I think I remember Nick saying that this was one of his first few attempts at
GMing so I really hope that, whenever his email account allowed, he enjoyed
the game. Certainly we all owe him a huge thank you for battling against the
odds to keep our game moving forward. Thank you too to Trout & Nick for
stepping in to get us through to the end.

I should start with an apology to Nathan for the blatant & premeditated lie
right at the start. Have to say though that I like the way you battled on
afterwards. Once I occupied ENG I felt in a strong position so tried to drive
a hard bargain with you but I learned something from the way you stood your
ground. Obviously things turned out OK for me so it'd be wrong to say I
regretted the choice I made but I came closer than you might think to
following your line!

I think that maybe I also owe an apology to Benjy but before he gets one I
need a clear undertaking from him that he'll give prior notice before ever
visiting my neck of the woods. This is so that I have to time to get my
daughters safely under lock & key! Benjy must be able to talk anybody into
anything! He and I had a pre-start deal that his Russia would support
England's claim to NWY and that he'd therefore open 'south'. You can guess how
I felt when he open north, clearly intending to take NWY himself.
Nevertheless, he not only persuaded me to let that go, he also got me to
accept his ownership of Norway AND to do what I could to encourage Germany to
come to buddy up with him too. I still can't believe I did that. Benjy, you're
a genius!

Sadly our alliance ground to a halt after I took BEL and maybe that's where
the need for an apology comes in. To be fair however, he had broken our
agreement by placing a fleet in contact with the North Sea and he wasn't able
to offer reply to my suggestion about how we could fix that situation or to
offer one of his own. As I said, it worked out Ok so I'm not going to try to
pretend that I regret doing what I did but I do wish the E/R alliance hadn't
dissolved when it did.

Pintoski, I never did discover if I'd passed your test. I won't give your
methods away by talking about the detail of the 'test' you put me through but
it's all pretty clever stuff. I found your messages really entertaining and
tactically inventive maybe we'll get a chance to ally properly one day. In
this game by the time France had gone and we had the chance to work together I
found that my German alliance was going far too well for me to even think
about abandoning Kurt. In any case, I was always too worried about your
potential alliance with Matt.

Speaking of Matt, I have to thank him for not exploiting my pain on May 23rd.
I still say the better side lost though!

Thanks to Matt also for the late game agreement he offered me 'in case' I
needed the solo for tournament standing but was finding trouble with Germany.
I thought that deal showed a great Diplomacy brain and, as I said to him at
the time, it was a pleasure to play the game with that kind of thinker. I hope
that next time we share a table we are not so far apart so we get more chance
to work together.

My biggest thanks though go to Kurt. I learned mountains of stuff from you in
this game mate, simply mountains. I don't think playing Germany when there is
a strong England is a comfortable place but you handled it superbly. You
stayed calm and played to deal with the game situation not any potential
paranoia; brilliant. The only think that ever caused me to doubt my alliance
with Kurt was that it was going TOO well. It seemed that we were always on the
same wavelength and able to trust each other implicitly. The structure of the
game means, I think, that any two neighbouring players able to establish that
kind of relationship are going to do well and so it proved.

I came into this game hoping for a result that would give me a chance to win
the Winter Blitz but, of course, I didn't expect one. I was more hopeful that
I would at least enjoy the game particularly when developments on other tables
seemed to suggest that even a win would not be enough for me. Still this is
Dippy and things change so maybe I still have a chance. What is for sure
though is that I really, really did enjoy playing with the people on this
table. I'm, however, more than a little surprised to have topped a board made
up of such capable players. It just goes to show that with a little luck,
miracles can happen!

Thank you one and all, thank you very much.

All the best,

Paul.