I was germany, I screwed up in the middle, though I followed the game even after falling out.

Guys, it was a real messy endgame. What the heck did you just do there? :)
I have to agree, Russia acted quite strange.

Yeah, I confess I was a bit mystified by Russia's play toward the end, too, though I must say I'm not all too upset about it. :)
In my experience Sarg has been a very classy player & excellent gunboater, so I'm sure he had a good reason for acting like he did, even if it didn't work out. Perhaps he feared he'd be cut out of the draw if left with only BER/MUN at the end? I'll be curious to see what he has to say.
But anyway, thanks for the game all. It was very interesting & high-quality. Things just fell right for me there - I was half worried I'd be accused of multiing after.
Gg

Lando: "I just lost a lot of respect for you as a gunboat player. So many opportunities to arrive at stalemates and you threw everyone of them out the door."

I'm surprised you would make such a judgemental statement without giving me the chance to defend my actions in that game. I'm disappointed you would say such a thing about me here.

I was one of the first countries to realise that Turkey had a serious chance to solo. I easily had the position to set up at a stalemate with my armies. France (Lando) was very responsive to this and it was apparent very early on in Turkey's success that France and Russia could work together to stop the solo.

HOWEVER, England (Favio), in my opinion, played terribly at this stage. He proceeded to attack me and take my centers in Scandinavia, forcing me to disband units. England did not vote to draw when France, Italy, and I did. England persistently attacked me needlessly and gave me no sign that he would cooperate with me to allow me the space to hold Turkey to a draw. I increasingly got the impression that England wanted to squeeze my centers from the north and replace me so that I would be pushed out of the draw. I wasn't going to let that happen. Favio not once offered any of my units a support hold or even held his units for a turn to convey peaceful intentions for the greater good of a draw. Check back if you want Lando, Favio attacked me relentlessly.

From that perspective, I don't think I am the one who played without class but if you want to "thank Favio for his alliance" and attack me as a player with offensive language without even giving me the opportunity to speak then perhaps you are not the player or person I thought you were either.

@jmeyer: Thanks for backing up me. I respect that a lot.

Frankly, if anyone should explain their actions I feel it is Favio - whose actions in this game were so inconceivable that I would rather not play in another gunboat with.

I just looked back again at the movements and I really can't understand Lando's attack on me. You have to be blind if you can't see the Favio wasn't showing me any signs that I could trust him to let me hold a stalemate against Turkey.

Looking at this game, and I have been following it for a while now, I agree that I cannot understand England's play. It seemed pretty clear from the point of 1910 Autumn on, that any attack on Russia would give Turkey a chance at a solo. Even near the end game where Russia moved out of Denmark to hold the line England went for Denmark, in a WTA game this makes no sense.

strange game.....

id like to throw in that at several times, russia looked really strong for a possible win. Turkey broke into his back early on (1905) and i was impressed that russia survived this incursion and continued to grow afterwards

in 1910 russia and turkey were as big as each other, but with england attacking from north and turkey south, russia isnt going to be able to win and england doesnt look like it cares for the draw

so russias game then becomes one of survival until the end for me

england seems to only realise he shouldnt attack russia right at the end

Just my opinion for what it's worth:
Starting from fall of 1910 when Turkey got three builds, he was in excellent position. By this point, I think England was really irritated at Russia and wanted to do as much damage against R as he could and also to secure a stalemate position at StP. So E kept attacking R up north relentlessly, and R didn't want to get left out of the draw, so he went west, getting into France proper.
By fall of 1914, R didn't have enough armies left to deter T from taking war, mos, and berlin.
So, if R wanted to secure stalemate with E and F (a four way), he might have destroyed the fleet that got knocked out of the North Sea OR kept it in Edin and not move to Liv in 1913.

Wow. Thanks for the support guys.

@Cockney: You're right. Only in the last Autumn when Turkey has the 18 centers he needs, does Favio (England) offer a feeble support hold of peace from Liverpool to the Russian fleet in Edinburgh.

I'm glad you guys can see this - but shocked that Lando was completely blind to it. Shocked.

England really seemed to have lost the plot in that one, I ont see what sarg could have done differently. England wasnt just hitting an SC here or there, he was launching an all-out-assault on Sarg northern centers while Sarg was attempting to form a stalemate. Sarg could possibly have ignored him or supported him into a center ot two to send the message "hey we are on the same team" but doing so would be risky.

games like this are why i tend to abstain from gunboat now.

Sarg, I agree that England could have laid off, though they were in more danger of being eliminate thatn you were, IMO. But what happened in 1913 when you took Bre and Paris? You could have taken a shot at London instead. I don't understand making France disband two in that situation.

France's line holding Tunis wasn't perfect so neither Munich or Berlin could have been lost be lost, and it's vaguely possible that either England or Russia get squeezed out, but if Turkey hits the line quickly like he did, no one is going anywhere because England has the northern line and you have the middle.

Gramilaj: "But what happened in 1913 when you took Bre and Paris? You could have taken a shot at London instead. I don't understand making France disband two in that situation."

You are right - whatever my grievances with England were, there wasn't much need or use in me forcing France to disband. My reasoning for that though, just to explain was to:

1. Show England that attacking each other was pointless.
2. To secure some centers in the event that England was trying to squeeze me out.

In hindsight, the attack on France was unnecessary but either way, England was all-out attacking me right until the end and I felt the situation was an infuriatingly desperate one.

I don't really understand what Sarg was doing at the very very end. I get the initial part of his actions -- in that situation, facing the very real possibility of getting squeezed by an EFT, he throws everything at EF to force his way into the draw.

It makes sense UNTIL the attack into France. Instead of holding the War/Ukr/Mos line and barreling into France, I would instead have recommended going for London and defending Holland and Denmark while sending all available armies to Germany. Since England had no armies and France was busy in the Mediterranean, there was no means for England to try to cut Russia out of the draw if Russia got adequately entrenched in Germany (holding Kie/Ber/Mun with units and using Ruh/BAL to maintain the line with Hol/Den as available centers).

So basically, I agree in principle with what he did and think it was in general the right move, but I question the specifics of the plan.

I'll get back to this tonight, I have a lot to say. I also need to look at the game again.

Wow, great participation in this thread.
So here are some of my thoughts:
Firstly, I think it was perfectly logical for Russia to push west and throw the east to Turkey up until somewhere in the 1911-1913 range -- it increases his chances of being on the stalemate line when the solo threat comes through.
I do, however, think that the moves to Paris/Brest were misguided. Perhaps even just Brest to force the disband of the Ruhr army would have been ok, but when I saw those moves I knew I had the win.
England I think played poorly at the end; he was never going to be able to take Russia out of the draw (my thoughts at the time were that he needed to start building armies instead of fleets, which he didn't), and he was never going to be axed from the draw, either, as there were not enough enough disposable fleets for France/Russia to eliminate him. Such being the case, I don't understand his aggression, certainly not after taking STP.
Finally, considering the fact that England & France only had 3 armies between them, I do think that Russia would have been safe in the draw with, say, armies in MUN/BER/RUH and a fleet in HOL (+England/France in BAL/BUR, obviously), or something like that. So while it was important to stay active up until Turkey hit TYL/BOH, at that point getting armies west of Berlin and throwing Scandinavia/England/France would have been safe & almost certainly would have gotten a 4-way draw.
But I can understand why people acted the way they did. Play wasn't perfect, but that's part of the beauty of gunboats IMHO -- these things happen, and that's what makes it impressive when a stalemate is coordinated properly. Also, it's important to remember that in-game perspectives are never perfect.
I guess we'll have to let this stand as an eternal reminder of the dangers of a small corner power in the endgame. In fact, maybe it was all Germany's fault for not eliminating England when he had the chance!

Eden, you are right. As I said in response to gramilaj, the moves to France were, in hindsight, errors of judgement. I blame frustration at what I saw was a hopeless case in England, whose moves were completely impossible to work with. Attacking France was an error though and I accept that. I'm glad however that everyone so far, apart from Lando of course, that England WAS attacking me relentlessly and presented a credible danger to my existence and the possibility of a stalemate being successful against Turkey.

I enjoy the fact that even though we are criticizing/giving constructive criticism to each other, we are not cursing each other out like so many of the other threads.
+1 for civility.

Very true zultar - this thread has been really great and constructive and it's nice to see so many people sharing their views.

*really great in that respect

All I really have to say is that I pressed draw prior to Autumn of 1911, and Russia's supported move to the north sea forced me to continue to attack him. My only options at that point were to allow him to take over all my centers and screw me out of the draw, or fight him enough to stay in, which screwed me out of a draw anyway. After that, all i could do was try to get to germany before turkey, which was impossible with russia fucking around on my island. So when I started to simply support hold my own units without attacking his, which I did for two turns, with the exception of my own lands in England proper, i would have thought that was enough to say, get out of my land and move your units to where they need to be. Had he have done that and not conitnued to screw with me, I would not have screwed with him because I knew he was paramount to the stalemate. Hw had too much power in the north for me to just set there and watch idly by. So if you look at it from my perspective, I was screwed either way. I was simply playing for a survive by 1912.

I'll simply my small speech. My two options were either get a defeat or live for a survive. I knew what would happen by fighting Russia but I also knew what would happen if I did not. I know there is a certain class of players on this site and I was honored that I got to play in a game with them, but forgive me if I chose the route of self preservation....

"So when I started to simply support hold my own units without attacking his, which I did for two turns"

Which turns were they, Favio?

"I also knew what would happen if I did not"

Prior to your attack on me, I made no move against you. That is utter rubbish.

@Favio: There is not a single turn where you simply support hold all your units. Certainly not two turns.

thank you to gramilaj for seeing that I was more in danger of being eliminated than Sarg was.

Ok, my POV on this thing. I stand by my original points. I apologize if I sounded harsh, but I was still fuming from the game. I should have taken a time-out and sent something so as not to offend anyone. That was not my intention. I really wanted to understand what Sargmacher was thinking. I am not sure I still even fully understand, so hopefully if I pose any questions they may receive answers.

Anyway, this game can be divided into sections. I will talk about them independantly as they are all fairly different.

Pre-1909. This period doesn't really seem to cause any of the issues being discussed in the forum. I will say, though, that this period demonstrated a very strong level of gunboat play. It was fun, made one think hard and make difficult decisions. It was Gunboat at its best, which is why it is such a shame it ended the way it did.

1909-1911: This is the period where things changed. 1909 I recognized that nobody would be getting a solo victory other than potentially Turkey. My decision making stopped being about how to make progress but more about how to stall Turkey and ensure a place in the draw. It was clear that is what others were doing as well. Russia focused on Germany while England seemed to be making an attempt to eliminate Russia from the draw. From my perspective in this period, this was still a possibility. Unfortunately, England played it too slow, Russia's anticipation was too good and he managed to make that impossible with his strong occupation of Germany. It mattered not what happened in the North.

The rest of the game can all be lumped together. This is the period where it was clear to me the only possible draw was a four-way draw. This is what I was playing for. Let us look at 1912, England was in Norway and Russia was in the North Sea. From there Russia was sending fleets at the British Isles and Britain was sending fleets at Scandinavia. As far as I can tell, Russia is responding to actions by England in the previous period. Russia seems to be exacting vengeance and moving away from the stalemate line. While England seems to be fighting to get to it. There is still time so I am not panicking.

1913 - Russia moves his fleets towards the MAO. This is good, he will stop bothering England and help me hold my incomplete stalemate line. He also moves to BUR to be able to ensure the stalemate at Munich. This is the best work I have seen, I am impressed. England moves to reinforce Scnadianvia, which is still a part of the line. I figure a draw is ensured.

But no, the autumn of that year sees terrible things happen. Russia takes LVP/BRE/PAR all in one fell swoop while England takes HOL. These are all terrible moves that I hated. Taking BRE/PAR - whatever, I can deal with that. It doesn't kill us. But why on earth would you move to Liverpool!!??? That is the one that got me. That to me says "Russia is throwing the game, goodnight"

Russia is attacking England and England doesn't know what to do. This is completely fair. That is likely why HOL was taken.

It is important to note that at the start of 1914 we could have still had a draw guaranteed. A Russian move from PAR-BUR and from KIE-BER would have guaranteed the draw. This, to me, is the single biggest error in that whole game. This is the error that cost the game. It was clear to me that England was fighting over his home turf and to hold the line in STP. It was clear to me that Russia's only objective was to give Turkey the solo.

I assume jmeyers, you are a multi of Sargmacher's?

I personally believe it is inexcusable to throw a game in the manner Russia did. Regardless of what your neighbour is doing, so long as your existence is not threatened then the stalemate is the priority. This might change slightly in full-press, but that is erroneous. Russia had opportunities to set and hold a stalemate line so many times. That is what I saw. England had opportunities to be far more aggressive than he was. He was fairly tame and only took inconsequential centres.

Anyway, my biggest issues are Russia taking LVP in 1913 and not moving to the stalemate in 1914. Both times I saw those moves go through my heart sank.

Sarg, you say you are shocked with me? I am shocked to see it was you playing Russia. Not at all the moves I would have expected from you.

Whoever is right or wrong does not really matter. everyone is entitled to play the way they see fit, to reach the goals they set for themselves. That is part of the game. i saw that game from a very different perspective from most people here. I don't see big problems with England's play. A few things could have been done different so you saw some chance to draw. But really, he didn't not attack you to hard in the endgame and it can be argued you started it. When the game switches from "try and get bigger" to "stop the solo" can be ambiguous. You obviously saw it before England did, but it was clear to me he wanted to draw. You, Sarg, are the one who had the cancel vote up.

And I think you accused England of not voting draw. It was me that held-out the longest other than Turkey.

I probably did not cover everything. Please ask questions if you are not sure what I mean/I left anything out. I do not want this to be a fight, but hopefully people learn to be better gunboaters from thsi thread. Myself included.