AttilaTheHun wrote:

I've mentioned this in threads in the past but posting public comments in a Fog game should be taken witha  grain of salt. Players can use those comments to deceive just as easily as to reveal information.

True. This is why it's different from cheating. If I believe it will help me, I will give out some information. May be not all of it though. But I won't lie. I believe that it's important to get and keep a good reputation if you are a long term player on the site.

Turtling is a bit hard to pin down (especially in fog games) because there could be so many reasons that your opponent is not just attacking willy nilly.  They could be novice and not recognize when they're in a  strong position.  They could be preparing to make a larger push or elimination.  They could preparing to defend a large push from somebody else.  They could be trying to deny other players a card.

I've seen players who deliberately attack opponents they feel are turtling but this is mainly when it seems like the player in the most advanced position is not really doing much or taking advantage of their position.  If I'm in a weaker position I don't mind letting the dominant player turtle as long as I'm gaining the advantage somewhere else.  You see this a lot in the opening game sometimes where a player will just stack armies.  If you can be gaining cards elsewhere on the board but still keep some key territories defended you'll come out ahead.

Another point we could talk in this regard is the use of reserves.  They are a built-in feature of the site but have the same effect as turtling IMO.  Hard to say it's against the rules to build up units if the board designer allows "max reserves."

My $0.02

Turtling is often a valid strategy, but IMO when it is a valid strategy, that often indicates a problem with the board.  Usually this means that the bonus from holding continents is not worth the units you lose from others trying to break your continents, and instead the game has become all about losing the fewest units & still getting a card each turn.  When more than one person decides this is their best strategy, the game often can devolve into a stalemate.  IMO a good board makes it so that turtling is very rarely the correct strategy.

Turtling is a good strategy when you have no other hope though.  Some boards utilize this amazingly in that it gives players a hope even when things look very bleak.

I guess it's not always a sign of a bad board, but more than likely (in my experience, with my group of friends).

It seems an unwritten rule to not actually chat in games. I always say hello, good luck etc, but most people play their games in silence :(

Aiken Drumn wrote:

It seems an unwritten rule to not actually chat in games. I always say hello, good luck etc, but most people play their games in silence :(

For better or worse, this is especially true with fogged games.  Makes sense.

Vidoviti Milan wrote:

I know that this is just a game, but we play simulation of war! in war there are no laws, human rights, unwritten rules... you have only one aim and that is to win in the war at any price. sabotaging, espionage, secret alliance, fraud... is all part of every war!

"Many Bothans died to bring us this information." 

Vidoviti Milan wrote:

I know that this is just a game, but we play simulation of war! in war there are no laws, human rights, unwritten rules... you have only one aim and that is to win in the war at any price. sabotaging, espionage, secret alliance, fraud... is all part of every war!

I understand you might have a different view being in Serbia, but what about Geneva conventions ?

I don't know why would i have different wiev being a Serbian. You could also mention the Germans and the Holocaust, or the Americans and the atomic bombs on Japan, if we going to compare the horrors of war with my country and other nations...

Or you maybe know history better, but i can't remember ther was any fair war in this cruel world.

Vidoviti Milan wrote:

I don't know why would i have different wiev being a Serbian. You could also mention the Germans and the Holocaust, or the Americans and the atomic bombs on Japan, if we going to compare the horrors of war with my country and other nations...

Or you maybe know history better, but i can't remember ther was any fair war in this cruel world.

I mentionned Serbia as it is a recent war. So I was cautious in case you might have lived it and suffered of it.

Otherwise, I believe it's not just a game. It's war. But let it be a civilized war. 

Bridge comes to mind as a game where unwritten rules (or conventions) either become rules or become contained by rules. It has evolved to the point where, during the bidding, a player may not use any inflection, or timing, or any other mechanism to further "enhance" the meaning of the bid, and the meaning of a bid must conform to a previously announced list.

In golf there is a written code of ethics requiring players to call penalties against themselves. There are a number of scenarios where the player may be the only person that can make the call - for instance, when they double hit a ball, or when the ball moves at address.

Risk and similar games to this day do not include such rules. Most of us that have played the game in RL would probably agree that house rules regarding ethics usually evolve as players get to know one another.

On-line play has changed all this, and some of the enhancements of on-line play, such as fog, bring issues to the fore that were never envisioned by developers of the original game.  There are certainly ethical grey areas and in a lot of ways, we're making up the rules as we go.

I'm sorry I wrongly understood Toto. I thought it was a provocation because of the frequent presentation of Serbian prisoners of war in the media.

I didn't want to hurt anyone feelings, my apology to all, I overreacted.

As long as we do not have rules and punishing those who violate them, anyone can do what they want. What will I get if I follow some sort of unwritten rule, when the other 90% do not comply. I just wanted to say that to be honest and good does not bring success in such conditions, without the written rules.

Ozyman wrote:

Amidon37 wrote:I was visiting the forums of another Risk site

I thought an unwritten rule was that we didn't fraternize with the enemy.  ;)

 

The first rule is: We Don't Talk About the Unwritten Rules...

Candy Cane wrote:

The first rule is: We Don't Talk About the Unwritten Rules...

..or at least we don't write them.

For me turtling is a fully acceptable strategie. Most turtlers don't even know why and when to use the strategie,  so we should be glad they do try. Besides from this, it's a strategie easy to counter by multiple other strategies and therefore totally unharmful.

Same for information sharing in fog games. Information is usually biased by he sender. The reason he shares information is usually because he wants to get better from it and therefore it's part of the strategie to determine it's real value.

For me one of the very few unwriten rules should be to make no agreements after the game got down to three players. I know it's sometimes hard to finish a game which has come down to a stall between 3 players, but in this case it's better to discuss a 3-way final then a 2-way deal. It's impossible to both have a equal chance of winning. But some of you might say a deal can be broken so... I  don't know.

One thing I know is 'unwanted' strategies will rarely be very effective in the long run. If people do not like you turtling all the time they will hit you. And if they hit you you'll lose more often making the unwanted strategie less effective.

> it's better to discuss a 3-way final

What do you mean by this?

As mentioned by Luieuil, there are ways to counter turtling.  One way is to attack the turtle to just whittle away the armies instead of trying to take the territory.  For example, if the turtler has 15 armies, attack until they have 11.  By using attrition they will not garner a huge stack.  I think most people have the notion that they will not attack a territory unless they want to conquer it.  It is often very effective to attack without the interntion of taking the territory just to keep you opponnents forces 'manageable.' 

Maybe looking at the issue from the other side of the fence will help the discussion get somewhere:

Perhaps the question is not that there are "unwritten rules" so to speak, so much as "are there are certain things that are guaranteed to really aggravate a reasonable player, every time?"

The Geneva conventions are there because enough people agreed that some stuff just shouldn't be allowed - presumably because it's intrinsically horrible - what kinds of things could a player do here that are guaranteed to make you angry everytime?