Yeah, what Dave said...although if you're Turkey and you have the right Austria (like I was up until yesterday) you can make it work really well for you. ("Well...it seems like he should stab me...but I guess he can just go around and go after Italy while leaving me alone to eat up Russia...right?")

http://webdiplomacy.net/board.php?gameID=15693

I've played it well a couple of times, but you really have to do a lot of communicating to make it work long term. As Turkey, I ended up going first for Russia and then moving across that Meditteranean with fleets. BESM played Austria, and committed himself to building a land force. He was really a great ally.

So what should Turkey talk about to Austria in the first round of messages? What sort of proposal should he make. If the alliance is doomed from the beginning is there anything to say?

Yes, pretend the alliance isn't doomed (it isn't with enough trust)...
Offer an alliance against Russia, maybe say you'll open to BS and ankara if he opens to gal and Rum or some kind of early deal like that.

Alternatively go for the slower approach of splitting the balkans in 1901 and leaving armenia unmentioned so you don't have to commit against Russia.

You can keep both Russia and Austria happy with fleet builds in Smyrna, to gain trust, and leave the decision of who you're really with until as late as possible.

I had such an alliance recently (being Austria), and would be grateful for comments.

http://www.webdiplomacy.net/board.php?gameID=14051#gamePanel

The alliance was broken between Spring 1904 and Autumn 1905 and then restored.

The problem with this is that unless austria doesn't take much of Russia, Turkey will probably need to move through him to expand. This doesn't make for a long term relationship!

if turkey and austria ally, they usually turn against russia.
after russia is gone, the balance of power between both strongly favours turkey:
it´s very hard for austria to push the turkish genie back in his bottle, but turkey can stab austria quite easily.
if youre turkey: go for it.
if you are austria: try to avoid it.

i agree with renate... i've played several very successful TA alliances both as A and T... and I've played several where it went down hill fast. usually the best TA is when you have an equivelant EF and end it in a 4way draw... but otherwise, it is likely to end in blows to the detriment of Austria.

however, as Austria, sometimes you dont have a choice - a non-responsive Russia and an inept italy almost force your hand you just have to keep units at home...

but in my experience for the alliance to work, T needs to get Gre, Sev, and most of italy/tunis while Austria gets Rum/Bul/Ser... so at some point, you'll have to swap Gre for Bul... with the understanding that T can only have fleets in Gre. as time progresses, you can also try to dmz Aeg... and potentially A parking his fleet in Adr. this avoids most of the problems... but still more unstable than any other alliance on the board.

this is why i dislike Turkey so much... the relationship with Austria is written off by so many ppl, and any solid alliance with Russia has to be so hidden so that people dont get scared of the Jugg... and its so difficult to work with italy unless you promise to build zero fleets (or limit to one) so in essence, turkey's choices are so limited and if any of your neighbors are bad players or just novices, its even tougher.

long story short - if you can get the AT to work, it is to you benefit, so its worth the extra effort - as most people dont expect it and cant respond well to it, and it eventually gives T the upper hand.

Good advice Renate and Babak. Nice insight.

agreed all around - i played it once very well, but it was quite nerve wracking - and i was turkey! i felt very exposed b/c all my fleets were so far away and it seemed like austria's armies were never far.

gameID=10650

key things were good relations with both italy and russia at the start, including plans for a jugglenaut with russia. getting the early drop on italy seemed crucial, leaving russia for later.

but other times i have tried to propose it, i have only gotten shafted unfortunately.

gameID=4230

Turkey is almost as likely to stab Russia or Italy. Turkey is just dangerous. A/T works just fine.