Diplomacy zine -- Chapter Four From: Eric_S_Klien@cup.portal.com Date: Sat, 16 Dec 1989 04:57:33 +0000 Issue #123 of ELECTRONIC PROTOCOL: Chapter One contains: NAVARONE, BLITZKRIEG, OPERATION OVERLORD, GETTYSBURG, and HMS HOOD And is published by daybell@aludra.usc.edu/Donald Daybell Chapter Two contains: DRAGONSLAYER, BISMARK, COLD WAR, JACAL, TRENCHFOOT, and VERSAILLES And is published by tedward@cs.cornell.edu/Ted Fischer Chapter Three contains: TANNENBURG, VERDUN, ENTENTE, MULHOUSE, and DAWN PATROL And is published by dragon@agora.hf.intel.com/Bill Wheeler (He has been compiling the chapters but has so far been unable to get them back to me. We are working on the problem.) ------------- Chapter Four ------------- Spring '05 of the game RATATOSK (BNC number 1989IJ) (GM is jall@diku.dk/Mogens Jallberg) Due Thursday December 21 Spring '05 of the game BUSHIDO (BNC number 1989IN) (GM is ronin@cory.berkeley.edu/Sam Parazette) I've tallied peoples opinions about what to do during christmas break (or rather the month break, in which I will be gone) and the consensus is to hold until I get back. So, beginning Dec. 20, BUSHIDO is on hold until Jan. 20. Autumn and Winter '03 of the game HUGO (BNC number 1989IO) (GM is willis@trwind.ind.trw.com/Willis Marti) Not Received. Autumn and Winter '02 of the game JUGGERNAUGHT (BNC number 1989IR) (GM is rdesper@eagle.wesleyan.edu/Rick Desper) Builds: Turkey England A Ankara A Edinburgh Russia Germany disbands A Kiel F Rum F StP Spring 02 due next Sunday. Still up in the air about moves after the next one...A number of the players would like to continue with a guest GM. I need everyone's opinion. Rick Spring '02 of the game TOKUGAWA (BNC number 1989IS) (GM is joseph_harold_thomas@cup.portal.com/Joseph Thomas) (Still missing Spring'01 results) Two players were replaced, game delayed. (One standby selected was about to go on vacation. Fun city!) Autumn and Winter '02 of the game PETAIN (BNC number 1989IT) (GM is ssmith@ms.uky.edu/Scott Smith) RETREATS: Turkish F Con disbands. English F Nwg retreats Cly. ----- BUILDS/DISBANDS: England: Disband A Lon Germany: Build A Kie Russia: Build F Sev, F StpN Turkey: Disband F Con ----- UNIT POSITIONS: Austria: A Ser Tus Tyr Ven F Adr Gre England: A F Cly Wal Yor France: A Bel Pic Mar F Ech Iri Germany: A Hol Kie Pie F Den Nth Italy: A Apu Rom F Ion Russia: A Arm Bul Fin F Bla Con Nwg Nwy Sev StpN Turkey: A Ank F Aeg ----- PRESS: (Con) From the Sultan's press Corp (our motto is "You've got to move to keep ahead of the news"). Serious street fighting has caused the Sultan and his harem to flee the capital. Tearful farewells were said to those loyal servant's who were asked to stay behind and cover his move. ---------- (Smy) The Sultan (in Winter quarters) sends a prophetic message to the strategy department of the Austrians. "You're next" ---------- England (AP): The Duke of Lavery, leader of the English Armies, has died of a heart attack. This will prompt the cancellation of his impending wedding to Queen Beulah, and the disbanding of the Duke's Army. Apologies go out to all the ambassadors who are on their way to London, but perhaps you could go and make other vacation plans. I here that the event to attend is the Octoberfest in Munich. ---------- MOSCOW: (Novosti Press) Constantinople has fallen. Russian forces from Bulgaria seized control of the Bosphorus, with support from the Black Sea fleet. In a surprise move, the newly commisioned Second Army (with Azerbaijaini reinforcements) liberated Armenia unopposed, as all Turkish troops there fled to Ankara. The Bulgarians have continued to be faithful allies, and the Turkish fleet was unable to land in Bulgaria. Prince Yakov Smirnoff returned to Moscow to relax during the Christmas season, after a very successful campaign against the infidel Turks. In recognition of the latest victories, Czar Rajeev IV has appointed Prince Smirnoff as the Viceroy of Turkey. His Imperial Majesty also made the following Proclamation: "I call upon the Turkish Government to surrender. Resistance to Russian forces is futile and can only lead to further bloodshed. As a gesture of peace, the Turkish navy may be allowed to retain one fleet which will serve as the vanguard of Russo-Turkish forces into the western waters. The Turkish Royal family will be unharmed, and the Sultan may be granted the Grand Duchy of Murmansk, with all the rights and privileges that the great Napoleon enjoyed at Elba." Later, the Czar was heard muttering to the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador that -- the Governorship of Eastern Siberia was still available to Emperor Wilhelm to comfortably retire to, -- Russia would accept Prince Herman as the new Austro-Hungarian ruler forthwith (and recognize his claims to Guyana, Brazil, and all other parts of South America), -- The Czar was willing to serve as Regent until Prince Herman came of age, -- A new fleet was being commissioned in Sevastopol and setting sail for Trieste to escort the Emperor on his way to Vladivostok, -- and (in case the Emperor preferred Cape Horn over Vladivostok in July), a regular steam boat service would be established between Vladivostok and Cape Horn. Oslo: Grand Duke Dmitri's delegation en route to the English Royal Wedding has made great progress. The vanguard of his forces has sighted land, and even the Kremlin Guards may be ashore this year. Yerevan: The Grand Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church has apologized for his earlier calls to dismiss Prince Smirnoff. Celebrating mass in the newly liberated capital of Armenia, the Grand Patriarch called the Prince "A Heroic Instrument of Divine Might", and asked that the Prince be dispatched to Greece to complete the reunification of the five Orthodox Churches of Moscow, Yerevan(Armenia), Sofia, Constantinople and Greece. In Moscow, the Prince is believed to have reacted by suggesting the Grand Patriarch spend the rest of his days on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and offered to provide His Holiness an escort through Syria. Vaduz: The Russian Ambassador to Poland today categorically rejected the Prince's call for a weapons-free zone in Central Europe. He insinuated that the Prince was serving as an unwitting tool of the rebellious Polish group, Solidarsnoc. While the Ambassador was speaking to the Press in Vaduz, Russian troops occupied all public squares in Warsaw and other important Polish cities. Strict censorship has been imposed on all news from Warsaw. ---------- The Leech'n'Sting Tatler ------------------------ Marsielles - Our correspondent correctly predicted a military build up here, except she could not tell the difference between an army and a fleet. Warsaw - Our Marsielles correspondent has noted unusually high troop manouvers here, but this time will insist that no fleets are being built here. The British Isles - Tourist arrivals this year will be at an all-time high. Spring Fashion Preview: Coffee and Danish will be out the Kuerfurstendamm, Swedish pancakes will be trendy. Summer '02 of the game DUNKIRK (BNC number not known) (GM is sjzwange@phoenix.princeton.edu/Steven Jacob Zwanger) Not recieved. Publisher comments: Despite having a record 140 active players, I am having problems due to the winter vacations. If you think that you would like to standby, please let me know! I have enough people for another game but I don't want to start games without a sufficient pool of standby players. Also remember that signing up for my variants of gunboat, blind, 1914, and classic Diplomacy would also be helpful. ********************************************************* Scribed by code name Video Dienstag/CS107124@YUSOL.BITNET ********************************************************* Taken from Springboard #31 (Published in England): I told you last month that I would spend some time during my holiday writing an article about how "Springboard" gets produced. I spent a lot of time during my holiday writing not just that article but an awful lot more. I'll grant you that correcting the "First Two Seasons" articles wasn't so much fun, but writing the others WAS an enjoyable way to spend a holiday. We did a lot of other things besides. So, here is the article. If it is long-winded, detailed and repetitious, then that's your problem, not mine. ******************************* How "Springboard" Gets Produced ******************************* None of this can possibly be exact; while some things have to be done in a certain order, others change each month, and even where the same order of events occurs, they get done in slightly different ways each time. That's how life is in the real world ... This article can't be extrapolated to cover zine production in general either; every zine is different, and a large proportion of the zines of the hobby are printed by litho by professional printers. There are massive differences all round. So ... Let's imagine that Springboard "x" was posted to subscribers and traders a couple of days ago. Let's imagine also (rather unrealistic, this one) that no mistakes have been made, so no corrections have to be sent out pronto. Relief. For a week or so (if we're lucky) we're left to simply live life. Whoopee!! Always within two weeks, someone sends in a set of orders or letter, or both. If it's mine rather than Kath's, it gets dated immediately. The stamp is removed. Ordinary, franked, British stamps I collect for the RNLI. (Foreign stamps my son Stephen, collects for himself, though, unfortunately, precious few.) During this time before orders pour in, I try to get one or more new articles typed into the computer and saved onto a floppy disc. This particular job is always an on/off thing stretching throughout the period between deadlines. Orders and letters start to come in. The orders, where possible, are entered into the computer. If it's not possible to do this immediately, the order sheet gets put into a "pending" tray. (Our home is an office in more ways than one!) Once these orders, and any others in since, have been entered onto the computer, the order sheet is filed: one folder per game, one "pocket" per season inside the folder. A new pocket is brought forward with each new season. On the front of the folder is a matrix showing the names of the players in the game, one beneath the other, and the seasons along the top, one column per season. As orders are filed, the relevant box is ticked off against season and name. As letters are received, they are read and I consider automatically whether to publish or not, and vaguely what comments to make, if any. I enter letters onto the computer when I can, just like the orders, putting my answers and/or comments then and there if I can. Money! Soon after the last issue went out, we produced from our spreadsheet a list of subscribers whose credit is below the limit -- yours is shown on your copy in red -- and that list is stuck inside our "Blue Book" (our manual-entry Accounts book). Kath calls this list the "naughty list". For me it's the "default list". Either way we have an at-a-glance list of who won't receive their next issue unless they cough up some money. When you send me money, it is recorded in the Blue Book, and in another book on a separate list which is started afresh after each payment to the building society. They are our fail-safe record of who has paid what and when. If we forget to record in either book, we have to go back to the letter or set of orders on which mention was first made of the payment. This is why it is helpful when you write your personal number on the letter, or, if you send the money with your orders, to write the fact at the top of your order form rather than sending a separate letter with the orders. Trades. Read, and note anything of use or interest, especially where there is hobby news. Envelopes. Get a pile of up to 200 envelopes C5 size. Get my stamp made from a John Bull Printing set (that was a devil of a job to find!) Stamp my own address on the back flap of each and every. Stamp Springboard logo on front, top left, of each and every one. Consider yet again, a way of mechanizing this job. During the Week Leading Up to Deadline -------------------------------------- I take the game folders one at a time, and bring a season pocket forward. I get an adjudication card from the set, and draw lines on the blank side. The lines mark the boundaries between each player's orders. I then write a list on the back of the card showing each player's Supply Centre count. Orders are coming in daily now, sometimes with publishable letters, sometimes not. Date each, remove the stamp from the envelope, read the letters, glance through the orders. Note misorders, curse at orders which are written a) along the lines, next to each other (as published in Springboard), instead of one below the other b) using the full names of units and areas, because they have to be studied instead of being taken in at a glance. Have a vague think about how these orders might fit into the game. Where time permits, enter some or all of these orders/letters onto the relevant section of the computer programme. Thursday: The Night Before Deadline ------------------------------------ Wait for phoned orders. After entering them on the computer (which will not necessarily be immediately), find game file, tick off to show receipt (with a "ph" to show a phoned order -- I don't like orders by phone, they create extra work). During that evening I may or may not be adding more to the computer store, or various other odd jobs connected. Friday: Deadline! ------------------ An absolute mountain of post, which is generally ignored until I've had a rest from work. It also depends on whether Kath went shopping during the day. If not, then we go out together to get the shopping. Which means no letters get opened until after Kath has gone out to her church choir because I've been busy cooking our tea. So, finally, between 7:30 and 8:00, I get to opening envelopes: date on everything as I go, one pile of orders, one of letters, any money along with what it came in. Stamps off letters, to go into the bag (small plastic bank bag) for the RNLI. Everything into a single pile until I'm ready for the mammoth task of entering onto the computer. Maybe I do that immediately, maybe ignore because phone rings/door knocks/watch TV. Enter orders onto computer, including *all* press, conditional or otherwise. This will take up at least 2 hours, including all outstanding orders not previously entered: everything has to be checked against the originals. And mistakes STILL creep in! If there's time, and I have the inclination, more letter or parts of get entered and answered. Answers are given as I enter the letters unless something needs careful thought. (Then I have to be careful to remember to do it at all.) Rules queries get priority. Those orders, having been entered on computer, are taken downstairs to be filed and ticked off. This way I have an at-a-glance record or orders received. Saturday -------- Morning. More orders received? Check postmark and stamp. Mark orders as to whether acceptable. Date anyway. Whether or not I work on Springboard today depends on domestic arrangements, and the zine usually takes a back seat for most of the day. Evening. Finish entering any orders onto computer, any letters -- and answer them. Rules queries get priority, and will be answered even if received after deadline. Other letters will, depending on interest value and time available. Check on Hobby News. Check which zines are due for review, and on available info on these. Each review can take up to half an hour to write: how to say nice things about a reasonably decent zine that some of you may well enjoy, which doesn't have *any* of the things I personally like to read. If there's still time on Saturday evening, I start writing orders from the originals onto the file cards previously ruled. These cards, one per season, are my basic record of orders received and the adjudication. Sunday ------ Late morning. Carry on writing orders on cards, around 2 hours' work. There is no point in trying to start adjudicating while there's activity around the house -- total concentration is needed. In any case, there's a meal to be prepared, and Kath and I share the cooking between us (her, me, or both). In between times, I do any of the other little jobs that need finishing, e.g., orders, letters, articles, and if none of those things are needed, I am actually available to do some things in the Real World. Evening. Dip board out. Oldest game out. Start adjudicating. This takes anything from a half hour per game to 2 hours and more per game: Set up board from last season's map, pencil and ruler ready. Read through entire set of orders with occasional glances at the board. (This gives me the feel of the season.) Underline glaring stand-offs, glaring misorders, glaring nso's, nsu's Back to the start and work through again, carefully, underlining, asterisking, bracketing, as I go, in pencil. At the end, either start again, or home in on specific problems, or both. Spring Season: draw a map, put the folder away, start a new game. Autumn Season: Turn over the card and start checking on Centres which have been won or lost. Check back to original orders for retreats, disbands, builds. Now draw a map. Get the folder and on the cover matrix write in the new Supply Centre count alongside the ticks. Put the folder away, start a new game. Four adjudications in an evening is my maximum unless I happen to be very fresh, or they are easy: maintenance of concentration can mean the difference between getting irate phone calls and not getting irate phone calls ... because a justified call means I have to correct an adjudication: 19p postage per player, plus stationery, plus my time! When I stop adjudicating during any given evening ... check "Back Page" information, "Front Page" statistics, start entering this month's accounts onto the Spreadsheet, start entering completed adjudications onto computer. Or even sit down and watch the box! More often than not, I have work to do for school, and during turnaround week that takes a back seat -- but even so, it sometimes has to be done during that time. Meanwhile, in some spare half hour, Kath and I check through the names and addresses between Blue Book and Database: temporary addresses are most awkward, so it's helpful if they get written on your orders sheet before the press (Easily found, and all that.) During all this time, Kath is doing similar things with her games and correspondence for her subzine which also has its place on the computer programme. Opening Comments, Articles, Hobby News, Letters, Games, Kath's Bit -- all are finished in basic form. Hopefully it's now no later than Wednesday or Thursday. So now I take an entire evening: I put each section into its rightful place on the programme, one piece at a time, putting in my own comments where continuity is necessary. Almost invariably I have to make changes in individual items. This idea of creating the zine on computer does have its problems, as those of you with word processors will understand. If you haven't and don't, here's a brief explanation: The computer "file" is continuous: a long file will "scroll" in the exact manner of the credits at the end of a television programme. The difference is that on the computer file, a word, line paragraph, any amount of text, can be removed at any point. But when it is removed, all that is "below" jumps up to fill the space. The file is divided into pages with a line across to show the bottom of the page. Now if I've got 35 pages of Springboard with a game spaced half across p25 but everything else correctly placed, I've got a major problem: that one game HAS to be moved down to start at the top of the page below. Result? Empty space above, where part of the game was, and a lot of games below are themselves spread between pages. Answer? Either leave lots of empty spaces that must be filled by banal chat and which make the zine longer because everything was moved down, or cut out Press somewhere. A combination of both is what usually happens. Which is why I get irate letters complaining that their wonderful press item got chopped, and who do I think I am acting as self-appointed board of censors. Well, chums, where I can leave it, I do, and where I can't, tough. This juggling can take a couple of hours and more. It's midnight, and I've had enough. We've now got to the second half of the first week (maybe even further), and next evening, having completed the juggling, having left the necessary empty spaces for the stencils sent in by Outside GMs (they have to have standard headings added) and having made sure that the back page is complete and tacked on to the end, I can start actually producing stencils. An entire evening's work again: each stencil takes 5-10 minutes (put in printer, switch on, take out), and multiply that by the number of stencils, one per side of paper, and that is one hell of a long time. While they are cutting, as each relevant stencil is finished, I use a stylus to cut the section heading: Articles, The Hobby, etc. The "Issue Number" gets cut on a separate stencil, ready for the Front Page, but that can't be done yet because I can't do the Contents until the stencils are cut and I know what is on which page. That in itself is an hour at least, and may be done the same evening, but far more likely the next evening. And we come to that "next evening", and I've hopefully managed to get the Contents done early and that Front Page stencil cut. I can then go over to Kath's church where I have a little room all to myself, full of: electric duplicator, shelves full of stationery, and piles of boxes full of books and filling half the room. Reason for boxes of books: Kath and I run a "used books" stall at her Autumn Fayre each year. The ready-cut stencils are brought to this room for duplication, usually about 190 copies: subscribers, players, traders, enquirers. This printing job takes a good 3-4 hours ... the longer the issue, the longer to print. Another evening gone. We might have reached the weekend (second after deadline). If we have, then I'd better get the stamps. If not, it's Friday, and I can get the stamps tomorrow, but I have an evening of collating and stapling ahead of me: the dining room table covered in 30-40 piles of paper. Pick up top sheet of each in sequence, collect together, shuffle straight, staple the corner: one complete copy of Springboard. Full speed is impossible all the time, so the average speed is around 2 minutes per copy. Only another 189 copies to do! So ... now we know the size, and therefore weight of this issue, and hence we know the postage cost. Thus, this month's total cost. This information is first written manually into the Blue Book, and then entered onto the computer Spreadsheet: the calculation is made of everyone's new credit level. A printout is made of the resulting figures, which are then written manually into the Blue Book (I dread to think of the consequences of losing that notorious Blue Book!). All that was done, if possible, by Kath, while I'm duplicating, collating, stapling. Calculate this month's total cash withdrawal from the building society: costs of production, envelopes, rule-book and map orders, game fees and stamps. Withdraw cash, and buy stamps. Print out address labels for subscribers and traders: half hour. FINAL MAJOR JOB ----- ----- --- Take a copy of Springboard, write on it the new credit (in red if it's debit next time), plus any Personal Comment. Fold copy, along with any flyer to be enclosed, and push into envelope - the longest and trickiest job of this series -- and seal envelope. Remove address label from sheet. Stick on envelope. Remove stamp from sheet, lick, stick on envelope. Throw envelope on floor as the start of the pile. Mark off matrix square in Blue Book, and move onto next person. Irish subscribers first, then non-playing subscribers (2nd class), then players. When all are done, some 5 hours later, the next job. 140 envelopes to the local post office, or to various boxes around the area. Return home. Same enveloping job for Traders' copies (though this may be done a day of two later). Post these. Back to the Spreadsheet to delete all information bar the present credits. Transfer this month's letters to the "dead letters" files. Finis!! (Until next month.) ******************************************** Scribed by Paul Caniff/uunet!microsoft!paulc ******************************************** Taken from the Pouch #53: THE GOOD OLD DAYS IN GRAUSTARK by John Boardman Twelve years ago I lived in the Long Island community of Jamaica, just a block from a branch of Macy's. At some time in 1961, Macy's had apparently placed a large order with Allan Calhamer for Diplomacy sets. This was in the days when Calhamer was marketing the game himself, out of an apartment stacked high with long maroon boxes. It was not until that year, two years after the first production of the game, that copyright was bought by Games Research, Inc. At first glance I was interested in Diplomacy, which unlike most "war" games then available reproduces the situation of an actual historical war, and which has no element of chance in it. It also occurred to me that the game would lend itself to postal play. Although I bought a Diplomacy set in 1962, it was not until the following year that I set in motion my plan to introduce postal Diplomacy. Byt that time I had married, moved to Manhattan, and bought a Gestetner 120 silkscreen mimeograph. I still have both the wife and the Gestetner, which are now domiciled in Brooklyn. My original plan for postal DIplomacy is one that has been maintained to this day. I envisaged seven players, making alliances by mail among themselves, and mailing their moves to me by stated deadlines. I would adjucate the moves according to the Diplomacy rules, print up the results, and mail them out to the players and any other interested persons. At about that time, through science-fiction fandom, I met Fred Lerner, then a Columbia freshmen and member of the DEast Paterson Diplomacy Club. The EPDC met regularly in that New Jersey town to play a wild, free-swiinging variety of over-the-board Diplomacy, which invariable began with a seven-power non-agression pact. I had also just described Diplomacy in my science-fiction fanzine KNOWABLE, and this description also elicited a few inquiries. In May 1963 GRAUSTARK #1 accordingly went out to about 25 people on the EPDC and KNOWABLE mailing lists. The most diligent inquiries failed to bring in more than five people interested in a game. Accordingly, GRAUSTARK #2 announced the country assignments for a five-man game unde rthe then existing rules, according to which Russia and Turkey were the two unplayed cpuntries. GRAUSTARK was chosen as a name from George Barr McCutcheon's popular 1901 novel about intrigue in a small easter Europoean country. This choice of a name from a fictional country has been followed by other postal Diplomacy plublications extant and extinct: RURITANIAN, from Anthony Hope's novels of the same period; WILD 'N' WOOLY and TRANTOR from planets in well-known science-fiction stories; FREEDONIA from and old Marx Brothers film; BROBDINGNAG from Swift; EREWHON from Samuel Butler's "Erewhon"; etc., etc. Many features of the early GRAUSTARK have since become standard in postal DIplomacy. With the "Spring 1901" moves of the first game, three plaers submitted press releases. The first press releases were fairly straightforward announcements of troop movements. It was only later that the became grandiose, fantastic, satirical, or didactic. The first game, involving three EPDC memebr and two others, was won by Derek Nelson, who remained for several years one of the most active Diplomacy fans. The major element in Nelson's victory as Italy was another player who tried to program a computer to make his moves. His collapse so enriched Italy that victory was a matter of only twelve moves. From then on things came with a rush. RURITANIA was founded by TV scriptwriter Dave McDaniel in September 1963 with the first seven-man postal Diplomacy game. WILD 'N' WOOLY was founded by Charles Brannan in the following month. Other early bulletins wre FREEDONIA (now also merged with GRUSTARK) and BROBDINGNAG. WILD 'N' WOOLY was the first postal Diplomacy fanzine to carry more than one game at a time. Another important innovation came in 1966, when publishers began printing a player's name in parenthesis after the name of his country. This greatyly facilitated following the progress of a game. From its first game GRAUSTARK has indicated impossible moves by underlining them. Other game-masters use a convention introduced by Brannan, printing successful moves in capital letters and others in minuscules. Most Diplomacy zines list at the end of each game year the supply centers owned by each player; in _sTab_ this listing was made more exact by underlining newly acquired centers and printing newly lost ones with slash marks through them, e.g. [ed note: the example does not translate to plain ASCII very well!]. GRAUSTARK deadlines (including those for the "Winter" builds and removal following "Fall" moves) were until last March two-week intervals. This made it one of the fastest Diplomacy zines; WILD 'N' WOOLY once experimented with a nine-day deadline but found it impracticable. With the increasing deterioration fo the United States Postal Service, the two-week deadline becaome impracticable, and in 1973 GRAUSTARK and most other two-week Diplomacy buttelins went over to a three-week schedule. When the old Post Office Department was replaced by the semi-private USPS, the last vestiges of public accountability disappeared, and the soaring postal rate increases have been accompanied by a severe decline in the quality and frequency of mail pick-up and delivery. The forthcoming rate increase to 10 cents per ounce, and the shift to thrice-weekly delivery, will further damage the efficiency of postal war-gaming. GRAUSTARK, like other Diplomacy bulletins, carries articles on the play of the game. These range from comments on general strategy to such specific points as how to construct alliances for Austria-Hungary, how to negotiate by mail, or how to build a defensible stalemate position. Most of these articles are written by readers; though I have been involved with Diplomacy for seven years and enjoy it, I am not a particularly good player. Early GRAUSTARKs were small in size; a five-page issue mailed on 25 January 1964 was proudly billed as "the largest postal Diplomacy fanzine ever published." Two pages was then the more general rule. It was only when GRAUSTARK had a very crowded letter column that this size was increased. Subsequently GRAUSTARK expanded further to include book reviews, two serials, and the publisher's comments on both the game and real-life international intrigues. Now a 12-page issue is produced on every third Saturday, so that its mailing weight is just under one ounce. By the spring of 1964 the number of postal Diplomacy fans had increased to the point where a second bulletin was printed to accomodate a second game. This bulletin, FREEDONIA, ran for 14 months and 28 issues, or until the game contained in it ended. By this time it was obvious that there is no reason why a bulletin cannot carry more than one game at once, and so FREEDONIA was merged back into GRAUSTARK. The same thing happened when the original publisher abandonded RURITANIA; I took over its publication until the game ended, and then merged it with GRAUSTARK. Originally I had tried to keep track of postal Diplomacy by assigning a number to each game, publishing periodic lists of players, and giving brief summaries of the completed games. However by 1966 this job became too much for me. I passed it on to Charles Wells, who in turn sent it on to John Koning. It is now handled very competently by Conrad von Metzke, who has recently assigned the thousandth of the "Boardman Numbers." Von Metzke's EVERYTHING now keeps up to date a master list of postal Diplomacy games and players, and assigns the Numbers. These designations consist of the year in which the game began, followed by a letter or letters chronological in order. For example, the first game begun in 1973 was 1973A. After 1973Z came 1973AA through 1973AZ, and so on. This is the same system used by astronomers to designate new comets as they are discovered. Other postal Diplomacy bulletines have tried numerous variants, but GRAUSTARK has stuck fairly close to the original game. This includes the Calhamer rules as modified in 1971; other game-masters have furthe rmodified them in their publications. Two variants have been introduced briefly in GRAUSTARK: a team game in which, with Turkey eliminated, three players played three countries slected by lot against another team governing the other three countries; and a game which set the actual Entente Powers of 1914 against the actual Central Powers. In this latter version, countires which remained neutral in the actual First World War remained neutral on the board, and beginning with "Fall 1917" an American army lands in Europe each year. Neither variant proved viable. In 1972 I looked over James Dunnigan's new game Origins of World War II, published by Avalon-Hill, and decided to expand my war-gaming repertory to include it. Based on Diplomacy fandom's experience with the postal game, Dunnigan inclded a system for postal play of this game. On 26 February I revived FREEDONIA in a second volume for the postal play of this game. However, Originas never caught on as vigorously as did Diplomacy, and after 14 months I re-merged FREEDONIA back into GRAUSTARK. GRAUSTARK still carries postal Origins games, but the greater simplicity of Origins and its negotiating system has less appeal for war-gaming fans. The serials began in GRAUSTARK #93 (12 June 1966)with the first installment of "The Adventures of Secret Agent O-O-Hate." O-O-Hate, a combination of James Bond and Batman, disguises his identity as a mild-mannered comic book collector, but is actually the top field agent of an unnamed government agency dedicated to getting another war going again. Aided by his teen-age assistan Burner (who was compounded out of two conservative GRAUSTARK reades named Turner and Lerner) he rushes about the country frustrating the efforts of the Sinister Forces of World Peace to undermine the American Way of War. Antoehr serial, "Brief History of the Grand Duchy of Beaucouillon" dealt with one of many imaginary countries which have appeared in the pages of postal Diplomacy bulletines. Unlike Rod Walker's Poderkagg or Terry Kuch's Grand Duchy and People's Republic or Hernia, Beaucoullon comes from outside the Diplomacy field. This miniscule country on the Mediterranean shore first appeared in the pornographic novels of the American writer whose pseudonym is "Akbar del Piombo." Both serials are long gone, and the former in particular represented a phase of radical anti-war agitation on the part of the author. The events of October 1973 brought this phase to an abrupt close by demonstrating what happens to people who think that they know better than the President of the United States. In particular, the cause of peace now seems to be about as viable as the cause of the Royal Stuarts. The chief feature of 1969 in postal Diplomacy was contests. Any game-master with specialized knowlege in some field would throw at his readers a number of questions: identify the Loket Republic, name the last King of Ireland, give a complete list of the Kings of Siunik, name the fictional work in which the Republic of Gondour appeared, tell what U.S. President was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. (Answers are: 1. An ephemral state which existed in Byelo-Russia during the Nazi occupattion; 2. George V of England, of course; 3. Go ask Rod Walker; 4. "The Curious Republic of GonDour" by Mark Twain; 5. Harry S. Truman.) In its eleventh year of publication GRAUSTARK has settled into a fairly comfortable routine. Gone are the variant games, the oversize issues, the attempt at a player rating system (which I now feel to be futile), the rosters of current games, the occasional dittography when a mimeo broke down, and the two-page issues. The typical 1974 issue of GRAUSTARK is 12 pages long, carries some half-dozen games of Diplomacy and Origins, and is otherwise filler with press releases, book reviews, strategy articles, over-the-board games, and miscellany. I would like to get into some of the Simulations Publications games insofar as they lend themselves to postal play, and have just begun a tournament form of the Fall of Rome game, based on an idea by John van de Graaf. I am enjoying moderating this zine, keep that mail coming! Eric Klien Up