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MagusofStars posted:
Hooray! It pays off to be a
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May 15, 2020 03:36
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ProfFrink posted:Too bad they don't have this variant. drat I wish I had time for that Dune LP 
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May 15, 2020 03:41
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ProfFrink posted:Too bad they don't have this variant.
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May 15, 2020 07:59
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All-Switzerland Diplomacy is just around the corner.
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May 15, 2020 08:12
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One variant that might be interesting for LP purposes is public press only, i.e. players may not send any private messages and all communication can be read by anyone. It would have quite a large impact on how the game plays out, more because it makes it so hard to coordinate on orders than because you can't say different things to different people in my experience, but the advantage is it lets the thread see what moves the players are making.
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May 15, 2020 10:23
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ProfFrink posted:Too bad they don't have this variant. Oops! All Italys
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May 15, 2020 12:58
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Xerophyte posted:One variant that might be interesting for LP purposes is public press only, i.e. players may not send any private messages and all communication can be read by anyone. It would have quite a large impact on how the game plays out, more because it makes it so hard to coordinate on orders than because you can't say different things to different people in my experience, but the advantage is it lets the thread see what moves the players are making. hmm, yeah, this WOULD be interesting. it could potentially work using the Gunboat mode in the app--that disables in-game communication. of course there are other ways of communicating, such as private messages or discord. though this would still ensure more communication in the thread which would hopefully get more thread participation. We could have viewers declare themselves for a country and try to influence where the player goes. as countries get destroyed, the viewers could retreat to a new country--a point system could be implemented here: gain as your nation gains, lose as your nation loses, suffer a large penalty if your nation is defeated and you have to flee to a new nation. i wouldn't necesssarily want to prevent people from using PMs or other external sources of communication, as I've always treated that as legitimate espionage. but there could be penalties for anyone caught. meaning you'd really have to take a risk when doing it lest the other player exposes you. i would also be interested in doing a tournament starting with the most populous map and ticking down. we could have global scores across all games. If people are interested, let's workshop the rules.
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May 15, 2020 17:33
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I've never finished a real game of Diplomacy so I'd be down for whatever.
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May 15, 2020 20:19
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As a spectator, open comms really makes it a lot more interesting. The dominions LPs do a 40 turn lag so that participants feel looser with their lips, but those games take like 3 months.
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May 15, 2020 22:42
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It also really helps that in Dominions LPs, the players in the thread tend to go "hello, I'm Mictlan, this is what I am doing and why, and here is some correspondence", whereas here, Dash Rendar could only post public map data.
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May 15, 2020 23:10
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Open Correspondence sounds like a great way to encourage in-thread discussion, but it also runs the risk of screwing over whoever declares first - because everyone else will get to react to their now-committed order. It could become a brinksmanship issue of everyone trying to squeeze in their orders right before the deadline, or alternatively simply prevent whoever declares first from having any viable moves because they're hoodwinked at every turn. A rotating-style turn order doesn't help much either, since it just spreads the damage around as opposed to getting rid of it entirely. From what I can see here, Diplomacy's main gameplay revolves around the whole simultaneous unknown orders being resolved - with open communication being a thing, anyone who makes their move later gets vastly more opportunity to put themselves in superior positions.
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May 16, 2020 01:17
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"Public Chat Only" games often tend to quickly devolve into Gunboat play anyway. Gunboat games are still great, you just don't tend to see alliances form as often. Attacks of opportunity often rule the day.
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May 16, 2020 01:29
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Personally i'd hope that public chat would lead to ludicrous roleplaying.Enchanted Hat posted:It also really helps that in Dominions LPs, the players in the thread tend to go "hello, I'm Mictlan, this is what I am doing and why, and here is some correspondence", whereas here, Dash Rendar could only post public map data. I mean, a lot of why that happens is that people are posting 30 or 40 or so turns after the fact. There isn't any concern about other players reacting to novel information about your backstabs and general gameplan - anybody who could act, has acted. Not sure if that's appropriate here, since it would mean delaying updates by a month.
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May 16, 2020 03:10
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Twib posted:Open Correspondence sounds like a great way to encourage in-thread discussion, but it also runs the risk of screwing over whoever declares first - orders would still be done in-app, presumably, like a gunboat game with no comms at all not sure how you'd head off the possibility of players contacting each other directly anyway, though, especially because this game actively encourages rule-bending so it might not seem as big of a slip as it is
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May 16, 2020 03:27
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How about if communication can be private during a turn, but after a turn is resolved players have to paste their chatlogs into the thread?
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May 16, 2020 08:19
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The fun tging with a game like this is the meta that springs up among the players as well. For example we found out that dash apparently leaks private messages like a sieve, so now whoever joins the next game will be aware of that.
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May 16, 2020 13:59
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Namtab posted:The fun tging with a game like this is the meta that springs up among the players as well. For example we found out that dash apparently leaks private messages like a sieve, so now whoever joins the next game will be aware of that. I think I literally got more messages from Dash Rendar that were forwarded private correspondence with other countries than I got messages that he wrote himself. I'm actually really looking forward to reading his retrospective, because despite our alliance I definitely was not privy to all of his shady dealings.
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May 16, 2020 16:45
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Namtab posted:For example we found out that dash apparently leaks private messages like a sieve, so now whoever joins the next game will be aware of that. Not all the time! That would be too predicrable, especially going into another game--but I did use this strategy frequently here. I definitely entered the LP with the mindset of trying to make my moves as entertaining to the thread as possible. One goal I had to do this was to try and simultaneously aid and betray every single player at any given point in time. The leaking intel like a sieve was really useful for this because it generally got people to trust me, even after I'd betrayed them--and then I could very easily start fabricating intel to try and influence the board. My after battle report is taking a bit longer to write than I thought. I've been keeping details of every plan, plot, and partnership in a spreadsheet since Turn 1, so it's taking a bit to go through between work and life. I will probably have to break it up into a couple of parts. Hopefully Danaru and ProfFrink are willing to write up post-mortem reports in the meantime.
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May 16, 2020 18:04
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I've just discovered and read this whole LP in one sitting and wow that was a rollercoaster.
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May 17, 2020 17:02
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If another game ends up going ahead I'll throw my hat into the ring. Pasco84 in the app.
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May 17, 2020 18:11
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Port-Mortem: Part 1 - Background and the Early-Game Alright, so a little background before I give my actual turn post-mortem. I had a bit of difficulty in figuring out how to start the LP and had been ruminating about it for a few months before it began--but I'll come back to the logistical issues of the LP in a bit. Xerophyte posted:So, some of the stuff I've been wondering about over the course of the game: To answer the question of how long have I been playing Diplomacy, there's a little bit of background to that. My dad is a long-time fan of the game. His history teacher played it with his class back in the day. At the end of each class, the various teams got to gather to write and submit their orders. Plotting and scheming happened before, between, and after classes. He always talked about it fondly. My dad played a couple games with me when I was a kid, but I was always intimidated by the game because we never had the full seven players meaning I'd have to play multiple countries. I didn't play it for real until I was in high school when I had a Social Studies teacher who used it in their class. It was an absolute riot! My teacher always jokingly said it was a way of keeping kids from skipping their class; if you skipped, you missed your turn. It worked for me because I was right into it. It took us a term to do a round in Europe and the winners of carried forward as Europe in a world map that my teacher had. (The losing teams were reshuffled). Again, it was an absolute riot and it definitely worked in making me show up for school. But I didn't play it again for a longtime afterwards... ...when I discovered the Conspiracy app a year and a half ago. Some of my buddies were trying to organize multiplayer games for our group, but time zones were always an issue. I thought of Diplomacy as a solution so we could do play-by-mail and came across a few different web and phone apps that would do it. Conspiracy had by far the nicest interface, so we started it up and I've been playing pretty regularly ever since. I am NOT particularly strong at actual game tactics. I frequently whiff my turns and miss obvious attacks and defenses. There are a number of times in this game where that happened. I often asked other allied players for their thoughts or religiously refreshed the thread for good suggestions. Dr. Snark and CirclMastr were invaluable in keeping me alive early and mid-game. What I think is my biggest strength in Diplomacy is my ability to bullshit and spin stories. Whenever I play with friend or in random matches in the Conspiracy app, my bullshit is often all I have. The success rate is about 50/50. There's a couple of times I've talked my way to victory, but I'm having the most fun when juggling multiple alliances and trying to play people off one another. This means I play opportunistically, which has frequently annoyed people who thought I was their ally up until the point I wasn't. I wish I had archived some of my older games, because I've seen some amazing back-stabs and drama go down in Conspiracy. Some highlights: quote:In playing a classic game with some high school buddies, I was Britain and one friend was Russia. We formed an alliance that carried us through much of the game and we'd agreed on aiming for a two-way draw--when suddenly the knife was plunged in my back. I was rapidly defeated and Russia took a solo win. We all started a new game and former-Russia insisted on playing anonymously. This was probably because they had already won three games in a row and wanted to avoid revenge from myself or the other players. quote:In the North America map, I rolled Colombia. I took the Hawaii SC early on but was challenged when the California player brought a couple of fleets down. They messaged me and asked me to "be an adult" about the situation and recognize that California could more easily defend Hawaii and so that I shouldn't make a thing of it. Instead, I should accept the Hawaiian loss and we could work together as teammates elsewhere on the map. quote:I was playing a South America game and had two separate alliances going simultaneously. This one is less convoluted but the results generated more salt. My (Brazil) Colombian ally back stabbed me before I could organize any solid counters meaning I had to fall back to my other alliance with Paraguay. We outnumbered Colombia, but it was hard to organize a proper defense because Paraguay just wasn't very talkative. We started to lose SCs. Then Paraguay took two of my territories without any warning. Whatever shot we might have had at stopping Colombia was done at that point. Paraguay insisted it was an accident and they meant to tell me, but by then I had already messaged Colombia and offered to help play as kingmaker if they let me live. Colombia was skeptical at first, but I'm good at bullshit. I talked them into fighting to a draw with me. quote:One of my more recent games was in the Asia map. I played British India in this one. Once again I did my multiple alliances thing, one with Vietnam and the Phillipines, and then a separate one with China and Russia each. I played at being allies with everyone, but it was clear by my moves who I was actually supporting. Japan was the first the glean onto it and tried to expose me in the group chat: quote:As I say, though, I frequently get caught out in my lies. If anyone starts to distrust me and talk to other players, it becomes apparent pretty quickly what I'm up to. This is a recent Mediterranean game I played where everyone came together pretty quickly to destroy me: Besides Conspiracy, I've also been GMing some physical versions of Diplomacy for my local friends off and on for the last three years. We just use the standard map and do a turn or two a day. More if we can get together for an evening. We play with some variant rules that allow for peaceful resolutions, though those have rarely been pulled off. Attempted, but hardly ever brought to completion. But to come back to the logistical issues with this LP, I didn't really want to participate. I would have much rather been an observer and just report back what was going on. One, it would have allowed me the chance to discuss my thoughts on the on-going game in the thread more--something that I think was lacking until someone got knocked out and could give a post-mortem. Two, it would keep me out of the game so I wouldn't get wrapped up in plotting some stupid and elaborate schemes. Conspiracy DOES offer a spectator mode, but only for public games. So I had the issue of wanting to run an LP of Diplomacy but preferred to be the turn resolver than an actual player. I actually did spend some time putting together a map and was prepared to go forward with that--and still may at some point. But I settled on using Conspiracy for its generally pleasing interface, fairly newbie friendly set-up, and the fact that it'd make LPing the thing far easier. I've abandoned my last few LPs because the amount of work it'd take to run wound up killing my drive. And the point of all this background? To bring us to my strategy going into the game. I had decided upon this before the thread had gone up. As this was an LP, making sure that the thread was entertaining was paramount in my mind. If there was any whiff of a draw starting, I needed to be willing to be flexible to keep the ball rolling, whether that involved offering myself up as sacrifice or playing a kingmaker. This meant I needed to go into the game not expecting to win--that was secondary. Thus the guidelines that drove me consistently throughout the game were as follows in descending importance: 1 - Always act in such a way that most benefits the thread. 2 - Simultaneously ally with and betray everyone. 3 - If the opportunity arises, try to win. Generally number 1 and 2 aligned. Admittedly, I leaked a lot of intel to every single country. I often positioned myself as a double or triple agent and readily admitted it; I was up front about my shadiness, and often encouraged the other players to help me generate ideas so they wouldn't suspect I was doing the same to them. That said, there were definitely times where being too obvious about the "always helping; always betraying" would have just wound up in my quick death so I throttled back so I could remain a presence in the game and try to influence its direction. Number 3 rarely popped up, unfortunately, and when it did my efforts were quickly thwarted, as I will go into detail. I frequently lied about my motivations, but hey that's Diplomacy, but at certain points did fully lay out my intentions. This was always met with mixed results whether or not the other player believed me. Some of those I confessed my intentions to questioned whether not I was genuine--and for the most part, yes I was! There was only ONE part of the game where I went into full Revenge ModeTM and was gleefully rubbing my hands together while I plotted. I'll go into that in detail later as well. Everything else was genuinely nothing personal and meant to keep me alive so I could keep trying to influence the game. Which brings me to the game: - - - 1901 - - - My opening move of the game was this:  Yeah, I had no real plan for this. Throw up smoke, see if it would be useful later. As it turn out, it really would. I was grateful to whoever the REAL United Kingdom was for not immediately ruining the bluff, though I imagine they were amused. These first few turns would wind up being the busiest ones; lots of alliances were made and broken all within a few turns. I did my due diligence and set about allying myself with everyone. France and I spoke early on about sharing the SCs between us and creating a DMZ. Which we did! Russia reached out to both of us and through a mutual wish to destroy the UK, we formed a triple alliance. The goal? Invade the UK and divvy up their country between the three of us as a show of force to the rest of the map: Operation: DUK & COVER (Destroy United Kingdom and COntinue to Victory over European Rivals)  So while I am agreeing to help Russia take Scandinavia to box in the UK, I am at the same time agreeing to help the UK take Scandinavia to stop Russia. But ALSO I am revealing to France that I have no real intent to win the game and just really hope I can enact a bunch of schemes to throw off thread predictions. It's a stubborn strategy--France and German are natural enemies in Diplomacy, but as I tried to sell to France: No one would see it coming. With Russia's help, UK would be either destroyed or shoved into obscurity. France and I could bounce our border forces off each other to look like we were in a war. Then while France attacked Italy, I could work with Austria-Hungary to attack Russia!  Like I say, stubborn gamble. I didn't want to reveal that Germany was Dash Rendar right away, so maybe that prevented France from trusting me in the end? Ah well. A bigger problem was that the UK didn't move the way we had hoped they would in the Autumn turn. This killed momentum for the 3-Way Alliance which is also probably what made me look like a more tempting target for France. But as I couldn't just put all my eggs in one basket, I was also in talks with Italy and Austria-Hungary to form a Central Powers alliance. This is a more traditional strategy and is pretty reliable--so I had a fallback if France let me down. Knowing their border with me was secure, Austria-Hungary and Italy discussed pulling off a Lepanto opening. They wanted to get aggressive with Turkey as soon as possible. Oh, and I made sure to say hi to Turkey! To recap: - Alliance with UK to deny Russia Scandinavia - Alliance with Russia and France to destroy UK - Secret alliance with France to face the world together - Alliance with Italy and Austria-Hungary to prove mutual support - Cordial relations with Turkey - - - 1902 - - - I AM interested in making the Franco-German alliance work, though. The UK wasn't going to crumble the way we had hoped, but they were on their way to being largely harmless at this point. To sweeten the alliance, I leaked every bit of intel I could get to France. Get them trusting. Show my worth. Ally with me and benefit from my compulsion to scheme! But my Diplomacy-Sense was already starting to tingle at this point. I was doing A LOT of the talking between France and myself. Maybe France was just laconic? I didn't know. But while messages were flying furiously between every other player, the lack of responsiveness was throwing up alarms. Regardless, Italy expresses concern over France. UK expresses concern over France. But I just keep purposely bungling turns to keep France strong. When talking to the UK, I pretend that the app messed up and my orders didn't properly submit. When talking to Italy, I blame it on British incompetence. So while I try to prop up France, UK has become somewhat irrelevant if unassailable. As I am beginning to question France's trustworthiness, I work at securing the Central Alliance. Austria-Hungary is wary of Russia--and, well, there's no where else for me to go, so Russia becomes my big target. In Autumn I start Operation: MOM! (March on Moscow)  Russia gleans onto my movements right away and warns me off. It's here that I put on the stupid newbie routine: I blame THEM for not being responsive enough to my messages, thus making me nervous and leading to my moving to protect my borders. Russia seems to buy it and I sweeten the deal by providing some accurate UK intel. Need to keep suspicion off me so I can strike a decisive blow. Furthermore, the Central Alliance needs my troops there to help tie up Russia so A-H can move in. Throughout 1902, I've being working on alliances and betrayals all over the board. Only Turkey remains. I message them asking how they are doing. I suggest that if they really want I can mobilize my forces against Russia to help them move into Sevastopol. But only if they really want. Turkey says, "Sure!" It's flimsy, but I've got something I could potentially throw Turkey under the bus for later if Russia is annoyed at my attacks. I've made mountains out of molehills before. Regarding UK, they ask for help attacking Sweden--I pretend I didn't see their ask before the turn submission and it goes no where. Russia is then able to go on and push UK out of Scandinavia. But by Autumn my Diplomacy-Sense was blasting klaxons around everything regarding France. I continue to provide support, but I start leaking whatever intel I can get out of France to the UK. At least this way, I can turn around and pretend I've been a "Friend to Britain" the whole time if things go belly up. So when it came time for the Autumn turn, I made sure to move into Munich JUST in case France wasn't totally on board:  And it's a drat good thing I did. To recap: - I am pretending to be friends with UK while actively sabotaging them. - I am trying to win over France as an ally while preparing for what looks like will turn into a betrayal. - As the Central Alliance looks like the more viable option, I am attempting to strengthen trust with Italy and A-H. - Preparations for a Russian invasion. - Attempts to loop in Turkey to my schemes to I can blame everything bad that happens to Russia on them. - - - 1903 - - - I try one more time to win over France. At this point the thread has been talking about France gathering momentum to victory, and it isn't doing France any favours. The entire board sees France as a threat. Literally every other player has been asking me to do something about France. So I point out that I am the ONLY pro-France player and that all I ask in payment is to no be destroyed so that I can keep plotting and scheming long into the game. France says, "Yeah, sorry" and we move forward. Only I am not willing to trust wholly trust France just yet. I am getting immense "ally with everyone; betray everyone" vibes from France. That another player would try to steal my gimmick in my own LP? This is a big threat to me. A big threat. Perhaps the biggest yet! It was gratifying to know that my gut feelings were right on this on, as oldskool would go on to admit that this was what they were doing:  So I gamble a move into Belgium. Worst case scenario: I can pretend I am doing the fake border war thing we'd already talked about. But in case France was attacking, I now potentially had Belgium as collateral. Which is exactly what ended up happening... And I blamed Russia for this, telling France that they gave me intel of their attack. It didn't matter if it was true, if France thought someone was telling lies to me, it would hopefully throw them off and make them distrust others more. Meanwhile, the Central Powers alliance was discussing how best to attack Russia. I gambled convoying one of my armies into Livonia. It would be an erratic move and it would throw Russia into disarray. If I was lucky, Russia would buy that I wasn't a threat and leave one of their home SCs open for the taking in Autumn. Worst case scenario, I have to retreat to Prussia and I'm in position to help A-H take Warsaw. Unfortunately, I was counting on UK also holding Norway, which didn't happen--like I say, I'm not great at tactics. Russia immediately calls me out on it, so I double-down on the stupid newbie routine. I pretend that my convoy was me randomly flailing because I felt boxed in by France and A-H and wasn't sure what to do. Russia is RIGHTFULLY dubious, but doesn't have a whole lot of other options considering they are surrounded by enemies, so they listen to my bullshit and give me a chance to prove my loyalty. At this point, Austria-Hungary and Italy and myself are solidifying the alliance, so this is all playing into my hands. But just in case, I play along so that the doors to a Russian alliance stay open. But how was I solidifying the Central Powers alliance? Well, at this point I had I pretty good idea of which posters Italy and Austria-Hungary were, so I started the ball rolling on some deep espionage:  They both got a similar message:  Fortunately for me, I guessed right. CirclMastr was indeed Italy and Danaru was indeed Austria-Hungary. They are both game for upping the involvement of our alliance and we agree to meet on Discord to plan more easily:  It's here that we really start setting up our plans to destroy Russia. We also coordinated to weaken France. Up to this point, the intel I had been feeding France had been solid and reliable. I kept feeding France intel, but now Italy and Austria-Hungary were helping me fabricate intel to influence France's moves, such as convincing them to move into the Irish Sea in Spring 1903. Yup, things were going swimmingly. I figured that the Central Alliance would last a good long time and would allow me to slowly build my strength. Italy, Austria-Hungary, and I would be some of the last players and we'd split amiably and have a good ol'3-way showdown when the time came. Yup. It was all going according to plan. Warsaw was our next step. Austria-Hungary was going to help me take it and we were going to push our way through Russia. Yup. Everything... Was going... According... To plan...  ... ... ... What the gently caress.  What the gently caress. Okay. So I had been backstabbed. I never saw it coming. Hats off to Danaru, you never gave a hint of it away. But alright, if this is the way you want to play it, then:  I play it off in the Discord chat:  But meanwhile, I get the ball rolling one Operation DANG! (Destroy Austria-Hungary Now Goddammit!). The plan? Create a GRAND ALLIANCE of every player on the board against Austria-Hungary and Italy. (Sorry CirclMastr, I know Danaru didn't brief you on the betrayal and you had nothing to do with it, but I also suspected you guys were going to ride-or-die together, so I had to jump ship to satisfy my revenge!) This involved a huge gamble in dropping any pretense I had with Russia. So I tell Russia to hold tight and start reaching out:    I even reached out to France, though they were now ghosting me:  Turkey and UK are in dire straights at this time, so they are both into the idea of a Grand Alliance. I hold off on telling the details to France until I know the other players are game with bringing them in. (They weren't, so I don't bother bringing it up with Russia--sorry, France! I DID float the idea with the other players!). At this time, Danaru got back to CirclMastr and I in the group chat and tried to justify the backstab:  I played it off, but things were already in motion. That's when Danaru asked this of me:  Narrator: But he didn't. At his point I dished EVERYTHING I had to Russia to build back some semblance of trust: Germany + Russia Chat posted:<Germany> Ok. This is long-winded... apologies in advance. To which Russia responds:  But they're in, so the game is afoot! To recap: - Friendship ended with France. Now Austria-Hungary/Italy are my new friend. - Austria-Hungary backstabs Germany. - Friendship ended with Austria-Hungary/Italy. Now Russia, Turkey, and UK are my new friends. - - - 1904 - - - The plotting and scheming had actually bled over into 1904 a bit. There was a specific bit where Russia asked me if they could take Denmark from me so they could use it to build an SC and attack Austria-Hungary. I am hesitant to do so because it weakens me, but it's a sound tactical move. It makes it look like Russia and I are at odds, throwing off Italy/A-H suspicion that I may have switched sides, and it strengthens Russia's trust in me. So I say sure. I bring up the trade in the Grand Alliance chat so UK and Turkey don't think Russia is making a power-play and the alliance falls apart. Now, I bring this up because Russia mentioned how obsessed I was with Denmark and that they thought my asks for it back was annoying--and, actually, I took issue with that accusation when I found out about it from UK. Once the offensive against A-H and Italy was underway, I asked for it back, sure. We were allies, and it seemed harmless enough. Worst case scenario, Russia says "no" and whatever, we keep marching on A-H. But maybe Russia wants to really lock down my allegiance so they say "yes". Heck, that benefits Germany. But when I asked:  So, uh... tease much? This basically left the door open for me to ask every Autumn--which I did. It took nothing to type out those words. Besides, each time, Russia would keep the possibility open:  To be honest, after this second ask and dismissal, I figured that Russia was never going to give it back. But whatever, if Russia wanted to dangle Denmark in front of me and think it kept me loyal, then by all means! My apparent desperation for Denmark helped hide the fact that I eventually started to work separately with the UK and Turkey to build them up as viable threats against Russia. But that's getting ahead of ourselves... Enchanted Hat in their after action report said this: Enchanted Hat posted:Now, Dash Rendar, playing Germany, had claimed throughout the game that he was just playing the game as a sort of trickster character, and that he just wanted to keep things entertaining for the thread with lots of reversals of fortune and betrayals. But I’m going to challenge that narrative a bit, because I think that Dash Rendar was genuinely getting a bit annoyed with Russia at this point. I, of course, tried to nurture this by suggesting that Russia was playing aggressively and selfishly while simultaneously I accommodated Germany as much as possible. When the cold war in the North turned into a hot war, I had no doubt that Germany would side with me. To this, I refute it. Russia actually wound up being one of my preferred allies. I regretted messing with them early game and regretted betraying them late game. I do recall the UK trying to play up Russia's supposed aggression and greed--it was not subtle--but I was not swayed: I was still playing by those 3 guiding rules I mentioned earlier in this post. But the repeated "Asking for Denmark back" tactic made perfect sense to me, particularly because Russia never once said "no". To be honest, I was completely baffled when Russia said this to me:  Considering only a few turns ago, they had also said this:  (Of course, a convenient reason popped up as to why they had to renege on giving it back, but whatever. As I said, I already figured Russia didn't truly intend to give it back willingly.) Anyways, back to 1904. This is where France took a big hit from both Italy and the UK. To recap: - The Grand Alliance is a go. Germany, Russia, Turkey, and the UK--onward, to victory! - Sorry France, you're not invited. - Austria-Hungary must be destroyed. - Sorry Italy, you're collateral damage. - - - 1905 - - - Much less chatting and plotting this turn. This is mostly the Grand Alliance starting its work. I talk the UK into giving me a unit in Belgium which is a HUGE win for me. I had hoped that pitting everyone against one another would have paid off sooner, but hey, I'm still alive and starting to gain SCs, so I won't complain too much. This is where talk of the "Russian Juggernaut" begins in earnest. I'm also leaking Italy and A-H discord intel like crazy here. There was also this comical exchange in the Grand Alliance chat:  To recap: - Nothing of note changes: France's superpower status is at risk and the Austria-Hungary/Italy alliance is compromised. - The Grand Alliance is working as intended. - - - 1906 - - - Here's where France would rapidly fall... faster that people expected, to be honest. It would force the Grand Alliance to reconsider its role rather quickly. I'm still feeding France intel at this point, but it's all fake. More importantly, Italy has been convinced of the need for German troops to come south. Russia is shocked, but hey, I love scheming and espionage--and I know how to bullshit and persuade:  So now I positioning myself to get revenge against A-H. And during the Autumn turn, I plunge the knife into Danaru's back: 
Sally fucked around with this message at 21:44 on May 17, 2020 |
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May 17, 2020 20:37
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My after action report will come in two more parts. Stay tuned!
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May 17, 2020 20:53
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EDIT: Whoops, I forgot some images/text in my Denmark apologia--fixed the order of some images too. The Part 1 should now be wholly correct and complete.
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May 17, 2020 21:45
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thanks again Danaru 
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May 17, 2020 21:50
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d-did you know Danaru was going to betray me that round? 
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May 17, 2020 22:07
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I ordered the code red 
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May 17, 2020 22:21
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Yo dash if you wanted to open the game up to more people and play more of a GM role we used to use https://sourceforge.net/projects/jdip/ back in the day until zorak banned diplomacy lps
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May 17, 2020 22:23
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Dash Rendar posted:
Fun fact, that video was equally directed at CirclMastr because I only made the decision to do it while drinking heavily and recording System Shock 2 twenty minutes before the turn ended, and I had to explain to my fiance why I had to wait between episodes because I had to negotiate and plot a betrayal before the timer ran out. CirclMastr found out like half an hour later during this exchange  Somehow I gained a reputation for not being trustworthy and Russia didn't do the thing. I like me 
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May 17, 2020 23:08
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I am finding it so very on-brand that Blind Sally abandoned the Central Alliance because of Dan's drunk shitposting, and the ride-or-die friendship resulted in me dying while Dan lived. There's just something poetic about it. Not as good as my proposal, where Dan and I defeat all the other players and then Dan stabs me for the win, but still, very on-brand.
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May 18, 2020 00:03
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oldskool posted:I ordered the code red I can confirm this! I was in as much disbelief myself when that happened, but man that was a twist. Said stab was finalized literally seconds before the deadline of that turn.
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May 18, 2020 00:04
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Namtab posted:Yo dash if you wanted to open the game up to more people and play more of a GM role we used to use https://sourceforge.net/projects/jdip/ back in the day until zorak banned diplomacy lps i looked at this one. i eventually came back to Conspiracy because it made LPing way easier. the automated turns was huge because it took pressure off me to keep a deadline for accepting orders and kept me motivated to come back and do updates. (but why were Diplomacy LPs banned by Zorak? hilarious drama reasons? or was it just to try and move them to TG?)
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May 18, 2020 16:30
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oldskool posted:I ordered the code red you were holding back on us with your post-mortem! haha, i thought i was truly on my way out of the game when that happened.
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May 18, 2020 16:32
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Dash Rendar posted:(but why were Diplomacy LPs banned by Zorak? hilarious drama reasons? or was it just to try and move them to TG?) Being generous about his perspective on an argument i was on the losing side of, i suspect he felt we were doing too many at once (to be fair we probably should have stuck to one thread), there was little audience interactivity outside of recruitment and that overall it belonged in TG. Oh well, that was the old era of no pokemon pseudohobby lp. All hail the new era. Namtab fucked around with this message at 16:52 on May 18, 2020 |
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May 18, 2020 16:49
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Port-Mortem: Part 2 - The Mid-Game - - - 1907 - - - And as I plunged the knife into Austria's back, France was struck a killing blow (despite their best efforts to get into Wales):  Chatting with Russia, they are starting to get fed up with Italy blocking their moves. Not directly, but with Italy giving such strong support to A-H, Russia is feeling trapped. Chatting with UK, we're quietly cheering the fact that we've built the UK into a position where they can stand up to the growing Russian juggernaut. This benefits me because I now have two possible nations to leech off of. If one goes down, I'll just jump to the other. We start discussing our plans to move against Russia. Chatting with Turkey, I start to feel out how they are feeling the Grand Alliance. They aren't doing swimmingly either. We have that in common. Italy is disappointed with me in chat. A-H swears unholy vengeance.  (The video Danaru linked: click) To be honest, I was a little surprised you guys didn't see this coming. I mean, Danaru, you had to have known the knives were coming. All the knives were coming. It was only a matter of time! But even at this point, instead of going "haha, revenge!" I play it off as copying Danaru's idea for a double back-stab. Obviously Russia trusts me at this point, so I tell them we can now use that to our advantage. CirclMastr and Danaru rightly point out that unless I do start attacking Russia, then my double back-stab is just a back-stab--and honestly, at this point in the game, I had no intention of easing off of Austria-Hungary. The attack had just begun! I intended to see it out. (Again, sorry CirclMastr, it wasn't supposed to be you! I had hoped to utterly obliterate Danaru and then re-court an alliance with you.) To recap: - France is dead - UK and Russia are the two clear superpowers - A-H and Italy are making arrangements for my destruction - Turkey and Germany aren't in great positions. - - - 1908 - - - With the death of France and the backstab of Italy/A-H, the Grand Alliance is actually winding down at this point. It would continue for a few more turns, but by now plotting was stepping up to a new level. It started here with Russia sending an ultimatum to Turkey and myself: Russia/Turkey/Germany Chat posted:<Russia> So, I wasn't expecting to have to go through this conversation so soon, but Italy's disastrous movements have kind of forced my hand. Basically at this point the game is officially between me and Britain, and you guys have the choice of which one of us wins. I doubt Austria would be willing to talk to me at this point, and I can't trust Italy given the last turn. I was going to refer to this as the landmark "Lines Drawn" speech, but I realized in rewriting this that Russia only made that reference to me and not our trio chat here:  So instead maybe it's the landmark "Ultimatum" speech? I dunno. But Dr. Snark beat me to the punch here in trying to influence the board. Beat UK to it as well. But yeah, even UK was talking to me as though it was down to them versus Russia. This was a good move. The reasoning was sound--and by approaching Turkey and myself quickly, there was a good chance they'd have our loyalty before UK could get their grip on us. Russia definitely played up the UK's threat at this point, how it'd be easier for them to steamroll the game than it was for Russia. This was seen by the thread, too. So clearly I needed to find myself a third option--and if one didn't exist, I intended to create one... For my first move, I agreed with Russia's plan and assured them I was loyal and would help convince Turkey to get on board. Secondly, I went to the UK and told them about Russia's ultimatum. I tell the UK that I would actually much rather ally with them to defeat Russia, however I put forward the idea of pretending to be allies with Russia so I can collect intel and feed them fake information, allowing us to better plan our attacks. Oh, and I say I will get Turkey to play along as well so Russia really thinks they have it in the bag, but actually Turkey is working with us. But I didn't stop here. No, I also went to Turkey and suggested the secret THIRD option:  We would both pretend to ally with Russia in order to keep them complacent. Then we would tell UK that actually we want to ally with them but let's not tell Russia so we can defeat Italy and A-H first before attacking them. BUT ACTUALLY Turkey and I are contriving to have UK and Russia keep fighting each other long enough for Turkey to build themselves up as a viable third option off of the corpses of Italy and A-H. Turkey is in. #healthesickman Oh, I should also point out that every remaining player knows I am Dash Rendar by now: Italy and A-H when I PMed them; Russia when I bared my soul to buy the Grand Alliance; UK so I could convince them that actually I do want to be friends (I sell it by doing the whole "Hey, wouldn't it be funny if we try to influence the outcome of the game to mess with the thread?"); and now Turkey to create the secret Turkish Juggernaut. Hard to say whether or not it was really worthwhile to pretend to be the UK, but I like to think that the reveal that *gasp* I'm actually Dash Rendar!!! helped sell my schemes a bit. The other players can confirm/deny this. I think it helped to emphasize the idea that "No, I'm serious this time, you can trust me now" which kept everyone from teaming up to kill me off. With the new plans in motion, all I had to do was make sure I survived Italy and Austria-Hungary's suicide run long enough to see everything come to fruition. Then UK, Turkey, and I have the first meeting of the "Destroy Russia after A-H/Italy Club". In it, we agree to tell Russia that UK has already come to Turkey and I to set up a secret alliance against them (for clarification: I brought together the UK/Turkey/Germany alliance against Russia). I get everyone to agree to this because I want to throw Russia off our scent for as long as possible. If there's no word, Russia might wonder if we're in talks. But if I very quickly come to Russia with evidence that UK is plotting to betray them? If it doesn't keep suspicion off me it at the very least helps make me look like I'm worth keeping around just a bit longer. UK thinks it's a great idea, so we implement it. To recap: - Russia issues ultimatum to Turkey and Germany: "You can't win, it's either me or UK--join me!" - Germany goes to UK and says "It's you or Russia--let's pick you and get Turkey involved!" - Germany also goes to Turkey and says "Let's make you a viable third option so neither Russia nor UK win." - Italy and A-H are making a suicide run at Germany. - - -1909 - - - At the beginning of the turn, Russia reaches out to me and basically says "it's go time" to attack the UK. I give UK the heads up and we discuss our defense plans. It's here that the UK gets really unsubtle at trying to get me worked up over Russia: UK/Germany Chat posted:<UK> Just out of curiosity, what is Russia even promising you? I mean, we are actively cooperating to gain SCs against Austria and Italy, and all Russia has done is lie about giving you Denmark. And to be clear, that's not annoyance at Russia, but more annoyance that my scheme to let everyone fight around me while I swoop in and vulture an SC or two hasn't paid off. France kept me hemmed in at every turn, and now A-H and Italy were pushing me back--it was their SCs I had hoped to take! Regardless, I convince Russia I need to play defensive so that the attack on the UK is held off and the UK can better position themselves. Meanwhile, Operation #healthesickman is going exactly as planned; Turkey is already starting to see gains while UK and Russia are both slowing down:   A-H and Italy are losing ground and Turkey is going to reap most of the benefits. Of course, this means that we're going to need to pick which of the two, UK or Russia, we want to destroy first. Turkey and I have some lengthy chat about this. We weigh the pros and cons: - We have the read that Russia is the more suspicious player, but are definitely in it to win it. Thus, they'd be really committed to an anti-UK alliance because it's their best shot at winning. This is a pro for Russia, as it means we could probably trust them to not back-stab us before we were ready to back-stab them. - Our read on England is that they are the chiller player. More laissez faire. They are into the idea of loving around with the thread and other players. I list this as a con. Though note that maybe it's because I was burned by Austria-Hungary. - Turkey chalks up England's confidence to their position of strength. I suppose this is another con--a confident player might be more likely to betray their allies for a faster victory. - Russia was keenly aware of how things could go sideways for them in their ultimatum speech. But does this make them more predictable? If so, that'd be a pro for keeping them around longer. - Positioning is an issue. Turkey doesn't have enough armies for Russia to be vulnerable to them. UK is further away, but Turkish fleets could move up quickly. This is kind of a pro in Russia's favour. - UK has been a super reliable ally to me for the past several turns. Pro there. - Russia has been a super reliable ally to me for the past several turns--longer than UK. And that's AFTER I tried to betray them multiple times. Big pro there. To be honest, at this point I was on my way to talking myself out of attacking Russia before UK. In my mind, UK should be the first to go. But we still had a turn before we really needed to make a move, so Turkey and I decided to think on it. But then something happened that threatened our alliance with the UK:  This Turkish move to WES!  This piqued some interest in the thread, for sure. But it was all a misunderstanding:  Russia had requested the move, so Turkey warned the UK before moving in to keep Russia complacent. I confirmed it. UK missed it--though I think they remained suspicious of Turkey ever afterward... To recap: - The reconstruction of the Ottoman Empire is starting to work. - Germany is barely holding off the combined A-H/Italy suicide run. - Turkey and Germany and pondering which of the two superpowers to attack first. - - - 1910 - - - So the turn ends and Italy is defeated. Despite my best efforts, Austria-Hungary has managed to persist and Italy has fallen. It wasn't what I had intended, but it'd work. Without Italy, Austria-Hungary would be next and then Turkey and I could focus on Operation #healthesickman. I was going to push to kill UK first and knife Russia second, but then something happened:  And man, you know what would really help Operation #healthesickman? If Austria-Hungary was in on it so we had a group of three working to take down Russia and the UK.  German/Austro-Hungarian alliance is BACK! Turkey is into the idea. Our combined SCs is nothing to scoff at--if we coordinate well, we should be able to pull off a hell of an attack. The only problem is that by bringing in Austria-Hungary, Turkey and I are locked into the course of destroying Russia first. Lots of bad blood between Russia and A-H at this point in the game. We consider attacking both Russia and the UK at once, but don't want to force a situation where they might team up against us in a 3v2. So wanting A-H's allegiance, we decided to go after Russia first. We set up a plan of attack: Turkey and A-H will go all out against Russia--and also attack UK where they can. But because of my positioning, I will only go against Russia. I will maintain friendly relations with the UK so that I can continue to get intel with them and share to the group. And with that, the Grand Alliance is well and truly dead. It failed in its goal of destroying Austria-Hungary, in fact having the opposite result where A-H wound up my ally again. Perhaps that was for the best? The Fall attack goes well with Turkey gaining a couple of SCs. The Ottoman Empire is no longer a player to be overlooked! Best part is the two other superpowers talking about it with me: UK/Russia/Germany Chat posted:<UK> Is Turkey seriously going solo? rofl But all in all, it was a good thing we decided to pull the trigger this round. If we hadn't, Russia's betrayal may have caused all of our planning to collapse. To recap: - Italy is dead. - A-H and Germany are allied once more--A-H joins in with the reconstruction of the Ottoman Empire plan. - The attack on Russia and the UK begins; Germany only joins in the Russian attack so that a Russia/UK alliance doesn't form. - - - 1911 - - - This turn is mostly just A-H, Turkey, and myself working on building up our own power while denying the UK and actively dismantling Russia. We are feeling pretty good. An A-H/Ottoman/German endgame tie could be a good thing--unless, of course, I manage to get enough SCs to make myself a viable threat. At this point, I trust in Danaru's bloodlust. As long as A-H stays relatively weak, I think they'll work with me and I think that will extend to overthrowing Turkey once Russia and UK are no longer threats. But if A-H gets stronger than I do, I know I can count on Danaru to come after me. Russia is chatting me up here. This is where they question my supposed obsession with Denmark. Russia rightly questions my motivations, but I all I can really do is point at my plan to disrupt the board and try to influence events to mess with the thread's predictions. I don't think Russia really believed me at this point, but I what could I do? I doubt Russia would have been satisfied by knowing my plan to secretly build up the Ottoman Empire as the winner or that I still thought I had a genuine shot at winning the game if I could betray ProfFrink at just the right moment. Russia would have thought I was mad! Or at the very least, dooming the game to a slow war of attrition or stalemate. Honestly, by that point I felt pretty good about ourability to defeat both UK and Russia. UK wasn't feeling too confident in their defense against Turkey and Russia was really working to turn UK against me. I was a little concerned by some of the messages UK was getting:  Yeah. So Russia correctly suspected my plan at this point. I laughed it off and hoped UK wouldn't make any preparations against us. By the end of 1911, Russia is losing SCs fast. In chatting with Turkey and A-H, we all agree that now is the time to start putting pressure on the UK. To recap: - Russia is hemorrhaging; they try to diplomacy their way out, but it's too late. - UK is worried about Turkey's growing power, but it still a threat in their own right. - Germany is still feigning allegiance to UK, but the Turkey/Germany/A-H alliance is beginning plans to destroy the UK. - - - 1912 - - - I prod UK for their intentions this turn:  Their intention to move through Venice is slightly annoying and hurts A-H. Unfortunately, there's not a drat thing any of us can do about it. I have no good reason to dissuade UK from making this move and attempting to do so might cast suspicion on me too soon. That said, I also can't let UK move in there without giving A-H a heads up. So I have to negotiate myself through to make sure I look good in both player's eyes. Who knows, there's still the chance that I need to keep working with UK later on. UK/Germany Chat posted:<Germany> Austria is friendly with me atm and will probably expect to know about this in some form. And meanwhile, I hear from A-H:  Okay, good. I remain in good standing with A-H/Turkey and (just in case) with the UK as well. Turkey and A-H push for me to attack London this turn. It's not a bad idea, but I'm worried about the drat Russian fleet off the coast of Denmark. I warn of Russia moving against me and putting myself in a bad position. Turkey and A-H agree, and it's a good thing I refrain:  Of course, it would have been better if I COULD have moved into London. Though this would have necessitated bring in Russia and trusting them not to attack me or spill anything to the UK. I, uh, didn't think that would work. Perhaps this was on error on my part? Who knows. I didn't have faith in my diplomatic abilities to pull it off, but unfortunately it did give the UK a chance to build a fleet their and consolidate their defense a bit. To recap: - Russia is falling fast; A-H and Turkey are worried about UK. - UK is worried about A-H and Turkey - Germany's primary goal is the fall of the UK, but is trying to keep the doors open in case the Turkey/A-H/Germany alliance goes sideways. - - - 1913 - - - Russia's spirits are beaten here:  For the rest of the game, they did not submit orders. All of their units simply held. Of course, as a player isn't truly out until they are completely gone, this threw a wrench in a lot of my planning. That damned Russian fleet was still parked off the coast of Denmark! I couldn't be sure Russia wouldn't make some spite attacks against me--after all, that's what I would have done--so I wound up playing far too defensively the Spring turn. By now in the thread there have been some people worried the game was going to ground down to a dull slog as we slowly chipped away at each other before reaching a final stalemate. I had no intention of that happening, so I set in motion some more convoluted plans. A-H/Turkey/Germany was still a go, but if it got to a point where were unable to break the UK, I needed a back-up plan. One that kept me actively gaining SCs in the game. So I gamble another "Tell All" and hope it'll buy more trust for the UK:  Of course as Enchanted Hat mentioned in their after action report, this was kind of the beginning of my end. The plan was for us to pretend fight up in the French borders; we'd only submit turns that bounced against one another. While doing so, we would both separately negotiate with A-H and Turkey hoping to turn them against each other. For my part, I never actually did this. I told Turkey and A-H that I was working on some psyops to confuse the UK and to ignore them--though I didn't give details (Partly because I was feeding the UK genuine Turkish intel; the intent was to have the UK stretch themselves thin so I would eventually have an easier time attacking them). I was hoping that Enchanted Hat would play along while I re-positioned my fleets for an overwhelming attack against them--though I am sure they noticed that I was only building fleets and not armies. As you may remember, the problem was that Enchanted Hat's fake attacks were real ones:  To recap: - Germany's plans are starting to fall apart.
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May 22, 2020 19:27
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I got one more update in me for this. Danaru, ProfFrink--either if you going to give reports? No worries if you don't wanna, I just want to get an idea whether I should hold off on planning another game.
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May 22, 2020 23:03
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Spending half the game plotting to backstab me and never actually pulling the trigger? I see right through you, Dash Rendar, you're just a big softie! 
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May 22, 2020 23:04
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You were the first nation I conspired against to destroy! 
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May 22, 2020 23:19
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I just want to say I appreciate all the post-game breakdowns. The look behind the curtain is pretty cool, especially with Dash Rendar basically making all decisions in the light of "how can I make this as crazy as possible?"
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May 23, 2020 00:29
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I appreciate the length of the post and effort that went into it, but it's just way too long and detailed for me. What I got from it are that: - Some players take the diplomatic aspects of Diplomacy to a much higher level than I would. - Russia assumed it (or England) was going to win way too early (with just 7 SCs) and pushed that assumption onto its neighbors. That did not end well. I just want to know why England lost its mind and allowed Germany to win. NeoRonTheNeuron fucked around with this message at 07:50 on May 23, 2020 |
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May 23, 2020 01:24
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| # ? May 2, 2024 20:30 |
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NeoRonTheNeuron posted:I appreciate the length of the post and effort that went into it, but it's just way too long and detailed for me. I'm not sure I'd go so far as I assumed that I was going to win at the point where I threw out the ultimatum, but at the time it honestly looked like it would be me or Britain with how SCs were being divided. And until...whatever happened to cause England's flip, said ultimatum seemed to be pretty on point, especially with them bearing down in the Med and the North Sea. I'll admit in hindsight that the "no one else can win but them or me" argument was...flawed to put it mildly. But with the common enemy of Italy dead and Austria no longer functional, I had to say something.
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May 23, 2020 01:36
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