Game rules
(a) Each game is supervised by a game master who takes care of its smooth running and carries out the resolution if the system is manual or if the automatic system is failing.
(b) In case of a tournament, the director (and, possibly, several assistants) of tournament is the game master of all the games.
(c) For a team tournament, each player is supervised by a captain responsible for guiding him on the system and taking action in case of his defection. In case of a tournament, there is a captain for each team.
(d) Each player will have to communicate his real identity (names and first names) in addition to one possible pseudonym.
(a) The games are completed on one of the following conditions:
Outright victory of a player (“victory with 18 centres”),
Vote of end of the game,
Stop of the game from the game master due to stability of the centres over three (3) consecutive diplomatic years,
End of the last diplomatic year (The year value is defined in the tournament specificities for the round).
(b) Scoring system defined in the tournament specificities for the round
(c) Ties for a specific game are defined in the tournament specificities for the round.
(a) The duration of the deadlines will be roughly:
Deadlines for moves: one week,
Deadlines for retirements/adjustments: 48 hours.
(b) The seasonal times will be lengthened of 50% at the time of the first diplomatic year.
(c) For the games in tournament an approximate calendar is established before the beginning of the first deadline.
(d) A resolution could be carried out before the deadline if:
All the players who have orders to submit expressed their agreement,
No player without an order to submit has expressed his veto.
(e) The adjudication will be carried out no later than 24 hours after expiration of deadline (when all orders are present).
(f) A Game master should never block a game, in the sense of not accepting modification to orders and still not publishing the result of the adjudication for longer than 24 hours.
(g) Requests for deadline extension to have more time for negotiations shall require to be expressed at latest 12 hours before deadline.
(h) In exceptional circumstances, if no player of the game expresses his opposition (in private or a public), a game could be appreciably accelerated to mitigate a long planned absence of a player. This is in order to avoiding an unpleasant replacement.
(a) To intervene on a game means to explicitly send a message in diplomatic, strategic matter or tactic with one or more player(s) during the course of the game
(b) Contrary to the face to face games, the negotiations are authorized during all the phases of play - except after the deadline for a player who did not submit the orders requested.
(c) Contrary to face to face games, a player eliminated from a game can always intervene on a game and can take part in the negotiations to determine the winner of the game.
(d) Unless specifically authorized on the level of a tournament, a player who never ever belonged to the table (prohibited cross gaming) and a player who left a game (he is not thus any more player) cannot interfere on a game.
(a) The system may allow anonymous public statements, yet the real identity of the author of the messages will be known to the system administrator, and upon official request by game master or tournament director anonymous messages may be suppressed.
(b) The game master should not forward anonymous public statements.
(c) The system and the game master should not authorize falsified public statement, i.e. usurping the identity of another player of the game.
(d) Normal courtesy is required in the contents of the presses. It is possible to complain about the contents of a press to the game master, who will be able to take the adequate measures.
(a) The vote of end of the game can be requested at any moment by a message addressed by a player to all the others players of the game and the game master.
(b) The players will have to vote with the adjustment orders.
(c) The vote is positive only if all the players still part of the game expressed themselves in favour of the stop (unanimity) except that a player in civil disorder is supposed to have voted for the stop of the game.
(d) A player who proposes the stop of the game has the full right to vote against this proposal.
(e) The detailed result of the vote is and remains secret (except if the vote is positive.) at least until the end of the game.
(a) It is forbidden to directly diffuse orders (movements, retreats and adjustments) without using the system or a game master.
(a) It is necessary to have an electronic e-mail address to take part in a game to be able to consult it or use it regularly. Even if negotiations are on the site, the email is used by the site to inform a player of the events on the game.
(b) Players using several e-mail addresses (typically professional and personal) for negotiations are requested to inform the other players and game master of their game, so, more particularly, not to await a response to a message during the weekend on a professional e-mail address.
(c) When a message transmitted towards another player returns in error, it should it be announced to the captain of the faulty player (and, optionally, to the lieutenant of the team of the faulty player, specially if the faulty is the captain). If the problem persists, it must be announced to the game master of the game (and the tournament director if different.) A Game Master may expel a player from a game if his email address causes too many problems.
(d) Falsified messages are prohibited (i.e. messages likely to mislead others by exploiting a better competence in the data-processing tool.)
(e) To forge a false message and to transmit it as such to a third party does not enter within the framework of this prohibition.
(f) It is authorized to transmit part or totality of a received message of another player. E-mails and other communications are the intellectual property of their author, but the game master and players, by virtue of agreeing to master or play in the tournament, freely give permission for the use of those e-mails and communications by other participants as part of the play of the particular game for which the e-mails or other communications were sent.
(g) If the game is anonymous, use of emails between players is of course forbidden.
(a) Replacements must obey strict rules and should in no case to be treated lightly. During a replacement, replaced player must diffuse a message to all the players and game master of the game to introduce his substitute. The substitute must present himself in the same manner. At no moment, there should be any doubt in the mind of the players and of the game master on which is the player with whom to negotiate on the game - i.e. which player will submit the orders.
(b) It is however possible - in exceptional circumstances, in a team tournament - for the captain (and the lieutenant) of the team of a player to submit the orders on the flight, on request of the latter last or following a failure of the latter. The player must then assume these orders. The latter will be able to be however opposed to it, and in this last case, if the player is late, the captain or the lieutenant will not be allowed to interfere on the game.
(c) A player who left a game cannot return to it (this restriction applies only to the players of the game and not to the game master) unless he specified at the time of his departure that its replacement was temporary.
(d) The specific replacements by a player of the team not participating in another game are tolerated in a team tournament.
(e) A substitute who played in more half of a game (in a consecutive way or not) will be no more be considered as substitute thereafter (one must count the number of seasonal orders for which it had the responsibility.)
(a) The defects of orders are regulated by a system of number of NMR tolerated before issuing a CD (civil disorder) and threshold of alarm.
(b) When one is normally on the point of solving (that it is in a manual or automatic way) and that one misses one or more orders, then the game master or the system sends a message of recall to all the player of the team of the latecomer player. Moreover the game master or the system decrements credit of country(ies) in question. If one of the countries whose orders are missing still has credit, then the resolution is postponed 48 hours (seasonal orders) or 24 hours (non seasonal orders or late game). If at the time of the new attempt at resolution the orders persist in missing, the game master will be able to put in civil disorder the countries of the latecomers.
(c) Exception will be made for the seasonal orders of the first year of a game (spring, autumn, and adjustments/builds 1901 – but not for retreats and adjustment/removal) for which no country may be declared in civil disorder. The game will be blocked until the player(s) validate orders or a substitute is found according to present regulations. The credits of latenesses will not be affected.
(d) Exception will be made in case of a tournament when the games are synchronized; the director of tournament will be able to directly declare the countries in civil disorder in the event of defect of order. The credits (number of NMR) will still be affected.
(e) The number of NMR tolerated before issuing a CD may be averaged and calculated in a certain way according to the specificities of the tournament
(f) A player is in green alarm if he was at most once (1) late, in yellow alarm if was twice (2) late,, in orange alarm if was three times (3) late, in red alert if was four times (4) late and in black alarm if he was at least five times (5) late.
(g) It is suggested adopting the following behaviour for a NMR:
|
Civil disorder if phase is: |
And player colour |
|
Negative adjustments/Retreats |
Orange or worse |
|
Positive adjustments/Movements |
Red or worse |
|
Eviction if phase is: |
And Player colour |
|
All |
Black |
(h) It is the accumulation of the published NMRs of a player (or a team) which is taken into account, given that that a NMR is not published until the adjudication is carried out.
(i) If a NMR is directly turned into a CD (for any reason) the NMR is still inflicted to the faulty (in addition to the civil disorder) in order to being accounted thereafter.
(j) If a player is late for a retreat without incidence on the game (i.e. who cannot prevent another retreat, cannot take again a centre, whereas then it disappears from the game), the game master will show the greatest leniency with respect to the CD while possibly submitting the order on his behalf in order to save time.
(k) Should occur a situation where it is necessary to await certain players and not others at the time of an adjudication on which there are NMRs, the latter profit from an unhoped-for leniency and will be able to submit their order in the interval. However, should follow a situation where only players - not to be waited - remain late, the adjudication may be carried out immediately.
(l) Unless otherwise stated, penalties following NMR occur for all game phases (moves, retreats and adjustments).
(m) A CD occurring during a move phase causes a direct CD on a retreat during the next phase and/or negative adjustment during the next phase
(n) A CD occurring during a retreat phase causes a direct CD on a negative adjustment during the next phase
(o) A player that invalidated his orders after the deadline is at risk of being in the same situation as a late player
(p) A player who builds his play by expecting a civil disorder of another act at his own risks.
(a) A third (3) set of orders of movements submitted by the captain in a consecutive way for a team tournament leads to the eviction of a player of the game.
(b) A second (2) set of orders of movements in civil disorder in a consecutive way, even if the team takes a responsibility in the transformation of the NMR into CD, leads to the eviction of a player of a game.
(c) If the player has been evicted from the game and the game is waiting for the replacement by a human player, the country is in civil disorder without anybody being able to submit the orders for the player.
When a game master detects the failure of a player, he should not announce it to the other players of the game before the adjudication of the phase in progress or the arrival of the substitute.
A game master never gives information to the players about the chronology of the submissions nor on the identity of the country(ies) whose orders are lacking.
(c) When the replacement is caused by the absence of a player and that the substitute did not have possibility to express himself during a phase of play in entirety (i.e. his orders have not been taken into account in a movement adjudication) and that the replaced re-appears, he can take again his place this being announced as for a normal replacement (and the game master is compelled to notify at least a warning to him.). The return gives place to an extension to leave the other players time to resume the negotiations.
(a) The lateness of more than one hour (compared to the moment when the game master wishes to treat the orders) are treated with the corresponding paragraph “N.M.R.”
(b) The modifications of orders after the deadline but before the adjudication are possible but without any guarantee of positive result.
The requests for extensions are encouraged (especially in the games in advance on planning of the tournament) to avoid the risks of NMRs in the submissions – except for the games in tournament when synchronized.
(d) Each player is entitled to at least on extension.
(e) Games within a tournament may be extended while bank holidays, at game or at round level.
(f) It is up to the game master to judge if the repetitive requests for grace are not excessive and if it is necessary to ask the replacement of the player in question. Thus, when a player announces that it will be temporarily unavailable,
either the duration is very long (he must be replaced in a final way)
either it is sufficiently short (the game is blocked while waiting for its return.)
either one needs a temporary replacement (by a member of the team not player in another game)
(g) The game masters are supposed to accept the extensions during the school dates of holidays.
(h) The game masters must make sure that the times of submission (for the phase of retirements and adjustments) entirely included in one weekend do not annoy a player.
(i) Individual and/or broadcast reminders may be cast of the deadline but the lack of a reminder will not serve to excuse failure to submit orders.
(a) At the end of each game, before the diffusion of the last report, the game master will be charged to collect make the players insert their votes for the trophies (the ones determined by the players themselves.)
(b) When a player is eliminated from a game, he is advised to collect or insert in the system at once his votes and to preciously preserve them.
(c) The votes for the trophies may be expressed only before the game closure.
(d) A message of recall inviting to carry out the vote for the trophies will be transmitted towards a player of the game:
at the time of his elimination,
during all the last diplomatic year (if he is not eliminated).
(e) A message of recall will encourage the player to write declarations of end of game (EOGS) and to send them to the game master, who will make them public only after game closure.
(f) The vote of the players shall respect the following constraints:
For each trophy, the vote is expressed by appointing a player (or a line of players).
The negotiation before the vote is not necessary but is not prohibited.
It is authorized to abstain from for one or all the votes.
It is forbidden to vote for oneself.
If the voter would be a substitute, it is advised to him to consult the opinion of the other player(s) of his team having taken part of the game.
If a nominated potential would be a substitute, the voters must carry out a synthesis between the various representatives of the team who followed one another the game. Indeed the vote is used to decide between teams and not players. Therefore, if several players of a team followed one another, it will be necessary to judge in proportion to the attendance time of the members of the team.
If players take too long to vote, the game master will be allowed to consider that they abstain before closing the game.
(g) The results of the votes for the game will be visible only after game closure (in the form of the number of voices collected by each player).
(h) Team results only make sense in case of team tournament.
(a) Any correction of the situation (continuation for example to a litigation, an error of resolution, an unexpected replacement) gives right an extension for the players.
(b) The new deadline must be shifted of at least half of the time passed at the time of correction since the faulty publication.
(c) The principle of the referendum is not excluded a priori. It is not used to regulate the litigations but to obtain the approval of the whole table (thus the vote can be positive only unanimously players still in string of the game) to carry out a morally legitimate distortion with the official rule.
(d) Adjudication mistakes must be pointed out and will be corrected as soon as possible. If they are not pointed out and another adjudication is published, without correction of an error, the error will stand on the condition that the mandatory period was allowed between adjudications. Rollbacks (ie allowing players to resubmit orders for a turn that has been adjudicated) will only be permitted with the express consent of the overall TD.
(e) In case of conflicts between all information is provided (maps, unit positions, adjudication etc.) the graphical map will always take precedence..
(f) Wherever an adjudication error leads to two units in the same space, any unit erroneously present in that space will be placed in the space where it should have been if that is otherwise vacant, and otherwise off the board, as soon as the error is discovered unless one of the units has vacated the space by the time the error is noticed
(g) If it is discovered that an extra unit is present for a player, and that unit has existed for more than one adjudication, the imbalance between the number of units present and the number of units to which that player is actually entitled will be rectified, if necessary, during the next build/disband phase.
(a) It is strictly forbidden to attempt to mislead a game master or tournament director in any manner.