Mapu, GC, and KICEMEN actually bring up very good points about not allowing CYOC (even if they didn't intend to). There are 3 potential problem situations:

First: Let us say a noob starts a brand new CYOC game on the world map. Selects Central States just for fun. Logs out, and comes back a day later to find the game has started, but he's surrounded by bozo, Ruffhaus, myself, and Ambassador. Kinda sucks for the noob that he has literally no chance to win because we were able to pick to surround a weak player right? And even if the noob were used as a pawn and survived the early game, they'd have no chance in the long run. Something like this would very rarely happen in random draw.

Second: Player A creates a CYOC game. Player B comes along and realizes that Player A, who is someone he almost always gets along with and can usually ally with, has an open slot next to him. So Player B grabs it, knowing that he has a good shot at allying with this player right from the start. This gives an advantage to people who know each other in that they can pick slots where they can *usually* (not I'm not saying always) have an assured ally nearby whereas new players (who dont' know many people) can not. Again, something that random draw would prevent from happening. At least in random draw, if those players are next to each other, it's due to "luck", and not because they were able to choose it to benefit themselves.

Third: Player A is ready to join a CYOC game. He notices Amby, bozo, Ruffhaus, and myself are all in North America. Realizing that to join there would mean a very difficult start to the game, and that Africa has a bunch of newer players in it, Player A goes and joins Africa so he can dominate the noobs. Player B comes along, and the only slot left is in N. America. How is it fair that just because Player A joined first, he has the option to avoid the good players if he wants, whereas the last player to join is stuck with whatever spot is left, even if it means being surrounded by the best players on the site? It's not.

I don't expect this to convince anyone, but you can't deny that these are distinct possibilities that would unfairly influence the balance of the game, and that they're all easily avoidable by random draw.

Myself, I am not accusing ANYONE of cheating. While not accusing any one person, we all know it happens. The integrity of the game come into question when you allow people to choose their power. Some comments here already border on "cheating" in the technical sense....setting yourself up in a situation vs any particular person (good or bad) is cheating to a degree! And then throw in the whole early contact aspect and you have more integrity issues. Again, I am not pointing the finger at any one person but why allow this air of cheating to permeate the entire site? Some keep pointing to the fact that I can choose to simply not play in that sort of game and while I get that, does anyone believe that does not affect the integrity of the entire site? Who you choose to associate with says volumes about your own self.

Again, this is (for me) about integrity and putting yourself and the site above improprieties. Selecting what power you will play, allowing one to position themselves near or away from particular people, game contact before the game is full, these are examples of cheating, cheating made easy by the site itself, refusal to set ones self apart from such behavior is simply unacceptable.

Those are some good points, drano. Two ways around some of those would be to keep the game anonymous, and/or keep the selection process anonymous by hiding who is playing what nation until all are selected and the game has started. Of course, the second person who signs up could pretty easily figure out which country the first person selected, but you could beat that by not allowing selection until the game is full. Then everyone picks without seeing what anyone else has picked and the game starts when that process is completed.

Tom, my biggest problem with your stance is that you are applying the actions of a few to the integrity of everyone on the site. If I choose to play a game on this site, and some other game on this site that I'm not a part or even have knowledge of has a cheater, does that make me a bad person? I think we all agree that cheating is bad, and we certainly agree that CYOC allows for said cheating to be done more easily (even if it is unintended as in drano's examples). Clearly there are also a number of people who want to be able to choose their country for a game. I'm sure if we all settle down and stop being overly dramatic about it we can come to a reasonable solution that allows people to choose a country while minimizing cheating (you can never eliminate it no matter what you do).

I do have an alternate proposal regarding CYOC.

Im willing to bet a large % of the CYOC games are two player games where two opponents wanted to play each side once. What if we allowed cyoc for two player variants, but for larger, we tested out my suggestion of having a designated mod? It would at least shown whether its feasible or not, AND it would reduce the POSSIBILITY of some of the things in mentioned above.

Yes, the actions of a few most certainly affect all. If those actions are ignored, then they are given an indirect approval. Seriously, let's say you had a FTF diplomacy group. You guys met once a month, say you had 100 members (wow!) of those 100, most are quiet but 3 or 4 get drunk and yell and the police are called to every single meeting. Does the action of those few affect the way the police and the neighbors think of the club as a whole? You bet they do!

as far as actually choosing your country, we did come up with an easy solution to that. If selecting your country is the issue, then we have an answer! In case you or others missed that solution (this IS quite long now) players would submit their ranked power preference to a designated moderator (already one volunteer to do this) this moderator assigns powers once the game is ready. The only arguments to this are the delay before the game starts ...but the delay at worst case is a few hours and a player might not get his number one pick and end up with his second or third choice ...hardly an issue and even this could be worked around by way of allowing special comments the player can relay to this assignment moderator!

This is in fact a reasonable solution but is still being objected to, those objections are simply objections to "the way things are done" only.

2 player games ...who cares if they chose their country? Nothing wrong with that in the least (but a personal opinion ...why would anyone ever want to play a 2 player game like this? it simply isn't "diplomacy" since the best part of the game is the actual "DIPLOMACY" required to play well!? but I digress, hey, some people like Coors Light, to each their own)

I didn't miss that, Tom. In fact, I even brought it up myself, and have stated to you in PM that I like that option. I am not opposed to that one, and when I say "we all settle down" I do mean all and not just you. Also, I think your example misses the mark a little bit. Under your example, you are requiring an outside influence to quell the problem players. Here, the mods are trying to take care of the problem themselves. So, in your example, what if those people who cause problems are kicked out by the people running the FTF event? Wouldn't that improve how the neighbors think of the club? Anyway, we are approaching this from two different angles. Clearly, what you are concerned about is what others outside of the community think, and that is certainly a valid concern. What I am saying, is that you seem to be implying that people disassociated with the cheaters are also bad people instead of saying that those people would appear bad to outsiders. There is a difference in those two statements. One is accusatory (you are bad because someone else cheated) and the other is cautionary (outsiders will see you as bad because someone else cheated). I think your statements are coming across as much accusatory as cautionary but I think the sentiment behind it is intended to be more cautionary.

since I did not accuse anyone of cheating and since I mentioned it was something that affected all even when you chose to not play that type of offering ...yes, cautionary is of course what I have meant all along!

The problem with this discussion is that we want the option of choosing a nation assignment for the many good reasons listed in creating variant games. This is a variant based Diplomacy site by all rights. So I think it's important to allow the feature in spite of the risks associated with it.

The trick is to allow the freedom while still holding onto the integrity of the games. Sadly you cannot legislate morality. Cheaters will find a way to cheat anywhere. I don't agree with making it easier for them, but in this case I do not support the notion that the moderators remove this option. I advocate a better written explanation of the CYOC feature, and that the community as a whole shun these games when special rules necessitating them do not exist. If we do that, then the only games subject to the level of abuse we loath, will be those played by players of said dubious character or simply those who do not care if the games are at risk. Sadly that exposes new players unaware of these risks to potentially awful gaming conditions.

Retillion, I have nothing more compelling regarding your behavior than your own words. There is nothing for me to report. What you are doing is unethical. You have openly admitted that you do this. If the moderators here think that's within the rules and standards of the site, then you are clearly free to play that way. I cannot imagine anyone else wanting to participate in games like that, but there appears to be a subset of players that wants that level of gaming. I hope that you enjoy it.

I think in all future WWIV 6.2 games, I am exempt from Egypt. I think that is only fair. :) That can easily be programmed in.

DEFIANT, I think you should be forced to be Egypt until you solo as Egypt. ;D

Hey RUFFHAUS,
Please don't make any cheating accusations in the forums. If you a suspicious of the activity of one of your users we request you report it to the mods here:
http://vdiplomacy.net/modforum.php?

Any future infractions will result in a 24-hour silence.

Holy crap are we still arguing about this?

Not really. Everyone seems willing to just sweep this entire conversation under the rug . There hasn't even been any discussion on my latest proposal really.

I didn't see Ruffhaus accusing anybody of cheating in this forum, he simple stated that some players like to pick their countries and that may lead to some unethical decisions made by players. Fasces if you feel Ruffhaus said something that indicated the accusation of a cheater, please put forth the comment so we all can see what is intrepreted as cheating accusations.

The only accusation Ruffhaus made was that Tom drinks fruity girly beers ;)

That's a cheating accusation, Defiant. It must be reported to the mods.

What's a cheating accusation? "The fact that some players like to pick their countries that may lead to some unethical decisions?"

Yeah, he says my world class Founders Reds Rye beer, whose hops gave it a pineapple hint suddenly became a pineapple "flavored" beer. Twisted to his way of thinking that all craft beers are bad and the big guys are big because they make superior beer. He can drink his coors light all he likes, he can swig on his swill and make fun of my Troegs Hopback Amber and my Arrogant Bastard and my aforementioned Founders Reds Rye and heck, even my Southern Tier Pumpking all he likes, I will be the blissful one in the exchange!

mmmmmm, Beer!

oh, and he DID accuse me of farting in elevators as well didn't he? :-)

funny, picking your country based on who your neighbor is is now thought of as cheating? My how things have changed since I brought this subject up!? Yes, it IS cheating yet this site does not think so and wants to keep the practice! So no accusation is made on the person only one on the site that thinks this is acceptable behavior!

yes and yes, I have got to say Tom, you make a hell of a war map but your taste in beer is something less than desired. Bud light guy here( watching my girlish young figure).
I was telling Ruffhaus a beer here in town was put on tap at 3.00 a 16oz glass, Pumpkin beer from Bud and it sucked. It was only delivered in a 1/6 barrel and still isn't gone from early october and it is now 1.5 glass.

Maybe you heard of Point Beer, that is where I am from, the brewery is here in town, and that crap sucks but it keeps winning national titles, don't get you hops chewing beer drinkers. :)

That's what my comment means, just what some says. To say it doesn't happen is naive and foolish, that's all.

**** not, "what some says" what Tom says" ******** must be friday

"What's a cheating accusation? "The fact that some players like to pick their countries that may lead to some unethical decisions?""

No Defiant. This:

"The only accusation Ruffhaus made was that Tom drinks fruity girly beers ;)"

I think it's the obligation of the Mods to step in here and clarify what is and what isn't cheating. If they don't, we the players don't know what to report to them, and what we are able to say on the public forum.

There's two things I see needing clarification:

1) Is it cheating to pick your country solely based on other players and the countries they have picked?

2) Is it cheating to arrange for people to join a CYOC game quickly in order to "force" the remaining players to be in certain spots? For example: I have 5 people ready for a CYOC classic game. I intend to open the other two slots up to anyone. I arrange for the 5 of us to be online at the same time so we can grab England, Germany, France, Russia, and Turkey, thereby "forcing" the two remaining players to be the two "traditionally weakest" (even though we all know that's not really the case) countries on the map.


If neither of these is considered cheating, then Ruffhaus did nothing wrong, and Fasces owes him an apology. However, if either of these IS considered cheating, then the Mods NEED to remove the CYOC feature as it clearly is an easy way to cheat (again, only if either of those things are considered cheating, we're ignoring the whole "talking before the game starts" argument).

So Mod team, what is considered cheating?

Then I agree and that accusation is unfortunately true and that MUST, as you said be reported to the Moderators.

I second Drano.

Point Beer...not so good!
Bud pumpkin, blechhh
Bud Light, egads man, live a little, let your taste buds live a little as well!

CYOC clearly makes cheating easier. The only question is whether we should protect those that wish to take the risk from their own stupididity or leave the option available, in keeping with the theme of this site, which is at least in part, maximum variety.

So it seems to me.

In regards to the great beer debate, alas, I am afflicted with the gouty arthritis so I will have to sit in my corner drinking red wine with my pinky finger in the air, looking much more effete and refined than I am. (burp) See?