You're goddamn right you're going to get yelled at for not taking a draw/cancel. That was the shoddiest damned game I've ever been a part of, and one button press from you could have cancelled it and we could have started over properly.

Italy (witylernn) was without a doubt the most disgustingly dirty player I've ever seen in a game, gunboat or live. That kind of bullshit isn't tactics, it isn't fair game, it's gaming the system in every way you can think of to fuck people over and troll the game, and it's fucking unbelievable.

Four players -- Four -- made it to every round. And two of them were crushed in part by the variable CDs and underhanded, bullshit play of the CDers.

You were the only one, from probably 1902 on, who didn't draw/cancel. I have plenty of spite for France, too, who withdrew his Draw whenever there was a slight chance he'd profit from the crap other people were spewing, and put it back on whenever he felt threatened -- but you could have, should have, ended the game three hours ago. It was without a doubt the worst play experience I've had on this site. And while you and France never CDed, you're just as much to blame as those who did.

Utterly disgraceful.

I think he is pissy because he was one of the first ones out...due to tactics...well played on both fronts, Russia. I don't ever remember a time where I was "ahead" since I don't determine position based on number of units on the board. you nearly always had much better position...I finally broke through the south though lol

For me, what it comes down to is that I play a lot of live gunboat games, and I think what Italy was doing has no place in live games. I don't want to do anything that suggests even in the slightest that he should consider doing that again. I was faced with the choice of rewarding his behavior or playing on -- there was no in-between option. I don't feel good about having played on, but I would have felt worse about supporting Italy's behavior. I would have set draw immediately if Italy were marked as Left, since then he would not have been in the draw. That never happened -- he just kept hoping we'd hand him a draw.

[And yes, I did hit my cancel button when Germany left - I was the first player to do so, I might add, and I left cancel up until I saw Germany submit orders.]

So, yes, I'll accept if you'd like to be upset with me for deciding that punishing Italy's behavior was more imperative. I'd prefer you agreed with me, but I knew when I was the only person not agreeing to draw/cancel that the rest of you might not. Then again, I also suspect that had all of the other players noticed during the game that Italy was online and choosing to submit all holds rather than actually away, that there would have been other players without their flags up. Perhaps I'm wrong -- mind if I ask whether you noticed that Italy was actually present and changing his flags around during all of those turns? Again, I would have set draw immediately if Italy were marked as Left, since then he would not be in the draw.

Favio -- I've been the first or second person out of gunboats plenty. I've got tactics problems up the ass. And I've never, *ever* been this upset by a game before. Please kindly shove off.

CSeinhardt. -- Why no Cancel flag, then? I think that would have been easier to understand. And if there were ever a time when cancel was warranted, it would have been this situation. I remember at least two turns where everyone was sitting at Draw/Cancel except you. Alternately, a draw while all 7 players were still active would not have benefited Italy either. I can't remember, however, whether that situation actually occurred -- again, there were so many CDs it's hard to remember the timing of them. Regarding Italy -- I wasn't aware that simply changing flags was enough to keep someone around in game. Clearly, it's a "tactic" I'll have to be more aware of.

Anyway. Watching the final battle lines between you two was enjoyable, and I do think you earned your victory. I'm just utterly disgusted by the first half-dozen years or so that led to it.

@Favio: Take a look at the S11 position -- gameID=91954, since I forgot the link above.

At this point, it's essentially a race. I am going to lose Rome and Venice. You have trouble defending Berlin from me and maybe Denmark. I also have some short-term counterplay around Italy, but that goes away pretty quickly. That turn, I was able to take the North Sea and keep Berlin empty, which was enough to win. I was also able to guess correctly enough around Italy. However, it was inevitable that by the end of 1912, you were going to have both Rome and Venice, and only at that point can I hold a line [if I let you get into ADR, the line might not even really end there, but if I shift units quickly enough, it can]. So, I needed to take a center off you in the north by 1912, or I cannot win.

Imagine that you had kept NTH that turn and ordered two supports for BAL - Ber. At that point, Kie S Ber and Mun S Ber are going to be enough for a little while. At that point, what are my options? If I cannot take Den or something else off you, then you are on 17, I am on 16, and instead of trying to take Munich, I have to keep Germany in there and take the draw, because if I try to eliminate him and he gets upset, he can throw you a center on his way out. So even when I get to BAL, it's to support Berlin, not to take it. You can also, at that point, keep him in Berlin.

Even worse, I could not both take Greece and keep the Ionian. If I lose the Ionian, I similarly can't hold the line, yet it's the same race I just mentioned -- I need to win before I lose, because I can't draw. The geography is such that I can't hold a line with Ber but not ION or Den.

So basically, I had only two options -- guess perfectly in F11 and take both Den and [Mun or Ber] -- in that case I also probably lose Ven immediately, so a wrong guess means the game is over. Or, guess that I can get the North Sea, which then leaves me a second guess in 1912 to try and get either Den or something else. Again, I must guess right, or else it's a draw/loss.

So at that point, I think it's fair to say that you were ahead. It was obviously closely poised, but given the board in Spring 1911 and the S11 disposition of Germany towards both of us, I'd rather play France than Russia (although you can't order Mun S Kie - Ber because of the Tyr - Mun threat; supporting BAL - Ber is needed unless you are ordering a power-2 attack on Venice as well, which you can't safely...fortunately for you I picked a different risk to take, rather than risking that you might take Ven instead of Rom and I not get Ber, in which case I cannot hold a line and you win).

Pretty complicated endgame, though, which is one of the reasons I chose to play it out even though I felt I was behind.

Yeah, I think in Spring 11, had I have gone for rome and venice, basically leaving you naples, I would have owned the Ionian, which would have granted me free access to the adriatic and austria....the outcome might have been much different for this game lol

@jmbostwick: I did set cancel when Germany went CD. When Germany returned and set orders but did not set cancel, I figured it was game on, and removed my cancel flag. Germany did set draw/cancel after S02 processed, but by that time Italy had started screwing around, and Germany might have done it in response to that, instead. If Italy had submitted orders in S02 and Germany set his cancel flag anyway, the game would have been cancelled (at least, I would have set my flag).

One of the things that I have accepted is that not everybody will draw/cancel when there is a CD that benefits them, so I am essentially hurting my statistics by being ethical and agreeing to it as a reflex rather than seeing whether it helps or hurts me. My solution to this is to assume the other players in the game have the same sense of fair play that I do, but if I discover that any of them does not, then I will not draw/cancel until that player has been eliminated. Once I discovered Italy screwing around, there wasn't going to be a draw until he was gone. For what it's worth, if France had permanently left up his draw/cancel, I think I would have set the draw when Italy finally left (three-way at that point, I think), even though it had been a while. I'm not entirely sure -- I was strongly leaning that way, but it didn't come up. Once France unset his flag when he got a stronger position, I took that as a sign that he felt it was game on from there.

That's probably a longer answer than I should have given, but the brief answer is that I did set cancel until Italy started screwing around, and I was not going to reward his NMR with a cancel. Once he pulled that crap, the game was not going to end until either he was eliminated or I no longer had a say in the voting.

@Favio: This is one of the reasons that endgames are advanced tactics, all of the tradeoffs involved. I'm currently playing a game that I might write an article about because of how complicated the endgame tactics got -- at one point I calculated that I had a win, but on average it would take just over 26 movement phases to get it, and if it went poorly enough as far as guessing, it might turn into a second-order virtual win, which I've seen theoretically but haven't actually had come up in a game before.

So, you definitely shouldn't feel bad about making a reasonable decision that turned out not to be optimal after looking several movement phases ahead at the entire board when ordering 15 units in under 5 minutes. You played it very well, and as a result my misorder very nearly cost me the game -- In Spring 1908, I intended NWG - NAO, not NWG - NTH, precisely because I was trying to avoid this particular endgame. However, it wasn't that likely this endgame would result, and it only got there because you and Germany played very well and punished MAO - WES (similar to what you did in that it looks appealing, and while it felt wrong to me at the time, in 5 minutes I couldn't convince myself that it actually was, and it turned out that it was). One of the great things about these live gunboats is that I have to make those decisions quickly enough that I often get it wrong, and I always find that I learn a lot more from getting things wrong than I do from getting them right.

@CStein:

I'm not that up to date on some of these terms. What is a second order virtual win?

>>At that point, Germany came back.<<
Just to be clear, the original Germany never came back. I bet 11 to join this game in Spring 1902 for three reasons:

1) I was thinking about playing a game, not really sure I wanted to, but there were no new live games anyway when I found this position.
2) I figured it might be fun try to turn around a German position that had given everyone else a two-turn head start.
3) By joining, I could give the rest of you a game.

That third one there cost me the next 2 1/2 hours of my life. On a Saturday night and the eve of my Father's Day, I stayed up till 2:45 a.m. or so playing out this piece of shit. I'm unlikely to step into a game again as a result.

And maybe that's not a bad lesson to learn. You need to be willing to set aside three hours to play a live game. If you can't do that or don't want to do that, then you're not really doing anyone any favors by joining.

Anyway, I hoped to pick up either Denmark or Holland in 1902, but England and France thwarted me. I tried again for Holland in the Fall, failed again to take it and also lost my army in Ruhr. After that, I played defense through 1907.

I guessed well against France to stall his attack, and by the time he had the necessary force to potentially win a guessing game against Kiel or Munich, I was receiving welcome support from the Russian fleet in Denmark.

France had to destroy his army in Ruhr in 1905 due to an Italian attack, and he backed off after that. I continued to hold and support, however, because my only shot at growing was against Russia, and I felt that at that point in the game, France was still the bigger solo threat. I didn't want to abet it.

That started changing in 1907. Instead of pressing in the Balkans, Italy began poking at me in Munich. He also was getting some traction against France, which cost the Frogs tempo. Russia, meanwhile, was cleaning up the East and had punched into Venice. At that point, I decided to make a play for Scandinavia. I hoped that Italy would stop poking at Munich to focus on defending against Russia. He did not.

I captured Denmark in 1908 but lost Munich to the Italians, so no build. In Spring 1909, I took Sweden. But in the Fall, I stupidly played a self-standoff to defend Denmark against the Russian fleet, which retreated to Skag. Charles sniffed that out and supported me out of Sweden. No build again.

France started boning me in 1910, trying to win the race to 18 rather than focusing on stopping Russia from getting there first. He lost the race.

And I lost a lot of sleep. Now, since I have a father and am one, it's off to the family celebration.

turkey--
austria, why did you keep on attacking my borders instead of trying to defend your own. it was obvious that italy was going to attack you, so why did u keep on with the attack. also to everyone, why did we not team up for the draw. especially france and germany. for half of the game it was just one on one while russia grew stronger and stronger. it would have been a more interesting game if everyone responded to threats normally, but instead just chose to fight. Italy was being so stupid for the entire game, and thought that capturing munich would be be the best strategy??? in a winner takes all, it seems pretty obvious that if youre loosing, u want a draw instead of hurting others.

b4 anyone says anything, i meant losing.