EG is great.

I think it is for the early game, but unless serious territory shuffling is done, is too unstable in the mid-game

Autumn 1903:

Turkey:

I don't understand why you'd abandon a completely defensible home center to fruitlessly attempt to take RUM. The chance of that move working was almost zero and even if it did work, you'd never hold it. As I said in my previous commentary, it's essential for Turkey to hold his home centers, which you could have done with that fleet in BS. There was no reason to throw away your position.

And thanks to Gen Lee for taking over so others can continue the game. It's pretty bad, but there's always room for Diplomacy. Your fleet is in a nice position. You could try to sell yourself as a mercenary in exchange for your life.

Italy:

Good call on defending TUN. You'll want to be further West anyway so that England remains under control. Consider your builds very carefully. They'll really determine what you are able to do for a while. Consider where your next set of builds are coming from.

Austria:

You really need to make peace with Germany or Russia. This shouldn't be hard, since Germany just attacked Russia, but it still needs to be done. Also, keep an eye on your growth potential as well. You've started to fall behind Italy and your centers are started to get split.

Russia:

The German stab is unfortunate, but not particularly surprising. You are not in terrible shape, though, because you have so many builds this year, despite the loss of SWE. You can use this to defend STP and should be able to hold out for a little while.

It is critical, though, that you make peace with Austria. This shouldn't be that hard to do, since it seems as though you are both being attacked by Germany. Make sure you build carefully so you are able to properly defend yourself.

Germany:

Your campaign in the West is going very well. You are making out quite good on France's centers and leaving yourself in a fairly defensible position against England, which is important. I'm still not convinced about poking both Austria and Russia at the same time, though. It doesn't seem necessary and will make it hard for you to expand East or South, depending on what you want to do. I'd suggest you pick a front and stick with it. Having too many enemies will become a problem, especially if England starts wanting more centers.

England:

I feel like you are being a little too generous to Germany. Perhaps that will reward you with a game long ally, but it could just result in an enemy you are not strong enough to handle. You are expanding in a very smart way, though. You clearly understand the importance of controlling Iberia. So, both of you should be able to expand without encroaching on one another, if that is what you are both interested in.

Sorry, France, I didn't mean to leave you out.

France:

Assuming you are doing everything you can diplomatically, which would be trying to sell yourself to England or Germany as a mercenary against the other, and petitioning Italy for more assistance (which she probably should do anyway), I'm not sure what else you could do at this point in time. I will stress, though, that you have still an important position, so people should be willing to at least talk with you about potential plans.

bump

The only thing I want to point out here is that this phase clearly illustrates why England shouldn't have given up Brest- they're a unit behind. They should be either about to put an army through st p, or have a fleet heading to reinforce the south.

As it is, I don't think England is about to get a centre over the stalemate line, whereas I think Germany is.

Given the German army move to Denmark, I think a stab is coming. And I still think it's a mistake.

Looking forward to anything for people who aren't EG!

Italy had a choice with Aegean here, and I think going to con was much better than Ionian.

Ionian would have totally stonewalled England, forcing him to fight Germany or Russia for further expansion. Con leaves the east a bit more fluid, although I think the IA will win out against England there.

Basically I think that the EG should have rolled you all in the south, because IA is not a good response to EG, and there was no other dominant southern alliance emerging. But, EG squandered that by tactically strong but strategically weak moves- like Germany moving to Ruhr instead of Tyl and England not keeping Brest. This slowed them down, which means that England is blocked in the Med, and Austria is about to clean up turkey and return to having only one front.

I expect Germany will still do quite well, but I don't think they'll ever gather the resources for an effective stab of England, and so I don't think they're going to solo.

The Italy/Austria position is interesting- you're about to be so entwined that the board is going to dictate your moves and centre ownership. I think it still benefits both of you.

Germany has the position that determines the rest of the game- depending on where they put their pressure. Although I expect Germany to do well in the final result, I don't think they're in the strongest position on the board.

This is an important thing to realise- in diplomacy, often the player with the most influence is not the player who is best positioned to do well.

*con leaves the western side of the med a bit more fluid

Did Germ and Italy publicly declare war on Eng? Was that intentional or an error? The next moves will let us know.

Good comments from Abge & ATC

Tactics: It would have been better for Italy to move Tunis to western med here. There's no difference in outcome given englands moves, but the moves would have been functionally equivalent, and have a better range of possible outcomes.

It wouldn't have risked the Tyrrhenian Sea, because Tus-GoL and Tus-Wes would cut any support against TyS.

Alright my vacation is over, let's take a peek back into things. Not going to rehash everything up to now but instead will just give my take on the remaining players current standing as it relates to moving forward.

England: Things are mostly good. With France out and no foreign fleets anywhere near you there's a tonne of security for you. Germany has some ability to make moves on you, but for the most part you'll see them coming. Your expansion is limited after you take Portugal, but if this game ends in a draw there's a good chance you'll be part of it. Solo is fairly off the table but for the most part i like your chances.

Germany: You're pretty solid now. I think of the remaining players, solos are tough from here but of anybody you probably have the better odds. I like your clean front lines and decent opportunities to pounce on some people later in the game if you keep things going the way you are and were to start making a few tiny aggressive moves. Something could open up.

Italy: I like how far you've come, but you're definitely getting spread thin. You're going to really have to work your relationships over time to keep yourself safe as you clean up some better lines as you attempt to eliminate one of Russia or Austria. It'll be tough since you need to really lock down a threeway deal somewhere while hoping somebody doesn't screw you over in the process attempting for more ambitions endeavours. You've got your work cut out for you.

Austria: Looking rough. You're not the smallest and there's some opportunity available to you but you've got a lot of rebuilding and regrouping to do if you want a chance here. There's some opportunities to choose a side if R or I were willing but it's going to be a stressful couple years as you figure out who (if either) is trustworthy.

Russia: Pressures on. You've got hungry players from all sides and you're the smallest. By all rights you're an easy target, but if anybody has higher ambitions for a solo then nows a good time for them to look to you to help screw over tougher competition. As long as you can prove you're a viable and reliable pawn then there may be a shot at figuring yourself back into life on this. Not easy but i've seen people come back from MUCH worse. I've seen come backs, and even once done myself, from 1 Sc and gone on to solo so don't lose hope.

I largely agree with VI, but I want to make it clear that England and Germany had much better solo prospects until recently, and I'm not sure why they gave up those opportunities.

Hypothetical: Is there ever a reason to include a unitless side in a draw? Obviously there are reasons you might leave them until you can eliminate them without losing territory or tempo, but would you ever leave them until the end of the game?

bump

@Zybodia, the only reasons are laziness and pissing people off, really. Loyalty too, I guess. I got a one center/zero unit draw in a gunboat once.

Bump 4 commentary

No, not commentary :-(

I haven't written detailed commentary, because the game hasn't really changed. This is likely to be a large draw unless anyone does something silly.

The E/G have largely squandered their solo opportunities by burning tempo unnecessarily, and the A/I have largely squandered *their* solo opportunities by, well, sticking to the AI while the EG was rolling. Either the point of the commentary has been missed by the players, or the players haven't really agreed with it.

Germany's moves this turn are tactically poor. Boh s Sil is unnecessary with Pru s Sil. Additionally:

Boh->Gal
Pru->War
Sil supports one of those moves

completely defends Sil (because a supported attack is impossible) and gives a possibility of advancement.

It does mean that Sil can't support hold Boh, but:

1) it's unlikely that Boh is attacked anyway
2) Given that Germany apparently thought Sil was being attacked, the support would have been cut
3) it doesn't matter if it is attacked, the position isn't much worse.

Germany has the upper hand for sure in this E/G, and again, it's not really clear why. He's certainly not been using it to achieve anything, and stabbing England remains a poor choice. If your long term plan is to stab your ally, waiting isn't really the right way to do it. You may as well be making gains elsewhere along the way.

I think it's likely that the current moves ARE a stab on England, but if they are, it's aggressively awful if. A/I/ (or A/I/R) will tear the two of them apart if they fight. Germany - you can't build this coming year unless the southern powers let you. And, to fight England you need to build fleets. But to keep your home centres out of the hands of the southern powers, you need to build armies. Oh, and if you did stab your ally, you did it on a turn where you didn't build, but your new "friend" built twice, once of those builds from a home centre of yours?

If A/I told you they were going to stab each other, I have no idea why you'd believe them. The EG breaking up is the best thing for the A/I, and is the thing most likely to see it re-form if they actually did stab each other.

Well, if Italy stabbed Austria. For one centre. Poor form, Italy. It's cute in that it's in a turn that Austria can't do anything about, and in a turn where Austria is strongly incentivised not to turn on you in retaliation. And, having played with Ogion, I don't think he'll go ballistic and throw away his game just to punish you. But, I'm not sure that it's worth it, and I don't think it's particularly classy.

For those playing at home, Italy is over *the* stalemate line, but not meaningfully over *their* stalemate line. The diagonal 17/17 line tends only to be relevant in stopping opportunistic Italian solos - the horizontal lines are more relevant for stopping effective Italian solos.

That said, Italy could be *well* over their stalemate line if England crumbles. And England will crumble if Germany attacks them.

Relatedly, remember when I said that a solo is only likely here if someone does something dumb?

Anyway, this is a pretty grumpy update. Pauses are often where commentary games go to die. To avoid that, let's get some discussion from the players up in here. And, to balance the grumpiness, let's get some positivity.

Players, two questions for you:

What's one thing you thought you did well in 1901?
What's one thing one of the other players did well in 1901?

I'm asking about 1901 so that you can discuss press without affecting the current game too much, but you're welcome to discuss any aspect of game play.

You don't have to answer the questions, but know that if you don't, I'll assume you're not reading the commentary and probably not write about you in future updates.

Ten points to Slytherin and Griffindor for England and Italy who answered these questions in global press. I meant for you to answer here, but it doesn't actually matter. You were also told not to post here, so good job on following those instructions.

Good answers, both of you.

I do want to say that I don't expect following the advice of professors to be a prerequisite for more commentary.

My plan is to write commentary around once a game year, and to only write on game elements that I have something to say about. I'm going to keep doing this until the game is over.

Can we answer here in the thread?

Oops, missed the second comment on my phone.. Will write a response as soon.

I'm hoping to get some discussion in here while the game is paused- yes you can answer in the thread. Keep it reasonable though, and remember this isn't another press box.

(Also, I assume the pausing players are not reading any of this until they get back)

Had to post mine in global as my phone removes the 'post reply'-button when I try to post more than a few lines in the forum..

I'm Gryffindor.

Me too <3

I don't think a griffindor would go Ven-Tri without consent.

You need be bold