Warring States Variant (STARTED)

[TTBen]

I took a little break from the site and as I came back I was looking for suggestions from forum players as to what variants they would like to see run. While I'm working up 2-3 of these I think that Warring States is ready to go for me and I wanted to go ahead and reach out and gauge interest in it......

Warring States
A Variant for Seven Players


Introduction
Starting in November, I'm looking to GM another game of Warring States Diplomacy. This will be the second session of this variant played on the forum so far (see prior game in the archive). I was invited to use a previously existing Discord channel (Discord Server) specifically for this variant in order to try to bring some interest from playdiplomacy to this game. The admin for the site is “tap wature” and he was gracious enough to share his map files with me, though pointed out it was created by the variant creator, Samy Elias (zurn). The rules and map will be the same as those used for his game unless otherwise noted:

Warring States DipWiki Page (RULES)

Most of the rules are covered on the page linked above, please read those first but I am going to copy some important points that were made when this variant was previously run that give a general summary as well.

Walls
To sum up, Walls only come into play when attacking an occupied territory that has a wall along it's border with the attacking or attack-supporting unit. The attack is then reduced by one. Walls don't affect the units of the occupying power. A attack of zero doesn't cut any supports.

Fleets
To sum up, you can't build fleets, you convert armies into fleets. The conversion takes a season and can be interrupted by a successful attack. Don't try to convoy. If you give a fleet an order that can only be carried out by an army, the fleet will convert into an army and attempt to carry it out in the same season.

Floating Fortress
To sum up, fleets on rivers (or moving to rivers) are twice as powerful, they defend with 2, when attacking a river from a river or sea (not coastal) territory they attack with 2 and cut 2 supports. You'll need to cut 2 supports (using a supported attack on the fleet) to negate the supports of a fleet supporting in that situation.

Rapid River Movements
So to sum up, Fleets using the river can move multiple spaces (limit 3) along the river, but all rapid movement must be along the river (sea space at the mouth of the river is ok). The fleet moving rapidly moves at a strength of zero so the path must be free of conflict for it to successfully make it. Any conflict stops the fleet at the last legal space prior to conflict. Your own units don't block the fleet's movement provided there is no conflict and the fleet has a space to move past it to. If the fleet is wholly unsuccessful then it defends it's original space as normal.

[TTBen]

House Rules
Recruitment
I'm welcoming to new players, but I also prefer some experience. I’d love to have some players with experience playing this variant and some who are new to it. I will plan to talk on Discord with players prior to game start a few times to help identify responsive players who will make the game more enjoyable and attempt to minimize NMRs. Also, players with a known reliable track-record in forum or site games I have been involved in are more likely to be invited. This is not a first come first served sign-up, I want players who are reliable. All players are welcome to join my reserves list and those not selected will be considered as in game replacements; there's probably going to be at least one replacement needed.

Assignments
I’ve run some more complex arrangements for country selection but I want to keep this one simple to get going. All players will rank all countries 1 to 7. I will then look at all choices in order to find the lowest possible combination of rankings which will determine the country selection for everyone. In the event of a tie among ranking combinations I will break the tie using a random number generator.

Deadlines/Delays
The game begins in 450 BCE. Deadlines will be: 2/1/1 and will be designed to always fall on the same day of the week. Even if the retreat is not needed that time is still observed (Spring turns=Thursday; Spring Retreats=Friday; Fall turns=Sunday; Fall retreats=Monday; Builds=Tuesday). I may process retreat or build phases earlier if they are ready (remaining time added to next phase), but I will never post a spring or fall early. My deadlines will always be at 9:00 pm New York time without exception. I will aim to send out a 24 hour reminder and possibly more reminders if I do not have orders since I believe that NMRs ruin the game for everyone. The reminders are not a guarantee and not getting a reminder is not an excuse for an extension.
All reasonable requests for delays will be accepted if proposed BEFORE a turn begins, including requests to skip weekend processing. This means requesting a delay for Fall 448 BCE in the Spring 448 BCE for example (earlier is even better). Requests for delays after a turn has begun will only be granted in an emergency. However, I reserve the right to grant a grace period delay for the competitiveness of the game when orders are missing (see NMRs/Players Leaving Section). If a grace period is granted I will attempt to combine retreat and build phase time if possible in order to get us back on the desired daily schedule.

Orders should be submitted through DISCORD ONLY. Provisional orders are encouraged and you may change orders as many times as you want before the deadline. I will only look at this last order submitted, so all order sets must be complete and in one single message. For clarity sake I encourage you to label each order with the appropriate season (not required) and to write out the full name of the provinces as much as possible. If orders cannot be determined from context then they will be modified to HOLD orders.

As an experiment, once the deadline for orders has passed (assuming no grace period is needed) I will immediately post the text file of all orders before proceeding to adjudication. Even if it takes me longer to get the actual map up I feel that this will give you a quicker idea of what actually happened since most of you can figure out the adjudication. Nothing is official from this posting until the actual maps are posted. If this is not working I reserve the right to stop posting orders before adjudication.

Once maps and adjudication are posted I encourage all players to review them and let me know as soon as possible if you see an error, I am only human and subject to making errors. Once the next spring/fall turn has been processed any error will stand as processed. In the event of conflict between the written adjudication and the map, the written adjudication will take precedent and the map will be corrected. I may grant an extension of the deadline for the current turn if errors are discovered but this is not guaranteed.

NMRs/Players Leaving
A player who NMRs on the first turn will be permanently replaced.
A total of 2 NMRs will result in a player being permanently replaced.
NMRs in build or retreat phases will result in ½ NMR.
You will automatically receive a grace period of 24 hours for missing orders after turn 1 for up to 2 times, which will only result in ½ NMR if orders are received within that 24 hours.
If a player leaves or NMRs out of the game, I will pause the game in order to find a replacement
It is not my responsibility to find you a sub if you will be away. I will do all that I can to help in order to keep the game moving, but if the task is left entirely to me then the player will not be a sub but instead a permanent replacement.

game Endings
As stated on the rules page, there are 38 Supply Centres; 18 are needed to win. If there is a tie at 18, play continues until one power has more than the other, or until a draw is agreed on. All draws must include all survivors and are voted on secretly. In the event of a solo, there will be one winner and five losers. In the event of a draw, I will rank all surviving and eliminated players by total SC count or year of elimination. The size of the draw will be irrelevant. As this isn't an a scored game in actuality, there are no points attached to that rank; it's listed instead for posterity (and to discourage draw-whittling). Draw proposals will expire after one full movement phase from the time proposed (not counting the phase in which it is proposed)

GMs Decisions
All GM decisions are FINAL, however I will agree to consult with other PbF GMs to settle any issues that are unclear by my rules.

[TTBen]

Interested Players
1. Wobbly
2. Commander Tomalak
3. Henlo
4. Civility
5. Lornian (djoledada)
6. EpicDim
7.
8.
9.
10.

[W0bbly]

I'm interested!

[CommanderTomalak]

Just finished up a massive amount of busywork, so put me down as well - I am interested.

I've been busy but can and will be much more reliable. I hope Wobbly at least can vouch?

[W0bbly]

If my endorsement means anything, CommanderTomalak is top-notch. Reliable and active!

[0wl]

I'd be happy to play this. Looks interesting.

[henlo]

I’m interested

[TTBen]

Wobbly has joined the Discord server but I don't believe any of the rest of you have yet. I'll add people to the list above as they make it into Discord

[Civility]

This looks really fun!

Count me in