Hi Guys,

And a big thank you to the White Wolf himself, Andy for GM'ing this game most efficiently and with great good humour..

Main Characters:

England: Mark
France: Me ~ Joe ~ as replacement
Germany: Roger
Austria: Pontus
Italy: Chris
Russia: Ross
Turkey: Steve.

My fourth game, in as a replacement which I found to be quite interesting.
Although in quite early, there had been some vicious stabs around my neck of the woods, so much so that Roger/Germany and Mark/England (another replacement) were sworn enemies.

Down South there appeared to be much mayhem, with stabs and counter stabs..so not much trust around the board when I arrived. Austria/Pontus had done very well, but was not well liked by his surrounding countries, presumably because of earlier stabs he had made..

My position as France was under threat from Roger/Germany who was making very warlike sounds against England, but in fact was sitting in BUR and looking for more...

In a key development of the game, Roger/Germany and I/France agreed a plan for an attack on England,I readied my forces but not quickly enough for Roger who took off on his own, leaving me high and dry. Seeing our alliance at an end, (or so I thought) I grabbed BEL off Roger. This action cemented Roger with Ross/Russia forever, or at least until Ross got tried of Roger not making progress againt me/France and Mark/England!

This action was to color the rest of the game. Roger/Germany felt bad about losing BEL, and spent the whole/entire rest of the game trying to get it back. He succeeded allright, but only for a Season at the end of the game when he was down to his last unit. Hard luck ~ but full marks for perseverance Roger!

The rest of the North was dominated by Roger/Germany and Ross/Russia, and for a long time it looked like they would overwhelm Mark/England and me/France by sheer weight of numbers. But at a critical juncture a Russian F was eliminated in CLY and the gap of the North Atlantic was plugged.

And so we were deadlocked, Pontus/Austria came on board and for a while it looked like we could hold MUN or force RUH against Roger, but Pontus NMR'd at the critical moment and the impetus was lost.

While we were deadlocked I worked hard at trying to prise open the German/Russian alliance, but Ross/Russia was in no hurry holding the whip hand, while Roger/Germany could not get over the loss of BEL and was fixated on getting it back.

On the other side of the board there had been a lot of early stabs which I'm not privy to, but to me at least it looked like Italy/Chris was doomed as the Juggernaught roared towards him taking everything in its wake. I/France went to lend a paltry hand in trying to slow it and support Chris, but in what was probably the turning point of the game, (and I would be interested to hear Chris/Italy and Ross/Russia's view on this) Italy somehow got Russia to stab Turkey, (played by German Zorba)who had played an excellent game up to this, and the writing was on the wall for Turkey.

That left the North to be decided. Ross was going to have to choose between Germany/Roger or me/France as to who would be the junior partner.. Luckily he chose me, ( maybe you could explain Ross) and once he decided to attack Germany/Roger from the rear, it was curtains for Roger.

That left me to take out Mark/England, which I felt bad about doing as he had played a difficult positioon very well for years, so sorry about that one Mark, please forgive me!

So, the setup now, all brokered with superb Diplomacy by Chris/Italy (who actually had the smallest amount of units on the board of the three major nations) meant that there was just the three of us left, Russia/Ross Italy/Chris and myself/France.

I found this game most interesting for two major reasons, the difficulty of coming in as a replacement when your predecessor may have muddied your country's reputation, as well as getting up to speed on where all the countries are coming from, and also how a bad situation, (such as Italy/Chris was in) can be turned around by never ending diplomacy and good communication skills. So hats off to all those Replacment players out there, it sure aint easy!

I hope I havent left anything major out, and would love to hear from all the rest of you guys in due course!

Thanks to everyone, particularly Andy the GM, and to all my co-players, including yes, even you Roger. Our banter was great fun and added greatly to my enjoyment of the game!

Joe/France