Draugnar was a great fun ally to bounce ideas off - we tried to get a Turkey-Italy dominion going. It didn't work but it was nice to actually see both partners willing to attempt it for once.

This looks like a great game.

Not only rookies, but also more experienced players like myself can learn from analysing games like these. Looking forward to hearing some EOGs.

Gotta feel sorry for Draugnar. Turkey/Italy had a great opening going on (and I love a good Turkish-Italian alliance). With Russia and Austria on the ropes, Draugnar switches gear... and gets stabbed immediately! Which looks to be a great stab, by the way. I'm interested how Russia/Turkey/Italy feel about that.

I'm also interested in how EG got such a quick and stable alliance going. Did France do something totally wrong?

Finally, I don't think I've seen this combination (REG) often. The whole concept is a bit weird. Normally an EG sees England in STp and Germany in Warsaw. What made this game different?

"Normally an EG sees England in STp and Germany in Warsaw. What made this game different?"

As far as that goes, if you flick back to 1904-1905 you will see Germany committing units south against Italy - rather than concentrating on Russia with England. The war in Italy was a slow one and Germany ended up losing all focus trying to hold Venice and gave up having a numerical advantage over the Russians in Warsaw.


As for the 'Draugnar getting stabbed immediately', by whom do you mean he got stabbed?

The really interesting feature of this game was the early non-aggression pact between England and Russia over Norway and the north. It gave England the freedom to push his units into France and the Med and allowed me as Russia to pile nearly all my units south and led to the EGR combo talked about earlier. I agree with AK, all credit to Germany who found a way to balance between two very strong neighbours.

Sarg. I/T isn't uncommon at all. It is by far one of the more successful alliances in the south, because once Austria is gone, Italy sets a stalemate in Boh, Tyr, and gal, and lets Turkey move up, and he pushes into the med to hit France. I have won/drawn countless games with I/T. By far my favorite alliance in the game.

This is a brilliant game for beginners to look at! So much elaborate play that beginners don't accept. In general, a beginner playing Germany wouldn't have accepted England taking Paris in spring 05 even with the capture of Marseilles requiring the alliance to be rebalanced. In a beginner game, that would have been considered a stab. Also, England's capture of St.P (fall 06) wouldn't be accepted by beginners. It would have been treated with an immediate retaliation, definitely not an immediate peace leading to a draw in the end. Great game to analyze!

I've never really understood the opening to Pic and it obviously doesn't work here.

What confuses me most is Draugnar's moves in F02. Not sure what he hoped to get by giving up the BS. I assume taking Paris in 05 was discussed between E/G, right?

Looks to me like Russia and Turkey decided to flip things around and make it a jug after all (despite the aggressive anti-Russia opening by Turkey), but then Ruusia immediately rennegged on the deal and attacked Turkey. That is was when Draug got stabbed.

Well, the E/G alliance just happened, France flip-floped a lot on the first turn, first asked for a Sealion, then talked about a Western Tripple and then combined with England messages get me really paranoid and I moved to Bur expecting a bounce that didn´t happened and England also moved to EC. After this, the logical thing to do is crush France and to do that I need Russia to stay focused on the south. England was a smart player and saw the opportunity to get the upper hand in the West and go for it. And it was a real pleasure to have an alliance with AgentK, one of the bests E/G alliance I have.

The problem with this E/G/R configuration is that Germany is the man in the middle. I looked for any chance to stab Russia (stab England wasn´t really a choice as I don´t have the fleets) but he didn´t give me a single opportunity.....well played martin.

After that I just try to keep the balance to avoid giving a solo to Russia and England and also avoid a 2-way making clear I can throw the game to Russia or England.

To be short, great game from England and Russia.

And France played a good game too, he fight against 2 and even 3 most of the game and when he have no chance to win this battle, he worked as a mercenary and stayed alive until the bitter end. I feel really sorry to not include him in the final draw.

To me, the most important turns in the game are the very first Spring and Fall. I will admit that I am not a great late game player even with my multitude of wins, so I might have missed an opportunity to solo. Anyways, back to my musings. I started out sending clear cut messages to all parties asking for a partnership and outlining strategies. Its here where I think many new players don't quite grasp the amount of diplomacy necessary. "Hey I think we would make great allies, lets attack Country X" is a bullshit opening line. It does not make anything clear and tells me you are a mediocre player.

I told Germany from the start that I wanted to work with him due to France's shifty behavior and shady messages. I see that Germany got the same impression. After getting both Burgundy and the Channel I knew we were in good position. Here is another area where new players need to improve. After attacking a player, you need to keep communicating with them. I tried my best to assure France that the only reason I moved to the Channel was that Germany had told me France was moving there as well. My lies resulted in me taking Brest and from there France had no shot

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