Hi all,

This was a tricky game for me, because it came at a time in my life when I really shouldn't have been playing Diplomacy at all. I moved twice in December, again briefly in April, and then all the way across the country from BC to Newfoundland at the beginning of May. This came with multiple computer outages, moving related and otherwise. Perhaps I should have dropped out and asked for a replacement, but that's not how I roll. Regardless, once I fell behind on my diplomacy and my game started to be impaired as a result, I lost interest in the game quickly and that little snowball started becoming a very big boulder indeed...


My initial plan, from analysing the map and the SC breakdown, was for a naval assault against China or Oceania as part of an American Triple. Tim in Quebec said he was entirely on board with this, and Jerome indicated as well initially but it remains to be seen if his heart was in it or not. Maybe he never planned on sticking with me for long and was always with Oceania, or maybe it was simply my total silence that flicked his paranoia switch and moved him to the other side. Regardless, the plan became for me to push west, Tim and Jerome east, and for Jerome and I to supply an extremely valuable fleet into the other front. Arctic, for me, and as a bulwark against Oceania for Jerome. I noted very early the importance of snagging key ocean spaces because of the difficulty involved in being dislodged from them, and also the very poor prospects for an American continental war. So I went all in early on fleets rather than choosing to hedge my bets, and decided to make an early gambit attack on Oceania, hoping he'd think it too crazy a prospect to defend against it too heartily. Why? I knew Tim and Sean from previous games - Tim a solid ally and very capable player (who has done very well, and better than me, every time we've played together) and I figured I could string Sean along and get intel from him to help Tim to ensure my ally credentials. I was hoping Eurasia would stagnate while I pushed through with brilliant early victory in the seas. To make this work best I'd have to have a backdoor late-game alliance planned with Persia or one of the African powers, but much to my disfortune, I didn't contact any of them until much too late in the game. All the laziness and outside life factors. In Asia, Gino struck me as paranoid and potentially erratic like many a new player, so I didn't want to get involved in a long war against him without overwhelming help. Andrew in Ocenia on the other hand, struck me immediately as a very competent, very dangerous neighbour so I resolved to embark on a high risk, high reward war against him. If I could use my early moves to get a fleet behind his lines, I'd have the leverage to break him open. But that didn't work - no help from Amazon, no trust from China, not duplicitous enough against Oceania, too silent with other players... and the rest is history. This did lead to an interesting debate with Tim about who one should attack first that exposed our very different Diplomacy philosophies. I favour attacking the strong, helping the weak, ensuring a balance of power and focusing on the biggest threats early, and he a more traditional approach. Good discussion.


I started going dark, Amazon betrayed me to little surprise, and I focused on the long haul of survival. I knew I could form a line, even with Hawaii, that with Quebec's help I would be able to hold them off with indefinitely, which I think may have taken them a while to fully understand, and I used my tactical prowess (hah) to my best ability. This went on well for a while, as I more and more lost all interest in the game. I would have been very happy to continue this position and indirectly give Quebec a solid solo shot. Then Tim stabbed me and I decided to do all in my power to injure him. I knew the balance of power around my centers would mean that A\O and Q might mutually keep each other out, so I decided to be predictably unorthodox and just frustrate Tim's pace in the far north. And then after that, I was doomed, so I moved to piss him off some more. Hah!


The draws came and went. And I was eliminated. I HOPE that the time of the draw's passing was just that everyone had decided it was over, but I know this game had become entirely fixed and unfun for most of its players, and that it wasn't a move to secure a couple extra ranking points by extending the game one turn to ensure a few centre's extinction. That's fine for a tournament game, but a bit of a dick move otherwise.


As for the variant, I largely enjoyed it. This map appealed to me initially because it's a global game that isn't broken down into tons of small theaters of war. Each centre is not far away from any other and so there is a great need to diplome with the whole world. As for the map, it's been a long time since I've thought about it. It does occur to me that Oceania and the 3 Western hemisphere powers are much better defensively than the rest, with seemingly as good offensive capabilities but I don't know if that's true or not.


Anyways, thanks for the game even if I wished it ended months ago,
-Nick, from an islet in James' Bay

On Sun, Jun 24, 2012 at 5:40 PM, Andrew Tanner <amtrating(at)gmail.com> wrote:

Hey all, EGS as promised:

Well, this has been my second game on the worldwide variant, and have to say Mike that I feel like you've done a great job opening up the possibilities on this version.  My opening strategy was very different than when I played Amazon/South America before.  The Arctic opening influenced my moves even though I was at the other side of the map, because it immediately had half the players immediately concerned about the space. 


I immediately felt like Congo,Amazon, and Oceania were part of a triple that needed to go to 2 as soon as possible.  If 2 of us took out the third, and then stayed well away from one another's home centers, we'd forge a 2-way alliance with each of us becoming effectively corner powers.  Of the two, Jerome in Amazon seemed the most on board, and willing to discuss moves.  My success in this game is almost entirely due to his good faith and willingness to collaborate while resisting the urge to stab when I was vulnerable.  For example, when Mexico pushed southwest, had Amazon joined in with a couple strong moves I'd have lost all my southern centers.  He did not, and I was able to slowly and surely expand.


We decided on a strategy of containing Mexico while cooperating in Africa to eliminate our opposition there.  I negotiated peaceful relations with both Persia and China, and Amazon helped me push Mexico back to the eastern Pacific while I helped Jerome take some Congoese centers.  When I was in a good enough position, I attacked and seized some African centers for myself, and Congo was eliminated as a threat.  At this point, my attention turned to the Pacific.  I moved to establish a stalemate with Persia and went after Gino's China.


My choice of targets at this point was pretty much chosen by who was most willing to actively discuss moves.  I was concerned about a stab from Amazon, but he had been honest so far and I figured it would take some time to set up an effective stab, so I'd have some indications.  China had taken what of Russia he wanted, and it appeared that Persia was planning to stab him.  Mexico was stalemated, but too far to garner any gains too quickly.  So pretty much by process of elimination I chose to move on China.  Slow going, but I made progress, and kept pace with Amazon.


From there things proceeded fairly mechanically.  Quebec's apparent path to growth through Europe and Sahara began to worry Amazon and I; we feared he might be able to run for a solo by saving Mexico's centers for last.  We decided to jointly go after Mexico to prevent this, and bolster our own position.  And so the both of us marched North, collecting centers as we went.  It was a long slog through China's naturally strong defenses, but I managed to do some damage and force some key disbands.  Pretty much the same story in North America. 


Then the endgame - a Persia/Quebec was suspected, and I proposed a 3 way draw excluding Persia to try and make it look like Quebec was planning to stab Persia with our help.  Whether that had any effect or not, about that time Persia and Quebec started to get hostile around their borders.  I made some key moves to surround Persia and lock his armies into place, then planned to push into the Arctic to outflank him.  I think Amazon planned the same for Quebec.  We both supported a 4 way draw publicly, and I know I at least voted for it each time it came up, but planned to keep improving our respective positions until it passed or we were strong enough for force a 2-way draw. 


Probably the main reason we didn't push for a 2 way draw was concern that the other would make faster progress and solo.  We'd spoken before about racing to a solo without attacking one another, and though I was becoming sorely tempted by the thought of snagging some of his centers after I had turned Persia's flank, I preferred to avoid the risk and walk away as the joint SC leader in a 4-way draw.


Great game you guys, and thanks Mike for GMing!

Now map comments:

I really like how this map is shaping up.  I still feel like Oceania is too hard to attack, and exploited that throughout the game.  I calculated that with 7 units and one ally I could make myself safe indefinitely.  11-12 units and no ally would make me effectively impregnable to attack if I had the right centers.  The relatively few mid-ocean spaces makes stalemates fairly easy, as was seen in the Atlantic and Indian.  As a predominantly naval power (unless I wanted to bring down a joint China-Persia assault, armies in Bangkok and Jakarta were not a good idea till later) Oceania can fairly easily make any attack unprofitable to the medium term. 


Contrast this with Russia, who - especially with Arctic open - isn't safe anywhere.  The geography of a worldwide map makes Oceania a very safe position.  Amazon is likewise very safe.  The map does a great job of allowing corner type powers avenues of expansion against neighbors who usually have more fronts to worry about.


Now Congo's performance in both games I've played has been surprising to me, largely because both Congos have been skilled players.  I wonder if there isn't a sort of psychological bias at work - Congo could be as much of a corner power as Oceania or Amazon, either of which could be the odd man out in the southern triple.  But its almost as if being in the perceived center of a 2D map makes Congo like Austria to a juggernaut in standard Dip - a concentration of inviting, easily surrounded centers that seems to get attacked early because gains outweigh risks in a lot of cases.


Part of the problem, I feel, is that Amazon and Oceania don't have a lot of incentive to go after one another.  Accessible primarily through 1 sea lane, a stab either way probably makes one center change hands.  A possible solution, in my opinion, would be to create an Antarctic space as a counterpart to the Arctic.  If such a space could border Melbourne, Jo-Burg, and Buenos Aires, it could make an early stab more likely, and raise some tension - just as Arctic does for the northern powers. 


Making China a little more naval oriented might also help.  If Bangkok became a neutral center and was exchanged for Borneo or Singapore, that could make Oceania more compact and thus a better target for China early on. 


Another possibility might perhaps be the addition of several neutrals SCs in key places that aren't able to be claimed by any power until after the initial builds.  Maybe one per player, but always located right between 2 of them.


Just my ideas here - the map is going great and another playtest might lead to a completely different result.  I'd be happy to participate - and be in a different part of the map.  Might have totally different opinions if I'd drawn Europe or Russia!


Andrew

  

On Sat, Jun 23, 2012 at 3:05 PM, Jerome Payne <jerome777(at)ymail.com> wrote:

Hi everyone,

I'll send a proper EGS tomorrow, but in the meantime I just wanted to say 'congrats' to my fellow draw-sharers, 'well done' to Mike and Warren for surviving, 'unlucky' to Sean, Nick and Doug, and a big 'thank you' to Mike for GMing the game so well.


More tomorrow.


Jerome


Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphoneFrom: Michael Norton <mjn82(at)yahoo.com>
Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2012 10:17:53 -0700 (PDT)To: Gino Karczewski<gino.karczewski(at)gmail.com>; Warren Fleming<alwayshunted(at)hotmail.com>
ReplyTo: Michael Norton <mjn82(at)yahoo.com>
Cc: Michael Penner<worldwidegm(at)gmail.com>; amtrating(at)gmail.com<amtrating(at)gmail.com>; jerome777(at)ymail.com<jerome777(at)ymail.com>; maxatrest(at)yahoo.co.uk<maxatrest(at)yahoo.co.uk>; nick.s.powell(at)gmail.com<nick.s.powell(at)gmail.com>; sean_o_donnell(at)hotmail.com<sean_o_donnell(at)hotmail.com>; timothyl.crosby(at)gmail.com<timothyl.crosby(at)gmail.com>; dc399(at)diplomaticcorp.com<dc399(at)diplomaticcorp.com>; dougray30(at)yahoo.com<dougray30(at)yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: DC399 - Spring 2010
Congrats to you guys.  Espeically Max!  Although I have less territory than when I started,  Egypt's a great place to retire and rule with all the creature comforts.  I love the Med! 
 Mike

From: Gino Karczewski <gino.karczewski(at)gmail.com>

To: Warren Fleming <alwayshunted(at)hotmail.com>
Cc: Michael Penner <worldwidegm(at)gmail.com>; amtrating(at)gmail.com; jerome777(at)ymail.com; maxatrest(at)yahoo.co.uk; mjn82(at)yahoo.com; nick.s.powell(at)gmail.com; sean_o_donnell(at)hotmail.com; timothyl.crosby(at)gmail.com; dc399(at)diplomaticcorp.com; dougray30(at)yahoo.com

Sent: Saturday, June 23, 2012 11:13 AM
Subject: Re: DC399 - Spring 2010


Congrats to all from the Chinese Empire, currently struggling for control of the under-earth with the Mole people...

On Sat, Jun 23, 2012 at 12:09 PM, Warren Fleming <alwayshunted(at)hotmail.com> wrote:




Congrats guys.  Whew!

Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2012 10:42:47 -0500
Subject: DC399 - Spring 2010

From: worldwidegm(at)gmail.com
To: amtrating(at)gmail.com; gino.karczewski(at)gmail.com; jerome777(at)ymail.com; Maxatrest(at)yahoo.co.uk; mjn82(at)yahoo.com; nick.s.powell(at)gmail.com; sean_o_donnell(at)hotmail.com; timothyl.crosby(at)gmail.com; alwayshunted(at)hotmail.com; dc399(at)diplomaticcorp.com; dougray30(at)yahoo.com



...and that's all, folks.

After a number of attempts, the PQAO draw has passed and the game is over.  I can think of a few players who would rather have seen the game end earlier, but it was not to be.  Congratulations to Andrew, Jerome, Max and Tim on prevailing to the end.  Congrats as well to Warren and Michael for their survivals.  It's tough being under attack for the whole game, so thanks for sticking with us.




The selfish part of me wanted to see this game keep going, as I wanted to see Persia and Quebec go at it over the Europe/Russia border, giving the map a good test.  But, I also see that if they did that Ociania and Amazon had enough control over the oceans to make their lives miserable.  I really thought a 2-way was in the cards.  But that is not to be.




I'd love to hear your comments both about the game and the map.  I continue to tweak and test to try to make it better.

mvp




--
Gino Karczewski
765 Amsterdam Avenue #10-J
New York, NY 10025
917-434-9008 Mobile

646-807-4702 Fax