I'd also like to ask a follow-up, how do I do that?

If you have a question for a professor, I don't mind a PM to them, but you do have to remember that they are a professor and not your TA. As such, their information may well be limited based on how much or how little they feel their response is really something that should be addressed by your TA and how much it may or may not influence your game going forward.

It sounds like I should clarify a bit in terms of both England and Russia (I'm also happy to answer questions via PM, but remember that you'll get an answer based upon my reading of the board, not the press. The press has a lot more information than I do.)

It's ideal to play the game in a way where you have multiple good options and your opponent has only one good option, the one you wanted him to have. Generally, the players with multiple good, viable options are doing well and the ones with only one path forward are entirely dependent upon an ally.

For example, England in this position appears to be at war with France and at war with Germany. Thus, even though Russia is growing and is a long-term threat to him, England does not have the option of fighting Russia; its survival is dependent upon him. On the other hand, France currently can fight England and profit, can stop that war and fight Germany and profit, and possibly could choose to fight Italy and profit.

[I was going to lay out some future scenarios here, but don't want to unduly influence the game. So, let me speak more generally instead, in a way that I suspect will answer England's question as well.]

A decent rough way to think about flexibility is to count how many units are needed to defend what you've got, and the more units you have left over, the more flexibility you have. Even though at the moment you are working with Italy and Turkey, that won't last forever, so let's think about what's involved in minimally holding your gains down south:

A minimal defensive line with Budapest looks something like F Rum (BLA empty), A Gal S Rum, A Bud S Vie, A Vie S Bud. Four units, and if you're faced with armies all along the front, then you guess a bit with Gal and have something where at least a stab isn't guaranteed to get a center.

A minimal defensive line with Ser instead of Bud? You can't defend Ser: Bud - Rum, power 2 attack on Ser.

A minimal defensive line without either one? A Boh S Vie, A Gal S Vie, A Vie H, A Ukr S Rum, F Sev S Rum, A Rum, and BLA empty (if it's no longer empty, you have a more active defensive line, but it's active). Six units.

So, to summarize, with Ser - Bud, you set up a situation where you need six units to protect three centers (Vie, Rum, Sev), while if you take Bud and Turkey stays in Serbia, you need four units to protect four centers (Vie, Bud, Rum, Sev). In other words, Bud is worth three centers to you in terms of the extra flexibility! For three centers, this immediately becomes the largest problem you've got, and so whatever else you thought you wanted to do, you're going to be solving this one first.

[As a general rule, if you find yourself using more units than centers, it's an indication that you are in an unstable situation, and will shortly either be advancing or retreating (this rule of thumb changes somewhat in the endgame).]


Let's ask the same question for England last year. As England, imagine you could choose between two scenarios:

A) Pull everything back, disband because you lose Norway, and have three units to defend your three home centers.

B) Take Denmark, knowing that it takes two units to defend it (plus Russian help) if Germany keeps his second fleet, leaving two to defend your three home centers.

As before, using 2 units to defend 1 center is a liability, and if you're in a war for survival, it might be a fatal one. You're now tied to using as much of your power to defend Denmark as you are devoting to defending three home centers, and surely you don't value those two things anywhere close to equally.

I will encourage all of the players to do this calculation for themselves -- look at every power, count how many units they need to defend their current holdings, and count how many extras they have (in the case of a power under severe threat, this might be negative; if so, that's a good indication that the power is about to lose centers unless something drastic happens, and that this player should be willing to take major risks to change the situation). The more extras, the more influential their decision-making and thus the more time you should be spending focusing on...helping them make those choices.

Thanks CS!

Activity on this game seems to be very low. Do we still have other profs? Does somebody else want to chime in? I feel its the diversity of opinions that males the discussion more than the sum of its parts.

I support this suggestion.

bump

I kno jmo is super busy. I can ask others if they want to participate. I know uclabb has volunteered to guest prof from time to time--he's really good as well.

Yes please. Any others are welcome too as far as I'm concerned. I prefer to err on the side of too many profs rather than too few.

seconded

I agree as well

bump

I'll try to post commentary when I can. I'm enjoying the beginner SOW game quite a bit and this game could use some more discussion. Anyone (who isn't playing), including TAs, feel free to chime in with questions and I'll be happy to provide my opinion.

For purposes of this game, I'm not going to differentiate between beginners and "intermediate," whatever that means. As far as I'm concerned, being in the SOW makes you a beginner. That isn't bad, but judging by the moves so far, nobody looks to be threatening MadMarx's spot on top of the GR :)

Generally, I'll post what moves I like and what moves I dislike and tie it into my overall commentary. If I've misread anything or gotten anything wrong based on prior discussion, feel free to correct me.

Moves I Like:

Russia F Swe s Eng F NTH - Den. Several articles have posited that it is better for England/Russia relations to not have England control Denmark, given its proximity to StP. Most of the time, this involves a Swe/Nor switch, but putting England in Den seems to have worked nicely with the double support. Giving up NTH is usually not wise for England so early in the game, but for Russia, this move has tremendous upshot.

Russia A Gal - Vie, Italy s A Gal - Vie. I like this move for both parties. My favorite alliance in the game is the R/I, and if this is a sign of things to come, Russia is positioned to be the dominant force in this game early on. This works out well for Italy, too, given the potential for a stalemate after an Obriani opening. Turkey is still in the mix, so the dust has yet to settle on the east, but whichever two powers emerge will likely be a formidable duo.

England A Lon - Wal. Good read of France's intentions. I always love thwarting plans with a simple bounce.

Moves I Don't Like:

Turkey A Ser - Bud. I understand the intention here - Austria had double support back into Serbia and you had no unit in Bul to provide support. But in the short term, having Ser is much more useful than having an army stranded in a traditionally Russian territory in an R/T alliance. A good Turkey is able to break out of his corner through concentration of power, and having a unit on its own without any support from your own units is ill advised, even if it did result in a build. I'm interested to see how this plays out.

Big build phase coming up. Russia gets +2, Turkey gets +1, and the Balkans will clear out and have some more room to maneuver.

thanks 2wl

everybody likes Russia!

Three quick comments on the builds:

Turkey: Build A Smy

In isolation, this is very reasonable. However, last turn you chose to move BLA - Con, expecting this exact situation. Let's consider three possibilities for F Con and A Smy right now:

1) F Con/A Smy (current position)
2) F BLA/A Con
3) F Ank/A Con (like #2, in case vacating BLA was negotiated)

Which is best? Basically, the way to think about it is that you want to take two units and bring them into your Western theater - F BLA and a newly-built army. In the current situation, you try to bring the fleet west first, and in the other one you try to bring the army west first. Both have to come through Con, so you have a choice between A Con first and F Con first.

Which one is more urgent? Which one has the greater chance of being blocked and having everything get stuck for an extra turn?

I can't answer those questions for certain, because I don't have access to the negotiations. However, my strong intuition is that A Con was more important than F Con, and the problem with Turkey is that if you're not really careful about shifting units to the front, you pay for that for many turns past the initial mistake. A Con - Smy was a good example, and I suspect this might turn out to be the same problem. This is what I was saying about F BLA - Con last turn, but if you had felt that you really needed three fleets in the Med (i.e., and built F Smy), I would have understood the move.

Russia: Build A Mos.

If any of the adjustments can be said to be surprising, this is probably the most surprising one (and it's not a particularly big surprise). So, let me ask an open-ended question, one that every player should be asking about every adjustment:

The other choices were F/A StP. That Russia picked A Mos instead of one of them gives him a different set of possible places this army can go. What does this say about Russian intentions? Consider that a homework problem, and you'll find out over the next couple of turns whether you're right.

Germany Disband A Hol

Given an uncomfortable set of choices, this is probably your most aggressive, and without knowing the negotiations, the same one I'd have made. You've created the maximal tactical headache for your current adversaries, and by stretching them thinly, you've created the best conditions possible for a change in alliances, whether a stab on their side or a French stab of you. Sure, the latter would be bad news. And sure, having two armies instead of three may prove fatal if you can't negotiate your way into a better situation. But, when in trouble, maximizing your options and picking a fluid position is good (similarly, when you're doing well, minimizing everybody's options and locking alliance into play is good). So, well done, and we'll find out whether it works out for you.

"Consider that a homework problem, and you'll find out over the next couple of turns whether you're right."

LOL! :-)

What is an obriani opening?

An Obriani is Italy's northern opening.

Bump up the jam, bump it up.

Austria has not saved move, 2 hours left
Mods or Tru

Looks like he made it back

bump next phase occurred.

Spring 1903

The turn that effectively cripples both England and Austria. We now appear to have a solid F/G in the west, while in the east, Russia is going to eventually going to have to choose a side.

My likes and dislikes should be relatively clear this turn, since there weren't any real surprise moves nor were there any massively surprising tactical decisions that blew me away. Lets look at the West first. A solid F/G has emerged after they both dealt debilitating blows to England; France by setting himself up for Liverpool in the fall, Germany by securing Den. I question F SKA-NTH by England, since the double support was ensured, and at this point in the game you need all the help you can get, but I suppose it was inevitable that your hold in Denmark would be lost. With Russia's help, all is not lost yet, so best to hold on to what's left and try and regroup. If F Nor can get into the NTH and help out, you may still have a fighting chance. France, in the meantime, has established himself as the dominant force in the West with a commanding presence in England as well as solid fleet support and an ally with his hands full.

The East is a bit more muddled. Russia is helping Italy. Turkey is helping Russia. Russia is helping Turkey. Everyone is fighting Austria. Something has to give and Russia will be forced to choose a side very soon. Of course, there's no rule that says I/T can't team up, and given their respective strength, any of the two at this point will have a difficult time dealing with the third. This speaks to the importance of having a long term strategy. Russia's strategy of helping both Italy and Turkey is unsustainable, and given the rising power of Germany and Turkey, Russia may be in for some unwelcome turns of events in the next year. All three of those countries have some important diplomacy to conduct over the next few days that will likely determine the power structure in the east for the duration of the game.

moar analysis! this is not enough

bump

XD Zenetar angry! you no like Zentar when he is ANGRY!!!!! AAAAAARRRRRGGG

Sorry - I've been traveling and haven't been able to do much this week. I mentioned at the outset that this would happen and there would be some weeks where I'd need a bit of help...I thought jmo was also going to be around, though?

I've got pretty limited time, so a few quick thoughts on some moves that stood out:

English F SKA - NTH [with German power-3 F HEL - Den]: I understand what you're trying to do here, but ultimately it's a year too late. With this plan, the only chance I saw would have been to invite Nwy - NTH and hope Russia propping you up is more in his interest than taking a center off you in a partition with France.

To put it another way, when you were faced with three powers attacking, you really needed to make peace with two of them, and you came close, but couldn't quite get it done. You still get good marks for dealing with the triple threat this well, though, and it's not quite over. If you can get one of France and Germany to be satisfied with part of England instead of all of England...

Incidentally, http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/resources/strategy/articles/janissary.htm makes good reading.


Russia: A Sil - Ber: This is the first turn where I really don't like what you did, in what's been a very well-played game as reflected by the results thusfar. For the reasons I'm about to mention, this really needed to be Sil S War - Gal.

Russia: A Vie S Ven - Tri, A Rum S Bul - Ser: The immediate problem I have here is that you aren't gaining any of Trieste, Serbia, and Greece, yet you're helping others into those centers. This seems unwise. But moreover, it sets up a mess in the Balkans. Let me summarize it this way: Nobody can feel confident in what they have, because nobody can easily defend what they have except for Italy, who has the least [and isn't in quite as good of a defensive position as it looks in the intermediate term].

This is also your Rum S Ser - Bud problem now rearing its ugly head; if you were in Bud, this would actually be stable. Instead, Turkey can't defend Bud, you can't defend Vie, etc.

More generally, let me say the following: Turkey now has nowhere to go except either through [in alphabetical order; I make no suggestion as to which is better] Italy or Russia. As a result, the I/R/T [again, alpha] alliance will break up, because it can't not break up. Therefore, at least one of the three of you is making a mistake by letting Austria die because you'll need all the help you can get when attacked by the other two. Presumably, all three of you think you know who's getting the short end of the stick, and at least one of you is wrong. :) We will find out which one over the next turn or two, I suspect.

And with that in mind:

Turkey: F Con - Bul(sc): I'll go back to what I asked last turn about the order. Would you rather have F Bul(sc) / A Con right now or A Bul / F Con? The latter is more flexible, in many ways, so presumably the latter.

But, the other thing to notice here is that Con went to Bul(sc) rather than Bul(ec). He wouldn't have have to make that decision with the army, but with the fleet, he was forced to. Although I'm not privy to negotiations, I will hope that this decision was part of the negotiations over Rum S Bul - Ser.

Anyway, plenty of intrigue over the next turn or two in the east, and I'm sorry for the quicker/sloppier analysis. I should be around more for the next turn, I hope!