by Martin Janta-Polczynski
0. This variation of postal diplomacy can be played with any board and rules.
1. Treaties may be drawn between 2+ players (nt = n or more) and sent to the games master (GM) for enforcement.
2. Each Treaty must be a name and date; it must contain:
2.1. who the Contracting Parties are,
2.2. when its validity starts and ends,
2.3. what each Contracting Party binds itself to. Usually it will forbid units of certain Powers to attack or support to contain spaces.
3. Each Party can then send a copy of the Treaty to the GM, together with name, date, signature, and code word.
4. If each Party to the Treaty has sent a version of it in good order and in conformity with the versions sent by other Parties, if moreover the GM finds the Treaty sufficiently clear, he will notify his decision to enforce the Treaty (he may for good reasons restrict the Treaty’s validity in time).
5. Three possibilities exist here:
5.1. the GM notifies the Parties secretly that he enforces Treaty X,
5.2. the GM informs in his zine that he enforces Treaty X between such-&-such Parties,
5.3. the GM published Treaty X in extents in his zine.
6. Henceforth, the order of a unit which would contravene Treaty X simply fails; moreover the unit behaves as if dislodged.
7. It’s best to reduce the Victory Criterion in this variation (e.g. to 12+ centers, with a supremacy of 2+).
8. In New Economic Diplomacy (NED), the validity of Treaties cannot be fixed in advance:
8.1. Players must pay a small fee for each year of validity (to the Control Bank),
8.2. A Player may break the Treaty but has to pay a fine of 20 times the “validity fee” to his partners (they may agree on a number > 20).