Link to the game: gameID=205586
I'll have my EOG ready in a day or so maybe. Unsurprisingly, I have a lot of thoughts, and questions.

That was an excellent game, I spectated for quite a while. Swordsman played a very clever game with Germany, especially in the early part of the game. I recall him supporting France ? and Russia or England ? into sc's early in the game..players whose countries he later attacked and largely defeated.

Alright folks, maybe like 2 people will read this damn thing in its entirety, but I actually kept a titanic journal during this entire game.

It is about 80,000 words long, which I think is about as long as the average novel.

I will respond to as much as possible in this thread - BUT I WILL ALSO RESPOND TO COMMENTS MADE ON MY JOURNAL.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Kb2va8s-TbVYNd8dxyfi6ko5EJK_U22JMPiAfsJE9WY/edit?usp=sharing

Please let me know if there's some problem with the link, I want to share this very much. I wrote it for the purpose of teaching players about the game and put a lot of work into it.

I'm really impressed swordsman30003, it looks great! What a fantastic resource.

I've added this to tinyurl.com/webdipeog

Thanks Valis! Make sure to add to your chart that it was a gunboat game

Swordsman, having read up to page 29 and intending on reading further, the depth of this account is incredible and a great resource for anyone wanting to learn to play as any country and not just Germany

I've the entire first part and I think I have nothing else to contribute to the board aspect of the game. I think you hit every nail on the head, particularly with openings.

When I first started experimenting with openings for England, I found that overcommiting against russia almost never pans out. There's simply too much risk compared to the benefit of an extra dot. And a lot can go wrong before you're even able to build, and many times, things can go wrong even after getting it.

I think this is because as England, after you take St Petersburg, there's usually no more headway to make against Russia so Germany and France get paranoid and one of them usually makes a cautious fleet build. Once one of them sees the other is fine with going for England, then it's a wrap.

While I find it funny being called a chump for half the games moves, theres actually a reason I made the moves I made, haha.

As Italy, I like to stall for time. I hate the lepanto and would rather go for France or Austria. The thing with going for Austria is that it doesn't work in the early. Austria 90% will kick you our of their centers, no matter how many units it takes.

Also in order for it to work, Turkey needs to be in a semi-decent condition for that to happen, which means I cant help Austria take them out, because Austria usually gets their share first, which is bad for me. So I "played like a chump" for the first few years in order to stall for time. Eventually I went into Aegean and took Bulgaria in order have a more units for the west. After Iberia was taken I would have gone for Austria most likely, but they stabbed me a turn before I anticipated it (Which wouldn't have mattered anyway because I misordered my fleet to Naples instead of Apulia)

And then there's the unit in piedmont. It sat there forever because if I had attacked France with it, they would have attacked me. I thought I'd keep my options open. Yes Piedmont was support holding Marseilles, which looks like friendly move to France, but it's also in Piedmont. If there was any sort of indication that Germany was going to attack France, I would have attacked it long before I did. In fact the only reason I did was because France had moved into West Med and there were only 2 french armies on the continent.

As for the turn where I only moved one unit: simple negligence.
I had 2 different browser tabs open to the game for some reason and didn't realize it. I saved my actual orders (which included Piedmont to Marseilles) and then after a while of doing other things in other tabs, I went to the second tab and hit ready without thinking about it.

So yeah, I was kind of a mess in that early game. I think if I didn't make those technical errors, I would have attacked Austria before they attacked me.

I haven't read the epos yet, but I do recall Swordsman advising in an Italy-strategy thread to wait and then stab Austria.

I also remember that many years ago I tried to write a 50,000-word novel in a month. I barely managed to reach 25,000.. This guy just casually writes 80k for us!

nice game that was fun to watch!

Can we tell how many people spectate this game ?

Yoyoyozo, I hope you don't mind - I added your responses here as footnotes to the events your reference in my journal (I used footnotes for content written after the game actually ended).

Claesar, I do advise "fake alliance with Austria" as the best Italian strategy in gunboat - and it appears that's what Yoyo was going for, but it just didn't work out that way.

Claesar, you might be surprised but I have also tried to write a novel before and it didn't go very far. It was much, much easier to write down a journal of thoughts I was already having from playing the game (than to come up with content for a fiction story). I have to say though, that the effort of writing down my thoughts in the journal, day after day, diligently, made me think that I might have more potential as a writer than I previously thought. The challenging part was setting aside time each evening after work to keep my notes.

I watched! Nice battles!

My curiosity has been stirred. What's the difference between a fake alliance and an alliance?

My commiserations to swordsman. A fine effort. A rather cruel execution of Russia by some of the players, though.

It is possible to get into positions that are consistent with alliance, but can in a single turn be transformed into an attack.

For example, Italy could feign alliance with Austria and get a fleet into Aegean Sea and Ionian Sea to set up a convoy against turkey, only to in fact convoy into Greece or Albania.

Swordsman3003,

Per your note:  ".....maybe like 2 people will read this damn thing in its entirety, but I actually kept a titanic journal .... about 80,000 words long..."

In honor of your heroic effort, and to get to maybe the fourth person (I'll be the third) to be aware of it, please consider doing a verbal interview on the Diplomacy Games podcast:

http://diplomacygames.com/

That would be an excellent forum to discuss your thoughts as the dominating Germany in "Biggest Game of All Time."   This way your thoughts could  at least reach the lazy and/or hard working  people that may not have time for 80,000 hard-written words.  

In their most recent podcast, Amby and Kaner specifically asked for more interview volunteers.  You, and anyone from the game, are the ones we fans of Diplomacy (or at least me as a fan) would love to hear from.  You in particular, as you put a lot of thought into the EOG.

Thank you, swordsman, for the incredible effort you put in your journal. I just finished reading the first 30 pages.

I have one question that I'd like to ask here. You wrote that you thought that in Autumn, 1901, it would have been better for Turkey to move Ankara to Constantinople and Constantinople to Smyrna, because of the Italy-Austria threat. But that moveset would have prevented him to build a fleet in Smyrna and thus would make the Lepanto guaranteed to work, so I see this moveset as not a good counter against the Italy-Austria alliance. Am I missing something?

As France, my lot was lost relatively early - Aut 03 / Spring 04. When my army made it to the English mainland, I strongly suspected that Germany would turn on me. With Italy in Piedmont, and no real heat on Germany from any side, my fate was doomed. In hindsight, I should have been defensive longer. Too anxious to make something happen.

@Mercy
My thinking at the time was that Turkey would follow up by building a fleet in Ankara. Then in Spring, Turkey would move Smyrna to Armenia and rotate the fleets around into Constantinople and Smyrna. Such moves make a successful Lepanto impossible and assure that any gains from the collapse of Turkey would go to Austria and/or Russia. I call this strategy "taking yourself hostage." Also, these moves encourage Russia to ally.
(I added this as a footnote to my journal)

@Tektel
The temptation to invade England is so great when you are France. If it had worked, you would have been extremely strong.

@Jason
I'll consider it and check out their website.

I've only just started this swordsman, but it has been outstanding thus far, especially for someone like myself who relies on press and struggles with tactics occasionally. The way you walk through your decision process is impeccably thorough. This will be a great resource for anyone who enjoys the hobby. Much appreciated.

@swordsman I see. That would work to counter Italian convoys. Bulgaria would be pretty undefended though.

I almost finished reading the entire journal - I just skipped some parts at the end.

It is funny how much of a different look I have on alliances, but then I have barely played any gunboat games. At the moment that you were allied to Russia and not to Austria, and had the resources to help Russia in his fight against Austria, I would have, if I were Germany, felt it my duty to help Russia fight Austria, if I wanted to remain loyal to Russia. Similarly, if I were Russia, I would think that Germany was a bad ally after seeing Germany not helping at all against Austria. Now, this might be what Russia was actually thinking - after all, you not helping Russia with your units in Berlin and Munich in Spring, 1909 was followed up by Russia by an attack on you - or Russia sensed from your moves that you didn't really want to work towards a draw with him.

I would be delighted to see EoGs from more players.

Bumpity Bump

Bumpity Bumpy