Thanks everyone for a great game and thanks to Garry for his sterling GM'ing - I agree with Darryl that the NMRs did spoil things somewhat, and I'd prefer a game that found replacements, even though I know this can break the flow of a game.
From the beginning I wanted peace in the north whilst working to take out one of my southern neighbours, preferably Turkey, and fortunately (or so I thought) the diplomacy fell into place; in particular Nick was easy to work with and I could see our alliance being one that would last. Darryl covered his plans well and his attack came as a surprise; fairly quickly it became clear we were facing an E/F/G - whether Turkey was tied into this I don't know but either way with the three remaining powers already at war with Turkey my position was pretty bad, as I would clearly bear the brunt of the attack from the west, at least at first.
I was rescued by the British and French NMRs and thought an approach to Germany would be worth a try - luckily Darryl proved to be a flexible player who was open to a change of plan, which removed the threat I had been facing and allowed me to rejoin the war against Turkey. Darryl and I talked a lot and he was understandably keen for me to attack Austria whilst he moved west - at that stage I wasn't falling for that one but wanted to keep the alliance with Austria going whilst I strengthened my position. However I could see that once the Turkish centres were taken, I had no obvious route to grow, whereas both Germany and Austria could stroll west and pick up all the empty or NMR centres one by one. Once they started building units from these gains I would be in no position to attack either of them and, even in an alliance, would be the junior partner.
The critical turn for me was the one where I moved on Bulgaria and secured all the Turkish units for myself - the decision was a difficult one since my alliance with Nick was a strong one and we had agreed to go for the draw - but two-way draws are almost impossible in the game. When I looked at the position before that move, my situation was actually extremely dangerous, had Austria decided to move against me that turn - he had at least one guaranteed gain in Italy, could have moved into Warsaw, and closed me out of the Balkans.
A stab is only worthwhile in my view if it significantly changes the balance of a game - stabbing for a centre or two isn't worth it if there's no way to follow through since gaining an extra enemy normally cancels out any benefit. In this particular case I was lucky that the moves all came off as planned (and I will confess to reassuring Darryl that Munich was safe and tempting him to consider Mun-Tyl, which deprived Austria of a build - sorry Nick) and in one turn I went from third place to largest power.
The other factor that went in my favour was the bad feeling between A/G from game start - I kept talking to Nick after the stab and also to Darryl - there were enough NMR centres in the north to get me close to the 18 without having to follow through against Austria - stabbing him once was bad enough and I was really reluctant to break my word again. Hence for the end game I simply planned to sit back in the centre and get enough fleets to pick up what I needed in the north. Getting a fleet into the central Med avoided the need to take anything from Austria in the south - I could have sailed on and taken the 18th from France or Italy, but in the event once the outcome of the game was clear I thought better to put everyone out of their misery by taking Naples from Nick (sorry again).
Despite the NMRs I really did enjoy the game - my first solo win for as long as I can remember - and would happily meet any of the (active) players in this game again (so long as they can forgive and forget, of course). Thanks again guys!
Ian
