All, Here’s the thing. I love playing Turkey. It’s far and away my favourite country to play. The ability to Machiavellianly play countries off against each other while having the ability to shut up shop and make yourself impossible to crack is hard to beat. It’s the essence of Diplomacy for me. But it’s fair to say that some alliances are tough to break. The bonds of marriage, for example, are tough to wheedle a way between. Austria-Russia, in game terms, is a horrible alliance. How can that ever look like the right play for Russia – conquering Europe while repeatedly declining to consume the very easy pickings in Austria and the Balkans? But if it’s horrible for Russia, it’s worse for Turkey. But this is the hand I was dealt. A non-stop battering from Turn 1 with no chance whatsoever that any diplomatic or tactical play is going to persuade the two protagonists that I would make a better ally then the other. I’m watching a meta-game that was all sewn up long before the starting gun. In the event, the stab was a little too early. The haste to come get me let me into BLA, which was ultimately my saving grace – especially when I snuck the back way into Sevastopol. Nothing good ever came of an early Russia-Turkey war. Turkey hasn’t got the resources to make any inroads into Russia, but it has the resources to keep Russia busy a
long time – easily enough time for England/Germany/Austria to notice that there’s a vulnerability, and that a Russia occupied on multiple fronts is a whole load of SCs to raid. If nothing else, it means bad news for Russia in Scandinavia. So tortoise it was – hiding beneath my shell until the right opportunity presented itself. And it was all in hand – for a while – England/Germany was a sure-fire bet to romp all over Europe, taking advantage of the self-imposed constraints of the Austria/Russia alliance. All that remained was to wait until there was only the three of us left – I’m in the far corner after all… Would they take a three-way victory with me? Or would they keep going to the end, and hope that neither decided to just keep going that “one… more… turn…” to tip themselves over into solo territory? I bet they would have settled for the three-way. And if one did want to settle and one didn’t – well that would just prove one was going for the solo. So the other would be my new best friend. The English stab on Germany knocked me for six. I didn’t see it coming – maybe I should have done, but I wasn’t looking that far north. But cometh the hour, cometh the man - Derek took immediate control over the situation and marshalled the coalition of the “good guys” like a diplomatic genius. He brought instant peace to the Turkey/Russia/Austria warzone where there had been nothing but brutal slaughter since the first turn (albeit helped by the fact that both Robert and Susanne are really fantastic people – even when we were at war it was
relatively friendly!). It wasn’t the smoothest of alliances: emotions were fraught at times, and ultimately there were casualties (sorry Joe, Robert, Poul), but Derek deserves the real credit for turning the tide, and it’s thoroughly deserved that he ended up in the mix. If the real-world Kaiser had been quite so sharp when the moment presented itself, we’d probably
all be speaking in German now. Still, the stab added a whole new complexion to the game – right when I was on the verge of certain doom - so thanks Der for that! It’s fair to say I had larger ambitions. A two-way would still have been great. I had vague notions of a solo right through to the end. But it wasn’t to be. Props, though, to Hamish. He showed fantastic judgment throughout – and I think we are all the beneficiaries. He was friendly, fun and really helped make the game for me – and I hope for others too. Thanks to everyone! Hope to be fighting on your side again very soon. Chris
From: Robert Maeder [mailto:rmaeder(at)gmail.com]
Sent: 04 July 2014 15:34
To: Hamish Williams
Cc: Derek eyler; Der Ewald; Michael Sims; Joe Babinsack; Suzanne Maeder; Christopher Mottau; blitz2014(at)diplomaticcorp.com; victor hurup; Timothy Crosby; Timothy Crosby
Subject: Re: dc492 four-way draw declared Hey all,First off- regrets. I want to express apologies to all for any shoddy play on my part, the game truly is better when everyone plays at their max. I also want to express regrets that I was unable to knock out Turkey! I wish Germany had gone along with a three way alliance from the get-go. I suspect he may wish the same thing. Russia and I had every plan of splitting with him and forcing a little Italy/France/England skirmish. Congrats on a good game. Congrats specifically to Turkey for his lights out persistent play and never giving up. Congrats to all those who sussed out on turn one that Russia and I would likely be allies! Congrats to England for taking a very close shot at a solo! Congrats to Germany for turning when he needed to! Congrats to my wife(Russia) for raising a child and still somehow making it out of this thing alive. Congrats to my fellow vanquished French and Italian players. We got hosed, but we played hard. I know there were some debates about the leniency, and Hamish will make his own calls in the future. Aside from that issue, I would like to thank Hamish for his patience. I think he was a genial moderator, not stuck up about minutia, and caring about the general success of the game, not the specific success of one person due to an NMR. Because of his input we had a game that was as free as it could have been from awful gameplay. In my first game, Germany had one turn of NMRing and then pretty much ragequit because the moderator had been strict. I was Turkey, so I couldn't really take advantage and France, Austria, and Russia got to grow for free while I was kept out of things. This game, in my opinion, was far more fun, even though the result was less good for me, especially since I had to NMR for a week or so and ended up begrudgingly giving my wife supply points for tactical soundness of the alliance which cost me my life. Hamish, if you're ever in north New Jersey or NYC, you've got a guest bed waiting for you and a beer. You were very patient with us as a group. Thank you for your service to us this game. No need to wait for coming to America to get a beer. Grab yourself one right now! Cheers! -Rob/Austria On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 3:02 AM, Hamish Williams wrote:The four-way draw has been, in some cases grudgingly, declared. Congratulations to you. An interesting game to GM, so thank you all for that. If any of you want to write end-of-game statements then I'd like to read them. I'll update the website shortly. Hamish
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