I'm not speaking for Hel & Skag, but the Bulgarian coast is used to help keep things simple for new players to understand. Remember that one of the key targets of this site is to be accessible and friendly. True it might not be correct, but it makes it simpler and for the slight loss that is surely a benefit?

Edi, unfortunately Heligoland Bight is actually correct. Check here for the history of the first naval battle of the Great War:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Heligoland_Bight

Agree with figle though - changing north and south coast might be a tad difficult and confusing for some new players. The incorrect spellings should be changed though.

I do not see how Bulgaria NC makes it easier when it is a deviation from the board game. You are approaching it from the view of people who do not have the board game.

If we were to start to change the names of the provinces to make it easier for the new players by taking the he concept that they are not exposed to the game except through here, then we should make a bunch of changes in names.
It would not be the first time that someone tried to change all the names (French license did it in the 80"s on purpose to make the French game incompatible on purpose with the English board even going so far as to change the province name of Marseilles to Toulon just to be difficult).

I like a little more regularity in the board's display and names so that as you move around the hobby there is greater common ground on the basic game...makes for less mistakes on the Face to Face game. For example in a critical move on a World Class top board, there would be a sincere discussion on declaring an order of F Con to Bul NC as a mis-order. I should hope that it would be resolved as going to the EAST Coast, however I know a few top rated players who would make a call to the Tournament Director on it.

Edi, does it really matter? I should say it matters no more or less than the fact that you misuse the words less and fewer- 'makes for less mistakes' should be 'makes for fewer mistakes'- but it is unimportant because people know precisely what you mean. Similarly here we know where that coast is, and it doesn't matter whether it is called (nc) or (ec). The spelling error, being an error is perhaps more deserving of a change, but again, not desperate. In fact that is a closer to your irrelevant grammatical error.

And finally, we ARE approaching from the view of people who do not have the board game- that was the point.

I agree with Edi. One of the goals of the DATC was to get more uniformity between adjudicators and other Diplomacy software.

A change in coast names, means that the orders of phpDiplomacy can not be loaded in jDip, DipTool, RealPolitik or PalmPolitik. Or maybe someone will make an iPhone app in the future. With such change you create trouble.

Furthermore, new players will read articles about opening theory and in those articles the east coast will be mentioned. This is just confusing.

I also can't remember that the east coast was confusing for me or the people I explained Diplomacy (that are a lot).

In the research for the DATC I have been scanning many forums and newsgroups and I have never read anything about a confusing east coast.

Lucas

I'd support a change to standardize territory names... I can see how North coast might make it easier for some players, but certainly East coast would help players who have already played Diplomacy transition easier.

Do you really think there is confusion between Skaggerak and Skaggerack? Or between Heligoland and Helgoland? Seriously folks, there should be about 8,000 things more important in your life than this.

Like Edi, I played on a board before joining this sight. Since this sight is duplicating the board game, it would only make sense to have the same spellings (even if they are historically incorrect.) If that is easy to accomplish, then why not do it? But if it is difficult to accomplish or would cause too much confusion, then I think the current spellings are OK.

I am not saying that what I asked is not picky or petty, it is just something I would like to see done.
There have been some series of misspelling on maps, including the current one that Wizards just did/ as I said misspellings are sort of a tradition, but it does mean we should accept it.
A minor bitch and moan, I agree, but what the hell its the end of the year and those sort of things are in at this time of year.

If the game was printed with Russia spelled Russa, would you want to keep it?

I think if anyone was this confused about the difference between east and north coast of bulgaria when it is clearly represented on a map is in trouble anyway.

I'd say making it uniform with realpolitick and other programs would be the priority. Well, a relative priority, as we all seem to agree its not a huge deal.

Is it really a misspelling or the result of translations? I don't know about Skaggerack/Skaggerak but "Heligoland" is the German spelling of the island and bight and "Helgoland" is the Anglicization.

Again, not the biggest deal in the world but there might be a reason for the spelling. Geographical renaming is a pretty contentious issue.

I am very aware of the contentious issue of naming, and I think many people agree that different languages have very different names for things.
My favorite example on the Diplomacy set is aside from the English Channel, if you look at the Italian language boards the name of Munich is
Monaco.

However, I was trying to get some conformity to the mass of the English language boards put out by Avalon Hill in the 70-90's when they did spell most of the things right (Except for Eas and Bur).

In the 1959 and 61 versions it was Ukrainia not Ukraine by the way.

Edi - totally love your wealth of dip knowledge - I really find this thread quite edifying... (does that make me a nerd?... no doubt)

I've said it before, and will say it again - you are a treasure to the hobby and php.net is lucky to have you.

I can't really see how North Coast is any more or less confusing than East coast... Am I missing something here? Why is North easier for a new player to follow?

Seriously I just looked at the board again, and... I don't know you'd have to be pretty dense to be confused by that. If that's tripping you up, I imagine that's going to be the least of your problems trying to play this game.

That being said I don't think there's anything terribly wrong with using North Coast, but... well I'm not sure why it would have been changed in the first place.