon so much.

but this website is supposed to represent the board game, which is played FtF. when you play FtF, you almost always know someone going into the game, and it always turns out alright. diplomacy is still about dog eating dog and if you dont ever backstab your friends, your just plain bad at it.

The problem is that this setup has a points system, and ranking. Friends work together far too often, ally across a lot of their games, in order to up their points.

I've been in games where two or three friends joined at once, allied together, and gave me no chance at all. Sure, they might then go on to fight each other, but basically I was just a source of points for them.

I've also been in (and am now in) games where friends have declared as such at the beginning of a game, and gone on to play fairly, sometimes allying, othertimes not.

I've no problem with many friends playing on the site, I'd expect it to grow in such a way (I'm working on setting up a game for a bunch of my old wargaming friends currently), but I do have a problem with a) undeclared friendships and b) perpetual alliances across multiple games.

Especially true in the PPSC environment, where 18/16 is good for both players.

But aren't you more likely to ally with people who have been good allies for you in the past? I'm just saying it makes sense to ally with the same person if they continually prove themself reliable.

i guess those are some good points...thanks for clarifying why it was viewed as cheating.

The reason why metagaming is frowned upon is that it gives the metagamers an unfair advantage. Diplomacy is all about allying and stabbing, and everyone else has to be afraid of stabs while the metagamers don't, it's not all that fair, right?

Anyway, metagamers are bad losers, otherwise why would they go to such lengths to win (and sometimes fail, =.=)?

But isn't another point of the game to "win at all costs"?
And "any method of communication are allowed"

I played with a friend in a few games, started off with an alliance, then destroyed him with another country, is that meta-gaming?

Not at all, you killed him just the way you would be expected to kill anyone else:]

metagamers arent afraid of stabs in the back? and go to such lengths to win? ill admit, i played a game with friends before i realized it was 'against the rules', and believe me, if you or your friend are any good at diplomacy whatsoever, you should be worried about backstabbing. if your good, you backstab whoever so long as it benefits you. and going to such lengths to win? enjoying a game with some people i know is 'going to such lengths'?

besides, after looking over the rules that come with the board game, i realized its centered around the fact that ONE PERSON wins. no teams win. so therefore, if you make an uber-strong alliance with a couple of friends (on a second thought, the other players should just get smart and ally agaisnt that one) only one of them wins anyway. so the others should backstab to be the one with the most amount of supply centers. if somethings wrong here, its the sharing the pot system. that guarantees that a team as a whole can benefit from a win.

Murk, you're right to say that a meta-alliance *should* fear a stab. Unfortunately, such stabs are rare, which is the problem. You're also right that it's PPSC that creates the environment where such alliance are more likely, however WTA games with a points system still get draws &c, indeed the rulebook also implies that a forced draw (ie peace) is better than an outright win (ie conquest).

The points system is needed to make the website work (there's a thread about it in the Dev forum that got linked to a few days back), but any points system creates incentives that some people will try to abuse (gods, I sound more like an economist every day). So we need ways to work around such abuse.

FWIW, I've no problem with playing with friends, or friends joining games on here, I'm in a game on the FB app where several players know each other, but that was declared openly at the beginning and they're playing fairly.

Vamos--yes, I am more likely to ally with someone I've worked with before, *if* such an alliance is to my or mutual advantage, I'm also likely to ally with people that've utterly defetated me before, I want to ally with the best players as my position is thus safer.

And just because I've worked with someone in the past effectively doesn't mean I won't expect them to stab me in this game--if they're good enough, they should be planning for it.

I'm currently in a game (on FB again), where I've ended up allying with the guy I stabbed in order to claim my first ever victory online. It took me and the other guy ages to defeat him, I thus know that he's good and worth playing with as well as against.

But he also knows that at some point, I may decide to take the win from him, and vice versa. That's the game.

Meta alliances break this element, and that's why I dislike them. That the first time I encountered such an alliance was as Austria, with them as Turkey and Russia, may taint my opinion a little, naturally. Fortunately, the rest of the board joined me in defeating them.