Your first Diplomacy game

1. Take a seat

Sign in with Google or create an email account and verify your address. Create a game with a name, your power, a phase length, and public or private entry. To join a private game, ask the host for its game ID and invitation code. The last player to join starts the first spring phase.

2. Read the board

Armies move over land. Fleets move through seas and coastal provinces. Supply centers determine how many units a power can maintain. Occupying a supply center in the fall captures it; passing through during spring does not transfer ownership.

3. Negotiate

Use the conference for public discussion, direct dispatches for one-to-one conversations, and named groups for alliances. An agreement in chat does not submit an order, and players may change their plans. Keep personal information out of conversations.

4. Write orders

Select one of your units on the map. The order menu offers legal moves, holds, supports, and convoys. A support order needs to match the action being supported. A convoy needs both an army move by convoy and the appropriate fleet convoy orders. A legal order can still fail when another player's order interferes.

5. Save, then seal

Save orders stores your draft on the server. Seal orders also marks your power ready. You may unseal before the phase advances. Once all powers that owe orders have sealed, the server resolves immediately. Otherwise it resolves at the deadline, even if players are offline.

At the deadline, the last server-saved choices are used. Missing moves hold, missing retreats disband, required missing winter removals are chosen automatically, and unused builds are waived. Edits that have not been saved do not count.

Draws and inactivity

In the Table menu, surviving players can vote for a draw or withdraw their vote. Every surviving power must agree, and all survivors share the draw. Votes reset when a phase resolves.

An unfilled lobby expires seven days after creation. At a phase deadline, a game ends without a winner if nobody has saved orders for the longer of 24 hours or three phase lengths. Weekly games therefore allow at least three weeks. Any player saving orders resets that timer; chat and merely opening the game do not.

6. Review and return

Open the chronicle, select a resolved phase, and use Show orders or Show result to replay the map. All powers' resolved orders are visible; current drafts stay private. Load earlier phases for the full campaign. My games → Past games retains completed and cancelled campaigns without using active slots. Dislodged units may need retreats; winter may allow builds or require removals. Use My games to switch campaigns. Saved orders and seats survive closing the browser. Signed-in practice games are separate: one practice game is saved per account, and starting a new practice game replaces it.