Hey, all!
The internet is home to several excellent diplomacy communities, and sadly, there isn't as much overlap between those communities as there should be. Luckily for all of us, I (with the help of friendly Playdip mod Skidmarks/Tarsier) am about to change that and give you a fun tournament to play in in the process. You'll recognize the format as being similar to the GFDT we've had in the past, but there's going to be an added focus on giving you all the chance to play with the top players from other sites, most of whom you've likely never had the pleasure of facing before.
The rules are as follows:
The tournament will be played in three rounds, with each player playing two games in each round. Games will all be played at webDiplomacy on the original Diplomacy map (Classic), and will be fully anonymous, full press with 36-hour phases and 5-point buy-ins. Games in the same round will start two weeks apart so that players aren't starting two games at once, and care will be taken to mix players from different sites in games so that everyone has a chance to experience unfriendly faces and new playstyles. If a player receives the same country assignment in both games in a round, the second game's country assignments will be shuffled.
A player's score in a game will be his or her final supply center count plus 420/draw size for a draw or 420 for a solo. Rounds will be seeded initially by site ranking and then by previous round's score in rounds after the first. Ties will be broken by seeding. Depending on the number of players, 14 or 27 with the highest scores will advance from the first round to the semifinal round, and then seven will advance from the semifinal round to the final round.
Each player will be allowed one pause per game lasting up to one week without question. Any further pauses must be agreed upon by everyone, and it is recommended that account sitters be found if such a situation arises. Games will also be paused to prevent NMR when possible, but any player who NMRs or is saved from NMRing twice will be replaced.
Sign up here: http://goo.gl/forms/uXfRzyIHjC