Humptybump for more comments on the new phase!

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Well, folks, I have a conundrum. A week from today, I will be headed to Pennsylvania to participate in the 150th anniversary reenactment of the Battle of Gettysburg. I will be gone for several days without internet--specifically from June 26th to July 1st. I should be back and able to participate on the 2nd. Obviously, this is longer than one phase, so something will have to be done. As was done earlier, I will leave it to the community to decide the best course of action. Here are the options, as I see them:
1) Pause the game. It wouldn't be for too long, but it would hold it up some.
2) Get a sitter to enter orders in my stead. The game could keep going, though my "personality" would change for a little while, as I have no way of instructing the sitter. He would be acting autonomously.
3) Get a new player. Obviously I'd rather stay in the game, but if this is the only acceptable choice I will step aside.
I hate to cause problems like this, especially for a second time, but I see no alternative here.

Cool thing to have a problem over though, rs2e. I'd love to do reenacting. But I'm a wuss who can't stand getting dirty and itchy and spending hours on end in the heat of the day wearing a heavy wool uniform and carrying around equipment and weaponry. :-)

Sounds like you've tried it before, or at least know someone who does. I've grown up around it. My dad has been in the local unit for years.

Just research after watching Gettysburg (the TNT miniseries from some years back which used reenactors for the battlefield) and all the extras on bluray and knowing a bit about civil war history and uniforms and such.

Add to that my own experience as a United States Marine some 28 years ago...

Hey rs2, if the delay is less then a week then we'll pause the game for you.

@everyone else, I'm giving rokakoma to post and comment as a professor to help make up for my less then adequate job with this game. If anyone else is interested in helping professor please pm Tru Ninja or myself.

I'm fine with pausing. To be honest, I have a lot of stuff to catch up on myself.

Fine with pausing too.

Autumn, 1903

East:
As both 2WL and CSteinhardt had indicated, everyone was fighting austiria, but I'm curious which of them was actually thinking postmortem austrian times. The I/R/T (alphabetical) alliance have to break up inevitably. At first sight it seems quite obvious who the real allies are over there, but we all have seen surprises. Nevertheless, whoever allies out of those 3, this time, he should think about the future, after the've eliminated their newly found Enemy.

The way Russia and Turkey have split central europe is all but stable, both of them can lose territories at this time, yet it's a bit more robust for russia. That puts him in a good negotiating position to define the agenda, on the contrary though, it puts him to the spotlight as well, as the most powerful country on the map, whom against everyone gladly allies before he gets too big.

I'm curious how the east will continue, Italy surely needs good negotiating there, but keep in mind, whoever you ally will eventually turn on you when the common enemy is out of the picture.

If I were russia I might want to ally with italy, to curb turkey, if I were turkey I would be worried about that, moreover it's hard to ally with russia at this point, as no common enemy is in place. Also for turkey fighting italy consumes a lot of resources making him vulnerable at home. That would eventually lead us to conclude an italy/turkey alliance, which is, given the 4 fleets, (at this very moment) can hardly be successful on the mainland against russia. Still, both of them can build 1-1 army.

It's quite a conundrum, I'm sure we will see some indications after builds phase.

West:
The same here, England is basically gone, mostly, well entirely eaten up by France. That raises the puzzle here, who will ally with who.

France is the "russia of the west" meaning, he is definiately in the strongest position, as he has no real threat on him at this moment. Let's see the options:

Germany can make a move on Russia, which will leave France completely without enemies, therefore fueling his ascent even further. Germany can also attack france, for which he has the capacity until england is still alive. But he cannot do it without russia, whom I'm sure would glady help this endeavour, since his 2 fleets up north are useless elswhere.

From France's point of view, he can either make (continue) the peace with germany and turn on italy mid-term while germany is occupied with russia. If he attacks Germany the main benefitor will be russia, if he attack italy, turkey will benefit. That's a good strategy if you want a 3-way, but guys, go for the solo, always!


And where we find out there's no east and west:

Keep in mind, there are always 7 (or what's left) players on the table. We are over the tipping point where we can distinct east and west anymore. If russia chooses to attack germany, that will result turkey going for italy, and France will be the happiest player on the map.

If Russia chooses to ally with Germany, Germany should ask himself what will happen after russia is all over the north, and in england?

Conclusion:

Generally the biggest powers can define the agenda, but the small ones have to be very careful to go along with that. The small ones would rather ally with the 2nd biggest ones. If you are small and vulnerable, your chance is to make the 2 big ones fight eachother, as they realize after you are gone, one of them will be in worse position compared to the otherone. As a small one, until you can ally with the 2nd biggest, and make the alliance more poweful than the biggest one, you have sg. to offer to the 2nd biggest.

Sure, if two big powers can agree, ally and cooperate, there's nothing to stop them, but in that case it will be a draw, not a solo. Meaning, sometimes it's their interest to help the small ones short and mid-term. As the example above, it's probably France's interest not to attack either italy or germany.

Keep in mind, countries are falling by the order of the weakest. But if you are afraid you will be the next in the line, maybe you shouldn't help obliterating the weakest in the first place.

I hope I could confuse everyone enough to have a good round of negotiations :)

*hattip to rokaroma!
Thanks jmo for inviting others too, I understand it's a busy job so I hope we can fill the roster with more profs to help out.

[As before, travel schedule makes this a bit of a mess]

Fall 1903 Reaction:

Alas, poor Austria. I knew him, TruNinja, ...

As before, let's start by looking at a few interesting moves this turn:

France: A Gas - Lon:

There was a pretty obvious set of tactics this turn, and the end result was always going to be the same unless England did something very strange. But you should still get credit for picking the set of tactics that had the best chance for something to accidentally go right. This is a good thing to always do - occasionally it happens, and you would have felt silly if England ordered A Lon - Hol, say, and you ended up with F ENG in Lon instead of A Gas. Well done!

England: F NTH - Yor:

So, the idea of pulling your units home to defend is a good one. But, you've got a problem: this is a Fall turn, and you're going to go from three to two. Given that, why are you pulling three units home? Pull two home, fine, but take a shot at something, because it's a free shot with whatever unit's going to disband. So, I would have expected to see SKA - Den (with support?), SKA - Swe (with support?), NTH - Hol (with support if you can negotiate it, who knows?), NTH - Bel, etc. -- pick one with whichever unit's going to pop otherwise. In this case, NTH - Hol would have let you then disband Hol and have three units at home to defend for a year, or keep Hol and try and use it for leverage. The situation doesn't come up all that often when you have basically a free shot, but when it does, you should try and find a way to take it. Austria did a good job with this - still died, but when all three of your neighbors want to split you, that's going to happen, and the best you can do (as Austria did) is go down clawing and screaming.

Russia: A Sil S Italian Tyr(olia) - Mun
Italy: A Tyr - Vie
Russia: A Rum - Ser
Turkey: A Bud - Tri
Italy: F ADR - Alb

I mentioned last turn that at least one of these three was wrong about the post-Austria setup. Without access to negotiations, it appears at first glance that Russia preferred Italy as his partner, Italy preferred Turkey, and Turkey preferred Russia. As I mentioned last turn, Con - Bul(sc) was probably a hint of Turkey's preferences, so in Italy's position, I would have taken that as a clear sign that Turkey preferred Russia. You should probably talk with your TA about why you didn't read it that way - there might well be a good reason in the negotiations, but a key rule to remember (I'll break it out into its own line since it's really important) is:

*** People sometimes lie, but their units don't. ***

Italy came out the worst of this particular turn, while Russia repaired the damage to his lines at Bud and Turkey has two builds. The question, of course, is now how this resolves. As before, Turkey has to signal something with his builds. For example, F Ank and F Smy would send two very different signals (and I hope you pay attention to these signals - this is the intermediate game, after all!). Similarly, armies and fleets can be used in different places, so the F/A distribution will be suggestive. The Russian build is likely to be less informative, while Italy also has an interesting decision with his retreat. This dance ends, or at least this round of the dance ends, when two of you get together and gang up on the third, but that hasn't been settled yet.

In the meantime, one last consideration: England, France, and Germany are also still alive. Each of you should be asking which alliance you'd like to see form in the East, and what you can do to influence it. Hint: you three shouldn't all have the same preference!

Most improved: F, R

Largest decline: I

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*** People sometimes lie, but their units don't. ***

Well, certainly turkey will not ally with Italy, as I tried to suggest him, to do. Nevertheless, an Italy/Russia alliance could still surprise as, which is certainly beneficial for both of them, but mostly for russia.

If Russia doesn't have solo ambitions he'll just go along with turkey. Turkey clearly gave up anything leading to a solo.

France seems committed to work together with Germany, that's the smart move to do. Go against the biggest one. On the other hand though, if turkey gets to ionian, which he'll, it's just the matter of time when France will have to intervene, to stop him. The question is how quickly or slowly he's willing to do that.

All that leads us to the point when only 4 countries are left and France/Russia will easily agree on abolishing Germany and draw the game. Which is completely okay, of course, but if such endgame arises both turkey and russia should ask themselves:

- Why didn't they go for the solo?
- Why didn't I allied with Italy, to weaken my neighbour so I can grow at their expense?
(And this sentence applies to france as well|)

If the scenario above will evolve, it only means everyone has some room to develop, where they can recognize the current path leads to a draw. Which is completely okay, as this is an intermediate class. But F/R/T can already be sure being part of the draw, no matter what happens, so if you want to go for the solo, now is the time probably to change course.

And when any of the 3 big ones wants to go for the solo, suddenly Italy would find himself as being the prom queen :), for whose love everyone is fighting for :)

Two quick items on the retreats/builds:

1) Italy: Retreat Tri - Ven

I absolutely hate this retreat. If you retreat off the board, you can rebuild in Ven anyway, but that gives you extra options and extra leverage. Maybe threatening Turkey with a rebuild as a third fleet would give him pause. Maybe you actually did want a third fleet at some point. Maybe France would offer you something or Russia would offer you something in return for rebuilding the same A Ven that you were going to have anyway.

Giving yourself options and leverage cost you *nothing*, a situation that almost never occurs in Diplomacy. Take advantage!

2) The other builds

I don't want to unduly influence the game, so let me just restrict myself to this: If you have a shot at a solo, always go for it. Every power who is not immediately concerned with survival should always be counting to 18, and on this map, there are at least three powers (in my view, more) who should be looking for a plausible path to a solo. Remember, a 3-way game is basically dead drawn unless there is a tactically-forced solo. So, you have to be thinking long-term about it - what's the right order to attack your neighbors, what needs to be happening on the other side of the board, etc.

If there is a "tame" three-way draw from here, I would feel strongly that at least two of you made a major mistake. I see several paths towards a solo here, and they begin soon. Let me try and describe one of the ideas here:

If you are France, you want those two English centers. But, if you're pushing for a solo, F NTH/A Lon is probably more useful to you than A Par/F Mar (where you'd have to rebuild those units if you were magically given immediate control of those two centers). So, see if you can take advantage. On the other hand, that English fleet can also swing the balance of a R/G conflict, or possibly even R/F. Remember, Russia can only build one northern fleet each year, so getting one from a dependent ally saves you a full year (and more, since you'd then need to get it to NTH).

Similarly, if France and Russia both attack Germany, of course they have the forces available to kill and partition it, but that's a draw. On the other hand, German forces are enough to swing the outcome of a F/R war, and neither F nor R can get to 18 unless they win such a war. Thus, both of you should see Germany as potentially much more valuable to your solo chances alive than dead.

In other words, this is an intermediate game, so one of the key things here is to stop seeing small powers as dying and start seeing them as opportunities, a couple of units who will do whatever you demand in order to survive, if only you'll offer them a reasonable path forward. I will be very disappointed if none of you try and take advantage of the opportunity here.

Actually, on that last point, I think I forgot to mention one last key issue, something that I guess I've internalized but really should be said in a teaching game.

Let's take Germany as an example, and ask the following two questions:

1) If France takes all of Germany and gets no further, does France solo?

Answer: Probably not. That makes 12, 2 from England makes 14, but then what?

2) If Russia takes all of Germany but gets no further, does Russia solo?

Answer: Probably not. 5 more makes 14, but further expansion runs into some easily-defended lines.

Why did I ask this? If the answer to one of these questions were yes, it would be essential for one of F/R to make sure they got their share of a partition of Germany. But, the answer to both seems to be no. In other words, if you try to work together with Germany and the war doesn't go well, you're not risking a loss; it's still a 3-way draw. So working with Germany is a free shot at trying to do better than that, with very little downside if you get it wrong. And that's why I'd be really disappointed if in an intermediate game, nobody took a serious shot at it.

Couldnt agree more. I've seen this in so many different ways in so many games. In my view, this counting to the solo, rather than to the draw, is what makes all the difference in level of play. Even in early game, this can sway your choices.

I love these comments! Thanks all.

I can just reiterate what I've said and what CSteinhardt has also pointed out very clearly:

"In other words, this is an intermediate game, so one of the key things here is to stop seeing small powers as dying and start seeing them as opportunities, a couple of units who will do whatever you demand in order to survive, if only you'll offer them a reasonable path forward. I will be very disappointed if none of you try and take advantage of the opportunity here."

That's also what I'm trying to push from the beginning I started following this game. Use the small ones! Neither Russia nor Turkey took my advice, yet France seems sensible and the only solo threat currently is France. The beauty of this, as CSteinhardt stated, the small powers will do whatever France wants, because he can offer a reasonable path forward. And only he does.

Russia made the wrong calls on many levels I think. He is now vulnerable basically to everyone! Staring from England through Germany till Turkey. I expect Russia to collapse in 2 turns and current alliances to be redshuffled again.

Generally playing Russia is tough, because you look enormous on the map yet you barely have enough SCs, while Germany for example can have 6-7 SCs and still be "smaller" then the territory of Moscow alone. Don't get confused by your size and that lot of purple coloring :)

With Russia you have to be at least 12-13SCs to become a solo threat, since you have to fight 3 fronts all the time, why everyone else usually fights 1 or 2. Generally I would say a 7-8 SC Turkey is much more bigger threat than a 12 SC Russia.

I think Russia himself beleived he's the biggest, but he wasn't. Now he will pay the price. It's impossible for him to get a new SC this turn, yet he can lose 2-3 easily crashing him immidiately on every fronts.

If all that happens I'm curious what will Turkey do as he can suddenly find himself alone, alone but without substantial threat as well. Yet he has 3 fleets, whatever he promises tho units can go only 1 direction.

1 more note, CSteinhardt is wrong on what happens if France takes all Germany. If France takes all Germany, then he can solo. It's a rule of thumb you CANNOT defend scandinavia and StP at ANY circumstances from a powerful northern country. This means if France gets Germany and Tunis, then he won. And let's face it, he can get Tunis as well. France is by far the biggest solo risk, and the funny thing the small powers still want to work with him, because he's the only one who offers survival for them. Currently nor Italy's neither Germany's interest is to stop France because Russia and Turkey are immidiate threats to them.

He was the only one who have realized small countries are opportunities not dying ones.

I'm spending much of the next week with sporadic internet access, so let me also agree with much of what rokakoma said. It's interesting to see the things rokakoma and I disagree on, so I'll try and outline those when I have more time; in particular, I'd give Russia much higher marks than he would. I suppose we'll find out over the next couple of turns which one of us was right. :)

For what it's worth, I disagree on Scandinavia; because Russia has northern fleets on the board, correct defense will hold Scandinavia even with the loss as far as Berlin, as long as there is not a hostile F Ber (a hostile A Pru is even fine, and in many cases a hostile A War). But, either way, those are for the endgame; for now, the point is that collapsing the small powers tamely is wrong for at least one of you, and probably more than one of you.

Anyway, I'll do my best to add some analysis to this turn over the next day or two.

@CS: +1

@Rokakoma: there's a lot of big statements coming from you.
When CS analyzed the moves, he always proposed an alternative variation as example.
I'd like the same from you, if you wanna back up your post.

I deliberately do not want to suggest moves, for two reasons:
a) you have a TA to help you with moves
b) I don't want to influence the game more than I already do.

I already suggested you to ally with italy, I repeated it after builds as well, you didn't take my advice, which is completely fine, because this is your game, not mine! But I cannot suggest moves after you chose to go a different way.

I wrote in my opinion the best you can do is to ally with italy, you chose not to. That doesn't mean you are wrong or I am. It's a different solution and we'll see where it leads to. In my opinion it will lead where you lose a couple of SCs because your only ally is somebody with whom you cannot find a common enemy. But I already wrote this too.

Looking at the map, you have everybody against you with an ally who cannot really help you at all. But this is a result of your choices, over a point of no return I think. But as you might shrink suddenly you'll find yourself not being the common enemy anymore, then you'll have achance to correct the errors.

As both CS and I stated, killing the small ones is wrong for some of you. And it will apply to those times as well, when you will be one of the small ones. As Italy and Germany has a chance to survive and grow, when they will be bigger and you will be smaller it will change back.

That's how it works. :) Anyway, even though my statements might sound big, it doesn't mean they are true at all. We will see... :)

Hi Zentar, the professors are some of the best players on the site. If you don't understand their views or agree with them then go talk to your TA, that's what they are here for. If your TA disagrees as well they are welcome to ask the professor via pm. Students should not be asking questions though.

@Rokaroma: all right, I got you.
@jmo: The last message from my TA is dated 14th of June, and so far I haven't got any replies from him. It's okay that you insist on discussing everything through a TA, although CS already replied to my question once.
And I have no doubts about Rokaroma's skill, his position and total points number makes everything clear.

Zenetar, I'd like to refer you to the discussion we had in the Beginner SOW thread on the benefits/drawbacks of the Juggernaut:

http://webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?threadID=1010911&page-thread=10#threadPager

Your alliance isn't technically a true "Juggernaut," but it's much closer to the real thing than the alliance in the other SOW game. However, at this point, the same principles still apply. The R/T can only get so big before it inevitably runs into organized opposition from the remaining powers. In this case, F/G/I have teamed up to ensure that you don't get any bigger. This is no reason to get upset at the analysis provided by rokakoma; after all, he's one of the best gunboat players on this site. The bottom line, though, is that a R/T can only get so big while going unnoticed by the rest of the board. Eventually, any power who wishes to solo will run into opposition. Players are just more adept at spotting a Juggernaut and reacting than to, say, a R/I alliance, simply because the R/T is the most well known alliance.

Russia and Turkey are great allies at the beginning. You have a common enemy in Austria, and both of you can pick up some easy builds in the first few years. Once Austria is gone, though, Russia and Turkey no longer mutually benefit each other. Turkey can't help against Germany, and Russia can't help (much) against Italy. Russia's job, then, is to parlay success in the south into units in the north to continue the Juggernaut's momentum into picking up builds in Sweden and getting the jump in Germany before he has time to react. If you don't do so in time, then you risk having a powerful France or England take your Scandinavian centers.

I'll reiterate what rokakoma said - it is impossible for Russia to hold Scandinavia and St. Pete against a powerful northern opponent. The logistics of the provinces in the north simply don't allow for this to happen. I disagree with CSteinhart in this case - for you, losing Scandinavia is inevitable.

@Zenetar, I'll contact Tom and in the meantime I'll try to find you a replacement with Tru.

2wl: +1 :D

Not because you agree with me, but because you can tell all this in a style in which I can't.

Anyway, Zenetar, what 2WL also implied, and I want to make clear. Diplomacy is a constantly changing, evolving game. You have allies with whom you break up and/or ally again. You have to adapt, always. This is not personal.

You can't have an ally lastin till the very end, because if you have it means you'll draw, therefore one of you should have broken that alliance in order to go for the solo. Every alliance breaks up, that's inevitable, that's the nature of the game.

My comments are not against you, or in favor of France (you will see this soon, when I will state France is too big :))

My comments are to help you realize you might need to look for new objectives, new allies. As austria got out of the picture, your objectives have changed with it, therefore your enemies and allies should change as well. The game is about perfect timing, when to change allies. Neither early nor to late is good.

Why I don't like to suggest moves, because MOVES ARE NOT IMPORTANT. Beleive it or not, when you have allies moves become so simple, because you have a lot of cooperating units suddenly. Moves are important when you become the clear and only solo threat, when you get above 12 SCs, or when you have to stop a solo. I'm pretty good at stategy and planning moves for hours, but it only counts when you are all alone. To get to a point where everyone is just against you is a different skill. That's the skill I'm trying to teach you now, to think of the game as a general who is with who.

You need some insight what will happen generally on the board. I never plan moves until I get really strong alone, I always plan alliances. I commit to my allies and against my enemies. Doesn't really matter what you move if you know your and your ally's interest is the same. Then you can overpower anybody.

I make plans like:
- I let russia grow (I don't attack him), so he will fight with Turkey / Austria
- I build only ships (as England), so Germany won't be afraid of me
- I don't attack Austria (as Italy) so he can withold R+T
- I don't attack Scandi+StP at all, because I can take it anytime, because it cannot be held.

If you read my EoGs you will see, I barely talk about moves, more a general way how I was thinking. threadID=890685

These are plans, not moves. As France didn't build armies so Germany is safe from him. Turkey built fleet, so you are almost safe from him. Doesn't really matter what they move, does it. On the other hand though you clearly want to fight everyone and grow. That's whay they have turned on you, but as soon as you are contained, they won't attack you so enthusiastically.

Also it's important to know which part of the map can be held, which don't. Fighting for scandinavia at this point seems useless I think. I think! Oppenents can always make mistakes of course. This comes with experience, and a lot of analysis, but by time you will just know by instinct what can you hold, what you can't.

When I say you will lose a couple of SCs, my experience tells me you are just unable to hold them. But whoever gets those SCs they might be unable to hold it too. That's why you need allies. And it will change again and again.

If others are allied against you, that will break up too. Meaning you will not necessarily die, that alliance won't last forever. As they see you will die, the smaller out of your opponents will ally with you. As Turkey should have allied with Italy in the first place. You are lucky, because he cannot do that anymore, with all that fleets.

So, I proposed a pause for a little less than a week, starting tomorrow. I'd appreciate it if that could be put into effect. I will be leaving tomorrow morning, as I said, and I should be back Monday, or Tuesday at the latest. Thanks!

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