Re: Removing personality from Diplomacy?

From: bruno@cerberus.csd.uwm.edu (Bruno Wolff III)

Date: Fri, 18 Feb 1994 22:09:01 +0000

From article <2k2ihcINN3e8@hoss.summit.novell.com>, by skrenta@summit.novell.com (Rich Skrenta):
] Forgive my ignorance, but I just don't see the appeal of anonymous PBM.
] I thought the whole point was being in a game with lots of interesting
] people, working out cool negotiations with them, roleplaying your
] characters, etc.
]
] Even in a game with no roleplaying such as chess, I'd still want to
] know who my opponent was.  Would it be any fun to call up Compuserve,
] choose a MP chess game, and get connected to some random anonymous
] player?  You might as well be playing the computer.
]
] Could the failure of anonymous commercial games mean that they're
] just not as fun or interesting?
]
] --
] Rich Skrenta <skrenta@summit.novell.com>

One reason you might want annoymous players is to keep them from making
deals that only work when people play together over a number of games.
Many people like to play Diplomacy games as independent games with very
chaotic activities going on (lots of double crosses). This doesn't work
so well when people play together a lot. People will start to keep deals
that may hurt them in a current game expecting the other player to keep
similar deals in future games. This takes a lot of the chaos out of
Diplomacy and its not that great of a two sided wargame.
Another reason for limiting diplomatic tools is to allow computer players
to compete on a level playing field.

References

Re: Removing personality from Diplomacy?
skrenta@summit.novell.com (Rich Skrenta)
Fri, 18 Feb 1994 14:15:08 +0000