To start with, as Italy or France, I always want complete peace between us as it otherwise really fucks us up. So that limits me to going against Austria or Turkey. Talks were good with both, but Turkey wasn't making commitments and was being very nebulous, so I went with Austria as an ally against Turkey.
Autumn 1901, France moved to Spain (sc) and built fleets in Brest and Marseilles, assuring me I could trust him. I did not feel I could trust him so I moved to TyrSea and delayed moving into EM. France moved north against England. If I had rolled the dice, the game could have gone quite differently.
Austria and I slowly gain ground against Turkey and Russia, but with Austria gaining centers. Austria kept promising to get me a center, but strategically it didn't make sense so I foolishly didn't press him on it. My mistake.
In 1903, England is defending against France, although Germany will be hurting England pretty bad so if France persisted would overcome England. Instead France moves south against me. Tells me again that he can trust me and that he will move back on England after throwing England off balance. A delayed western triple is certainly possible in my mind so I once again move back to defend, delaying taking a fifth center. And France does stab England and again, if I had trusted him, would have been in better shape.
Not that I had any reason to trust him. He never gave me any warning or consideration.
By the way, all this time England isn't talking to me much.
In 1904 I get my fifth center while France, Germany, and Austria are each at 8 and England has a few. France wants me to stab Austria even though I'm in a very bad position to do so. Austria wants to keep together and is moving north against Germany.
I figure if I try a poor stab of Austria, then he and France will grind me up. If I stick with Austria, there may be a chance of things working out for me.
By the by, I probably should have leaked some intel to Germany that I was pretty sure Austria was headed his way and not stabbing me, to slow Austria down a bit. Again, my mistake, sorry bud.
1905 I get my sixth center and Austria is at 10 after having stabbed Germany and I've moved against France. France has decided I'm an idiot and has muted me. And I believe he muted others as well. I have decided France is an idiot, England is a zombie, and Germany was foolish for not played it safer with regard to his southern border.
1906, Austria stabs me. I try and form a grand alliance E/F/G/I against Austria. But France isn't talking to anyone as far as I can tell and from what conversations we had before he muted me, I knew that he and I could not see eye to eye. I had given a game plan for stalemating Austria to England and Germany at this point.
My only hope of being kept in a draw was to help Austria and to still be stalemated. Austria said he wouldn't eliminate me if I helped him and he was stalemated and frankly I believe he wouldn't have. I even told Austria the moves I expected them to make to stalemate him.
And they completely fucked it up and let Austria have StPete. They actually had two chances to secure StPete and missed them BOTH. Meanwhile, France tells me that he'll protect me in Tunis. I tell him how they've lost StPete so Tunis doesn't matter. He doesn't get it. At that point there was no way for me to stop him.
So I said fuck it. Austria deserves the win more than the other three deserve a draw without me and I'm happy with the ending.
If I had trusted France (Ivo) when I had no reason to do so, things would have gone differently. If I had insisted on Austria getting me a center when I should have, things would have gone differently. If I had warned Germany to protect his southern border, things might have gone differently. I'll own up to that.
Will Ivo own up to how his feints toward me greatly helped Austria and allowed Austria to position himself against me and Germany? He already said no in game.
By the way, this is only the second time I've played Ivo and the first time we were France and Italy as well. We started off with a bunch of lunging back and forth before finally getting a neutral zone and profiting from it.
Hello, bonjour, salamaleikoum and na nga deff from Senegal
now!
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