That isn't metagaming, or shouldn't be. But a mod may disagree (rabble rabble rabble)

It shouldn't be metagaming at all. What purpose is there in playing a non-anon game other than being able to know who you are playing, study their patterns, and form a strategy around that? If that's metagaming, then each game should be anonymous with no option to play non-anon.

Well you see this is what I think. It is odd that Jmo, a former Mod in high standing, claims otherwise.

I think it's hard NOT to let these things be an influence on your decision making, especially if you've played with that player before. Trying to ban/punish them is almost an impossibility.

That being said, trading wins with people game by game would be something I would strongly encourage punishment for. Clear cases of repeated alliances would have to be dealt with similarly. It's a grey area though and the mods will have to make a call in those cases.

For example, I won't play in a non-anonymous game with people I've seen playing in a lot of games together (especially if they have both been doing well). Am I the one that should be reprimanded or am I justified in making that judgement call?

Completely agree Floodgates. This is why I rarely play non-anon games at all. It's a grey area that I just want to avoid, and I would rather play a game that's affected more by what's happening on the board than who the people next to me are.

"High standing". Man who stand on toilet high on por

Pot* sigh. Ruined my own joke. :/

How can anyone in their right mind not let another player's game history influence their play? If you know that a player is super aggressive and will go for the solo even in inadvisable positions... are you to believe that player when they say that they want to be your buddy to the end?

Back to the original quote, I think that the key words here are " when proven".
The only evidence that the mods could use to evidence alleged metagaming would be the messages, private and public, that are posted on the server, something along the lines of "X always does Y when playing as Z, so let's not ally with/stab them".

Of course, that could be utter tosh, for the sole purpose of misleading or beguiling another opponent.

In Non-Anon games, players might seek to trade on/exploit the reputations of both themselves and others. That is really the essence of both diplomacy and Diplomacy.

I think the point is that games should be played in a right spirit - ideally with everyone taking each game in isolation. I don't think that anyone would object to that in principle.

However, I don't think anyone's suggesting that we can't pick and choose who we play against in Non-Anon games, which could be based on reputation or possibly even from having taken exception to a forum comment. But when we're in a game, surely we should all play [dis]honestly?

If I see valis in a game with me. Im gonna kill him. Just saying. Our press styles dont get along. Were both blatantly in it for ourselves

I don't see how this could really be construed as metagaming. If people do view it as a violation, they can choose to just play anonymous games and avoid the situation, no?

If you enter a non-anon game, your name is visible. Meaning your past games are visible, your forum posts are visible etc. If you don't want that baggage, play anonymous games. Seems pretty cut and dry to me.

I would be shocked if the mods viewed a situation like this metagaming - but hey I could be wrong.

Bump for mod ruling.

Seriously though Jamiet, there isn't a ruling to be had here. The site rules are final and you can access them easily. Now if you have a situation that isn't clarified, like I mentioned in the initial thread just now, then I'd recommend emailing the mods and asking for a ruling. I personally don't care about the question I posed, so I won't be emailing them. But I wouldn't expect an answer on the rules if you can't be bothered to follow the requested method of communication in them.

"I personally don't care about the question I posed"

Then why did you say what you said?

Do you just enjoy seeing your own posts?

Ah, there's good old jmo-problems

Because I was sick of hearing him whine about a situation that had a legitimate question but focusing on an irrelevant part of it.

If you're so sick of it mute him BOOOI

I don't use mute. If you mute too many things the page loads too slowly and it causes issues with the page counts and a variety of other things.

But if you and Jamiet are so worried about me and don't want to deal with my posts please feel free to mute me.

I love you all.

Hi Jamiet

Great question. These things can always be a little blurry, but we try to keep a community who feels that there is enough of a difference between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour. And like much of human behaviour, we don't have prescriptive precise language at all times. So what I'm going to do is give a continuum of actions that are OK or not OK, to help act as a reference.

Very OK
"This player always opens this way as France, I'll have to assume that's happening unless he or someone else gives me reason to think otherwise"
"I know this person often lies, I"m going to take that into account"
"This player is good, I'm going to be wary of him"
"This player is my friend, but I'm going to ally/attack with them because press/board-state"
OK
"This player is winning the tournament, I'm going to kill him regardless of press/board-state"
Grey
"This player is good, I'm going to kill him regardless of press/board-state"
"This player is my friend so I can trust him more but let's see what everyone says"
Not OK
"This player is my friend so I'm going to ally with them regardless"
"He let me solo last game, so I'm going to ally/help him solo this game"
"He killed me last game, so I'm killing him this game"
"He's attacking me in some other game, so I'm going to attack him here"
"He's dutch so I'm going to attack him"
Very not OK

You'll notice most of them come down to "Did you make this decision based on what's going on in the game, or before it even started?". Now, there's some exceptions to that: player skill, player tendencies, etc, but they all have tolerances. Intent matters a lot.

Many people have problems with the idea of rules based on intent, but at the end of the day it's a large part of what matters, and even if not tangible real, and we do our best to sort out any problems that may occur but largely rely on people being self-regulating to select out most problems.

This is enshrined in our rule:
This includes playing public games with family, friends, relatives, coworkers, or even joining a game with any player of a previous game with a predetermined intent to ally with or attack certain players. Additionally, you cannot make deals based on any factors outside of the game. (http://webdiplomacy.net/rules.php).

Players are not required to get permission or disclose that their account has a sitter.
Sitters are only bound by the normal rules of the site; there are no impositions of playstyle, effort, etc. It's up to you to find someone you trust to do so.

Sitters cannot share any games with the person who's account they're sitting.

So nothing is "Very not OK"?

Valis had a pretty good post, I think. In a non-anonymous game, it is almost impossible to not take the "OK" things into account and, perhaps, some of the "Not OK" things.

I wonder how the competitiveness of the point system affects everyone's views of this. In a casual game where there is no effort to accumulate points, even the "Not OK" becomes "Funny" or "Amusing" when things aren't so serious.

Regardless, there is something a little unsettling about certain people being allowed to know who someone is and others are not allowed to know. Maybe not cheating or meta-gaming but a little rude or discourteous, perhaps.

Thank you Valis.

Do you understand how spectra work, JECE?

No, I'm colorblind and tone-deaf.

Did you forget to delete "Very OK" or "Very not OK"? I understand that your continuum is a rough illustration of your personal opinion as a mod, but it would be more helpful if we could tell whether "This player is winning the tournament, I'm going to kill him regardless of press/board-state" is "OK" or a "Grey" area. Context suggests that you forgot to drop "Very not OK" (or else inadvertently placed it below "He's dutch so I'm going to attack him"), but I was able to get that because I've been around a while.

Maybe you actually meant that "This player is winning the tournament, I'm going to kill him regardless of press/board-state" was somewhere in-between "OK" and a "Grey" area, whatever that's supposed to mean. But I certainly didn't get that after you said you would list "actions that are OK or not OK" (as if into categories).

Your last theory is the correct one.

Things that are very not ok include
"She stabbed me in this game so I'm going to fill her house with rats"
"She stabbed me in real life so I'm going to stab her in the game"
"Her units form a pentagram so I'm going to summon a demon to haunt her"
"She's a demon irl so I'm going to arrange my units into a pentagram to banish her"
"She's the prime minister of England irl so I'm going to persuade her to leave Europe"

Thanks, ghug.

@krellin

"I love you all."

I love you too.

"Allowing factors outside the game, such as a persons game history, or previous experiences impact how you play with them in the game is punishable metagaming when proven."
I had to read this sentence three times before I understood it. I believe it contains a grammatical error. Shouldn't the comma between 'history' and 'or' be placed between 'experiences' and 'impact'?