read what we said in the "more discussion about the points system" thread for ideas.

Great, encourage metagaming through prejudice.

prejudice? where do you come from? i think you are projecting.
people are different and also we see things different as some phases of our lifes. That doesnt make it bad or wrong. If you see this as an opportunity to act with prejudice...then you have big problems. I will recommend that you start to check your values.

pitirre: no offense, but are you really that ignorant? do you seriously think that there will be no one who would change their decisions because of that information? do you think that no one on this site is prejudiced against anyone?

I find it humorously ironic that we are worried about *more* information making people prejudiced. That seems a bit backward considering the way prejudice normaly works, but a valid fear nonetheless.

What this really boils down to is an argument as old as Diplomacy itself, and one that we've had more than a few times on this site. Do we play each game blindfolded and disallow any sort of outside influence, or do we allow people to learn about their opponents and take the experiences of each game on to the next? Each way plays to the strengths of a different group. Sadly, neither group likes playing the other's way, so as with all things, we must compromise. This is why, though people complain left and right, the site really doesn't change that much.

TeutonicPlague: why do you think less info is bad?

Prejudice is a pre-conceived bias. One very strong connotation of the word is that this bias is based on little or no information. Thus, ignorance breeds prejudice.

I was pointing out the irony of the fact that in our phpDiplomacy world, people are afraid that *more* information will lead to prejudice against them in the games.

aoe, are you a child?
if your are an ignorant or emotional inmature that doesnt mean the world has tio act limited or defensive for people like you.
in every aspect of life the personality profile is relevant for taking decisions.
definetly your a child.

Putting the idea of prejudice aside, I think there is already enough information available about each player that you come up against. The idea being that you can look over games that the other player has finished or is in, and get an idea of his/her play style from those games.
This is the kind of information that we want anyways, because in the end it doesn't matter if im male and from thailand or female and from england, what you need to know is how i play.

I think one of the wonderful things about Diplomacy is how your name eventually pre-ceeds you and people get to know your reputation. This obviously used to be much more prominent in old postal diplomacy but there are some names that are very familiar on this site.

As for this prejudice arguement i cannot frankly see where the idea came from, i dont think that more information about a person would lead to discrimination. To be perfectly honest you can normally tell if somebody is English, American or from another country by the quality of their English and level of articulation.


And pitirre, if you are dismissing aoe's view because he/she may be a child are you not discriminating based on your personal prejudice that children are ignorant!?

actually, if someone knew someone was of a particular race or religion they might be inclined to attack them. which country do you live in? i'm in America and a lot of the adults are racist - most of them were born before segregation in schools was banned. oh, and i never said anyone had to act "limited or defensive" for me.

and, yes, of course i'm a child, i put it on my profile! (or at least, i might just pretend to be. you can't believe anyone on the internet.)

Locke: i dont know, all of the people who apologize for having bad english have very good english. (very odd.)

yes, pitirre, why would children be ignorant? have you ever read Ender's Shadow?

Majaii, i partly agree. most info besides the ideas suggested in the original post (not the replies) are all that are necessary. timezone is already provided.

census, statistics, psychological tests, profiles...
yes, all of that is done just for fun.

No, the truth is that personality from an individual or a collective can be very predictible. So, the more information we can gather the more we can predict (or try to predict) some events or characteristics of a person.

and to say that a child is ignorant is not the same to say that he/she is stupid; just lacks experience compared to an adult (normally).

there was a secretery of defense from the US who once said that for better decisions one has to have "empathy" for the enemy. To have empathy one needs to understand the differences, needs or personality of the other and not to commit the error of seeing things on our own's perspectives. recognizing that doesnt makes you a prejudice, racist or whatever. i think that avoiding this normal thinkming or actions just reflects some insecurities or irrational thoughts.

but is ok, no problem. this site doesnt have the options for the player give personal information abougt him/her...take it easy.

aoe, very interesting post....but do you not think that Enders Game was the better book?

an example; just the other day i saw the movie "Patton" and there is a scene where an assitant is informing about Patton's profile (religion, past lifes, prayers, conflicts and others) to his german general.

i dont think that they were going to make Patton a scrapbook and needed that information. is for a better understanding and what to expect and to make decisions more reliable.

anyway, is a great movie.

i don't have anything meaningful, or even on topic, to add to this thread. i just wanted to say i agree with locke that ender's game was by far the better book. the quality of the stories started to slide after speaker for the dead, i thought.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy is also a good to read, I feel the need to point out. Although the movie's are an adequate replacement. I also like cornbread.

Here I was thinking that this would just encourage players to either ally or attack others in part based upon their past performance both on the whole and as particular countries.

really?

interesting how an idea based off of winning percentages, after a small game of telephone, became a discussion on prejudice. personally i think the more information i have about a diplomacy player, or even an actual diplomatic (if i were a diplomat too) would only help me to build rapport with them and find a way to approach them with propositions. but i suggested the winning stats purely as an indication of each players strength because like i said in the original post, the points system is flawed in that aspect.

First of all, my vote definitely goes to Ender's Game as the superior book. Secondly, the Lord of the Rings is not a trilogy, as that describes three related but complete works, and the Lord of the Rings is all one story. Thirdly, I'd love to see as much information as possible about a player (medical history, frequent flier statistics, political party...) but I'll settle for winning percentages. Average number of stabs per game would be a fun stat too. :)

i do think Ender's Game is better than Ender's Shadow. but i mentioned it instead because Ender doesn't get the fact that they are spying on him as well as Bean does.

FREQUENT FLIER STATISTICS?!?!


thewonderllama: no, i think Ender's Shadow was almost as good.

Vampiero: that's exactly the point. knowing more about them would change the way you talk. if you already knew that before the game started, it wouldn't be fair. some people would say it didn't matter because everyone knew that about everyone, but you must admit that there are people who are more likely to become allies with an American than someone from Inner Mongolia.

# of stabs would be impossible to calculate without a human reviewing the conversation and subsequent moves in every game.

aoe, and thats part of reality.

in today's world england is an ally of the US; so much that they even comply to invade Iraq...ilegally!!!

is very probable that if i knew there was an hispanic player among the players...is very posible i would become an ally of him/her. But i dont think thats a disadvantage but a plus...because life, real life, is the same way. Is something more of a challenge when you convince an english player not to ally with an united states citizen or take an account that there are 2 or more players incline to ally beacuse of a X or Y reason.

if teutotinic wants to know if a player is a "frequent flier", i even eant to know what brand of toothpaste he/she uses.

i know im a new player of diplomacy but what i gather is that this is a game of intelligence, psychology and very last, warfare.

anyway, this site is great as ti is. i will keep playing with or without extended info of a player.

pitirre: that makes the game unfair. if you win because you just find some "advantage" that doesn't mean you're better than someone else at diplomacy, does it?

brand of toothpaste? um, i don't remember.

pitirre, you forget that the war on iraq has always been enourmously unpopular in Britain and we only went to war because Blair twisted the truth. Thats not to say that Britain and America dont have a 'special relationship' but we dont comply with all americas wishes!

I think that knowing information about others and then exploiting it would be extremely fun and make the game more interesting, but if there was a survey i know that i for one would lie. I'd probably say that i was a 61yr old black woman from texas, and i bet i wouldnt be the only one!!

is not a question if it is unfair or not, is just that life (diplomacy, intelligence etc etc) is like that and this game tries to asimilate to it.

And by the way, for just knowing what kind of toothpaste or if you are a frequent flyer is not enough; the beauty is how can you interpret that information to your advantage.

Maybe is that when i first encounter the game of diplomacy and started to read about it it says that is a game that requires strategy, negotiation, a bit of tactics and psychology and as a psychologist myself i was attracted inmediately to this game. Now that i'm playing it, i ccan see what they mean.

Is a beautiful game. I wish there were more books about diplomacy. Especially annotated games (including the communication between players).

Locke, i will probably le too. ;0) or maybe not. who knows!!??

Locke, i will probably lie too. ;0) or maybe not. who knows!!??

my god, look at me. I'm even saying i'm a psychologist! when this lying will stop!!!???

At the end of the day it is impossible to have completely anonymous games. If two friends in the same computer lab randomly find themselves playing in the same game, they will know who each other are. And this is true of real life too, America knows the Russians, the British know the French, we know which regimes we trust and which we don't. I don't think it is "metagaming" at all to treat certain players with caution when you have experienced their modus operandi previously. It's just common sense. And players who are continually deceitful, petty and generally unreliable will get the reputation they deserve, just the same as "good" players do. The "bad" players either learn to be deceitful in a more clever way, or they soon find no-one is ever going to ally with them in any game. Equally, if you have a successful and long-standing alliance with someone in one game, you are going to be more inclined to trust them in another. That's not cheating, it's just networking. Recognising and utilising another person's skill base.

I think building a reputation is and should be a part of being a good Diplomacy player - if everything is anonymous, then basically you're playing Russian roulette with your alliances, and the winner is the guy who guesses right rather than judges right.

great argument

I knew I liked you, Noodlebug - and that's not just because I like noodles and bugs. I also like drawing conclusions about somebody's playing style from their favorite brand of toothpaste. Mine is tetris.