It depends on the situation.
A 1901 CD will get a cancel/draw from me. The draw will be pulled after a few years.

Late game CD from a player on his last legs gets no special treatment. A strong player CD late game will mean a willingness to draw, but probably not cancel.

Totally agree on the late game last legs - hence game altering in the description of the CD.

two honest questions: is pulling the draw because of GR? And if a game is cancelled with a player in CD, does the CD player get the fake points refunded?

If you DRAW you can see who did it and it records a Resign on the offenders account and they lose their points ...... good reasons to DRAW methinks ....
...... but if you have been trying to get a live game going all night and you have already had 2 or 3 CD games I can forgive people for wanting to carry on because you're not sure if you can get another game going and you are desperate for the dipfix .......

Yeah, I pull the draw because of GR. But I usually put it back up when the game gets down to 3 or 4.

Finally, to return to the original question - does anyone think that there is any soundness in the don't cancel/draw because it encourages drop outs?

I could see that if the cancel returns the drop outs points. That would weigh against me cancelling in the future (plus I like the record of a resign). But that said, I realize that some wont draw after 1903 because of the GR implications.

I prefer draw as punishment for leaving the game especially if it affect game play. Having a major player leave lets those near him suddenly get SCs that they wouldn't normally get.

However I have played in games where players CD because of a connection problem and not because they intended to leave. Those types of games should get cancelled by the mods.

What are the GR implications, I have no idea what affects GR and if you really care about GR it might be you are playing the game for the wrong reasons.
I just can't imagine anyone getting off on the fact that they have a certain GR rating ..... it means nothing to anyone in the REAL world !!
If a reliability rating was brought in then we would DRAW rather than cancel to ensure the CD merchant got a resign, then when we set up future games we can exclude players with a high resign percentage.
If you CD then surely you are happier if you get your points back than not so you would prefer a Cancel ..... let's bash the CD merchants and all vote DRAW

Well I don't like GR that much, but a lot of players respect it or hold it to be some tell-all stat. So I like to try to keep my GR up (as it gives access to better games).

Anyway, GR doesn't take effect until 1903, so any draws before then don't matter towards it. Otherwise, from what I understand:

Less players in a draw is better
Beating higher ranked players is better

So, having one game where you solo against guys like Split, Partysane, MichiganMan, etc. is better than 10 games drawing with noobs.

So draw up to Year 3, then play on afterwards seems to be the way forward if someone CDs ...... you do of course get people who get a massive advantage early on because of the CDs and then refuse to DRAW because they think they can solo .... I think this will still happen but then of course if everyone attacks that player justice can be served.

I think cancel in spring 01 is good ... especially in live games where there may be other issues in play. I think draw until 03 is much better because it at least reveals the offender. After that, it is more a question of how the game is (still) being impacted.

I'll put up a cancel in Spring 01 in response to an NMR, but once the CD has actually happened I'll switch to a draw until at least '03 in order to reveal the offender.

@mendax What do you do with the offender after he is revealed?

Stone him to death of course ..... he won't do it again

There's nothing you can do, the way the site is set up right now. That is why it is counterproductive to cancel games when someone drops. It only encourages people to drop when they get a country they don't like, or don't do well the first year. Draws--doesn't really matter, but why stop a game when you really want to keep playing? Doesn't make sense. War is hell. Stuff happens that is unexpected and you have to deal with it. Play on!