Not to discredit Nigel, for he took what was given to him and
manipulated it perfectly, but I still feel this game was completely
screwed up from the get-go with Germany's disappearance. I know the
Kaiser probably felt a bit screwed with 4 different enemy units around
Mun after Spring 1901, but, as I told him was going to happen, Mun
didn't even fall that year. All he lost was Ber to Russia, which in all
honesty should never happen.

I guess the main reason this game pissed me off so much was that
Germany's disappearance completely negated my stab of Austria, which
came off exactly as I engineered it, something always fulfilling to
see. The general problem with attacking Austria right off the bat as
Italy is that Turkey and Russia usually end up with more of the gains
than you. However, I specifically made sure that I could take Vie, and
not just Tri, in 1901, so that that wouldn't happen. The problem was
that Russia was able to make unreasonable gains in the north because of
the NMR (without it, as he said, he wouldn't have had Ber or Swe),
allowing him to grow despite not gaining any Austrian centers. Once he
had those extra units, and no pressure coming at him from the north,
there was no way I was going to be able to hold him off. Further, the
full extent of what he was going to be able to take in the north was not
completely apparent until the exact turn when I decided to go with him
against Turkey, instead of the opposite (a choice I made because I saw
continued expansion paths for Russia that were not through me, something
I did not see for Turkey), so Russia was able to explode to a lead that
he never lost.

For a while after this I did all I could to convince Turkey and England
(who I must say I blame most for the solo because he had the best
opportunity to attack Russia) that we had to all cooperate against
Russia full force to stop a solo, but they didn't listen, so eventually
I stopped trying. And what do you know, Russia soloed.

Matt, Italy