For f2f and press games, I don't have any standard openings - I'm always going to choose something after talking to everyone, and I don't like to limit choices before that talking happens.

My favourite-ish Gunboat openings (these are by no means the openings I always use, I like to vary it up because getting stuck with the same openings is a recipe for getting complacent):

England1: Edi-Nwg, Lon-Nth, Lvp-Edi. (Yeah, Edi, not Yor. Opens the possibility of convoy via Nwg instead of Nth, freeing Nth to do something else. Yes, if French ->EngC then it's all a bit ugly, but not necessarily game endingly so.)

England2: Lon-EngC, Edi-Nth, Lvp-Wal (Let's just declare war on France - bit crazy, good odds of getting zero builds, but if you really wanna go for it... and actually it does keep your options a bit more open than it may seem. Landing an Army in Belgium without support can sometimes happen, depending on German and French openings, and from there you don't *have* to attack France, even though they'll be expecting you will...)

France1: Mar-Spa, Bre-MAO, Par-Bur (expecting Mun-Bur, but at risk of slightly sabotaging potential German cooperation)

France2: Mar-Bur, Bre-MAO, Par-Bur (the "let's take Iberia and be happy and hedge our bets" option).

France3: Mar-Bur, Par-Pic, Bre-MAO (the "Reverse Schlieffen Plan" - very dodgy, likely to result in one build in 1901 - not necessarily a fatal problem, provided someone else comes on board v. Germany by 1902).

German1: Kie-Den, Ber-Kie, Mun-Ruh (or Bur, depending on how paranoid you're feeling). This buys into the whole F1901M Problem Of Sweden. :-)

German2: Kie-Hol, Ber-Kie, Mun-Ruh (or Bur if you just want to declare war on France). Avoids the Sweden Problem, but then, that isn't necessarily a good thing.

Russia1: StP-GoB, Mos-StP, Sev-Rum, War-Ukr ("I want my two builds and hedge my bets North vs South"). Austrian Vie-Gal, Bud-Rum would make a terrible mess here, but that's a very unlikely opening from Austria, since it makes it very likely Austria will get zero builds. Also a bit anti-English, but not definitively so. A fairly clear "Please R/T" to turkey though. Might not help, Turkish Fleet Bla is very likely. :-)

Russia2: Sev-Bla, Mos-Ukr, War-Gal, StP-GoB. ("Let's mostly declare war on Austria").

Russia3: Sev-Bla, Mos-Ukr, War H, StP-GoB. ("Let's hedge our bets and see what happens by 1902")

Austria1: Vie-Tri, Bud-Ser, Tri-Alb. ("Greece is mine.") War-Gal makes this opening very bad though, but it's very nice if that isn't the Russian opening. High risk, high reward.

Austria2: Bud-Ser, Vie-Gal, Tri-Alb ("Let's grab Greece whilst poking the bear.") Ignores any potential for trigger happy Italians, but ah well.

Austria3: Bud-Ser, Vie-Bud, Tri-Alb ("Grab Greece, and leave myself open on both sides, which is the Austrian version of hedging your bets with an opening").

Austria4: Vie H, Bud-Ser, Tri S Ven ("Let's just take the one build, and wait to be attacked")... I'm not sure I would actually play this opening, but it's the paranoid tactical option. You definitely get one SC and can't lose any. But then 1902 is likely to see you jumped from all sides, IMO.

Turkey1: Ank-Bla, Con-Bul, Smy-Con. Probably the most standard "play it safe" opening?

Turkey2: Ank-Con, Con-Bul, Smy-Ank. "Let's R/T". Cover yourself in fall with Bul-Con, Ank-Con, Con-Aeg. You *could* theoretically end up with zero builds with Russian Bla S Bul-Con, but that is pretty unlikely.

Turkey3: Con-Bul, Ank-Bla, Smy-Syr. "Let's R/T, the play it safe option". Loses tempo with getting that fleet out into the med. That isn't necessarily a problem, since you'll probably build F Smy anyway if things go well. But it's not as nice logistically if you're serious about R/T.

Turkey4: Con-Bul, Ank-Bla, Smy-Arm. ("Let's declare war on Russia.") I would rarely open with this one - you're pretty much gambling on an anti-russian opening from the Austrian, *and* a non-southern opening from Russia. If it works, bye bye Russia, but yeah. Low odds.

Italy1: Ven-Pie, Rom-Ven, Nap-Ion. ("Let's declare war on France".) It's... a weird option, and you're betting on Austria going east.

Italy2: Ven-Tri, Rom-Ven, Nap-Ion. Actually not *that* likely to succeed, a lot of Austrias will cover Trieste somehow.

Italy3: Ven-Tyr, Rom-Ven, Nap-Ion. Not necessarily any better than Italy2, but you get a few more tactical options depending on Austrian openings.

Italy4: Ven-Apu, Rom H, Nap-Ion. "Hey, Austria, let's play nice, but I'm watching my back".

Italy5: Rom-Nap (or Apu), Ven S F Tri, Nap-Ion. "Hey, Austria, let's play nice, but I'm paranoid and unsure."

Italy*: Nap-Tys instead plus any of the above. "Look, let's just avoid any paranoia about Greece, OK".

The real question for Italy in particular with many openings is Fleet Ion To Tunis, or Army to Tunis? That's not as obvious an answer as one might think. Usually it's the fleet. But if Austria is leaving Trieste empty and has Fleet Greece, then build F Nap, Nap-Ion, Ion-EMed, is a serious actual possibility, depending on Turkish opening and build. Not a settled question, either way.

My prefered turkish opening also includes armenia.

I also advertise it to russia to start with, and offer a bounce in armenia.
The rational is two fold, first getting the fleet to con means you're out into the med early enough to completely block a lepanto; second armenia is to ensurerussia co-operates. Russia often fears you will move into black sea an that it is a trap, so they order bla and leave sev open. As turkey you them have the option of self bouncing ank, or higting sev. So you managed to give up black sea while covering your home centers and putting pressure on russia.

Diplomatically, you have to tell russia first, and ideally convince him that the move to arm is not an attack, merely a security measure which any decent player would deploy. (And the main tactical advantage is getting your fleet into the med, which is actually pro-russia) If russia chooses to believe you and bounces armenia, then you have the start of a possible alliance and you have prevented Russia from moving south (because mos-sev will fail, russia must open mos-ukr if he want to open south and that is more anti-austria, which looks good for turkey)

Worst casr, russia opens sev-bla, mos-sev and war-ukr, and then you have to send armenia to ank.... And possibly have a war on your hands.

I agree with valis re lack of imagination; one of my favourite openings is the Key Lepanto and I don't see it that often nowadays.

But wouldn't it be good if someone would do with the database, for finished games, an analysis of the different opening sets for each country and the outcomes for finished games. Richard Sharp did a colossal amount of work on this up to the mid-90s for the UK postal hobby, the results of which were published in Dolchstoss. By the by, do not believe everything you read in the Dip Archive - Stephen Agar had a nasty habit, for example, of making some v minor changes in a variant and adding his name in place of someone else's - the availability to him of articles on disc was limited. So it is far from authoritative or even representative of 'old school' thinking. For example, I wouldn't take Nick Whyte's advice on how to cross the road, let alone opening strategy. In short, a lot if you guys have more experience and insight.

Chumbles, could you speak to the presence of metagaming in the older articles? Some of the articles seem more like the writer is trying to mislead the reader rather than provide a useful perspective - for example:

http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/resources/strategy/articles/basics_italy.htm

(and other basic Italy articles in general)

I just now noticed the author- I had this article in mind before spotting that, I swear..

Tru Ninja did some analysis of the common openings and the results on webdip - it focussed more on the number of centres achieved rather than whether or not it resulted in a draw or a survive. I can't find the link right now, but it's pretty interesting if anyone has it. Tru?

What about the author?

I like the differentiation between FP and Gunboat.

Hmmm, well I'm not too conventional. Here are my favorite openings to do. (not most often, but favorite)

England - Edi-Norwegian, Lon-North, Liv-Edi.
So this one is both a favorite and most frequent. Gives the option of convoy to either Belgium or Norway.

France - Par-Gas, Mar-Bur, Bre-MAO
Fairly defensive. I'm always thinking defense as France for some reason.

Germany - Kiel-Den, Ber-Kiel, Mun-Ruhr. Mun-Bur can be too easily overcome with a suppport from Mar, so its suboptimal, even though this potentially exposes Mun.

Italy - Ven-Tyr, Rome-Ven, Tun-Ionian (followed by moves to Boh and Tyrolia, just like Eden said). I just love fucking with Austria and Germany as Italy.

Austria - Tri-Alb, Bud-Ser, Vie - Bud. I usually like to do some variant of a Key or Blue Water Lepanto. I've learned the hard way that one should not leave Serbia open to Turkey in the fall, because bad things will happen. So this is my new favorite.

Russia - St.P - GoB, War - Gal, Mos-Ukr, Sev - Bla. I don't know why, but I always go ham at Austria when I'm Russia.

Turkey - Smy-Arm, Ank-Bla, Con-Bul. You will always get great results from this, 100%

My favorite two are:

As France: Bre-ENG, Par-Pic, Mar-Bur. Then, use the two armies to take Belgium. And while England runs to cover London, send the fleet into NTH. Build in Mar, and take Iberia at your own leisure. Works best in Gunboat.

As Italy/Germany - Koniggratz Freakout. Italy moves Ven-Pie, Rom-Ven, without telling France anything. France has to cover Marseilles. Germany moves Mun-Tyr. Austria has likely left only one unit to protect Tri and Vie. Next turn, Austria tries to guess where the attack will go, possibly moving Vie-Tri with support from Serbia. Italy dislodges Germany (two variants here - either leave an army in Pie and build in Venice, or forget Pie and build a fleet), and Germany uses the retreat phase to waltz into whichever SC Austria didn't protect. This is very unlikely to work in Gunboat.

@Sherincall, pretty devious. I find that those sort of plans come from players with a great deal more experience.

I have always wanted to try the "Konnigratz Freakout" (never knew it was called that!) but every game I have been Italy, I have been unable to convince Germany to go for it.

@Sherincall: I love your French opening, but I do wonder: won't Germany and England simply gang up on you?

AndI know you said it works best in gunboat, but say you were to do this in full press, how would you sell it?

@goldfinger: I find it interesting that you're playing aggressive as Italy/Turkey, but conservative as Russia/Austria/Germany and England. Why not try an aggressive opening for England, like moving to the channel? In my experience, England needs to do something special to become a major power by 1902/1903. How do you continue from Nwg, Nwy and Edi?

By the way, Konnigratz Freakout is a bullshit opening for Germany. I'll go attack my natural ally Austria, empower Russia in the process, encourage Italy to go West and leave no pressure on England, Russia or France. That army in Vienna will be so worth it!

Attacking Austria is the dumbest thing either Italy or Germany can do.

Steephie22: I haven't played that opening as France, but in gunboat, it's actually not that easy for Germany and England to cooperate effectively. Fleet logistics complicates the issue. I reckon in press/F2F you'd get hammered, but in gunboat, provided you don't have good tacticians in both Germany *and* England, you might be OK.

In full press it can work out quite well for Italy about half the time, bo. Those odds aren't too terrible. But agreed with Germany - unless E and F are complete morons.

I play an aggressive Turkey and Italy to avoid getting stuck in the "Lepanto trap" Bu opening against Russia (hard or soft) you can sow some dissent within the ranks of the A/I alliance. Any problems you may incur with Russia can be patched up later provided you don't allow him to control Black Sea. As for Italy, you need to find that 5th SC quickly. Best way to do that is often through Austria. Or, you can support Austria with A Bohemia by helping him into Gal or moving to Sil to put pressure on Russia. Either way that army is being put to more use than it would be just sitting in Venice.

I avoid opening to EC because - as England - I don't want France in MAO when I stab. I try to negotiate MAO to be empty from A01 onwards, if possible. That way I can at the very least bounce him out of there and prevent the counter-attack. My 5th as England is usually Belgium or St. Petes, which I get with decent frequency. Den I should try for more often.

Austria I just hedgehog by nature, and G and R I'm too wary of growing too big too fast, so play conservatively.

@bo_sox, from my limited experience, attacking Austria as Italy is quite good: gameID=133607, gameID=47099. I think the Russian/Italian alliance is way underrated and Austria is kinda overpowered in high-level games these days.

bas: That opening's on my list too... As gold says, "Gives the option of convoy to either Belgium or Norway." So A Edi-Bel (via convoy F Nth), F Nwg - Nwy.

Or slightly crazier, convoy to Holland or Denmark...

Or even wilder and crazier things like ordering Fleet North Sea to move to Belgium. :-)

a key concept people forget with Austria, is that they are the powerhouse in the Balkans. To maintain that control, you have to keep your borders red.
Vienna move to Galicia
Budapest support move to Galicia from Vienna
Trieste move to Albania
now if you can trust Italy, this works well. You can have a quick hit on Romania with support. It puts Russia back a step, and it makes Turkey think about who to play along with. You can leverage Serbia that way.

OR

Ensure that Turkey is bouncing Russia in the Black Sea and
Vienna move to Galicia
Budapest move to Romania
Trieste move to Albania
Both great first round moves, and both can set back Russia a tad. As Austria, you have to control your borders.

Yet you do nothing to keep your southern border. If I were Turkey to your Austria, why wouldn't I move Bul-Ser?

It's a trap..

I don't understand why any England would ever tolerate a German opening of F Kiel to Holland. Surely 10 times out of 10 England should demand (or at the very least bounce Germany out of) Denmark and should 10 times out of 10 have Russia on their side. Do you really want to bet your whole game in Spring 1901 on France choosing you over England (or over just leaving you to to duke it out fruitlessly)?

As England, I convinced Germany to move to Hol once. Because he ended up in a complete mess, he was now forced to trust me.

It was a very interesting deal. He would get Belgium, I got Denmark. I made sure France did something about Belgium and another one bites the dust.

England:

F-Lon -> Eng
F-Edi-> Nor
A-Lvp -> Wal

I like the aggression in this one. If I'm feeling pro-France then I'll change to Nor/Nwg/Yor, but I will almost never convoy to Norway - I hate that opening.

France:
F-Bre -> MAO
A-Par -> Bur
A-Mar s move Par -> Bur

Pretty standard stuff. If I'm being anti-English then I'll change to Bre->EngC, Par->Gas, Mar -> Spa. By far the best way to attack England.

Germany:
F-Kie->Hol
A-Ber->Kie
A-Mun->Ruh

As I'm almost always in favour of giving Russia Sweden anyway, I'm far more in favour of the Holland opening and dictating who gets Belgium. Whilst this looks anti-English, it can be changed to a sneaky anti-French opening by going Hol->Bel s by Ruh, Kie-Hol and giving England Denmark (which is guaranteed to create an early E-R war whilst you mop up France by having a fleet on the Channel in 1902). This is also the only reason to ever open Mun-Ruh - if you're not opening to Holland then this is pointless. Go to Burgundy or go to Tyrolia - otherwise you're just moving a unit for the hell of it when you're pretty much never going to get Belgium anyway.

Russia:
F-STP -> GoB
F-Sev -> Bla
A-War -> Gal
A-Mos -> Ukr

Standard opening. I tend not to be risky. Might occasionally go with the northern opening instead if I get good vibes from France & Germany.

Turkey:
A-Con -> Bul
F-Ank -> Bla
A-Smy -> Arm

I like being the anti-Russian Turkey.

Italy:
F-Nap-Ion
A-Rom - Apu
A-Ven Hold

Also pretty conservative. I hate going anti-French and I'm no fan of the S01 -> Trieste move either. If I was going anti-French I'd do it properly and go F-Nap -> Tyr instead of the dumb hedging where you go to Ion anyway and thus guarantee that other than a 50/50 on Marseilles in 1901, your attack on France is going to do absolutely nothing without German support.

Austria:
A-Vie->Gal
F-Tri -> Ven
A-Bud -> Rum

Hedgehog or nothing, bitches. (But really, A-Vie -> Gal, A-Bud -> Ser, F-Tri-> Alb).

So, lately, every time I get England in gunboat I try to see how far towards Syria I can get one of my fleets. Starting S01. Here are some examples:
gameID=164578
gameID=163640
gameID=162760

Right now my records are
TYS: 2
TUN: 1

Gunboat is serious business guys

Here's one option:

S1901: A Ber-Kie, F Hol-Bel, A Mun-Bur
F1901: F Hol-Bel, A Kie-Hol, (A Bur S F Hol-Bel) or (A Mun-Bur)
B1901: Builds, at least one, likely two...
S1902: F Bel-
Eng (!), A Hol-Bel, ...

That's definitely not anti-English in any way, and cracks wide open the maginot line mini-stalemate line. It's pretty crazy, for sure, as England probably gets Denmark...

In any case I'm not sure why England should necessarily be all that worried about German F Hol/Bel alone. It's not like Germany's going to magically conjure an extra two fleets from somewhere to come knocking down the English front door.

@JY - similar comment to bas on those Austrian moves. You'll get burned by Turkey more often than not doing that.

I know that Turkey can go on Serbia, but then you get Greece for sure. the only change, you get to exchange Serbia/Greece with Romania. Besides, once Turkey sees your positioning, they usually like to cooperate. (my experience)

In my experience 1) You never get Rum and 2) Turkey goes "Oooh, free Serbia with a free Greece in 1902!"