Don’t underestimate this beautiful move! Your n-ng-Rama, allows me nch-Roca, according to subsection 2(e) of the Fourth Addendum on Phonetic Allowances, at least in my copy of Ethelred, Marie of Edinburgh, and related Games, revision 19.1, by Sir Horace B. Hogsley-Sogbottom. Thus
Sinchi Roca III, Emperor of the Incas
This gets us back to real sovereigns, delays Tom’s win for yet 2 more moves, and lets me declare (if other players cooperate) Maria in 3 moves via the usual Holland-Romanoff(*) connection! Yes, I know the leap to Inca would normally require paying tokens, but I still have the One Ring of Power. Be thankful I did only this much.
(* - Note that Sinchi Roca III is shown on the Internet (:p) as 26-great grandfather of Catharina Amalia Beatrix Carmen Victoria, the Heiress Apparent of Netherlands who will celebrate her 7th birthday in a few weeks.)
That does appear to close off the direct approach via Victoria Regina Imperatrix, doesn’t it? I shall have to consult my references. Well-played; I don’t believe I’ve seen Murakama actually derailed (to borrow a metaphor from MC) before.
Fortunately, my earlier play of Bayezid allows me to shift to Abdelhamid II; as the One Ring holds no power in the trans-Danube, I think I can continue to claim Marie in 2, via the Treaty of Berlin.
All five continents have been played, by my count, so Level 3 Rules are in force. As far as shown at this prestigious reference, the Osmanoğlu family has never inter-married with any other sovereign family. Thus I can force a partial stalemate by jumping straight to the eponym himself: Osman I
As far as I can tell, tokens will have to be spent now, just to make a legal play. (Unless of course a blood connection between Osmanoğlu and some other dynasty is demonstrated.)
“Unless a blood connection between Osmanoğlu and some other dynasty is demonstrated”
Excuse me?!?!
How many ways should I demonstrate it?
Should I start with France, (Nakshidil) or is that too obvious? How about Portugal, (Itimad), China, (Qimin Khan), I could go on, but this hair isn’t going to highlight itself tonight, so I’ll just play Queen Kalanikauikaʻalaneo Kai Keōpūolani-Ahu-i-Kekai-Makuahine-a-Kama-Kalani-Kau-i-Kealaneo of Hawaii, though I know I have no chance of winning with this move. A bit petty, perhaps, but at least it moves Finland out of play as far as the Romania-lovers are concerned. (I’m not naming names, you know who you are.)
Look, I know I got to the game MUCH too late to shove rules 23 thru 34 of The Honorable Way To Win Æthelred down everyone’s throat, and the last thing I want is to turn our game play unreasonably legalistic by insisting on Montrail’s Provisional Procedures for Experts, but we could at least pretend to be serious and stick to the spirit of the law by deciding as a group to enforce the Unplayed Princess Statute as laid down by Hawt and Midge in the Dictum Regent Expansion Guide. Honestly, I shouldn’t even have had to go there.
Also, next time I hope someone has the good sense and decency to remember that CHILDREN MIGHT BE PLAYING and keep mention of Meroviginians to a bare minimum.
All right, I’m off my soapbox…I won’t even mention the fact that no token-dispersal was offered pre-Charlemagne.
AFAIK, the Sultans of Turkey have never acknowledged their roles in the white slavery business, and reject the Martinique-born Nakshidil hypothesis.
The website I cited has this to say about Nakshidil:
and, to emphasize rejection of the Osmanoğlu-du Buc connection, shows Aimée herself dying at age 6. I assume we use official pedigrees (for lines not specifically covered in Wandsdale’s Cuckoldings, Incests and Adoptions for the Advanced Æthelred player. (BTW, what is the alleged connection between Aimée Dubuc de Rivery and Josephine de Beauharnais anyway? My pet centipede burrowed through most of the pages in the French section of my copy of Cuckoldings Advanced.)
But, petty bickering aside, your strong play at Kalanikauikaʻalaneo Kai Keōpūolani-Ahu-i-Kekai-Makuahine-a-Kama-Kalani-Kau-i-Kealaneo baffled me at first.
But am I not correct that it leaves me room for the same Pacific finesse that Nast-Ogsden used in the 1933 World Cup Semifinals?
You need to check your calendar more often, septimus. On this, the anniversary of her ascension to the throne, I am privileged to play Elizabeth I of England, apply for a general waiver, AND enact a special waiver on all fictional objects. This also puts me back on track for Marie in 2.
You fell into my trap, Tom! Normally Eliz I’s father would now be off-limits, but since I can respond to your Eliz I date association, by noting today’s celebration of the betrothal of Catherine Middleton to Eliz II’s grandson and heir apparent, and note that Catherine’s 12-g grandmother was none other than Catherine Carey, the putative daughter of William Carey and Mary Boleyn.
But Catherine was in fact Eliz I’s older half-sister, the daughter of Henry VIII, King of England
I also can get to Mary of Edinburgh in 2 moves now. I think the next move will decide the game.
I don’t see the trap there; Henry VIII is a strong mid-game move, but not at this stage; it still leaves you a half-step behind when (thanks to the general waiver) I play Victoria I, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India (which I will now do), putting the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha approach off-limits to other players for 2 rounds (the heart of Murakama’s strategy, of course). The Romanovs are open, of course, but no one has yet landed a close enough approach. The Hohenzollerns have yet to be breached to the best of my recollection.
Still, you’ve surprised me a number of times in this endgame; I am officially abandoning my earlier prejudice against playing a full Marie instead of calling the game off at Æthelred.
Very well played, Tom! I think this game, and your skillful execution of this new Murukama variation will become a textbook classic. A player more gracious than I would probably concede defeat now, but since a concession wouldn’t be binding on other players anyway, let me take what seems like the best gambit from here:
Tugdamme, King of the Saka and Qutium.
I don’t think even this can stop Tom’s Marie-in-2, but if anyone still has any yellow tokens, I could be mistaken:
(2 or 3 Merovingian Kings of Austrasia are playable now, to anyone with sufficient yellow tokens. Please respect goodie’s wishes and enclose all Merovingian mention in child-proof spoiler boxes.)
Yes. And the way you’ve parried thrusts to arrive already at Marie’s grandmother has combined determination and wisdom. I commented earlier that Æthelred is too easy for top-notch challenge match. If Marie leads to too long a game, let me recommend Iain Toom Tabard !
I’m tempted right into reminding everyone of, what was his name? That rather large swarthy fellow from the Alabama team in Olympia, ’97, at the Odd Orange Club Semi-finals, he said, and I’m sorry if I misquote, but I was two or three tables away, ‘A Sinchi Roca eight moves after a Henry? You’re trying to feed us a brimful bucket of month old summertime ditch liquor and I won’t stand for it!” And then he slammed down a green token and, with tears in his eyes, muttered “Mary, Queen of Hungary” and walked out. We all tried SO HARD not to laugh, but really, what did he expect? (I know this game is wildly different, but the move count was what reminded me. On an even further tangent, EXCELLENT sushi at the Odd Orange.)
Anyway, now that I’ve lightened the mood a bit to make up for my last post, I’ll give a little wink and play King Christian III of Denmark. There is no need for a house check as, I’m sure everyone knows, Graff set the precedent in his win over McCreachen (correct spelling?) in 2003 at Jackson Hole.
Looks to me like we’re in end game now for sure, Æthelred to Marie notwithstanding.
BTW, septimus, I make no formal objection at this time, but what I wouldn’t give for a time machine, a reality-show-ready film crew, and a Wal-mart shopping cart full of paternity tests to put you and your Osmanoğlu ideas in their proper place…
I have to say it’s quite delightful how classic MC strategies seem to map so beautifully to this genealogical variant. Isn’t this pretty much the same idea as the brilliant triple-gambit that Hayashida used to blaze to victory in the 1976 world championship semi-final. I must say my memory of Hunter’s classic annotation of that game is hazy but if I understand his proposed counter-strategy and the equivalent for this game the obvious move would be:
IMHO, you’ll find Murukama in the dictionary right next to “over-rated”, but I still know when I’ve been taken to school, Lantern.
Tom’s got us all in his sights despite some darn good tactics by you more experienced players…
I’ll play a quick Joan of England Queen of Sicily that does at least completely stop up any lobs from the Holy Roman Empire until a “layman/pope” is called by the senior player.
You know, we lost a lot when we lost Walthers in that tragic spelunking accident he had searching out his so called “second Petra” last year, not least because I happen to know that he was about to publish a partial reversal of his Urich opinion from his Treatise on Regal Offshoots. He was good people.
I’m almost sorry to bring this game to a close, especially since I really owe this to two striking strokes of luck, the first being Wargamer’s still-inexplicable gaffe in bringing an unprotected Confessor into play and the second being Gloriana’s coronation day arriving just as septimus and goodie had placed an effective blockade. I am not myself a fan of Murukama’s style of play; I find it plodding and generally boring, and am pleased to see that the modern game is finally developing effective defenses. Still, I will go back to that well one more time, cash in the four purple chips I picked up for playing Æthelred to enable me to return to my previous play and skip a generation, and proceed directly from Victoria to
I’m happy to see the game go to such a steady player. The quality of play has, in general, been very high. I look forward to our next game, all.
By the way, does anyone intend to go to the '11 World Championships in Banff? I think I’ll bring a transcript of this game when I do. Many will be interested in it, I think.
Thank you, Tom, for a sterling demonstration of skillful play. In your hands Murukama’s style is hardly boring!
Fair warning: In the next game I plan to “take the gloves off” and scamper through the Merovingian Kings as fast as I can, accumulating pink and yellow tokens.
