Interview with Dave Maletsky about eCarnage and WDC

The guys catch up with Dave Maletsky about eCarnage and what's happening with the World Diplomacy Championship. Plus talk about Diplomacy news and discuss variant development.

Intro

• The guys discuss their drinks and venue. Amby mentions how he met well known Diplomacy player, Peter McNamara at the Fox very early on in the podcast (0 mins 10 secs)
• Amby introduces an interview with Dave Maletsky about November's Carnage - now eCarnage - and the roadmap ahead for the World Diplomacy Championships (4 mins)

Interview with Dave Maletsky about eCarnage and the WDC

• Amby asks about what's happening with this year's Carnage (6-8 November 2020) due to Covid (5 mins 20 secs)
• Dave discusses how this year's Carnage - being all online so called eCarnage - is running two rounds in the US and two rounds in the Asia-Pacific using different scoring systems, and how player' rankings determine a final ranking for the Top Board (6 mins 50 secs)
• Dave flags the need to formally register and the need for a small entrance fee (9 mins 10 secs)
• Amby clarifies the tournament play process (10 mins 50 secs)
• He asks what's happening with the World Diplomacy Championships (WDC) and Dave outlines (12 mins)
• Kaner asks about the logistics in the games (14 mins)
• He goes onto ask how the broader tournament organisers are managing Carnage (16 mins)
• Amby asks about the normal physical Carnage whether players walking around take an interest in Diplomacy. Amby asks about the relationship with Dungeons and Dragons (18 mins 30 secs)
• Amby asks about the round timings (22 mins 45 secs)
• Dave discussing the seeding aspects of the games (25 mins 20 secs)
• Amby asks about how participation in eCarnage is reflected in a broader rating system (27 mins)
• He goes on to ask about player numbers (29 mins 30 secs)
• Dave talks about the cross over being successfully achieved from online players being increasingly involved in F2F/virtual events (31 min)
• Amby asks about the cultural change happening in the game (32 mins 40 secs)
• He goes onto ask about the resolution process for adverse behavior (35 mins)
• Amby asks how many Carnages Dave has been director for (37 mins)
• Dave talks about some of the awards at Carnage (39 mins 50 secs)
• Amby asks about where players can find all the up to date info about eCarnage (44 mins)
• Dave talks about confidence and attitude in games (46 mins)
• The guys wrap up the interview (46 mins 30 secs)
• After the interview, Kaner mentions a Bourse is being run on the Top Board for eCarnage (47 mins 10 secs)
• Kaner & Amby quickly gives an overview about what a Bourse game is (48 mins 40 secs)
• They talk about the two different time zone competitions and what's happening with WDC (53 mins)

Latest news & shit

• The guys talk about the article in Popular Mechanics about Diplomacy and Andrew Goff (56 mins)
• Kaner asks Amby if he's going to play in Carnage before discussing Gary Gygax (58 mins)
• Amby brings up Legendary Tactics post about Twilight Struggle (1 hr)
• They talk about Trump being in hospital at the time of recording (1 hr 2 mins)
• Amby discusses how the Brother Bored interview on the show has been remastered to be in the Brother Board robotic voice (1 hr 5 mins 15 secs)
• Kaner discusses GoHornsGo's recent post about his Diplomacy collection (1 hr 8 mins)

Around the grounds

• Amby runs through the Media Wars game which has now drawn. Players in the Spring 1912 draw were: Brother Bored (Germany 14 SC's), Legendary Tactics (Austria 11 SC's), CaptainMeme/DiploStrats (Russia 8 SCs's) and Village Idiot (Italy 2 SC's) (1 hr 11 mins 20 secs)
• The guys talk about the Winning game that Amby's in. This is a cross over Classic game with a forum thread at vDip. If you win the forum thread that turn, as a Diplomacy player you get the GM to request another player to make a specific move that they must do. They discuss some of the duplicity in the game (1 hr 16 mins)
• Amby is also having a little opening joy in his Italian Stallions Machiavelli game. Kaner asks about the map (1 hr 25 mins)
• Last up is his Declaration of War Fall of the American Empire IV game (1 hr 28 mins)
• Kaner's Europa Renovatio game Lockdown Renovatio has just finished with him doing well, being part of the draw as Naples (1 hr 30 mins 30 secs)
• Amby reflects in the Winning game that another one of the players - Macca - is also based in Brisbane. They discuss about getting a face-to-face game happening (1 hr 36 mins)

Variant development update

• After some more drinks, Kaner discusses a message we received from Amuzet about drawing maps (1 hr 38 mins)
• Amby gives an update from Flame about whether his Lab would be available for variant development (1 hr 41 mins)
• They discuss what you need to do to set up a server, or whether its better to just sit on it until Kaner's next lot of holidays. They go onto discuss getting Kaner prepared to play a virtual game: Tempest in a Teapot (1 hr 43 mins 20 secs)
• Amby get a message from David E. Cohen about a Classic variant but where some of the water is frozen. Kaner talks about it. Amby reflects on the Ice Age variant he started creating. He has the territory map and names/SCs maps done, but can't remember who the players are meant to be and whether there are any additional rules - pretty sure there aren't any beyond the additional impassable areas due to glaciers (1 hr 46 mins)
• Amby discusses Fake Al's Tiglath-Pileser variant set at the time of Solomon in the bible (1 hr 50 mins 40 secs)
• Kaner got a message from Major Mitchell at webDip and does a shout out before they wrap up the show (1 h 56 mins 30 secs)

Venue: The Fox, Brisbane

Drinks of choice:

Kaner: Two Suns Pale Ale and Grappler lager by Green Beacon

Amby: Marty's Block shiraz cabernet

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Thanks as always to Dr Dan aka "The General" for his rockin' intro tune.