How did that happen?
add “t to survive the game at this point.”
I ended up either 2nd out or 3rd out, I forget. I outlasted Germany by a couple years; Turkey and myself both exited at about the same time and I’m sure Russia was soon to follow. E/F/I were in lockstep all game and just swept eastward swallowing everything in their path. I’m only mildly curious to find out if they agreed on a 3-way or turned on each other. F and E could easily have gobbled up most of Italy pretty quickly if they tried.
Damn all.
Look at what Erlend pulled off in WM154 (that I was adjudicating).
http://www.wooleysark.com/dip/WM54
A five center stab-gain in F08 to bring him a solo!
Them’s some fine playing.
The remaining participants must be mighty pissed at Italy.
I sure would be.
Erlend prefaced his final orders with, ‘OK…it’s time.’
Woof.
I bet Italy feels like a complete idiot in that one. Or he feels Finnish, whichever.
And now I’m invited to be one of the Round 2 GMs.
Will one of you people be at my tender mercies after June 15? Tune in, sports fans!
Huh. They didn’t invite me. Morons.
Hey, I’m the GM of the Year. I’m bona fide!
Will Rd. 1 ever end? I’m stuck between an Austria and England jockeying for position for themselves and for their teams. Each is trying to prop up their teammates in some other games.
Name of the game.
Round 1 will end, come hell or high water, no later than June 15 (barring disaster).
Both games I’m running are certainly over with.
Rd. one ended for me this spring 1907. Sandwiched between France and Russia, my last German unit was disbanded in Holland.
Except that France stabbed the hell out of me in 1907. My revenge, hopefully, will be throwing the game to Russia, thereby depriving France of his ill-gotten gains. With the bases I’m giving him, Russia’s strength will be up to 16 bases, so all he needed was to get two bases on his own in the last 2 years. We’ve just finished 1908, and I don’t think he’s going to be able to pick up those 2 bases.
However, while France is going all-out to block Russia from gaining in Germany, I should be able to pick up a SC or two from his rear - I’ve already grabbed Portugal, he can’t stop me from taking Spain, and Brest and Marseilles are live possibilities.
Austria and Germany are dead, and Italy’s down to one base, so it looks like I’ll finish fourth, behind Russia, France, and Turkey (whose vacillating was what put Russia so far ahead to begin with).
I guess fourth isn’t so bad, for a first time. I survived, had a good time, learned a few things. I’m not complaining.
Well, might as well give an update for my game. I’ve bitched a few times in this thread, and this one will probbaly be no different. My game has been absolutely no fun. A big part of the problem has been the GM. You all heard my ranting and raving about a unwarranted NMR he hit me with, followed by another NMR (Turkey) that benefitted my main rival in Italy massively. To needle things even more he’s been wholly unwilling to issue delays. He’ll only issue one delay per player, no matter the circumstances, and each delay is automatcially a week. The game has just sucked. Deadlines are midday Monday, and a few of the players don’t have access on the weekends and with the players being from all over the world, communication has been sketchy at best. These are just the kind of circumstances where a flexible GM is really needed. If he were really pressing to get the game finished quickly, I might shut up about it, but every turn is a week and winter turns and retreats tend to take 2 days. Flat out ridiculous. Ok, enough ranting.
Now to the game. So far the game has been a E/F/I against everyone else. Since I’m playing France, this is quite alright with me. Germany was dispatched without much trouble. Italy was having slow going with Austria and Turkey at first, I was in the channel and negotiated it to remain at peace, so I was looking good. I would have very likely been in the lead except for 4 things, first Germany decided to fully defend against me which slowed my gains and allowed Englad a good foothold. Then I was NMRed on a turn where I guessed dead right and would have crushed Germany, it took me a full 2 years to recover form that. Then Turkey was NMRed and Italy had a 3 SC Fall. I was then no longer the board leader. Lastly, England refused to cooperate with me to stop Italy. He consistently chose to keep many units along our front of of paranoia. He wouldn’t cede a SC to me when I needed it to build an extra fleet. This left me pinched and stalemated between England and Italy. So, I sniped at Italy to no avail and vice versa. England and I were rock solid allies, and then he sniped the channel on a turn where I was supposed to vacate it to block Italy. Luckily I didn’t and he failed, but the following turn I had no choice but to assume he was plotting a stab on me. I negotiated a series of moves and blatantly stabbed him. I knew full well that it’d probably mean my doom and give Italy an assured first place finish and good shot at a solo, but I was looking at zero chance for gain for the rest of the game. So now, England is pissed at me and has professed his intention of giftwrapping a solo to Italy. Italy claims he wants to remain at peace with me, but the two fleets in GoL and West strongly refute that. Turkey and Russia are soon to be eliminated and Austria has completely married himself to Italy. Italy had him down to 2 SCs and could have easily eliminated him, but I suspect that he negotiated an alliance based on aid on another board. If not, then Austria has had an amazing turn of emotions and is essentially giftwrapping a solo to the country which gutted him.
Here’s the map.
Not looking good is it? We’re here in the Spring of 1907 and my hopes are that I can fend off Italy and muster some unified defense from Austria, Turkey and Russia so that I can hold out and get part of the end game in 1909 before Italy gets the solo.
Did I mention that I’ve not enjoyed this at all?
I don’t have a real problem with that, except my position is set, and there’s nothing I can do about it. England and Austria each have 12 SCs, and I have 4, right between them. Each is deathly afraid the other might get a solo, so rather than risk gutting me, and creating a quagmire of 4 SCs, both England and Austria keep giving me support, and I’m not placed in anyway that can allow to grab an extra SC.
So right now I stand 4th, once Italy gets mauled, then I’m up to 3rd, but I’m really not doing anything.
So move for a DIAS and see if they’ll end the game there.
Well, I ranted here about the lack of cooperation in my game before. A/T/I/R/G did all come together to stand off E/F, but nobody was really workeng together IYKWIM. I really stopped caring, and when the inevitable happened- people started to poach one or 2 SCs from others in the alliance, I went from 6-2 fairly quickly ( Because i wasn’t in a position to poach-I was committed to mutual defense, and with most of my ( Italy’s) units busy stalemating France, I was pretty easy to take out. We’re in 1909 now and I hope to survive the game ( Turkey says that as long as he has a solid 2nd place he won’t eliminate me, and he does, so I should at least survive.) All in all I’ve been a bit disapointed in the quality of gameplay I’ve gotten from my neighbors. Turkey is getting a 2nd place, true, but it’s a 2nd with 6 SCs. If he hadn’t screwed everything up way back, we would have had a shot at beating England together, I think.
DIAS has been repeatedly voted down, b/c both England and Austria covet the centers that each could pick up from Italy. Each player thinks he needs about 2 more SCs to help his team into the next round.