I write the conversation in the notes section every phase. I can start doing it in the global if that helps.

Captain, where are you based if I may ask?

I've started putting EST on the PMs as well as GMT - please PM me if you need another time zone added!

I'm based in the UK, which is why I was using GMT.

Also, the gunboat game will progress late tonight - apologies for the delay.

My wording in the last PM in FP was not good, and caused some people to not realise the phase had progress, so I'm adding some time to the phase. It'll progress in 12 and a half hours (11PM GMT, 6PM EST).

I realise I forgot to explain how the draw vote works at the start, so I'll post it now:

You can vote to draw at any time in Blind Dip by sending me a PM telling me you wish to do so. Draw votes work in exactly the same way they work on the site - they will stay up unless you withdraw your vote (again, by sending me a PM saying you wish to do so).

If a player puts their draw vote up, every player will receive the following PM:
[Country] voted DRAW. Current draw votes: [number of votes]/[number of surviving players].
If a player takes their draw vote down, every player will receive the following PM:
[Country] withdraw their DRAW vote. Current draw votes: [number of votes]/[number of surviving players].

The draw will pass if every surviving player is voting to draw at any point.

If there is a "Draw" vote in, and a player is eliminated, will you PM all the remaining players to tell them the draw vote is now, let's say, 1/6 instead of 1/7 ?

When someone's eliminated a PM will go out to everyone saying that that country has been eliminated, so I'll add this onto that PM.

Thanks for clarifying. By the way, at this point in proceedings, I'd just like to say that I'm finding the full-press Blind Dip game absolutely fascinating. The gunboat is very confusing and pretty difficult - too much is down to luck, I think.

A round of applause to captainmeme for all the admin work.

Yes. I agree with Jamie. Entertaining idea. Excellently implemented.

Yeah, really well done. It's draining but you keep getting the feeling that you'd like to try it again at some point

Again thanks to captainmeme. I think the gunboat is challenging but fun.
I would like to give the full press version if one is going at a later date.

Great to know everyone's finding it interesting :) The games are really fun to watch from a non-blind perspective too.

I probably won't start another until both of the current games are done and the mafia game finishes, as GM'ing two games is probably as much as I can do right now. Also the PMs are drowned really fast already, so I think if there were 4 or so going on at once it would have to happen by email, because the PMs would be lost before they could be recorded.

Apologies for the delay in resolving this phase, I'm still waiting on orders from a player in both games...

An issue has come up in one of the games which has made me aware that some more rules need to be made clear:

1) Lying about interactions with the GM is fine - that's just part of Diplomacy.
2) Regarding sending queries to the GM, you may:
- ask about anything that all players should know (rule clarifications, phase deadlines, etc.)
- ask about anything that you specifically should have knowledge of (your unit positions, your submitted orders, etc.)
You may not:
- ask about anything that you should not have knowledge of (unit positions of other players, whether another player has submitted orders, GM interactions with other players, etc).

Please PM me or write a post in the thread if you have any questions about this.

I dispute this ruling. In a normal game, lying about interactions with the moderators would usually be considered a breach of Rule 4: "Do not use the software or moderators as a diplomacy tactic".

Using the GM as a diplomacy tactic surely falls into the same category?

As this game has been a fun experiment, I'd like to elaborate on what happened and explain my stance (and, sorry, Jamie. I realize this won't help me diplomacy wise).

Jamie had asked me to enter an order (fuck it, tap Sev) and my response was that I had forgotten and that I'd tell The Captain of my change in my plans. Jamie then asked The Captain if I he had received a change in order from me (or something along those lines, I don't have the exact press). The Captain said he hadn't and then Jamie questioned me about it. I then went back to The Captain to figure out what the fuck happened.

I think that it is a mistake for the GM to have said anything about whether or not I had entered orders and a little out of line for Jamie to have asked about it (but we're still exploring the rules so it's completely understandable).

In fact, Jamie. I don't see what you're disputing. Aren't you saying the same thing?

Drawing parallels between the site and the game is fairly difficult here, as I'm a GM and can make mistakes, but basically:

If you're talking about a PM regarding anything only you should know about AND that you would be able to find out from the site if this variant was implemented and not human-GM'd (like your unit positions), you can lie about that.

If you're talking about a PM regarding something everyone should know about (like rule clarifications), you should not lie about the contents of that PM if you decide to talk about it.

If you're talking about a PM regarding something only you should know but that is caused by having a human GM (such as a phase misadjudication), please don't deliberately lie about it because it causes extra work for me.

And yes, I should not have sent the reply to Jamiet's original query - I wasn't thinking about it at the time. Hence why I've now stated that you may not query anything to do with another player's interactions with the GM.

Ah, after reading Yonni's post here it makes a bit more sense. Jamiet's initial PM was asking whether I'd received a PM "regarding a problem with [Yonni's] orders". I took this to mean a PM querying a misadjudication of the last phase, or a PM about him mis-entering his orders last phase (which would not have affected much as I will not role back a phase for a wrongly entered order on the part of the player). I responded with this in mind - obviously a misadjudication is serious so I wanted Yonni to send me a PM about this asap.

I did not reply to this message with a PM about an order change last phase in mind. I was not referring to last phase when I gave an answer, so this should (hopefully) not affect the game too much, as I have not actually answered Jamiet's question.

Anyhow, I'm glad this came up, because the not contacting the GM about other people's PMs is an important issue and one that should have been in the rules from the start.

My concern is largely one of principle and fairness. For me, if a player lies about having contacted the moderators or gamemaster, that's metagaming of the kind that is usually considered bad form and outside the normal intrigues of dimplomacy.

Rule #4 is not a great one to use here because it's ambiguous, as I'm acting as both a moderator and an adjudicator. That's why I've clarified it above - essentially, if you're contacting me as an adjudicator (entering orders, checking unit positions, checking previously entered orders) it's fine to lie about it. If you're contacting me as a Moderator (misadjudication, rule clarification) it's not.

Jamie, I figured it was akin to "Oh man, I thought I had changed my orders in time." It's a pretty weak bullshit lie that seldom works. I didn't even have much of a reason to lie there, it sort of just slipped out I guess.

Really didn't mean it to be perceived by you the way it was. Apologies for that.

Ok, apology accepted.

The phase for both games has been extended to Sunday 10pm GMT (5pm EST) because I won't have time to adjudicate it until then.