Rules for Blind Diplomacy

I've found three versions of this variant on the internet. The oldest is Diplomyopia by Colin Hemming (can be found here). Then came the first one called Blind Diplomacy, Joan C. Artés (here). There's also a little more different version made by Eric Klein (here).
This is the Jens Version. I think it's closest to the Diplomyopia version.
I've also found out that Ally Bain plays one version at his page (here).

Blind Diplomacy is played on a standard map and standard diplomacy rules apply. The difference is that you don't know what the complete board looks like, only the parts you can see.

1. The difference between "seeing" and "be informed of"

If you "see" a province, that means you will get information about everything that happends in that province. "Be informed of" means tah you get to know something that has happend in that province, but not necassarily all that happend in that province. Sometimes, you will both see and get information from a province, sometimes only see, sometimes only information, most of the times nothing.

2. What you can "see".

Every player sees his homeland provinces and, if they are under his controle, the provinses bordering them. If he looses controle over his homeland provinses, he won't see the provinces borering them, but he will still see his homeland provinces (did I repeat myself?). Even if he is eliminated, he will still see his homeland provinces. The citizens will always provide their legal goverment with information. That means an eliminated player could still affect the outcome of the game (by passing on information). Of course, if a player anarchies his country has no legal goverment and he will not get any information at all.
Every player can also see all supply centers he owns (wheter occupied by one of his units or not) and all none-supply centers he own (wheter occupied by one of his units or not). Ownership of non-supply centers is described further down.
A unit that is ordered to Hold or to support a Hold can see all provinces around him. This only apply to units that really is ordered to Hold or support a Hold. A unit that is misordered or a unit belonging to a player that NMRs (both will count as Holds) will not see anything around them.
A unit that moves, support a move or convoy can't see anything.

Everything that you see will be presented for you in the adjudication as orders, for example: F(???) - NTH If you see NTH but not ENG.

3. What you will "be informed of"

Units that move, support a move or convoy can't "see" any provinces, but they can still gather some information for you.
  • If an order fails, you will always be informed of the reason for the failure. For example: A(Gal) - Vie (FAILED) Stood off by Austrian army or A(Gal) S A(Rum) H (CUT) Attacked by Austrian army.
  • You will always get information about if you are attacked.
  • You will never have information from where you were attacked.
  • You will be informed of support given to you by another power, unless the support is cut. You will not get any information at all about a support that was cut. Logic: if they never came to help you, how would you know they where on their way?
  • If you support another unit (and not is cut that is) you will get the same information as that unit about the province you attack (or if you support a Hold - the province he is standing in). If you support a unit that moves, and the move fails, you will be informed of why the move failed, but you won't be informed about if the unit you supported is attacked in its origin province.
  • If you attack a unit that has support, or is attacked by a unit with support, you will be informed that you we're fighting two units (or three for that sake), but you won't know who supported who. For example: F(Gas) H (DISLODGED TO MAO) Forced to retreat by two Italian fleets or Attacked by one French and one German army (If you are attacked by two different powers, one supporting the other, they will always be mentioned in alphabetical order. If attacked by one army and one fleet, the army will always be mentioned first.)
  • If your fleet convoys an army, it will get the same information as the army. Could be: Stopped by Austrian army or Convoy line broken in ION (The fleet in ION will have information about why the convoy line was broken but unless it is yours you won't get that information)
  • You will have information about any opposition when entering a province. For example: A(Pie) - Tus With support from Austrian army in Ven - Forced an Italian army to retreat.

    Note:
    A(Pie) - Tus says nothing about if Tuscany was empty before, or if there were a unit there that moved out of it.
    "Stood off by" says nothing about if the hostile unit was moving to the province (and bounced) or if it was standing there before (and holded).
    To know such things for sure, you need to "see" the province.

    4. Ownership of non-supply centers.

    Ownership of Supply Centers follow standard diplomacy rules. Ownership of non-supply centers is not mentioned in the standard rules, as it has no affect on the standard game. Here, on the other hand, you can "see" all provinces that you own, that means they could have an important role in the game.
    Non-supply centers are captured both in spring and autumn moves. It will be yours until another power capture it.
    Note that we are only talking about land centers. You can not own sea centers.

    5. Conditional orders

    Retreats and builds are, as you probably know, often sent as conditional orders. Conditional orders will be adjudicated depending on what your power know about, wich will (as this is Blind diplomacy) probably not be the whole picture.
    An extreme example: England can't see or get any information about what happends in Tunis, but orders for Autumn 01: Build F(Lon) Unless Italy takes Tun then build A(Lon).
    As England can't see what happend in Tunis, he will therefor build F(Lon) even if Italy did take Tunis.

    6. NMRs and Anarchies

    Noone will be told if a player NMRs or goes into Anarchy. All that players units will Hold, and it'll look exactly the same as if they had been ordered to Hold (if any other player can see the center where the unit is standing, that is).

    7. Adjudications

    Every player will recive a personal adjudication via e-mail with every order ha can see and all other information he could gather. He will also be told of any province ha captured, and any provinces he might have lost, and he'll get a complete list over all centers that he own.
    The adjudication on the website will contain press, deadline and e-mail addreses to all players and GM. With the autumn adjudication there will also be a ranking of the powers in order of supply centers owned. Of course, the number of supply centers is not made public.
    All maps and orders will be made public when the game has finished.


    This is what an adjudication might look like for Austria in S01:

    Austria:
    A(Bud) - Ser
    A(Vie) - Gal (FAILED) Stood off by Russian army
    F(Tri) - Ven (FAILED) Stood off by Italian army

    England:

    France:

    Germany:
    A(Mun) - ???

    Italy:
    A(Ven) - Tyr
    A(???) - Ven (FAILED)

    Russia:
    A(War) - Gal (FAILED)
    A(???) - Ukr

    Turkey:

    You lost control over Tyrolia to Italy

    If there's something you haven't understood, feel free to ask, either in the Message Board or via e-mail (to Jens)

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