Interview with Martin Bruse, Diplicity app creator

Kaner & Amby interview Martin Bruse, creator of the Android Duplicity app. A bit of Diplomacy chat and an update on Amby's variant development plans. And who is that boom box guy?

Intro

• The guys discuss their beers, the ban on dancing and everything else being totally open now there's practically no Coronavirus in Queensland (0 mins 10 secs)
• Kaner & Amby are recording two episodes back to back in different locations 3 15

Interview with Martin Bruse, creator of the Diplicity app

• They begin to introduce their interview guest, Martin Bruse, the Android app developer of Diplicity (3 mins 45 secs)
• The interview starts with Martin telling the backstory of creating Droidippy and how his plan evolved into Diplicity (5 mins)
• Kaner discusses how easy it was to download and use for his Android app. He asks Martin how  Diplicity can also be used for iOS, computers etc. However your push notifications are done as email if not using the Android app (9 mins 30 secs)
• Amby asks about the migration of players from Droidippy to Diplicity (12 mins 30 secs)
• They discuss why Martin developed the app and what he likes about Diplomacy. Martin, Amby and Kaner go onto discuss AI (16 mins)
• Kaner asks about the beautiful nature of the maps on Diplicity, he goes onto discuss where some of the variant maps came from eg Twenty Twenty and Vietnam War (22 mins 40 secs)
• Kaner asks about the games engine and its hard limit on two types of units (armies and fleets), he asks whether a 3rd type of unit could be created in Diplicity's code (27 mins 45 secs)
• Amby asks about Martin's plans to get the word out about the app. Martin gives a hat tip to Joren Bredman who helped Martin with the UX (32 mins 45 secs)
• Martin discusses investigation work into an iOS version of the app and the "funding model" for Diplicity (34 mins)
• Amby asks Martin about why he moved from Sweden to Switzerland, they talk about the Swedish Diplomacy community (37 mins 20 secs)
• Kaner asks about whether Diplicity has a similar sandbox function as Backstabbr (41 mins)
• Amby asks about Martin's views on how Diplicity is different to Conspiracy as an Android app. Martin also discusses the Tribute rating system used in Diplicity and scaring players off from the game if its not really for them (44 mins 30 secs)
• Amby asks where people need to go for Diplicity. Martin points to the Diplicity website or go to your favorite Android app store and search for Diplicity (51 mins 25 secs)
• The guys wrap up the interview (52 mins 20 secs)
• Amby asks Kaner about his experience so far with Diplicity. Kaner gives his one criticism of the game: a lack of shading in non-SC "owned" territories (52 mins 45 secs)
• Kaner is playing an anonymous gunboat Vietnam War game and is about to join a Chaos and a Twenty Twenty games that are forming (56 mins 30 secs)
• Kaner goes onto discuss the Diplicity Discord forum (1 hr 0 mins)

Diplomacy chat

• The guys talk about all the extra creative Diplomacy channels and offerings (1 hr 3 mins)
• Amby discusses getting face to face games going again in Brisbane now Coronavirus restrictions are pretty much gone. Kaner talks about getting shit faced playing Diplomacy in a pub in Thailand (1 hr 5 mins)
• They talk about whether WDC 2020 is still going to happen. Kaner discusses Americans who can't understand him and flat whites (1 hr 8 mins 45 secs)
• Kaner taunts Amby about his competitive nature in the Winning thread at vDip (1 hr 12 mins 45 secs)

Amby's variant development

• Amby mentions tobi has shown some interest (when time permits) to help with some of the coding aspects of his planned variants (1 hr 15 mins)
• Amby discusses what elements Kaner recommended for the Black Death may in fact be possible according to tobi (1 hr 16 mins 30 secs)
• The guys return to chat about Martin's inteview and the ability to have 3 or more unit types (more than armies and fleets) (1 hr 18 mins 30 secs)
• This prompts Amby to discuss his Nuclear Diplomacy variant concept (see episode 41 for Amby's earlier thoughts on his Nuclear Diplomacy variant) (1 hr 19 mins)
• Kaner gives his ideas on how to manage the transition of nuclear weapons from launch to detonation. They discuss whether current non nuclear powers could develop nuclear weapons (1 hr 24 mins 30 secs)
• Kaner asks about what happens if two nukes "bounce" (1 hr 29 mins 15 secs)
• Amby discusses the nature of the Standing Neutral variant on a classic board. The guys talk about how not to disadvantage players (1 hr 30 mins)

Around the grounds

• Kaner asks Amby about his Scottish Clans game, ''What's under your kilt?", before Kaner gets distracted and talks about his Europa Renovatio game, Lockdown Renovatio (1 hr 35 mins)
• Kaner gives some side advice on leveraging the Europa map for variant development. This is a visual discussion which may not make a lot of sense in a podcast. Feel free to skip this bit if you have zero interest in the way variant maps are created. They talk about the North Atlantic, Red Sea and the Sahara (1 hr 39 mins 30 secs)
• The guys elude to the guy walking around with a boom box who looks like Chris Martin (Note: this is discussed in greater detail in the Patreon episode recorded after - which was actually released last week) (1 hr 46 mins 30 secs)
• Amby has a theory on why Denmark does so well in the Europa Renovation map (1 hr 48 mins 30 secs)
• The guys start wrapping up the show (1 hr 52 mins)

Venue: Royal George, Brisbane

Drinks of choice:

Kaner & Amby: James Squire 150 Lashes pale ale

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Thanks as always to Dr Dan aka "The General" for his rockin' intro tune.