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Tournaments for the Diplomacy board game have been conducted around the world for decades.

The World Diplomacy Championship

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 World Diplomacy Convention (WorldDipCon or WDC) was created in 1988 and the winner of the tournament held at this convention ("The World Diplomacy Championship") is acknowledged as the World Diplomacy Champion (also called the WDC Champion).

The location of each WDC, with the players taking the top three places in the tournament held there, are listed below:

Year	Host City	Host Country	World Champion	Second	Third
1988	Birmingham	Great Britain	Phil Day	Matt MacVeigh	Jim Mills
1990	Chapel Hill	United States	Jason Bergmann	Jeff Bohner	Steve Cooley
1992	Canberra	Australia	Steve Gould	Eric Roche	Bruno-André Giraudon
1994	Birmingham	Great Britain	Pascal Montagna	Stéphane Gentric	Bruno-André Giraudon
1995	Paris	France	Bruno-André Giraudon	Antonio Ribeiro da Silva	Thomas Sebeyran
1996	Columbus	United States	Pitt Crandlemire	Leif Bergman	Björn von Knorring
1997	Gothenburg	Sweden	Cyrille Sevin	Roger Edblom	Borger Borgersen
1998	Chapel Hill	United States	Chris Martin	John Quarto-von-Tivadar	Mark Fassio
1999	Namur	Belgium	Christian Dreyer	Leif Bergman	Ivan Woodward
2000	Hunt Valley	United States	Simon Bouton	Brian Dennehy	Matthew Shields
2001	Paris	France	Cyrille Sevin	Brian Dennehy	Chetan Radia
2002	Canberra	Australia	Rob Stephenson	Grant Steel	Yann Clouet
2003	Denver	United States	Vincent Carry	Edward Hawthorne	Frank Johansen
2004	Birmingham	Great Britain	Yann Clouet	André Kooy	Cyrille Sevin
2005	Washington	United States	Frank Johansen	Tom Kobrin	Edi Birsan
2006	Berlin	Germany	Nicolas Sahuguet	Cyrille Sevin	Yann Clouet
2007	Vancouver	Canada	Doug Moore	Jake Mannix	Mark Zoffel
2008	Lockenhaus	Austria	Julian Ziesing	Cyrille Sevin	Daniel Leinich
2009	Columbus	United States	Andrew Goff	Daniel Lester	Jim O'Kelley
2010	The Hague	Netherlands	Gwen Maggi	Igor Kurt	Xavier Blanchot
2011	Sydney	Australia	Andrew Goff	Grant Steel	Liam Cosgrave
2012	Chicago	United States	Michael A. Binder	Don Scheifler	Matt Shields
2013	Paris	France	Cyrille Sevin	Toby Harris	Gwen Maggi
2014	Chapel Hill	United States	Thomas Haver	Daniel Lester	Phil Weissert
2015	Milan	Italy	Toby Harris	Rubén Sanchez García Luengo de Madrid	Thomas Haver
2016	Chicago	United States	Chris Brand	Doug Moore	Andrew Goff
2017	Oxford	Great Britain	Doug Moore	Marvin Fried	Tanya Gill
2018	Washington	United States	Andrew Goff	Doug Moore	Adam Sigal
2019	Marseille	France	Gwen Maggi	Andrew Goff	Christophe Borgeat
2020 and 2021	Event not held
2022	Dover	United States	Daniel Lester	Peter McNamara	Peter Yeargin
2023	Bangkok	Thailand	Jamal Blakkarly	Brandon Fogel	Chris Brand
2024	Varedo	Italy	Nicolas Sahuguet	Peter McNamara	Fabian Straub
2025	San Francisco	United States
2026	Athens	Greece

The 2020 event was originally scheduled for Dover, USA, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Both the already-selected 2020 (Dover) and 2021 (Bangkok) events were pushed back two years.

Virtual Face-to-Face

Online play with real-time voice negotiations, known as virtual face-to-face, became widespread in 2020, leading to three major annual competitions with global participation.

Virtual Diplomacy Championship (VDC)

The VDC is an open tournament held over a single weekend in December. Rounds are scheduled to be convenient to players around the world.

Year	Champion	Second	Third
2020	Morgante Pell	Nicolas Sahuguet	Bill Hackenbracht
2021	Nicolas Sahuguet	Farren Jane	Liam Stokes
2022	Riaz Virani	Jason Mastbaum	Johnny Gillam
2023	Jamal Blakkarly	Peter McNamara	Mikalis Kamaritis

Virtual Diplomacy League (VDL)

The VDL is an open league with monthly gamedays and rounds convenient to players around the world. The season culminates in a championship game held in January.

Year	Champion	Second	Third
2020	Tanya Gill	John Anderson	Morgante Pell
2021	Nicolas Taillet	Brandon Fogel	Mikalis Kamaritis
2022	Brandon Fogel	Nicolas Taillet	Timothy Crosby
2023	Mikalis Kamaritis	Nicolas Taillet	Matthew Totonchy

Diplomacy Broadcast Network Invitational (DBNI)

The DBNI is an invitational tournament held annually in February. Players earn invitations based on their performance at a wide variety of Diplomacy competitions over the previous year, including in-person face-to-face, virtual face-to-face, and extended deadline online play. The champion receives the title "DBN Diplomat of the Year".

Year	Diplomat of the Year	Runners-up
2021	Peter McNamara	Matthew Crill Russ Dennis Andrei Gribakov Farren Jane Nicolas Sahuguet Markus Zijlstra
2022	Jason Mastbaum	Brandon Fogel Katie Gray Farren Jane Seren Kwok Ed Sullivan Nicolas Taillet
2023	Brandon Fogel	Chris Brand Noam Brown Peter McNamara Nicolas Sahuguet Ruben Sanchez Riaz Virani
2024	Peter McNamara	Johnny Gillam Seren Kwok Doug Malotte Ed Sullivan Matthew Totonchy Christopher Ward

Online Diplomacy Championship

Created in 2015, the Online Diplomacy Championship occurs once every two years, rotating between a number of Diplomacy websites. The winner is considered to be the World Champion of Online Diplomacy, a format in which phases are processed once every one or two days, and all correspondence is sent in written form via the host site. Players in online tournaments typically play under pseudonyms, and accept the title under these names.

The players taking the top three places in each ODC tournament are listed below.

Year	Host Website	Online Champion	Second	Third
2015	webDiplomacy	Octavious	VillageIdiot	Yonni
2017	PlayDiplomacy	Steve Cooley & Bravo Papa Alpha		Machiara
2019	webDiplomacy	Brumark	Teccles	Napoleon of Oz
2022	PlayDiplomacy	RedCandle	Pootleflump	Yonni

North America

DipCon

The winner of the DipCon (Diplomacy Convention) tournament is the North American champion. The title of North American champion was not given at the beginning, but since 1972 has been awarded to each winner of the convention tournament. DipCon was created in 1966 and occurred each year (except in 1967 and 1968). There was no tournament in 1966, 1969 1971, and 2020.

The winner of each DipCon North American Championship tournament:

Year	Host City	Host Country	North American Champion	Notes
1970	Oklahoma City	United States	John Smythe
1972	Chicago	United States	Richard Ackerlay
1973	Chicago	United States	Conrad von Metzke and John Smythe tie
1974	Chicago	United States	Mike Rocamora
1975	Chicago	United States	Walter Blank and Bob Wartenberg tie
1976	Baltimore	United States	Thomas Reape
1977	Lake Geneva	United States	Mike Rocamora
1978	Los Angeles	United States	David Lagerson
1979	Chester	United States	Ben Zablocki
1980	Rochester	United States	Carl Eichelberger
1981	Burlingame	United States	Ron Brown
1982	Baltimore	United States	Konrad Baumeister
1983	Detroit	United States	Joyce Singer
1984	Dallas	United States	Jeff Key
1985	Seattle	United States	J.R. Baker
1986	Fredericksburg	United States	Malcolm Smith
1987	Madison	United States	David Hood
1988	San Antonio	United States	Dan Sellers
1989	San Diego	United States	Edi Birsan
1990	Chapel Hill	United States	Jason Bergmann
1991	Scarborough	Canada	Gary Behnen
1992	Lenexa	United States	Marc Peters
1993	San Mateo	United States	Hohn Cho
1994	Chapel Hill	United States	Bruce Reiff
1995	Baltimore	United States	Sylvain Larose
1996	Columbus	United States	Pitt Crandlemire
1997	Seattle	United States	Chris Mazza
1998	Chapel Hill	United States	Chris Martin
1999	Columbus	United States	Chris Mazza
2000	Hunt Valley	United States	Simon Bouton
2001	Denver	United States	David Hood
2002	Chapel Hill	United States	Morgan Gurley
2003	Washington	United States	Edward Hawthorne
2004	Portland	United States	Ken Lemere
2005	At Sea	United States  Mexico  Belize	Rick Desper
2006	Charlottesville	United States	Hohn Cho
2007	Vancouver	Canada	Doug Moore
2008	Tysons Corner	United States	Chris Martin
2009	Columbus	United States	Andrew Goff
2010	San Francisco	United States	Eric Mead
2011	Fairlee, Vermont	United States	Chris Martin
2012	Chicago	United States	Michael A. Binder
2013	Silver Spring	United States	Nate Cockerill
2014	Seattle	United States	Dan Lester
2015	Philadelphia	United States	Chris Martin
2016	Chicago	United States	Chris Brand
2017	Killington, Vermont	United States	Doug Moore
2018	Washington	United States	Andrew Goff
2019	Seattle	United States	Steve Cooley
2021	Dover, Vermont	United States	Adam Silverman
2022	San Jose	United States	Tanya Gill
2023	Chapel Hill	United States	Mikalis Kamaritis
2024	Surrey	Canada	Katie Gray
2025	Chicago	United States

North American Grand Prix

The winner of each Grand Prix:

Year	Steps	Players	Winner
1999	7	58	Chris Martin
2000	14	125	Matt Shields
2001	34	166	Jerry Fest
2002	17	171	Andy Bartalone
2003	16	213	Edward Hawthorne
2004	14	305	Doug Moore
2005	13	234	Andrew Neumann
2006	12	200	Jim O'Kelley
2007	12	270	Doug Moore
2008	15	275	Thomas Haver
2009	10	182	Adam Sigal
2010	10	220	Peter Yeargin
2011	9	143	Chris Martin
2012	11	202	Michael A. Binder
2013	8	136	Graham Woodring
2014	8	188	Dan Lester

Europe

EuroDipCon

The location and winner of each EuroDipCon tournament is listed below:

Year	Host City	Host Country	European Champion	Notes
1993	Paris	France	Samy Malki
1994	Linköping	Sweden	Xavier Blanchot
1995	Cirencester	Great Britain	Inge Kjøl
1996	Oslo	Norway	Inge Kjøl
1997	Namur	Belgium	Cyrille Sevin
1998	Bedford	Great Britain	Toby Harris
1999	Turku	Finland	Simon Bouton
2000	Paris	France	Leif Bergman
2001	Dublin	Ireland	Paraic Reddington
2002	Malmö	Sweden	Frank Johansen
2003	Dogana	San Marino	Yann Clouet
2004	Darmstadt	Germany	Edi Birsan
2005	Utrecht	Netherlands	Simon Bouton
2006	Cheshunt	Great Britain	Benjamin Pouillès-Duplaix
2007	Marseille	France	Fabien Grellier
2008	Brunate	Italy	Luca Pazzaglia
2009	Bonn	Germany	André Ilievics
2010	Paris	France	Fabian Straub
2011	Derby	Great Britain	Gwen Maggi
2012	Serravalle	San Marino	Nicolas Sahuguet
2013	Namur	Belgium	Gwen Maggi
2014	Rome	Italy	Peter McNamara
2015	Leicester	Great Britain	Cyrille Sevin
2016	Paris	France	Gwen Maggi
2017	Milan	Italy	Gwen Maggi
2018	Paris	France	Lei Saarlainen
2019	Marseille	France	Gwen Maggi
2020	Sion	Switzerland	Alex Lebedev
2021	Serravalle	San Marino	Alex Lebedev
2022	Sierre	Switzerland	Christophe Borgeat
2023	Paris	France	Jelte Kuiper
2024	Sion	Switzerland	Karthik Konath

European Grand Prix

The winner of each Grand Prix is listed below:

Year	Nb of steps	Nb of players	Winner
2002	10	283	William Attia
2003	11	349	Yann Clouet
2004	15	472	Yann Clouet
2005	13	364	Gwen Maggi
2006	14	340	Gwen Maggi
2007	14	272	Gwen Maggi
2008	11	207	Emmanuel du Pontavice
2009	11	175	Gwen Maggi
2010	8	172	Gwen Maggi
2011	6	108	Gwen Maggi
2012	5	76	Dave Simpson
2013	7	112	Gwen Maggi
2014	6	81	Gwen Maggi
2015	8	116	Matteo Anfossi

Australia and New Zealand

Bismark Cup

In the early 1980s 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 tournament 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 articles 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 tournament 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 Harry Kolotas, Marion Ashworth, Neil Ashworth or Luke Clutterbuck.

When The National Tournaments Championship was created, its perpetual trophy was named The Arthur Bismark Cup (usually referred to as simply the Bismark Cup). The title of Bismark Cup Champion is awarded by the Diplomacy Association of Australia and New Zealand (DAANZ) 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 awarded depends on the size of the tournaments and the person's placing in that tournament.

The winner of each Bismark Cup is listed below:

Year	Nbr of steps	Nbr of players	Winner
1989			Robert Wessels
1990			Harry Kolotas
1991	3	75	Robert Wessels
1992	5	123	Steve Gould
1993	6	93	Harry Kolotas
1994			Craig Sedgwick
1995			Rob Stephenson
1996	5	65	Craig Sedgwick
1997	5	74	Bill Brown
1998	7	92	Rob Stephenson
1999	8	117	Brandon Clarke
2000	9	111	Rob Stephenson
2001	10	104	Tristan Lee
2002	7	84	Rob Schöne
2003	6	52	Geoff Kerr
2004	8	56	Grant Steel
2005	8	65	Tony Collins
2006	10	76	Sean Colman
2007	–	–	Not organised
2008	7	58	Andrew Goff
2009	7	69	Shane Cubis
2010	7	69	Thorin Munro
2011	5	49	Grant Steel
2012-2015	–	–	Not organised
2016	?	??	Tim Jones

As the Cup has not been awarded since that year, the 2016 winner Tim Jones is still considered the "current holder of the Bismark Cup".

Diplomacy World Cup

The Diplomacy World Cup is a team-based tournament in Online Diplomacy, a format in which phases are processed once every one or two days, and all correspondence is sent in written form via the host site. Players in online tournaments often play under pseudonyms, and accept the title under these names.

Two different tournaments, the Diplomacy National World Cup and the webDiplomacy World Cup, are grouped together in this category. The Diplomacy National World Cup only ran twice, once in 2007 and once in 2010. The webDiplomacy World Cup had its first iteration in 2010, and runs once every two years, with the exception of 2014 as the 2012 World Cup was still ongoing. WebDiplomacy World Cup teams are not country-specific, and can instead be from regions.

Edition	Members of the World champion team	Members of second team	Members of third team
2007	France Emmanuel du Pontavice Fabrice Essner Jean-Luc Granier Fabien Grellier Michel Lacroix Gwen Maggi Jean-Pierre Maulion Nicolas Sahuguet Rubén Sanchez García Luengo de Madrid Cyrille Sevin	Italy Enrico Agamennone Alessio Cei Giovanni Cesarini Davide Cleopadre Marco Noseda Pedraglio Luca Pazzaglia Roberto Perego Leonardo Quirini Andrea Ziffer	Argentina Leonardo Colangelo Pablo Echevarría Mike Goldfeld Martin Kaplan Marcelo Larroque Ismael Puga Felipe Sanchez Ariel Max Sanchez Romero
2010	Ireland Mike Cosgrave Brian Dennehy Aidan Duggan Conor Kostick Cian O'Rathaille Nigel Phillips Rick Powell	United States Kevin Dietz Jim Green Melinda Holley Brian McCain Pete Marinaro Charles Mullin Kyra Olson Yashwant Parmar Eric Sorenson	France Frédéric Coste Fabrice Essner Gwen Maggi Jean-Pierre Maulion Jean-François Mougard Reynald Nicod Vincent Reulet Nicolas Sahuguet Rubén Sanchez García Luengo de Madrid Cyrille Sevin
2010	South America Rubetok (Captain) Xapi JesusPetry rdrivera2005	Southeast Europe hellalt (Captain) Kompole Dejan0707 Ouraguinus	Iberia JECE (Captain) Silver Wolf StevenC. Troodonte
2012	California A The Hanged Man (Captain) uclabb (Assistant Captain) Tasnica Mujus	Iberia JECE (Captain) Troodonte (Assistant Captain) gantz MuadDib	The Balkans hellalt (Captain) Hellenic Riot (Assistant Captain) rokakoma Kompole
2016	Cascadia ghug (Captain) VillageIdiot (Assistant Captain) MadMarx Balki Bartokomous thatwasawkward	Dixie Gen. Lee (Captain) ckroberts (Assistant Captain) eturnage The Czech DrCJG	Sweden Vixol (Captain) Seichuto (Assistant Captain) AronAmbrosiani SunRa
2018	Cascadia Balki Bartokomous VillageIdiot ghug cspieker MadMarx	Greatest Lakes Tom Bombadil Durga Yigg Yoyoyozo peterwiggin jmo1121109	California ezio micha slypups Ogion The Hanged Man
2020	Yorkshire Puddings CaptainMeme (Captain) Brumark Scarabus desdemona22 teccles	Eastern Canada Hamilton Brian (Captain) cdngooner Yonni Peregrine Falcon Lando Calrissian	Prosecco gimix (Captain) Riccardo Falconi Babbo Natale Superwerty Randaz20

See also

Diplomacy List of world championships in mind sports

Notes

1. Originally scheduled to be in Hunt Valley, but moved when the original host convention moved from Hunt Valley to Lancaster.
2. Tournament scoring in ODC 2017 allowed for a tie for first place.
3. DipCon I held in Youngstown, and hosted by John Koning in his home, 31 August 1666.
4. DipCon II held in Youngstown, because "...we had so much fun last time, let's do it again."
5. Held as part of Origins, which was in San Mateo, but held in a separate hotel because of space limitations
6. We can see in Diplomacy World 35 that the name of the winner is Joyce Singer.
7. The best North American player, Marc Hurwitz, finished 2nd.
8. Hohn Cho won the 1989 DipCon Diplomacy tournament, but that year's "DipCon Champion" was decided by a number of events.
9. ^ This year, the DipCon was the WorldDipCon.
10. The best North American player, Matthew Shields, finished 3rd.
11. Played during a cruise from Galveston and with several stops: Progreso , Cozumel and Belize City .
12. DipCon status was removed from the Bangor event by the NADF on 30 July 2008.
13. Results Disputed. Under normal hobby practice, the Tournament Director is ineligible for prizes due to real or perceived conflicts of interest. David Webster acted as TD, but still declared himself the winner.
14. The best North American player, Jim O'Kelley, finished 3rd.
15. The best North American player, Chris Martin, finished 2nd.
16. The best North American player, Doug Moore, finished 2nd.
17. DipCon 2020 reported in 2021 (COVID-19).
18. The best North American player, Michael A. Binder, finished 2nd.
19. First European: Gihan Bandaranaike (second of the tournament).
20. First European: Filippo Lonardo (second of the tournament).
21. "Diplomacy Results and Rankings". daanz.org. Diplomacy Association of Australia and New Zealand. 8 May 2022. Retrieved 11 August 2024. The current holder of the Bismark Cup (the 2016 winner) is Tim Jones.
22. ^ This tournament was an iteration of the Diplomacy National World Cup.
23. ^ This tournament was an iteration of the webDiplomacy World Cup.

External links

• (in English) The World Diplomacy Database stored all the results known of competition in face-to-face.
• (in English) The international calendar of tournaments in face-to-face.

• Avalon Hill games
• Diplomacy (game)
• World championships in board games