Join In On The Action "Register Here" To View The Forums

Already a Member Login Here

Board index Forum Index
User avatar
Ambassador
 
Posts: 885
Joined: 24 Apr 2003, 6:31 am

Post 17 Jan 2014, 9:13 am

I suck at EOG's because my memory is terrible with stuff like this, so I'll shamelessly steal Dario's format , re-read some old emails, examine the maps and see what I can come up with.

1901
So when the game began, Darren immediately approached me about forming an IT. He was intrigued by the idea of it since it was generally considered so difficult to pull off. I'm too dumb to understand that any alliance is "too hard" so I happily agreed. Austria was very quiet in the early part of the game, and I think that really pushed him to the front of everyone's target list. I also recall suggested to Guy that we form a Central Triple with Austria, to which he responded "I love triples" and apparently then went to Tom and Dario to form his own. So much for that idea. My opening to Tyrolia served two purposes here as I recall. One - if things went smoothly, I could attack Austria, and the IT would be off and running. It anything else happened, I could explain it away as a concern about Germany. It turns out Germany bounced me there (making that explanation pretty realistic), France moved to Piedmont and England made the typical England opening. It was only Spring 01, but already the giant red flag indicating a Western Triple was waving. With the painfully obvious Western Triple bearing down on us, all four of the Eastern Powers united. Even Austria, who seemed to come out of nowhere with a sudden flurry of messages, joined in.

1902
I was in charge of the southern naval battle since I was the primary target here. I wasn't 100% comfortable with having foreign units so close to Naples, so I asked Austria to remain in Greece, thinking it would be ok to just have the threat of being able to move that fleet to the Ionian. I realized quickly that that was a mistake, and in the fall, I corrected it by gambling on France attacking West Med. Fortunately, he did, but there was a brief opening here that France could have exploited if he had been aggressive enough. He wasn't, and by fall, we had things blocked up. France had nowhere to go.

1903
The light-bulb finally clicked for France, and he turned his attention north to England. Getting him to finally turn around was an exhausting experience. Now, as it turns out, I intended to bide my time and attack France when A) he was a little more committed to England and B) when England was a little more contained. At this point, though, I was focused on other things. With France turned around, Turkey and I re-booted our IT alliance, and brutally stabbed Austria. We both genuinely felt bad about that, but that's the game.

1904
1904 was all about moving north and getting Turkey's fleet out my waters. I was successful in both, and Darren and I kept up good communication throughout. Of course, I was also keeping an eye on the France-England war. Things were going extremely well from my point of view. England was losing ground, but France's gains were pretty minimal and guaranteed to be used against England.

1905
Now was the time I started seriously talking up the idea of attacking France. I even moved my fleet into Tyr in the fall as a setup for it. This was the year that Darren stabbed Russia, though, and he was concerned that without France we wouldn't be able to push past the stalemate line. I'm not sure if its true or not, but it did appear to be a daunting task, so I was talked out of the stab.

1906
In hindsight, I think I could have moved on France in the spring and been ok. For some reason, Germany decided to take back Munich, which reduced the defenses they had against us. Keeping Austria around was his best chance at survival. Without that unit, France and I were able to move into Munich in the fall. Heck, I could have even taken Berlin, but we had already decided I was better off moving to Prussia to gain the flank on Russia. That pretty much ended any concerns over the stalemate line.

1907-1908
After 1906, stabbing France was no longer really an option. He picked up two builds, and there wasn't enough going on up north to distract him from retaliating. With the opportunity missed, I focused on plotting out how best to take down the rest of the centers as quickly and efficiently as possible. Russia could have stalled things another year if he supported Germany in the fall of '08, but he decided not to. If he had, I might have considered proposing a DIAS anyway.

So that's that. I enjoyed the game. I enjoyed working with Dario and Darren. I'm glad we were able to make the IT work, even if we had to include France in the deal. :)

Thanks to Brad for GMing and to everyone else for a fun game.
User avatar
Dignitary
 
Posts: 364
Joined: 12 Aug 2000, 3:11 am

Post 18 Jan 2014, 2:11 pm

Sendric,

A very interesting comment about your desire to stab France. Yes, I was afraid that we'd get stuck below the stalemate line but in hindsight, I wonder how things would have played out if I had the courage to risk it. I suspect there was more than a little sentiment involved there too. After all our efforts to get France to attack England, I didn't want to prove, Tom right by stabbing him.

Certainly, that was the time to strike... When France was absorbed in his English war. I'm sorry I lost my nerve.