Diplomacy is a tense game of strategy and negotiation. It's a game where all players plan their turn simultaneously, and whether your move worked or not depends on what everyone else did. If you can work out a deal with someone, it is incredibly powerful, because troops are weak on their own but can trample over everything with support. But you've got to look out for those backstabs.
How do you play Diplomacy?
You are one of the Seven Great Powers of Europe, around the time of WW1. See those little sun icons on some regions? Those are Supply Centers. The first player to control 18 of them is the winner. Also, they determine how many military Units you can use -- for each one that you control, you get one Army or Fleet. Battle and negotiate for territory until one player dominates!
I'm going to explain the rules as clearly and simply as I can, or you can read read the full rules booklet here.
Starting in 1901, there are two turns each year, "Spring" and "Fall". Each turn consists of these four phases:
Diplomatic Phase: Players talk and negotiate
Order Writing Phase: All players write their orders, simultaneously and secretly
Order Resolution Phase: All orders resolve at once
Retreat and Disband phase: Players might have a quick choice to make in the aftermath of battles.
Additionally, once per year after the Fall turn, there is the Gaining and Losing Units Phase.
There are four orders you can give, and you will give one order to every unit:
Hold
Move
Support
Convoy
We'll go over these one at a time, while we cover the rules of how units move and battle.
Hold
This is the obvious order to leave your unit in place. If you don't give an order to a unit, this is the default. If you want to explicitly order your fleet in Spain to hold, you can do so.
Move
This is the order to move. Specify the type of unit you are moving, the province it currently is in, and which provence you are going to move it to. "I'm moving my fleet in Spain to Portugal" or, with Diplomacy's standard abbreviations, "F Spa-Por".
Each province can only contain one unit at a time (or zero). Each unit is of equal strength.
Without "support" orders, all units just bounce off each other. If two units attempt moves that are contradictory, they "standoff" and stay in place.
Examples (click for captions)
Two units cannot simply trade places.
Three or more units can "rotate" (as shown in one of the examples), but two units can't just swap. There is a way around this using the Convoy order, which I'll cover later.
Examples
There are two kinds of unit: Army, and Fleet.
Armies can only occupy provinces, land. Fleets can only occupy coastal provinces, and water spaces. When a fleet occupies a coastal province, it is "on the coast", and can only move to other land spaces on the same coast.
Examples, and unique weird geography things
Support
This is the key move of Diplomacy. One unit, without moving itself, can "support" another unit, increasing its power, allowing for more interesting situations than a standoff. You can support your own units with other units, or you can support other players.
The more support a unit has, the more powerful it is. When two units of unequal power try to move into the same space, the more powerful unit succeeds, and the less powerful unit fails to move. If a more powerful unit tries to move into a space already occupied by a less powerful unit, the less powerful unit is dislodged. (unless it's already moving out at the same time)
You can support any unit's movement when you are adjacent to the place it is trying to move.
If I have a unit in Portugal, and my French buddy is going to try to move into English-occupied Spain from Gascony, I can lend support by saying "My fleet in Portugal supports the army in Gascony's movement into Spain" or "F Por S A Gas-Spa". Note that this only works if the army in Gascony actually tries to move to Spain. If Gascony does something else, or someone else tries to move into Spain, then your Support does nothing.
You can support a unit's "standing still" ability simply by being adjacent to it and ordering that support.
If I have a unit in Portugal, and I think France is going to try to push my English buddy out of Spain, I can lend support by saying "My fleet in Portugal supports the army in Spain" or "F Por S A Spa". This will make the army in Spain more resistant to being dislodged, as long as it doesn't try to move. If it's lending support elsewhere, or using a "convoy" order, then it is also holding position, so you can support that. If it's trying to move, however, your support order is invalid.
Support examples
Except, when I say "Adjacent" in those last two rules, I mean the support unit has to be capable of moving there itself.
Armies can't support movement to ocean spaces, and can't support a fleet holding an ocean space. Fleets can't support spaces they can't reach (for instance, because it is on the wrong coast).
There's also these two rules:
--A dislodged unit can still cause a standoff in a province other than the one that dislodged it.
--A dislodged unit, even with support, has no effect on the province that dislodged it.
Examples
If a unit is trying to give support somewhere, but is attacked from somewhere else, that support is "cut".
Examples
Convoy
To move an Army across bodies of water, you need to use a Fleet to "convoy" it. The army gets to skip over the water space to its destination in a single turn, but the fleet spends its turn using the Convoy order. Simply order the Army to move from its current territory to its destination, as if they were adjacent. Meanwhile the Fleet in the middle needs to be ordered to convoy that specific army to that specific destination.
To convoy an army from London, across the North Sea, to Norway, you would use these two orders: "Army in London to Norway" and "Fleet in North Sea Convoys Army in London to Norway". Or, to use the abbreviations, "A Lon-Nwy" and "F Nth C A Lon-Nwy".
You can attack into an occupied territory via convoy. But you'll need to get your support from yet ANOTHER unit, because the convoy itself does not count as support.
You can even chain multiple Convoys together, allowing an army to travel great distances in a single turn. Each fleet must name the same source and destination in their order. Players can convoy each other, with coordination -- but if you're expecting a convoy that doesn't happen, your army doesn't move.
--------
There are more rules to cover rare corner cases, but as a new player, you shouldn't have to worry about them until they become likely in-game. And they probably won't. Here's a full list of rules for order resolution.
Retreat and Disband phase
After all orders have been resolved, some units might have been "dislodged". Dislodged units aren't "dead", but have been forced from their location. Quickly, and without consultation, players should choose what to do with those units:
Disband: The unit is removed from the map. However, if you still have enough supply to maintain that many units, you will be able to rebuild it at the end of the year in one of your home Supply Centers.
Retreat: Move the unit to a neighboring unoccupied space. You can't move it to the space that its attacker came from. If two retreating units try to enter the same territory, they both disband instead.
Gaining and Losing Units phase
Every other turn (after the "Fall" turn), we resolve Supply for winter:
(1) Capture supply centers. Supply Centers are only captured after Fall turns. If you end a Spring turn in one, then move out, it remains with its original ownership.
(2) Count supply centers. Count your supply centers, and your units. If you have excess supply, you can build more units. If you have too little supply, you will have to choose units to disband.
(3a) Disbanding units. Simply choose which ones you want to disband, and they will be removed from the board.
(3b) Building units. To build a unit, you must have an empty HOME supply center that you still control. You may place an Army (or Fleets, on coastal provinces). If you have more than one extra supply, and enough places to build the units, you may build more than one.
Like with every other decision in Diplomacy, players write down their decisions simultaneously then reveal.
...
And that's the tutorial. If you have any questions, please ask! There are a lot of "what-if" questions that can pop up, and having answers for them will make the game more intuitive.
I'm going to explain the rules as clearly and simply as I can, or you can read read the full rules booklet here.
Starting in 1901, there are two turns each year, "Spring" and "Fall". Each turn consists of these four phases:
Diplomatic Phase: Players talk and negotiate
Order Writing Phase: All players write their orders, simultaneously and secretly
Order Resolution Phase: All orders resolve at once
Retreat and Disband phase: Players might have a quick choice to make in the aftermath of battles.
Additionally, once per year after the Fall turn, there is the Gaining and Losing Units Phase.
There are four orders you can give, and you will give one order to every unit:
Hold
Move
Support
Convoy
We'll go over these one at a time, while we cover the rules of how units move and battle.
Hold
This is the obvious order to leave your unit in place. If you don't give an order to a unit, this is the default. If you want to explicitly order your fleet in Spain to hold, you can do so.
Move
This is the order to move. Specify the type of unit you are moving, the province it currently is in, and which provence you are going to move it to. "I'm moving my fleet in Spain to Portugal" or, with Diplomacy's standard abbreviations, "F Spa-Por".
Each province can only contain one unit at a time (or zero). Each unit is of equal strength.
Without "support" orders, all units just bounce off each other. If two units attempt moves that are contradictory, they "standoff" and stay in place.
Examples (click for captions)
Two units cannot simply trade places.
Three or more units can "rotate" (as shown in one of the examples), but two units can't just swap. There is a way around this using the Convoy order, which I'll cover later.
Examples
There are two kinds of unit: Army, and Fleet.
Armies can only occupy provinces, land. Fleets can only occupy coastal provinces, and water spaces. When a fleet occupies a coastal province, it is "on the coast", and can only move to other land spaces on the same coast.
Examples, and unique weird geography things
Support
This is the key move of Diplomacy. One unit, without moving itself, can "support" another unit, increasing its power, allowing for more interesting situations than a standoff. You can support your own units with other units, or you can support other players.
The more support a unit has, the more powerful it is. When two units of unequal power try to move into the same space, the more powerful unit succeeds, and the less powerful unit fails to move. If a more powerful unit tries to move into a space already occupied by a less powerful unit, the less powerful unit is dislodged. (unless it's already moving out at the same time)
You can support any unit's movement when you are adjacent to the place it is trying to move.
If I have a unit in Portugal, and my French buddy is going to try to move into English-occupied Spain from Gascony, I can lend support by saying "My fleet in Portugal supports the army in Gascony's movement into Spain" or "F Por S A Gas-Spa". Note that this only works if the army in Gascony actually tries to move to Spain. If Gascony does something else, or someone else tries to move into Spain, then your Support does nothing.
You can support a unit's "standing still" ability simply by being adjacent to it and ordering that support.
If I have a unit in Portugal, and I think France is going to try to push my English buddy out of Spain, I can lend support by saying "My fleet in Portugal supports the army in Spain" or "F Por S A Spa". This will make the army in Spain more resistant to being dislodged, as long as it doesn't try to move. If it's lending support elsewhere, or using a "convoy" order, then it is also holding position, so you can support that. If it's trying to move, however, your support order is invalid.
Support examples
Except, when I say "Adjacent" in those last two rules, I mean the support unit has to be capable of moving there itself.
Armies can't support movement to ocean spaces, and can't support a fleet holding an ocean space. Fleets can't support spaces they can't reach (for instance, because it is on the wrong coast).
There's also these two rules:
--A dislodged unit can still cause a standoff in a province other than the one that dislodged it.
--A dislodged unit, even with support, has no effect on the province that dislodged it.
Examples
If a unit is trying to give support somewhere, but is attacked from somewhere else, that support is "cut".
Examples
Convoy
To move an Army across bodies of water, you need to use a Fleet to "convoy" it. The army gets to skip over the water space to its destination in a single turn, but the fleet spends its turn using the Convoy order. Simply order the Army to move from its current territory to its destination, as if they were adjacent. Meanwhile the Fleet in the middle needs to be ordered to convoy that specific army to that specific destination.
To convoy an army from London, across the North Sea, to Norway, you would use these two orders: "Army in London to Norway" and "Fleet in North Sea Convoys Army in London to Norway". Or, to use the abbreviations, "A Lon-Nwy" and "F Nth C A Lon-Nwy".
You can attack into an occupied territory via convoy. But you'll need to get your support from yet ANOTHER unit, because the convoy itself does not count as support.
You can even chain multiple Convoys together, allowing an army to travel great distances in a single turn. Each fleet must name the same source and destination in their order. Players can convoy each other, with coordination -- but if you're expecting a convoy that doesn't happen, your army doesn't move.
--------
There are more rules to cover rare corner cases, but as a new player, you shouldn't have to worry about them until they become likely in-game. And they probably won't. Here's a full list of rules for order resolution.
Retreat and Disband phase
After all orders have been resolved, some units might have been "dislodged". Dislodged units aren't "dead", but have been forced from their location. Quickly, and without consultation, players should choose what to do with those units:
Disband: The unit is removed from the map. However, if you still have enough supply to maintain that many units, you will be able to rebuild it at the end of the year in one of your home Supply Centers.
Retreat: Move the unit to a neighboring unoccupied space. You can't move it to the space that its attacker came from. If two retreating units try to enter the same territory, they both disband instead.
Gaining and Losing Units phase
Every other turn (after the "Fall" turn), we resolve Supply for winter:
(1) Capture supply centers. Supply Centers are only captured after Fall turns. If you end a Spring turn in one, then move out, it remains with its original ownership.
(2) Count supply centers. Count your supply centers, and your units. If you have excess supply, you can build more units. If you have too little supply, you will have to choose units to disband.
(3a) Disbanding units. Simply choose which ones you want to disband, and they will be removed from the board.
(3b) Building units. To build a unit, you must have an empty HOME supply center that you still control. You may place an Army (or Fleets, on coastal provinces). If you have more than one extra supply, and enough places to build the units, you may build more than one.
Like with every other decision in Diplomacy, players write down their decisions simultaneously then reveal.
...
And that's the tutorial. If you have any questions, please ask! There are a lot of "what-if" questions that can pop up, and having answers for them will make the game more intuitive.
We'll have a thread in the Games forum, where I'll post a map with each turn, and announcements and things. You can also use the thread for any talk you'd do in public. Shit talk your opponents, bluff about your unbeatable strategy, make mysterious remarks, etc. For private talk, you can PM each other.
There will also be IRC for more interactive negotiations. When I played this game online, that was the absolute best, I highly recommend it. We can use a standard IRC server like synirc, or maybe set up camp on Rena's IRC server if she's cool with it.
Each turn will last about 2 days.
--You'll have 24-36 hours for a combined Diplomacy/Order-Writing phase. When you have time to play, discuss your intentions with each other and try to figure out what to do. PM your orders to me when you've decided. You can change your orders ONCE, and only before the deadline. This deadline will always be at 10pm PDT.
--I will then process the orders and produce the map for that turn.
--I will also try to get any Retreat/Disband decisions from players during this time. If you can't answer within 12 hours of my question, your units will automatically disband. As soon as everything is settled, I will post the map in the thread and the next turn will begin.
--After Fall turns, there will be the Gaining and Losing Units phase, or the "Winter" turn. This might eat away at the time allotted for next Spring, but if things are too rushed I will bump everything back a day when necessary.
When you PM each other, I ask you to please CC me! A lot of the fun of running this game comes from watching the players wheel and deal. On IRC, I will have a few "meeting rooms" set up where I'll be idling, and I'd love it if you used those so I can read the logs.
There will also be IRC for more interactive negotiations. When I played this game online, that was the absolute best, I highly recommend it. We can use a standard IRC server like synirc, or maybe set up camp on Rena's IRC server if she's cool with it.
Each turn will last about 2 days.
--You'll have 24-36 hours for a combined Diplomacy/Order-Writing phase. When you have time to play, discuss your intentions with each other and try to figure out what to do. PM your orders to me when you've decided. You can change your orders ONCE, and only before the deadline. This deadline will always be at 10pm PDT.
--I will then process the orders and produce the map for that turn.
--I will also try to get any Retreat/Disband decisions from players during this time. If you can't answer within 12 hours of my question, your units will automatically disband. As soon as everything is settled, I will post the map in the thread and the next turn will begin.
--After Fall turns, there will be the Gaining and Losing Units phase, or the "Winter" turn. This might eat away at the time allotted for next Spring, but if things are too rushed I will bump everything back a day when necessary.
When you PM each other, I ask you to please CC me! A lot of the fun of running this game comes from watching the players wheel and deal. On IRC, I will have a few "meeting rooms" set up where I'll be idling, and I'd love it if you used those so I can read the logs.
Sign up! You can specify a country, or I can randomly assign you somewhere.
Also, if you have any questions, post away.
Austria (red) -- bkamakaze
England (dk blue) -- Doctor Shemp
France (lt blue) -- Zyglrox Odyssey
Germany (black) -- Aposke
Italy (green) -- O-Card
Russia (white) -- Fluffi-dono
Turkey (yellow) -- Elgadika
