This was my second game of Ancient Med; the first ended
prematurely but I was in a strong position as Rome, and wanted to check out
what it felt like at the other end of the board, so I bid strongly for
Persia.  It’s probably the weakest power, so not surprisingly there
were no competing bids!


 


I think quite a lot of what I write will be influenced by a
feeling I had that the game is actually unbalanced and favours Rome strongly. 
In the early game, the Adriatic forms a barrier almost as strong as a mountain
range, and its effect is to give Rome only one neighbour for much of the game
(I’d be interested to hear Nick’s and Tim’s view about this). 
Correspondingly, Carthage is in a weak position, almost inevitably facing the
whole Roman force from the outset.


 


I’m also interested to hear what Charles has to say about
Tim’s belief that they began with an anti-Persian agenda.  Charles’
communications were throughout the game brief and, most of the time, infrequent
– but I never sensed hostility in them  (Tim’s on the other
hand were hostile in every case – not in tone, but in content. 
Every one asked me to give up an advantage in the interests of closer
cooperation between us!  (I did think, Tim, that somewhere along the line
you might have realised that a change of tack might have brought better results!)


 


From the outset, Jim was the only player from whom I
received anything like a friendly response, and this led to us deciding to take
on Egypt early.  In the light of my belief that Carthage would have its
hands full with Rome that was a mistake; if Egypt wasn’t already disposed
to join Greece against me, my opening move (threatening to take Jerusalem
contrary to our agreement) probably sealed that!  And Jim had recognised,
before Spring 01, that he was going to have to compete with Rome for the
western islands.  Mistake!


 


Greece and I had agreed a DMZ from Isauria to Bithynia, but
it was no surprise when he invaded there in the Fall.  From then on the
pattern of my game was determined.  I was quite proud of my resistance
(although there was one other, possibly crucial, error in Spring 04.  An
order A Armenia -  Chersonesus would have saved Chersonesus and Greece’s
future might have been bleak indeed, with Rome breathing down his neck,


 


I spent a lot of time trying to persuade Greece that he
needed to resist Rome at an early stage.  It was clear that Rome was the
one to watch.  Tim was having serious trouble making progress against me,
whilst Rome was growing steadily.  Charles, in Egypt, was playing a clever
diplomatic game.  Whilst Tim was clearly always  trying to persuade
me to give up territory and SCs (quite why he thought I’d fall for it
beats me!), Egypt was quietly supportive.  When I made the decision to
evacuate the south to  bolster my position v Greece I was well aware that
Egypt might overrun me, as he did.  But there was no doubt that given half
a chance Greece would do it, so I had little choice!


 


After that the game became for me largely a spectator sport. 
Greece and Egypt did well to stop Rome’s progress, and in the end I
thought that Egypt could pull off the solo.  I was a little disappointed
that nobody could forge a diplomatic initiative to break the 3-way deadlock,
but then I have no idea what efforts were tried.  Possibly the level of
trust and fear was such that no way through could be found.


 


Well done though to the three of you; I don’t know
what happened to Jim – I hope he’s OK, but his defection felt
gradual and the result of the way the war was going; if so, that’s a
pity.


 


And very many thanks to Dirk for GMing extremely ably, and
for introducing me to Blind Auction Bidding – which as a result is now a
regular feature in another place!