TOURNAMENT RULES

1999 New Zealand Diplomacy Championship

TOURNAMENT DIRECTOR: Grant Torrie

DISPUTES COMMITTEE: Grant Torrie, Craig Sedgwick, Quentin Ball, Jimmy Millington. The Tournament Director may alter the members of the Disputes Committee at his sole discretion.

1. The Rules: The standard 1982 North American rule book applies except where amended below. A copy of this rulebook will be on the Tournament Director's table.

2. Rounds: The Tournament consists of three rounds, played over two days:

Day one: Saturday August 28, 1999
Day two: Sunday August 29, 1999

In each round players will be allocated to tables and countries by the organiser according to a secret roster. Players may play in any or all of the rounds.

3. Round timings: Players are required to report to the venue at 9:00a.m. Saturday, and 10.00a.m. on Sunday. All efforts will be undertaken to commence games on time, so please do not be late as you may miss out on a game. The Tournament Director reserves the right to delay the start of any round at his sole discretion. To avoid a "last minute rush" for supply centres, the times at which each round finishes are set by the Tournament Director, and are NOT available to any other person. The second round will commence sometime in the afternoon of the first day's play and the third round will commence sometime during the second day's play. Round 2 may continue overnight, at the Tournament Director's sole discretion.

4. Registration: All prospective tournament entrants MUST complete a Tournament Registration Form upon arrival at the Tournament Director’s table at the venue. Please complete all parts of the form and return to the Tournament Director’s table.

5. Stand-downs: If there is not a multiple of seven players the Tournament Director may make up a multiple of seven by playing GM positions, or may ask people to stand down. Standing-down players shall be at the sole discretion of the Tournament Director however, this will only be requested if absolutely necessary.

6. Seasons: Games will be played with a "Spring" negotiation period, and a "Fall" negotiation period. Retreats and Adjustments will be part of the negotiation time for the following period. The time allocated to the "Fall" negotiation period will start immediately after the time allocated to the "Spring" negotiation period has elapsed, and the time allocated to the "Spring" negotiation period will begin immediately after the time allocated to the preceding "Fall" negotiation period has elapsed. For the first two game years of each round each season shall be 20 minutes. Starting with Spring 1903 this will be reduced to 15 minutes per season. At any stage after 1908 the times may be reduced further at the Tournament Director’s sole discretion. At the end of each season, when the time limit expires the Tournament Director will call "Time". Negotiation periods will be displayed at the tournament venue and will be adhered to strictly. Adjustment of times may occur at the Tournament Director's sole discretion. It is the players’ responsibility to resolve Retreats and Adjustments quickly to avoid losing much time from the subsequent negotiation period.

7. Retreats and Adjustments: The Retreats and The Adjustments phases are each regarded as seperate phases. No negotiating or "diploming" is allowed during Retreats or Adjustments phases. Any player may request clarification of the available retreat options for a dislodged unit, but otherwise no Diplomacy is permitted. Retreats MUST be written down, and are revealed simultaneously. Winter adjustments happen AFTER the resolution of Fall retreats. For the adjustments phase all builds and disbands MUST also be written down and then revealed simultaneously.

8. Warnings of approaching deadlines: It is each player’s responsibility to be aware of approaching deadlines. A warning may be given 2 minutes before the expiration of the negotiation period, and again at 1 minute, 30 seconds and 10 seconds before the completion of the negotiation period. However, failure of the Tournament Director to announce these warnings will not result in the deadline being extended.

9. Submission of orders: Deadlines will be strictly applied. On each table there will be a designated box for collection of orders. Players must have their orders in the "orders box" when the Tournament Director calls the completion of the negotiation period. In the event that a player places their orders after the Tournament Director has called the completion of the negotiation period then that player’s orders shall be considered "late". The first time that a player's orders are late, they will receive a verbal warning. On second and subsequent occurrences any player without orders in the "orders box" at the completion of the negotiation period i.e. whose orders are late, will be considered in Civil Disorder as per Rulebook Rule XIV Civil Disorder. Persistent offenders may be disqualified from the round, or indeed the whole tournament, at the Tournament Director's sole discretion, or incur any other penalty (such as a points deduction) that the Tournament Director deems appropriate. No orders may be accepted once the reading of orders has commenced. In the event that no orders have been received by a player once the reading of orders has commenced, that player’s country will be considered in Civil Disorder as per Rulebook Rule XIV Civil Disorder.

Please note: A verbal warning is applicable for the entire tournament.

10. Order content: All orders should include the year, season, game name (or designated letter), country being played and player name and must be signed. Failure to do so may mean that the orders are disallowed, at the Tournament Director's sole discretion. Joint orders signed by two or more players are acceptable, perpetual and proxy orders are not acceptable.

11. Notation and syntax: The use of army and fleet notations and country designators where appropriate is recommended, but not compulsory. All orders must use unambiguous space abbreviations or full names. A list of recommended space abbreviations is appended to these Tournament Rules. (See Appendix A)

12. Reading the orders by the 'designated power': Each season, after the time allocated to the negotiation period has elapsed, the designated power for that turn will read their own orders FIRST, and THEN read each of the other power's orders for that season. In Spring 1901 'the designated power' at each table will be Austria-Hungary. Each subsequent season the 'designated power' will pass one power clockwise, based on the order in which the powers are printed around the border of the Diplomacy Board. If the designated power is not at the board for whatever reason (late, eliminated, etc.) then "the designated player" shall pass clockwise one player until there is a designated player present.

13. Game Ending Conditions and Provisions:

Concessions: No games may be conceded to a player as a solo victory. All games must be played out until the Tournament Director calls a time draw, or all players agree to a draw as provided for in "voted draws".

Time Draws: Due to the need to get three rounds of Diplomacy in one weekend, the Tournament Director may, at the expiration of any deadline, enforce a time draw. If the deadline that has just expired is a Fall deadline, retreats will be allowed (with NO negotiations) but builds will be unnecessary. SC counts will be conducted and recorded after the Fall retreats. If the deadline that has just expired is a Spring deadline, the game will stop immediately and the SC counts from the previous Fall shall be the game end positions.

Voted Draws: At any time the players of a game may request the Tournament Director conduct a draw vote. All surviving players must agree to a vote for a draw for the vote to proceed. The definition of a surviving player is: 'A surviving player includes any player who, when the draw is proposed, owns at least one supply centre regardless of who occupies that centre'. Please do not call the Tournament Director to your table if you do not have a unanimous agreement to conduct a draw vote. Please note: Agreeing to participate in a draw vote does NOT mean you intend to vote FOR the draw.

The tournament Director will provide each surviving player with two voting tokens, which the players MUST keep from view of the other players for the duration of the draw vote. Failure to do so will be looked upon seriously by the Tournament Director. No distinction is made between accidental and deliberate revealing of draw tokens. Revealing a draw token may result in disqualification.

One voting token will be white and one will be brown. The white token will indicate support for the draw proposal; the brown one will indicate the player is against the draw proposal. Draws Include All Survivors. The Tournament Director will have a box which he will hold aloft, and he will invite each surviving player to place one of their voting tokens in the box, whilst keeping the other token hidden. Once all surviving players have voted the Tournament Director will announce whether the draw is carried. All surviving players must place a white token in the voting box for the draw to be carried.

If the draw is carried, the game ends immediately, and the last completed fall turn (including retreats) will be counted as the game ending position. If the draw vote is not carried all surviving players will place their other voting token in the box (without revealing it to anyone at all) and the game will continue.

Only one draw vote per season per board will be allowed.

Any games ending in any process other than that outlined above, excluding those ending in a solo victory (18 centres or more) to one player, will be considered abandoned games, and all players in that game will be scored zero points for the game.

14. Convoys: The unwanted convoy: 'Unwanted' convoys for Armies moving along the coast are legal, cannot be refused. If players are concerned about this sort of thing they should employ the Ken Lowe Convention of specifying the convoy route they intend for their army in the order of the army (e.g. A WAL - IRI - MAO - NAF).

More than one convoy route: If the orders as written permit more than one route by which the convoyed army could proceed from it's source to it's destination, the order is not void on account of this ambiguity; and the army is not prevented from moving due to the dislodgement of fleets, unless all the routes are disrupted.

Convoying an attack on one of your own units: An order by one country which convoys an attack by another country against a space occupied by one of the first country's units does not permit a move dislodging that unit, but may be valid for other purposes.

Pandin's Paradox: If an army being convoyed would cut a support being offered by a fleet, which is needed to dislodge one of the fleets convoying THAT army ("Pandin's Paradox"), then the convoy does not succeed, but neither is the fleet dislodged.

15. Building and Disbanding:

Fleets may not be built in inland provinces.

Players should note that under rule XIII. Gaining and Losing Units part 2. Building and removing units (adjustments) it says: "...If he has fewer centres than units, he MUST [my emphasis] disband the excess units only, by removing them from the board. The units removed may be any of his units he chooses. If he has more centres than units, he MAY [my emphasis] build units...". Failure to disband when you are required to may be viewed as cheating by the Tournament Director.

16. Misorders: The Rulebook's ruling on misorders is somewhat ambiguous, and doesn't provide much scope for Deliberate Misorders when there isn't a G.M. Hence, the following rules on misorders will apply :

Players may use any valid, unambiguous abbreviation, or the full name, for a province.
It is preferred that you always specify coasts for fleets in multi-coasted provinces. You must always specify the correct coast when moving (or supporting) a fleet to a multi-coasted province, or building a fleet in St Petersburg.
Orders which are not ambiguous, but which nevertheless indicate an attempt by a unit to do something impossible under the rules, will be interpreted as "illegal orders". Units with Illegal orders simply stand in place, and may NOT receive support to hold. Note: attempts to move to a space occupied by one of your own units (i.e. self dislodgement) does not constitute an illegal order.
Misorders which are nevertheless legal, if unambiguous, are followed.
Ambiguous orders (ones which could admit more than one meaning) are not followed. Units so ordered simply stand in place, and MAY receive support to hold.
An order that has bad or incomplete syntax, but which nevertheless can admit only one meaning, is followed. If necessary the Tournament Director will rule on this issue. Be warned, the Tournament Director will tend towards ruling the order ambiguous, so write clearly and if in doubt write the space's full name and the nationality of the units concerned.
The Tournament Director, if required, will be the final judge of whether an order is ambiguous or not, but may choose to consult members of the disputes committee at his convenience.

17. Miscellaneous: The following rule points are worth emphasising:

Spain and North Africa are not adjacent. Norway and St. Petersburg are adjacent.
Fleets may support another fleet moving to the other coast of a multi-coasted province (e.g. F(GOB) S F(Nwy)-StPNc is legal).
Coastal crawl and Crawling Retreats are not permitted (e.g. two units moving F(SpaNc)-Por, F(Por)-SpaSc is a stand-off).
Convoys can be disrupted only by attacking and dislodging the convoying fleet -- merely attacking it is not enough.
If two units are ordered to the same space, and one of them is dislodged by a unit coming from that space, the other unit may move.

18. Errors: Any errors in move resolution must be pointed out to the Tournament Director immediately for rectification. Errors which remain undetected until after the next seasons adjudication will only be corrected at the discretion of the Tournament Director.

19. Seeding and the Tournament Draw: Players have not been rated for this tournament. Players have however been assigned a random seed which has been applied to a set draw. While two players may meet twice (but not 3 times) over the 3 rounds, attempts have been to reduce the number of groups of 3 players meeting more than once in a tournament to zero. Board allocations are made at the sole discretion of the Tournament Director.

20. Country Assignment: Countries for each player have been pre-assigned so that each player only plays one Great Power from each of 3 groups. The three groups are:

England, France and Germany
Russia and Turkey
Austria/Hungary and Italy

Please note that rules 20 & 21 are a guide to the conduct of the tournament and may be altered at the Tournament Director’s sole discretion. 21. Negotiations: There are "no holds barred" in dealings between players. However, the use of physical force or physical damage to property is banned and may lead to disqualification. Likewise, bribery is frowned upon and offenders will be "exposed before their peers." The organisers can in no way be held responsible for any illegal acts performed by players.

22. Outside assistance: No player from outside the board may aid or abet another player, directly or indirectly, with their orders or their diplomacy. Players doing so may be disqualified from the tournament and, if the Tournament Director sees fit, the Player "receiving the outside assistance" will be scored as zero in that game. Players that have been eliminated from a board may still participate by way of offering assistance to players still in that game.

23. Finishing positions: Players’ relative positions will not be revealed until the awards ceremony on Sunday. The Tournament will be scored using the Detour98f scoring system. The Tournament Director’s calculations will not be open for scrutiny and the Tournament Director is under no obligation to enter into correspondence regarding any aspect of the tournament placings.

24. Misconduct: Misconduct by players may result in: a) a verbal warning, b) a season suspension, c) a game suspension, d) disqualification from the championships without refund. The Tournament Director may incur any other penalty that he feels is appropriate e.g. deduction of points scored in a round or in the tournament. Penalties are not necessarily applied in that order.

25. Indemnity: All players agree to accept all judgements and directions given them by the Tournament Director. The Tournament Director may rule in areas not covered by these rules and may over-ride these rules at his sole discretion.

26. Teams Competition: The third round of the Tournament will double as the Teams Round. The Rules for the Teams Round are as follows:

To enter the teams competition a player must fill out the a portion of a teams entry form which will be available from the Tournament Director during enrollment, and throughout rounds 1 and 2. One teams entry form needs to be filled out per team, but each player in the team must fill out and sign their section of the form. Teams are limited to a maximum size of three players per team. Each player may only be a member of one team.

In round three no two members of the same team will be playing on the same board. As well as counting towards a player's overall individual score in the tournament, each player's score in round 3 will count towards that player's team's score. The team with the highest combined score will win the teams competition. The same tie breakers will be used to split any ties in the teams competition as will be used in the individual competition. See Apendix B.

27. Board Games Competition: Throughout the tournament there will be a board games competition run along side the main Diplomacy event. Players may play in as many or as few boardgames in the boardgames competition as they like. Any game of the listed games played is elligible to be included in the boardgames competition (if a score sheet for the game is submitted), unless the players agree before the game starts that it will not be included in the boardgames competition. For a game to count in the boardgames competition a "Boardgames Competition Score Sheet" must be completed and handed in to the Tournament Director by the end of Round 3 in the Diplomacy Tournament. Games which finish after the completion of Round 3 of the Diplomacy Tournament will not count. Any player may submit a "Boardgames Competition Score Sheet", which must be signed by the players in that game. Players refusing to sign a score sheet which they played in will be handled at the Tournament Directors discretion. If you played in a game, sign the sheet. If you want to leave before the game is completed, sign the sheet.

Games
The following games will be eligible to score points in the boardgames competition:

Game	Average Game Length	Weighting Factor
Lost Cities	20 minutes	1
Family Business	30 minutes	1.5
Take it Easy	30 minutes	1.5
Drunter & Druber	45 minutes	2.25
Freemarket	60 minutes	3
Shark	90 minutes	4.5
Settlers of Catan	90 minutes	4.5
Seafarers of Catan	90 minutes	4.5
Modern Art	90 minutes	4.5
Empire Builder	120 minutes	6
Tigris and Euphrates	120 minutes	6

Scoring
Points will be scored according to the finishing position of players in each game. This will then be weighted according to the average length of each game, so that someone playing lots of short games doesn't have an undue advantage over someone playing a few long games. Points vary depending on the number of players in the game:

Number of players	Finishing position	Points
2	1st	6
	2nd	2
3	1st	7
	2nd	4
	3rd	1
4	1st	8
	2nd	5
	3rd	3
	4th	1
5	1st	8
	2nd	6
	3rd	4
	4th	2
	5th	1
6	1st	8
	2nd	6
	3rd	4
	4th	3
	5th	2
	6th	1
7	1st	8
	2nd	6
	3rd	5
	4th	4
	5th	3
	6th	2
	7th	1
8	1st	8
	2nd	7
	3rd	6
	4th	5
	5th	4
	6th	3
	7th	2
	8th	1

The winner will be the player with the highest aggregate score.

Appendix A: Recommended Space Abbreviations.

Province	Abbreviations
Switzerland	swi switz
Adriatic Sea	adr adriatic
Aegean Sea	aeg aegean
Albania	alb
Ankara	ank
Apulia	apu
Armenia	arm
Baltic Sea	bal baltic
Barents Sea	bar barents
Belgium	bel
Berlin	ber
Black Sea	bla black
Bohemia	boh
Brest	bre
Budapest	bud
Bulgaria	bul
Burgundy	bur
Clyde	cly
Constantinople	con
Denmark	den
Eastern Mediterranean	eas emed east eastern eastmed ems eme
Edinburgh	edi
English Channel	eng english ech channel
Finland	fin
Galicia	gal
Gascony	gas
Greece	gre
Gulf of Lyon	lyo gol gulfofl lyon
Gulf of Bothnia	bot gob both gulfofb bothnia
Helgoland Bight	hel helgoland
Holland	hol
Ionian Sea	ion ionian
Irish Sea	iri irish
Kiel	kie
Liverpool	lvp livp lpl
Livonia	lvn livo lvo lva
London	lon
Marseilles	mar mars
Mid-Atlantic Ocean	mao midatlantic mid mat
Moscow	mos
Munich	mun
Naples	nap
North Atlantic Ocean	nao nat
North Africa	naf nora
North Sea	nth nts
Norway	nwy norwy
Norwegian Sea	nwg norwsea nrg norwegian
Paris	par
Picardy	pic
Piedmont	pie
Portugal	por
Prussia	pru
Rome	rom
Ruhr	ruh
Rumania	rum
Serbia	ser
Sevastopol	sev
Silesia	sil
Skagerrak	ska
Smyrna	smy
Spain	spa
St Petersburg	stp
Sweden	swe
Syria	syr
Trieste	tri
Tunis	tun
Tuscany	tus
Tyrolia	tyr tyl trl tyo
Tyrrhenian Sea	tys tyrr tyrrhenian tyn tyh
Ukraine	ukr
Venice	ven
Vienna	vie
Wales	wal
Warsaw	war
Western Mediterranean	wes wmed west western westmed wms wme
Yorkshire	yor york

Appendix B: Scoring.

The tournament will be scored using the DETOUR 98f Scoring System:

Part 1. Scoring of games resulting in a DRAW

(total of scores from a drawn game = 100 points)

Each player will score one point for every centre that they hold at the termination of a game.
Each player is awarded 1 point for survival (holds at least 1 centre) at the completion of the adjustments phase following Fall 1905.
Each player that has 1 or more centres at the end of the game is awarded 1 point. Please note that a player need not actually have units on the board, it is ownership of supply centres that matters.
If one player is the outright leader (has more centres than any other player) he is awarded points equal to the difference between the number of centres he holds and the number of centres held by the player with the second highest number of centres. If more than one player finishes on the most number of centres, no points are allocated in this section.
The first four players are allocated the following points: 1st: 4, 2nd: 3, 3rd: 2, 4th: 1. Where two or more players finish on equal centres points are allocated to those players for the lower position.
All scores resulting from a draw game will be standardised (calculated as a percentage of total scores from that game) and converted so that the total of scores from a draw game equals 100 points (individual scores will be rounded to three decimal places, so the total score from a game could conceivably exceed 100 points)

Part 2. Scoring of games resulting in an 18 centre WIN

1.The winning player will score 110 points.
2. All other players in the game will score 0 points.

Part 3. Tournament results

At the end of the tournament, scores from each player's games will be added together and the player with the most points declared the winner. Tiebreakers will be used to separate players on equal points, with the following tiebreakers used in order:

The player with the most wins.
The player included in the most drawn games.
The player with the better 'best' game.
The player with the better 'second best' game.
The player with the better 'third best' game.

If two or more players cannot be split after using tiebreakers then they are considered to have finished equal.

Part 4. Comparing Games

Games will be compared in the following order for tiebreakers, including tie-breaking best country awards. If a condition cannot split two players then the next condition is used.

Win beats Draw beats Elimination beats Loss (therefore a game where a player loses will be considered below an Elimination or Draw even though more tournament points may be gained).
Points from game.
Position finished in game based on centres (1st, 2nd 3rd etc.). Note an equal 1st is considered behind an outright 1st but ahead of a 2^nd, also the more players finishing equal, the less it is worth. E.g. equal 2nd with 2 players is better than equal 2nd with 3.
If both eliminated, longest survival based on fall supply centres. If both survived the same number of game years, the higher SC count in the last year in which SCs were held.
Highest score when subtracting the score of the player finishing 1st in that game.
Same for 2nd to 7th (zero used for eliminated players).