Okay...sorry to be last here. Been out of town and getting through both personal and work emails is proving challenging [oh yeah...and trying to reconnect in my current games].

I really enjoyed filling in in this game. I reluctantly took it because I had so many games going on but decided to try to help the cause. Plus, I honestly thought that the Whitecloaks were doomed and that it wouldn't take any time for me to bungle it further. The NMRs were unfortunate and I am sure that getting replacements was tough. I fortunately, as it ends up, wasn't in too bad of a place to pull a rabbit out. All in all I was quite happy to get/take the draw although I do think that I was definitely in a position to get part of a final 3-way. Unfortunately, like the rest, I felt that a Borderland replacement would have too dramatically altered the game.

Quick notes on the game itself:
Jorge - enjoyed working with him. He was first to offer an alliance and I saw no other alternative than to take it. We were able to work well together...unfortunately we just couldn't make progress. I think that the nature of the SeaFolk make them always an enabler unfortunately.

Stephen - always enjoy working with him. Not surprisingly, I quickly realized that not working with him would be foolish. At the minimum, he and I always had to have a bit of an agreement due to our proximity. However, in the end, I think that that strengthened things a bit.

Trout - {sigh}. You should have taken my offer a few turns back. Things might have turned out differently.

Sean - didn't get a chance really to do much with you given our schedules but our common work in the middle worked nicely.

Jules - sorry that someone had to be the odd man out and that that was you. I just couldn't see any scenario where we could work together and me gain on any front. Unfortunately that meant that I had to ally against you to get anywhere.

Notes on the map/variant:
1. Really liked the random Trollocs and Seanchan. Add a unique element.
2. Maybe should consider aberration builds for the game? I, for one, was constantly hamstrung by having nowhere to build [but did not seem to be true for BL/WL].
3. Agree with Trout's comments about the sea spaces. The SeaFolk can effectively lock down the coasts, especially with the rule about the Oceans being unpassable to all but them. Even if I had taken back Ebou Dar from Jorge I would never have been able to make any progress anywhere. As such, it was unlikely that I could ever see a way to stab.
4. Agree about some of the other spaces being constricted a bit. It honestly felt like I never had any way to stab Stephen had I wanted to because I could never bring forces to bear against him [because of the mountains]. That same thing made taking areas in the Midlands tough. The nature of the unpassables made several bottlenecks that truly would have made any solo really tough. Additionally, it seemed that they existed in some places and at some borders, but not at others [i.e. the Eastland/Midland/Southland/Whitecloak borders].
5. Might have been interesting to allow adjacent corners to be touching. There were several places where four areas came to a point but the two opposite corners could not "touch" one another. I understand the logic and nature of that but it still could have been interesting if several of them [say 3 of the 4] bordered one another.
6. I really think, without modifications, it could be very hard for anyone to solo on this board and it certainly will be hard to get down to less than three [and maybe four]. Nonetheless, it does have some interesting characteristics that would make it a fun game to play in again and certainly, with the right players, make a whale of a diplomacy battle.

The ending - who knows what could have happened? I cannot say for sure if I could have/would have swung to a Jorge/Trout alliance or not. I think that the comment that the game would swing on me in the future was correct, simply based on the position I had. Honestly the one thing I kept telling Trout and Jorge though was that I needed some real good reason to turn because I would be facing the brunt of the attack. Who knows if they would have been able to convince me or not? If so, the game could have lasted forever!

All the best to all who played and many thanks to Jason!

garry

-----Original Message-----
From: Former Trout [mailto:former.trout(at)gmail.com]
Sent: Mon 5/26/2008 9:43 AM
To: Jason K
Cc: dc134(at)diplomaticcorp.com; fixedbythepotter(at)yahoo.com; Bledsoe, Garry; Julien.Crawford(at)gmail.com; Stephen Lytton; Jorge Saralegui; thewizard.tim(at)gmail.com; wardus2274(at)hotmail.com; Michael Sims
Subject: DC-134 Southlands EOG


Hi Folks,

Well - here we are... A successful four-way draw with one survival. Not quite what I had in mind when I started my Captaincy of the Southlands, but a result I'm quite content with nontheless. Congratulations to my fellow draw-sharers, a tip o' the hat to Sean for his work in the Borderlands and my thanks to Julz and Tim for their efforts. (Julz - you deserved a better neighbour, that's for sure.)

Above all, a huge shout-out goes to Jason who designed and GM'd this exciting new game variant. It was a lot of fun to play, brother. I totally enjoyed it.

Although, I have to admit to being greatly frustrated - but this was mostly at myself. I am the first to volunteer that I did not pay the diplomacy in this game nearly the attention that it deserved. The biggest result of this was my long stalemate with Jorge and the Seafolk - a situation that finally began to resolve itself at the end of the game. (Surprisingly enough, it changed up when I wrote a few emails to him... Weird, eh?)

During the mid-game, I was once again stung by my failure to pay attention to the play. I think I had several opportunities to start working with Garry - all of which I squandered by timidity or lack of focus. I spent pretty much the entire mid-game propping up Julz against the West/Border/Whitecloaks alliance while trying to defend my own south from Jorge.

Things started to roll in the last turn - I managed to start talking to Jorge again and with some concessions made, he opened the front against the Westlands. If things had continued, and we had talked Garry into joining our northward-heading group, things could have gotten fairly interesting.

However, I agree with Steve when he points out that another replacement at this point would have blown. After the lack of attention I paid this one, I'm more than happy to be part of the draw - and I'd look forward to the next playtest where I can focus more on the game. =)

Map notes:

- I might open the sea zones up a little more by adding a few more over-lapping shallow water zones. With just two fleets, the Sea-folk can pin down three or four units for any nation with a coast.

- Windbiters Finger - make this a passable space?

- Another pass through the Mountains of Mist - sounds good... How about another through the Spine Of the World?

- Make the passes through the Spine of the world navigable by players and open up part of the Aiel Waste for traffic.. This would help eliminate part of the stalemate-ness of the board and take away the 'Southern Fortress' aspect.

Those are my thoughts. Thanks for the game everyone! And once again, nice work Jason...

Trout



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