Power

Name

Duration

GM:

Bob Watson

Spring 1901-end

Players:

Austria

Bret Pollack

Spring 1901-Fall 1906

England

John Schools
David Shipley

Spring 1901-Fall 1902
Winter 1902-Fall 1914

France

Randall Shane

Spring 1901- end

Germany

Richard Aldous

Spring 1901-Fall 1910

Italy

Stephen Worthy

Spring 1901- end

Russia

Steve T

Spring 1901-end

Turkey

Ben Hiles

Spring 1901-end

My EOG

First of all, thanks to Bob, it’s been a very smoothly run game.  Now, to my thoughts on the game:

I guess I’m glad of the draw in the end.  For a while, I thought even that would slip away from me.  I had a small flicker of a chance at a solo, but to be honest, in the end we all deserved our place in the final reckoning.

I was getting bored around the time of the start of the game, and this was one of the games in which I tried out an unusual opening (all of which failed – orthodoxy here I come!).  I decided that I wanted to see Italy attacking Germany from the start.  But I didn’t trust Austria to trust me, or not to blab to Germany, so I didn’t tell him.  Pretty stupid, really.  Naturally, when Germany foiled the sneak attack, I didn’t really have a plan B.

I assumed I’d end up as the typical 4-centre Italy for a while, but I got lucky.  Austria did the expected, forcing his way into Venice, but being kicked back out again.  At that point, the Russia and Turkey piled into the back of Austria.  I tried to make peace with Bret, but it was too late, and I ended up allying with Russia and cashing in on Trieste.  We moved on from Austria to Turkey very successfully, but when Turkey was bottled up in his homeland, the alliance came unravelled.

Steve moved on Trieste and we never managed to make a proper peace again.  I learned in this game that Steve and I find it very difficult to negotiate with each other – we had numerous attempts at agreeing ways forward and making truces, but simply never found common ground.  Next time, we’ll have to avoid getting too close to each, I suppose.  We spent the rest of the game struggling futilely over the Austria-Balkans middle ground.  It was about the time of Steve’s stab that I moved to help France against England, ending up in Marseilles (with France’s permission, I might add!), but mostly I concentrated on the east.  At one point Germany found his way into the midst, but with Turkey on my side, I managed to finish him off and help a Turkish army into Sevastopol via Rumania.

At this point, about 1912, the game was moving fairly sedately to the four-way draw we now have.  Steve made some very good moves and I think we would have pushed him back a little but been halted at the Mun-Mos line.  I expect the borders between Turkey and myself would then have been so long that we would have ended up being too afraid of each other to make further progress, and would have settled for the draw.

However, there was a chance, a tiny chance, if everything went my way, that I could solo.  I’m sure some might think I got greedy, but when you’re pretty sure of getting a draw whether you go for the solo or not, you might as well have a go.  I stabbed Turkey and went for it.  Sadly Steve was a bit too sharp for that, so my solo attempt came unhinged after about a year.  In my experience of making that lunge, this was the most tenuous, but it’s surprising how often the other players take a season or two to notice the danger.  No chance here sadly!

The endgame was fairly simple.  I circled wagons and hoped Russia and France would be unable to keep an anti-Italy alliance going once the Italian danger was over.  So it proved, with Randall going for Russia (and rightly too, or Steve would have had his own solo chance).  At that point, the only question was whether Steve and I would be able to agree long enough to take Turkey out of the draw, and there just wasn’t the impetus behind it.  In the end, Ben earned his place in the final outcome through sheer dint of surviving and alliance-building.

Well played all, I had fun even though I’m starting to get a little jaded at the moment.  I have one more game to finish and I’ll have a free plate, and maybe I’ll start up another game, but for now, I’ll take a well-earned rest.

Stephen