he forgot to say that italy was 7th. i THOUGHT it was wierd that i only saw a 6th.

Well I feel privelidged knowing I won as Italy. It also doesnt seem right that Turkey really won the most. But if those numbers are accurate they dont lie.

The thing is that there are much more finished games on the site than there are visible (over 500 if I remember correctly) - if You would make statistics based of all games I think You would have different statistics. For instance, I added up that I alone have won 3 games as Italy.

Fascinating. In play-by-mail diplomacy, the win percentages are:
Austria - 7.29% - 5th place (6th in php)
England - 6.83% - 6th place (5th in php)
France - 10.15% - 3rd place (3rd in php)
Germany - 10.50% - 2nd place (2nd in php)
Italy - 6.54% - 7th place (7th in php)
Russia - 10.84% - 1st place (4th in php)
Turkey - 9.12% - 4th place (1st in php)

(http://www.diplomacy-archive.com/resources/postal/chances.htm)

The obvious discrepancy is that on phpdiplomacy, relative to postal games, Russia is greatly weakened and Turkey is more powerful. Why do you suppose that is?

Possibilities:
- In postal games, strong players choose Russia; here, all assignments are random.
- Russia is more injured by the inability (on php) to support armies as it convoys them than any other power (Russia needs to support its convoys into Scandinavia and across the Black Sea). But Turkey is a naval power, too.
- In phpdiplomacy, since the cost of starting a new game is very small, people are more likely to quit when things start to go bad. And things are most likely to go bad for Austria and Italy. This leaves Turkey room to move west without facing its two traditional tormentors, while Russia still faces between three and four neighbors even if someone leaves.
- Not many people on phpdiplomacy (know about)/(can coordinate) the Lepanto opening, which crushes Turkey from the start. Turkey consequently being more powerful inhibits Russian success.
- Other ideas?

yes, i know the sample is small. is there any page with every game?

jimshif: yeah, i was just reading that page, and wondering about that. i never thought that no one could coordinate the Lepanto opening. but i just realized that, in all of my 40 or so games, i have never seen the lepanto opening played here. odd.

It may be because people on phpdiplomacy are, on the whole, new to the game, and simply don't know about the Lepanto. If Italy knows how it works but assumes Austria's a newbie, Italy's still not even going to bother proposing it, since it will require a great deal of hand-holding and coordination and he can't even be sure Austria will play along.

BTW, the numbers don't add up to 100% because they only count one-person wins, not draws.

um, that doesn't count. draws don't do count under finished games - they're not in this game at all, for that matter. they'll be in the next version.

Recheck the page I linked to. The numbers I used counted wins as a percentage of all games played (wins and draws alike), which is why the numbers didn't add up to 100%. What follow are wins as a percentage of one-man wins, excluding draws from the counting altogether. The rank-order is the same, but the percentages are different.

Austria - 11.89% - 5th place
England - 11.14% - 6th place
France - 16.57% - 3rd place
Germany - 17.13% - 2nd place
Italy - 10.67% - 7th place
Russia - 17.70% - 1st place
Turkey - 14.89% - 4th place

The Lepanto Opening is not an effective way to begin as Italy. It involves too much risk. The percentages are irrelavent as well. I strongly believe that any player can win as any country if they have diplomatic and military skills.

I'm surprised to see Germany in second place, I don't think I've ever been in a game where Germany won

Of course the win percentages aren't irrelevant. Sure, any player can win if he's good enough and his opponents are bad enough - but he's going to succeed more often when he plays Germany than when he plays Italy.

There's really not that much risk in playing the Lepanto. In fact I think it's pretty flexible, since (if you have to call off the gambit) the army in Venice is available for defense and the army in Tunis can simply be convoyed back to the mainland. Not quite sure where you're coming from, Zxylon.

If Austria is out to get you he could begin the game with a move to tyrolia and if France wants to attack they can move to Piedmont. If either both occur your screwed from the get go. I think you better off begining the game by either attacking an open trieste or marsailles and of course taking tunis. The Lepanto opening calls for stretching your forces thin and relying on Austria for support

Kestas, I like playing Germany a lot, it has more opening possibilities than any other country, not to mention that the diplomatic involvement should be maximal unless playing just for fun (and not to win) is an option. :)
Other than this, Germany finds itself between two „dynamic duos” that she can fire up: France vs England and Russia vs Austria. So it has several ways to develop and „entertain” conflicts.

My personal opinion is that, being all about random selection, Turkey received far more experienced players as it's ruler than any other country (or, in many games, the other players were new and unexperienced), that can be the only explanation for this win rate. If I recall exactly, some of my first wins came playing as Turkey and the first one was easier to take than the others.

Percentages dont increase your odds of winning. YOU increase your odds of winning. Data that switches from source to source are irrelavant. If they were consistent I would give them more merit.

Germany is most fun to play in my opinion for all the reasons opripom said and more. Its fun to replay WWI as the kaiser

Kinda funny how Turkey always wins, because Turkey should never win.

I think another reason why Russia is in 4th is that diplomacy is more vital to Russia more than any other country. In php if you draw Russia, you might look at that game and find that every other player except you has made their move. If they don't log on until quite a bit later, then you are screwed because you will be unable to talk with them.

In face to face you can always talk to someone whenever you want.

I think that the case of Germany is controversial - You either do very good (fast gaming & expansion, taking out England early on, occupying Scandinavia etc.) or very bad (English & French ganging up on You, if either Austria or Russia is also agressive, Germany stands no chance).

Lepanto opening for Italy is very risky until any attack to convoys will break the convoy thus I have never tried it here.

Funnily enough Germany is my favourite country to play as and i think i have won 2/3 times with it, russia is my second favourite i think and the Juggernaught is particularly pleasing to play (check out 'for quick players' in game history to see my win there).

I'm surprised that nobody has yet commneted on france, i think that with favourable opening years frances scope is limited only by the player..... France is probably the strongest of the western triangle tactically (disregarding the wins evidence!!) and i think that france can truly dominate mid-end game. A fantastic country for building powerful armies and mighty armardas.

i'm suprised to see england is sixth. The ability to support convoys remains an issue, but with so many options because of nearby sc's, i love playing with england and have faired well.

i to have been more successful with england and france, then germany or turkey, weird

Russia's poor php numbers must have something to do with the old St. Pete's bug which prevented use of the south coast.

France is not that easy to play, although it has pretty uncontested Spain & Portugal in the first year, also possibly either Belgium or Venice, if played well, the thing is that he is all open from both north & south & it's really difficult to protect if attacked from both directions - German/Italian or English/Italian alliance will finish up French pretty quickly.

If France allies Italy, it's the easiest country to play with imho. Turkey/Russia is strong too.

In my experience Turkey/Russia is usually a very strained alliance, hard to draw borders there. But Italy/France is definitely strong, but better for France than Italy usually

Taking that You can trust Italy and remove more & less all Your units to north :)

I have never allied with Turkey as Russia. If i am Turkey, the only way to expand is to attack Sevastopol in the first turn. Otherwise you become trapped in the corner while Austria and Russia fight you. If you dont ally with either Russia or Austria right away they will inevitably ally against you. I cant see how Turkey won so many times with the exception of 2 games i played where Austria didnt play which made expansion very easy for Turkey

Playing as russia i particularly enjoy an alliance with turkey against the board. Assuming the alliance punches through Austria with relative ease it can quickly dominate the entire board.

I find that most turkish players are easily seduced by the power of the Alliance and once involved in the alliance are unlikely to attack their powerful northern neighbour, being well aware that one 'should not bite the hand that feeds'

It is then simple for the russian player either to race to victory or to crash their mighty column directly into the scraggly turkish line and steal the win.

If Turkey plays it well, it could be as strong as Russia, or even stronger. First, he can get most of the Austrian lands, plus the Balkan. After, he can defeat Italy on his own, and take Tunis too. Russia on the other hand could be dealing with Germany and England, slowing its march. And Turkey has a much better defensive position, thats why I prefer it over Russia.

same here.

As you just said Locke. Turkey cant trust Russia because he can be backed stabbed easily under the superpower of Russia. You must take them out early in order to have a long term chance.

Personally I hate Turkey because it is a bottleneck - unless the Austrian player is an idiot, then it's difficult to expand. Also Turkey is really vulnerable to the stalemate line of the northern world.

same with england. to get around the stalemate line and take that darn 18th SC, you usually need to attack France first, but usually France kills england first.

i am not experienced user. so i prefer "corner" countries like England and Turkey.
Central forces and specially Austria and Italy requires experienced users with hi diplomatic skills.

that's true, but the central counrties are just as good. england and turkey are bad because they never get past stalemate lines.

Actually, from personal experience, these numbers do not surprise me at all. If we took into account all of the older games as well, I think you would find that France would be much higher, since occupation during the spring did not have to be maintained during the autumn to claim an SC, so France could claim both Spain and Portugal with one army/fleet.

I am personally very afraid of a successful Turkish player. If you have ever gone against one, which I have done all too many times, they are incredibly hard to stop once they go on their rampage. Besides the Lepanto, it is very hard to destroy the Sultan early game, because of his highly defensible position. I start to quiver in fear as soon as I see a game where someone has allowed Turkey to pick up two builds in the first year. Mostly, Turkey wins by terrestrial domination, painting Russia and Austria yellow. Taking Austria and the Balkans is easily done with the help of any other one of the multitude of countries surrounding Austria. After that, Russia is taken quite easily, and from that highly defensible position, Turkey rarely loses. With an annoying chokepoint to the north at StP, to the west at Tri-Tyr-Ven, and the stalemate line to the northwest, as well as an easily defensible Mediterranean position, the Turkish player can capitalize on a fractured alliance between England, France, Italy, and Germany. Only a strong France with England and Germany out of the way can possibly hope to defeat the Turk with the help of the Italian. If France or England are alive, they might feel bottled in, and it would take discipline to co-ordinate an offensive.

For all those who have yet to see a Lepanto, I personally, have seen quite a few in my games. In fact, in all my Italian wins, I have executed some sort of Lepanto variation, usually modified because a single fleet being attacked interrupts the convoy, so I would opt for a safer position.

I'm a little surprised that England actually does better than Austria here at php. England is very difficult to play in a setting where convoys are penalized, and England's expansion hinges on successful convoys. Austria, however, does not have to worry about these sorts of things, being a terrestrial power. But I suspect that it is simply Austria's focal position and multiple borders that are it's downfall. I like to play Austria a lot, because it is diplomatically the funnest.

Regarding Germany, other than a strong Turkey and a strong France, I most fear a strong Germany. They have the potential to expand very quickly at the start, and even when you think you have them down, they can quickly turn the tide, and expand quickly once more. They are in a position to grab a lot of SC's in a short time, so if you let them, they will boom. It surprises how many games I see the german player attack the austrian...

Russia most likely loses, because Turkey is particularly strong. The struggle to build a North Coast StP fleet is a big problem as well. England seems particularly inclined to capitalize on this fact, and often takes the dead end that is StP. Since Russia will find little success in the north without some particular diplomatic circumstances, they usually turn to fight Turkey, and/or Austria. A fight with both Turkey and Austria ends often in disaster for the Russian without dedicated foreign aid. If Russia opts to challenge Turkey, and the two go at it in earnest, the fight is usually swung in Russia's favour. Of course, even with this victory, the inflated appearance of Russia's territory is quick to spark an alliance against Russia, and despite it's impressive appearance, homeland Russia is not very defensible. So most Russian players it seems, opt for a cherry picking against Austria. Of course, unless the Turk is completely pacifist in nature, this route benefits Turkey too much for the Russian player to compete. Russia is a very demanding country to play, and requires careful Diplomacy. While most countries are eager to form relationships, other than Turkey, they are quick to reverse them, in the wake of the inflated appearance of Russia's territory.

I would also like to point out that, randomness should not be used to justify the statistics. Postal and face to face often uses random draws for countries, and there is no inclination of "experts" to choose Russia.