International prize list of Diplomacy

= WorldDipCon =

During the 1970s, there were very few Diplomacy tournaments outside North America. At that time, the winner of the tournament held at American DipCon was considered by the North American players as a world champion of Diplomacy.

The WorldDipCon (World Diplomacy Convention) was created in 1988 and the winner of the tournament held at this convention becomes the world champion of Diplomacy.

The players taking the top three places in each WorldDipCon tournament are listed below:

Europe

European DipCon

European Grand Prix

The winner of each Grand Prix:

Australia and New Zealand

Bismark Cup

The National Tournaments Championship - comprising the perpetual trophy known as the Bismark Cup - is awarded for the best aggregate tournament results at Diplomacy tournaments held during the calendar year. It is an annual (short term) ranking. The exact number of points depends on the size of the tournament and the person's placing in that tournament.

The winner of each Bismark Cup:

Origins of the Bismark Cup

In the early 1980's the Diplomacy scene in Australia was built around several PBM Diplomacy magazines, of which the most significant titles were Rumplestiltskin, The Go Between, Beowulf, Victoriana, The Journal of Australian Diplomacy, and The Envoy. Most of the torunament players were subscribers, players and editors of these magazines. The Envoy, which was published between 1986 and 1991, ran a series of articles which were both popular and influential. Purportedly written by Arthur von Bismark and styled as lecture transcripts, the character of Arthur von Bismark became celebrated among the contemporary Diplomacy subculture in Australia.

The aricles were popular at a time when tournament play in Australia had become more organized, with well-attended tournaments in Adelaide, Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney. Rating systems at the time were being hotly debated and many players desired a way to assess the best player in the torunament scene for a calendar year, as a way of overcoming the perceived inconsistencies of rating systems within one event. The annual trophy concept was accepted among the then-principle organizers of these tournaments and the title Arthur Bismark Cup was suggested by The Envoy's then-editor Mathew Gibson.

The real author of these Arthur von Bismark articles was never announced publicly, but was suspected as being either Marion Ashworth, Neil Ashworth or Luke Clutterbuck.

External links

* [http://eurodip.nuxit.net/php/rencontre/index.php?lang=Ang EDA - The World Diplomacy Database stored all the results known of competition in "face-to-face"] .
* [http://www.diplom.org/Face/cons/index.php The international calendar of tournaments in "face-to-face"] .

Notes