CD: Civil Disorder, occurs when a player leaves the game and stops turning in orders.
WTA: Winner-take-all. The winner gets all the points wagered on the game from all players.
PPSC: Points-per-supply-center. Points are distributed according to remaining center count at the end of the game.
Gunboat: Diplomacy without talking.

No official dictionary as far as I know.

That player who isn't putting in orders is what's known as an NMR- No Move Returned. After a certain number of turns in which a player NMRed, they will go into civil disorder, which is a CD. That basically means that the computer takes over and auto-holds everything, and there's an opportunity for another player to buy in and continue the game as that country.

WTA means winner-take-all, which is one of the two ways of distributing points, points-per-supply-center (PPSC) being the other. Basically, it either works that the winner of a game gets the entire pot, or it's distributed based on everyone's SCs at the end of the game.

A gunboat game comes from the term "gunboat diplomacy", i.e. diplomacy by armed force. It means that, in the game, players are anonymous and cannot message each other; everything proceeds as normal, but without any press.

Anyways, welcome to the site, and I hope you have fun playing!

Welcome! Don't let the bastards scare you off.

i think 'no talking' and 'anon' are both seperate options at game creation.

Press is another words used for messaging: no-press, global press only, and full-press, are the three options here.

(we used play gunboat on an honour system, where the game was full press, non-anon, and we just trusted everyone to not break the rules... but then someone came up with the bright idea of replaced trust with technology...)

Any other common abbrevs which we use? 234 is the symbol for dip points, sometimes converts a 'D' automatically into a 2 on the forums.

"Also: In my first game (I won't say which, because I actually read the rules before I posted my first post)" -andreakn

+1

Most players will answer in-game questions about moves and terminology honestly as a matter of sportsmanship.

This forum can get a bit rowdy at times (players are always arguing about God, philosophy, politics, etc) but it is a good way to get questions answered.

Good luck and have fun!

@ orathiac

If you type any number and place the word "points" after the number, it will be converted to the (D) symbol. eg. 456

Thanks everyone!

I assumed CD had something to do with people leaving games.
Great that no-shows are dealt with eventually (I assume that's what the red exclamation marks on that player are indicating now)

DMZ is a DeMilitarized Zone (an agreed upon zone where one or more players agree to leave devoid of units)
D is diplomacy points (the official point ranking system of the site)
GR is Ghost Rating (the more accurate unofficial ranking system found at phpdiplomacy.tournaments.googlepages.com or sites.google.com/site/phpdiplomacy)

There are other abbreviations like abbreviating country names or player names like TN for Tru Ninja, etc.

The red exclamation marks mean that the player has not entered moves. The grey check mark means he has entered moves and saved them. The green check mark means that he has "Readied" them, which means those are the moves he intends to play. Saved moves can be changed, readied moves cannot be. The difference is subtle, but can mean a lot to some people who read into that sort of thing.

If everyone "Readies" then the game will proceed to the next phase, even if the given time period for the phase has not elapsed

Other common terms:

"Bounce" - when two or more units attempt to make equal strength moves to the same province, resulting in all those units remaining where they started. Players will often agree bounces between themselves, such as Turkey and Russia bouncing in the Black Sea in the opening move.

"Juggernaut" - a strong Turkey/Russia alliance.

"Lepanto" - a strategy in which Italy moves fleets into Eastern Med and Ionian Sea in order to land an army in Syria.

"Multi" - someone operating more than one account. This is cheating and is a banning offence.

"I DEMAND JUSTICE" - a fun phrase which can be used in many situations.

"Tap" - attacking a unit without hoping to displace it, in order to cut any support that unit is offering to another.

"Bounce" can also mean the same thing as "Tap", but "Tap" does not mean "Bounce"

In what sense can "bounce" also mean "tap" ?

'Sealion' - and alliance if germany and france to invade england, ideally landing armies in 1902. Usually crippling when correctly executed.

'Peppermint' - an alliance between russia and italy (from the original board game where russia is white and italy is green) potentially more deadly than the juggernaut...

Oh but that list just goes on and on... I don't know why the jugg is the only alliance to get a mention.

Also lepanto is a nice opening if it is a surprise (hence the key lepanto variation) but when it gets mentioned as the first thing anybody hears it is far less surprising.

A reverse lepanto (turkey attacking italy with austrian support) is a much bigger surprise as it is so rarely performed...

You can't bounce support, only tap it..

But then you risk moving into the territoryif your opponent moves out... Whereas am arranged bounce lets you build trust with someone by arranging to mutually (and ineffectually) attack each other.

A 'double bounce' involves a 2vs2 bounce, with each unit supported in their move.

@Jamie - If a unit is attempting to move to cut support, another friendly unit may "tap" or even move on it with support with the plan being to "bounce" a possible enemy attack on the same unit. Or two friendly's may "tap" a moving unit's SC to "bounce" there because they.aren't wanting to move there but don't want the enemy trying to get in either.

I have seen triple bounces in a few places in the past too.

@andreakn - Welcome to the site. Don't let the assholes (moi included) get you down. And one thing to note. Someone who has put in orders will have a checkmark (grey I think) until they "ready" their orders in which case it goes green (I think, color blind). But no one is ever under an obligation to "ready" their orders. The phase lengths are set and they are free to use all of them if they so choose.

Also, an official NMR means they didn't even open the games page. If they opened the game and looked at it, no NMR is recorded and their orders go in as all holds. If they don't even bother to vists, the orders are still all holds but they get an NMR flag thrown. Two NMR turns in which they had orders to enter *in a row* and they go CD (left whoiel the game is running and resigned when the game ends) and this is a bad thing (see another forum discussion on it right now). NMRs are bad faux pauxs that can cost a game, but CDs are verboten in civilized Diplomacy. :-)

If you ever get sworn at or abused by some of the more seasoned players you must be doing something right because they're getting pissed off with you, unless you're not Readying-Up which is pointless and infuriating, some people think it's a good tactic when they're losing but it's not.

@draug, i've seen four units beat six, in a four vs three (leaving a territory) and four versus three entering a territory.

That was berlin -> munich (with sil, boh and tyr supporting)
Beats munich -> berlin (with baltic and prussia supporting)
And burgundy -> munich (with kiel and ruhr supporting)

A the same time!

Wow, ,massive play! I like it Ora. Has anyone ever seen a 4v4 bounce? There can't be too many places surrounded by 7 (4 on 4) or 8 (4v4 true bounce) territories on the map.

This was useful. I always wondered what the 'full press' meant.

BTW erik, what was on that sandwhich? hehehehehohohohohahahaha I slay myself. ;-)

Thanks again peeps! I'm not a complete noob, I've played my fair share in real life (though anonymous online seems safer wrt not antagonizing my real life friends) and had an account on dipbounced a while back in my happy student days. It's good stuff that the lingo is rich and evolving. Keep it up!

@draugnar is it two turns in a row or two years? Does retreats count?

@draug peanut butter.

So going for a draw in a wta doesnt make sense? What happens to the points in that case? I read the points guide but didn't find it crystal clear.
Does an agreed draw split the points evenly even if the game was WTA?

two phases in a row, so missing a move and retreat counts, as far as i know.

A draw in WTA divides the points equally between all surviving players - so it makes sense if you can't get a solo...