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@Redd Baron

You are on a good path here. Personally, I wouldnt bat an eyelid to attack a (proven) NAP breaker while having a NAP myself with said person, obviously if I am powerful enough to do so. I dont think anyone with a morsel of honor in him would view such an action as dishonorable. In such a case, the casus belli comes quite natural within the flow of the game, and my experience that 90% of the players are honorable when it comes to NAPs.

I always try to remember less-then-honest players, and I either try to go around them (nap or alliance wise) unless I absolutely am desperate, and even then I keep a very close eye on them.

What I mean is, because 90% is honorable, things tend to be solved ingame, without a real need for rules in regard to that. Its for the same reason, I make the distinct difference between the coalition NAP (abusable in a number of ways) and a regular one (WH posted or secret, makes no real difference). In regard to secret NAPs, I tend to believe screenshots being a true form of evidence. I doubt that someone would go through great lengths to manipulate screenshots with a Paint-like program. May be naive, but saves me the pain of thinking about it

Additionally, I will always strive to have rules only there, if it otherwise too unclear how to play a PL game. Everything that can be decided by 'ingame means' is something I would rethink 3 times before advocating something as a rule.

I hope people mean what I write here, I am aware it may come across as a bit fuzzy.

hello, i was playing from mobile and by mistake im doubting that i pressed the gold button on the market to by money which i dont need, im not sure how i can check that?or if u guys can see it? but if you do, this was a mistake and if u can see what i did buy i can repay it or do whatever u decide to fix it in case that happened. I just like the PL league its great and i would like to play by the rules so i thought i should say about what happened to stay clear.

@miech,

Yes I believe we are in close agreement in principle. Either your post was too fuzzy, or we may still be apart in how to apply those principles in game. Just to explain I will give a real game example with the names removed so no one feels personally attacked or flamed.

Here is a private message from a player who broke a NAP with me, along with an apology:

anon wrote:

yea a few hours early bud, sry .. don't normally do this but i've been catching horrible flak.

However, what do you suppose he wrote publicly in the newspaper?

anon wrote:

the multiple offenses comment is B S, i only did it last month to wildL cause of his rudeness, control & dictator tactics. ALL other games i was fine ASK Ordo66 he played with me in them and as an Ally., so throw those comments out the window ... smh

Plenty enough to try and maybe talk to other neighbors and try to get some to attack the guy one would think right? At least 2 honor rules breakages and potentially a 3rd hard rule breakage depending how the mods rule?

Let's see what they said when I contacted them.

anon wrote:

I had no idea..I tried to be as much out of the diplomacy as possible this time around!

anon wrote:

I'm sorry, I heard your complaints, but I wasn't involved in those conversations or the details of the NAP's. anon didn't comment yet, I believe. It sounds like a complicated case.

Either way, I will not break my personal honor by breaking a very plain and simple NAP. Imp.Russia broke a NAP on me in a previous game, and I am cautious, but still I will not "break it back".

Besides, it ends in a few days anyway.

anon wrote:

Well anyway... if that would be an excuse for me to break NAP, people could then break NAP on me too, other people could then break on THEM, and it would spread like wildfire, making the whole concept of NAP useless for the entire PL.

anon wrote:

You know that we no longer enforce normal NAP-s? Also, anon is known deal breaker from last games....

No I didn't know. It wasn't announced. Neither bit of information. So there you have it. No one knows who broke NAPs and who didn't. Nor is it enforced or even announced who these players are. Nor even when admitted, can anything be done ingame, because even when caught the nap breakers still expect other NAPs they made to still be in effect. Completely unworkable system in every respect. And as one person correctly noted, it makes the whole concept of NAPs and honor rules useless in PL games.

However, those simple changes I posted earlier solve all of them, including hopefully dramatically reducing the flaming found in the newspapers. Everything regarding honors rules becomes known, and public to all. No rules at all regarding secret NAPs, only honor rules regarding public NAPs. And when broken everyone both knows that an honor rule was broken, and all have a casus belli allowing them to attack without breaking any honor rules themselves. After all, what is honor if not an extension of reputation. For it to work, reputations need to be public, but in a way that doesn't include flaming. It's all handled ingame, and should dramatically reduce the nasty spamlike flaming in the newspaper as well as also reduce dramatically people trying to get away with breaking honor rules, knowing almost no one knows and even if they know, nothing generally will be done.

I'm in,

Name:alpharunner

Maybe NAP breaks could be announced every month.

NashBean wrote:

Maybe NAP breaks could be announced every month.

I think the better solution is proposed up thread. Here is my version of it:

1) A private NAP is private. Breaking it is not something anyone else wants to hear about.

2) A public, published in the Herald NAP is enforced by community behavior. Breaking that NAP provides anyone who holds an NAP with the deal the right to also end a NAP with the deal breaker. I would go a step further and call for "effective immediately".

3) A "end of coalition RoW/NAP" is a game mechanic, enforced by game moderators, through game rules. It is a minimum of "end of current day cycle +24 hours" for a RoW and NAP to exist. Breach of that time line is game expulsion.

The first case is obvious. We didn't hear about it, we don't want to hear about it.

The second case is closely modeled to real world situations. When a nation breaks a treaty, the rest of the world does re-evaluate all treaties with them. In game, that would be an immediate end to all existing treaty obligations by other parties. I suggest that we start writing public NAPs with language to support this.

"Breach of this NAP by either party will be cause for any third party to immediately end any agreements with the breaching party and take any and all appropriate actions, up to and including war, against the breaching party."

The third case is special because of the game mechanic that allows coalition members to have full information about each other and mingle forces in each other's territories. Think of this third case as the time it takes to shift public opinion from "UK has a special, long term relationship with US" to "UK is ruled by the Anti-Christ and we mush occupy the British Isles to save the people".

F. Marion wrote:

The third case is special because of the game mechanic that allows coalition members to have full information about each other and mingle forces in each other's territories. Think of this third case as the time it takes to shift public opinion from "UK has a special, long term relationship with US" to "UK is ruled by the Anti-Christ and we mush occupy the British Isles to save the people".

What? Is this true? Americans should unite to fight against the UK right now! Don't let the Antichrist take over the world....let's nuke Great Britain...

...and Ireland, too.

(that was for @Quasi-duck...he knows why.)

PL standings for september have been updated:

Players League™ - Hall of Fame

Maybe the solution is NO MORE NAPS ALLOWED? its simple.

wild, just a ?, in the game i was in with you, did i do it correctly (breaking the NAP) notice on day 7 that it was ending on day 10. followed the 48 hour rule we agreed upon etc. just wanna make sure cuz any future games im in i dont wanna do something wrong within the game play rules. thanks...good game btw lol

I believe the NAP we agreed to naturally ended on day 10?

the cancellation time was if you wanted to cancel the NAP before the 10 day end period, so actually you could have attacked sooner.

Redd,

Just now I read through the OP of both October and November and I realise that you are right. With all the discussions left and right in various topics, I think the NAP 'thing' got lost somewhere in translation and was not updated in the rules in the OP.

I will talk to the others regarding this to make that change.

Regarding the principles - I do believe NAPs have merit, enforced or not. Worst case scenario is that people all around will break them (think: shift in metagame), and they indeed become useless. Yet, I want to think the other way around, that NAPs generally are upheld by most people. I can still count the number of people that broke NAPs with me with 1 hand, in all the games Ive been in. The ones that dont, will eventually have their reputation to deal with in future games. Its up to the individual how to keep track of those players. Im not in favor of posting a public blacklist - and its against Bytro's policy anyway.

Plus, it adds a bit of an unknown X factor in all your games, which I believe is a good thing. You dont want everything to be predictable. Well, at least I dont.

As Marion states, let the ingame community deal with it (obviously without the melodrama in the newspaper)

About the rule to make NAPs in paper enforceable:

It's fine from a technical point of view but the power of a NAP goes away. The impact will be that you can no longer have a NAP in secret.

So what happens if you have three neighbours and you NAP with two of them? You can't no longer surprise attack the third neighbour, he'll know that you're coming. In fact everyone will know who you are planning to target and where you will likely go with your troops.

However it could work with those types of players that you for some reason don't trust, and then you can keep the rest a secret. But what if the rest also want to post it in the paper for security?

I must say that I don't like the idea.

Yes, there is a definite risk and reward for posting a NAP in the Herald.

Truly, I don't see this as being a PL rule as much as just accepted practice between players. I can, (and likely will) insist on the language below being added to any NAP (or other agreement) that I am party to. This fits inside the game diplomacy mechanic.

"Breach of this NAP by either party will be cause for any third party to immediately end any agreements with the breaching party and immediately take any and all appropriate actions, up to and including war, against the breaching party or parties."

I will also, likely, insist on the agreement being posted or at least have a provision for what conditions will be cause for it to be immediately posted. For example, a clause that the agreement becomes public if either side is accused of breaking the agreement would seem like a good start.

Again, none of this is a PL rule that is enforced by the moderators. This is all handled by players, playing a game that includes diplomacy. Remember the "enforcement" is all players get the option to immediately end any existing agreement with someone who breaks a posted NAP.

If a player is prepared to take the risk of having the entire board declare war on him, the public NAP will not stop anything.

So, there you are, busy negotiating a NAP with each of your neighbors. The question of making them public or private suddenly makes for some interesting decision points. Public NAPs are a way to indicate what way you are (or are not) heading. Not posting them (at least initially) might be a way to "head fake" an opponent who is lulled into you heading a different way. A Public NAP does not prevent war. It just reveals a willingness to lie before sending troops across the border.

The only game mechanic that needs a PL rule is how we manage the break up of a coalition. That is a different beast entirely. The intent and mechanics of vacating territories, using RoW and how to track a time all should be looked at carefully.