Spring 1901 I've received peaceful overtures from pretty much everybody, as expected. I'm happy to ignore Italy for now if he'll ignore me; of my other two neighbours, I'm more interested in allying with Germany to crush England. Russia definitely seems interested in a northern campaign, so Germany has worries there, and that should keep him off my back for a while. I think I'll be greedy for the first move; it's within my grasp to get three centers (if I'm lucky), and I can guarantee almost certainly one and probably two. I move: F Bre->MAO A Mar->Gas A Par->Pic In an ideal world, I then will occupy Portugal, Spain, and Belgium, respectively. That probably won't happen, and what exactly does happen depends on who backstabs me. If England occupies the Channel, Brest is threatened, but he doesn't have any support, so I can just bounce him out with F MAO->Bre, or A Gas->Bre. If Germany moves into the Ruhr, he'll be in a position either to bounce me from Belgium or actually take it himself, though that would involve leaving either Denmark or Holland open in the winter. If Germany and England are allied, and occupy both the Channel and Ruhr, they're in a position to fuck me out of Belgium without sacrificing any SCs for the winter. Meanwhile, if Italy occupies the Piedmont, I would have to move the Gascon army back to Marseilles. In such a case, I might be better off having moved to Spain (as bouncing would let me keep Spain as an SC), but I really want A Gas to protect Brest in case of English treachery. If I only can take one of Spain or Portugal, I'd prefer Portugal (with F MAO), since Spain is only one space away from a home center. So, to sum up: if nobody backstabs, I get 3. If only England backstabs into the Channel, I get at least Portugal, and if he attacks Brest I get Belgium, otherwise not (but at least he doesn't get Belgium either). If only Germany backstabs me, I get Portugal and Spain, and he may or may not get Belgium, but he gets max 2 supply centers. If Germany *and* England attack, I get Portugal, saving Spain for later and writing off Belgium entirely. If Italy only attacks, I get Portugal and Belgium. If Italy and England attack, I might get one or none; if all three attack, I get none (but at least don't lose any supply centers!) Hm. Germany has suggested the Sealion offensive to me; this would require me moving into the Channel. It does indeed have a good chance of demolishing England... but I don't think I'm ready for that, especially as we seem to be agreeing on demilitarising the Channel. I've just gotten confirmation on the Channel treaty, so ixnay on the Sealion. Fall 1901 Happy day; everyone has obeyed their treaties with me, that makes my moves easy. Iberia is mine, no problems. My Picard army will try to take Belgium, of course, but it's not at all clear what will happen there. There are four units vying for two SCs... could be messy. If either Germany *or* England don't want me in there, they can easily keep me out. Maybe I should support one or the other into Belgium? Spring 1902 Gyeearrghh. I *knew* that was going to happen. Well, AH says he can't help, and Russia has his own problems (though if he moved to the Baltic, maybe he could take some of Germany's attention off me!) Nothing to do but swoop back to the northeast and hope England and Germany can't get anything through while my Iberian units are in transit. Fall 1902 Well, that went as well as could be expected. Conveniently, England and Germany have decided to divide their attention between me and Russia (guess they didn't need any help there...). That leaves six units against my five, so if I'm clever enough I should be able to fend them off for a while. Looks like one of them will get Sweden next time around, so I'll have another unit to deal with... eh. Italy's being pretty feisty down there, looks like he's setting up a convoy to Turkey. Turkey's asked for my help, but I'm not going to *think* about touching Italy while I'm so busy up north. Maybe once Austria gets its two new units, and puts some pressure on Germany, he and I can squeeze Italy a bit. At this point, Austria makes a very attractive long term ally; with a little luck maybe I could get a two-nation win with him. So for now my tactics will bring forces to hit England, then eventually swing around and get Germany (though I'd just as soon leave most of that to Austria). To that end, I'll try to occupy both the Irish Sea and the English Channel, though admittedly I expect the English Channel move to bounce again. Once the Irish fleet is in place, though, it can support the other in, and from there I can start convoying. Meanwhile, my three armies should be able to hold the Picardy-Burgundy front, since the Anglo-German alliance has only one territory bordering Picardy and three on Burgundy. With Picardy and Paris supporting Burgundy, it should be invincible (always assuming that Italy doesn't turn on me). A possible concern regarding the Irish Sea move: it's possible that England will use London and North Sea to support each other into the Channel, which would then succeed. In that case, he could possibly move (or be forced) into the MAO, threatening my Iberian centers. But hey, if I'm in a position to force him out of the Channel, he's not going to want to retreat *away* from his home SCs, which are rather more important to him than my outside SCs in Iberia. Winter 1902 Great! I have a fleet in the Irish Sea *and* the English Channel, and a stable front in eastern France. It's too bad England talked Germany into supporting him into Sweden, but I'll just deal with that extra unit later. I think I'll use my Channel fleet to support the Picardy army into Belgium, with extra support from Burgundy (and Paris supporting Burgundy). This holds up fairly well to various configurations of attack on Burgundy, except if England attacks with double support; but in that case, I'll be trading Belgium for Burgundy, which is better than fair (especially since that lone army won't be able to go anywhere interesting before it has to disband). Spring 1902 Feh. Austria is busy with the whole Rumania-and-Black-Sea business, so Germany will still concentrate on me. Oh well, I'll try for Belgium and see where it goes from there. Maybe I should try to get Germany to backstab England.... Fall 1902 Thbbt. I thought supporting a support made it harder to break... oh well, my fault for not checking the rules. But England has just made it easier for me to invade Britain---I think I'll convoy to Wales, so I can have the manoeuvrability of a land unit to run around England. Then, the question becomes whether I should use my Irish fleet to support the fleet, support the army, or attack Liverpool. Decisions, decisions.... Or... maybe I should support the Irish Fleet into Wales! Then I can move my Parisian army into Brest in preparation for convoying *that*; that would let me continue attacking Belgium. Fall 1903 Blah, blah, blah. I need to get Germany to stop supporting England, no two ways about it. To that end, I'll stop pushing Austria (who is being a complete nitwit anyway). Oh, sure, *now* Austria wants *my* support against Italy. No way, I'm fighting a nice little one-front war and I'd like to keep it that way. Maybe once I've taken Britain I'll turn on Italy, but the Treaty of Marseilles seems to be holding up quite well, and I don't really want to break it unprovoked (yet). Now Austria is sending me some incoherent plan involving him supporting me from Tyrolia. This is just bizarre. Winter 1903 Look at me do a happy little dance of joy... England totally fucked up there, thinking he had a fleet in Wales. Even if he'd tried that move from Liverpool I'd've succeeded, but I'm much happier with him not having the Irish Sea. Now I just need to figure out if he knows his Dip tactics that well... I'll support the Welsh fleet into London. If he supports his London fleet into Wales, we bounce off each other; but if he tries the other route, supporting the Liverpudlian fleet into Wales, my move for London succeeds! I only wish I knew why he moved his Swedish fleet into the Skagerrak. I mean, if he were invading Denmark, he'd've just done it; if he were moving to the North Sea, why not just do that with his Norwegian fleet? Also, it'll be interesting to see what Germany does with his build, and whether he's just been stringing me along.... Spring 1904 Well, who knew. Turkey, of all people, is giving me advice---and good advice at that; the English Channel has been the source of numerous problems in the past (notably, it's one of the three spaces bordering Belgium, but repeatedly gets its support cut from London; yet I don't want to move out of the English Channel and let England in). But now, I can evacuate the Channel freely, since either A) my Welsh fleet takes London or B) it retreats to the Channel itself. If the English fleet is in the Channel, I can move the Parisian army into Brest. The best part about this is it'll force England to either disband his army off the bat or else take over German Holland... *that* ought to strain the alliance Much as it bugs me to take his advice straight, it wins out in nearly every situation---the exception being if Germany gets wind of it and attacks Burgundy, since Paris can't support an attacking Burgundy. Ah... but why should Burgundy attack Ruhr? That leaves me open to accidentally *taking* Ruhr, which I don't want, when I can achieve the same thing by just supporting the Belgian attack. *And* that lets me support the Burgundian army, in case Germany tries some funny stuff. I wonder if he put Turkey up to this? Fall 1904 I'm a moron, I'm a moron. Burgundy needed to attack Ruhr to cut its support, what the FUCK was I thinking. Ah well. And I can't try it again, because of the English fleet now in the North Sea. Time for Plan B. What's Plan B? Here's a thought: not attack Belgium, but have Picardy and Burgundy support each other and let Paris move to Brest. Then, move the Welsh fleet back out to the Irish Sea, and the English Channel fleet into Wales (bouncing off the Liverpudlian fleet, presumably. With any luck at all this will look like I'm convoying the Brest army to Wales, and I can two-prong my fleets into Liverpool and London. Problem: I've got to worry about the two fleets now in the seas. Norwegian isn't a direct threat this round, but North Sea could *either* support Belgium *or* support the Londoner fleet into the Channel. I can counter either one, but not both. Winter 1905 Oh happy day! Belgium is mine at last. Of course, clever me, I managed to put an army in Brest, which I would've wanted to build a fleet in. *sigh* We'll see whether I'm allowed to convert that into a fleet, which would at least solve my Atlantic problem. ... Nope. Oh well. If I build an army in Paris, it's not very useful to my other stuff since it'll be moving, and it'd get there slower than something coming from Marseilles anyway. So I build in Marseilles. Clearly, in the conflict against England, I need another fleet, so that's what I'll build. Then I'll move it to southern Spain and, I think, to Portugal; on the one hand this could bounce England out of both, and on the other, he gets Spain. (I'd kill the Welsh fleet, presumably). He's then going to either hold Spain, which isn't very useful for him, or else move to Gascony or Marseilles (depending on which coast he's on). Gascony I don't care, Marseilles I'd hopefully pull an army from somewhere to defend. But what other choice do I have? Spring 1905 Well, so Marseilles will move to Spain. I'm going to try to get a fleet in the North Sea from Belgium, rotating in the Picardy army; then I can threaten Edinburgh and there's nothing he can do about it. That's about the best I can hope for. I'm pretty much doomed to lose one of the Iberians in the upcoming winter, afaict. Yuck. Fall 1905 Onward with the plan. So I can do one of two things with my Spanish fleet: move to Portugal or move to MAO. Each permits England to move into an Iberian province, if he picks the right one. However, it would be a bit better for him to have Portugal than to have Spain, so I think I'll move to MAO. Then there's the whole mess in the north of France. I'd love to have an army in Belgium but don't have the military might to orchestrate a rotation. The best I can hope for is that I could use the Channel to support Belgium into the North Sea (dislodging its presumable support, moving Picardy into Belgium and leaving Burgundy to fend for itself. That would likely result in a German occupation of Burgundy, and a retreat to Paris or Marseilles. But I can't see anything better.... Winter 1906 Feh feh feh. Belgium is taken back from me and I lose that fleet. It could be worse, he could've gotten Spain. We'll see what the builds look like for next year, but it looks like I have to be very much on the defensive until I can evict England from the MAO. Spring 1906 The King building in Liverpool, that can't be good. Obviously he's going to try to hit Iberia harder; and with two units over there he can really make a go of it. Feh. Looks like I'm back to needing Germany's help. Barring that, how can I retake the MAO and maintain a front there? I will need to do something soon... well, hm. I have two fleets bordering it; English Channel is sure to have its support cut, so it'd have to do the moving. With Spain supporting it, that'd knock him out of the MAO; he could retreat to the NAO or Irish Sea, both of which are wins for me, or Gascony, or Portugal, or North Africa. That last is a little odd, methinks, but in that case I'd get help from Italy at least. Portugal is easy, because with MAO and Spain I could squeeze him out. Gascony likewise, him being a fleet and all. Seems promising, absent any further word from Germany.... There's still a worry that Burgundy is invadable, but there's not much I can do there if I don't want to lose Brest this turn or the next. Oh well. Summer 1906 Fuckety fuck. I lose Burgundy; best retreat to Paris, where I can at least maintain a nucleus of armies that can support each other. Maybe I can get Marseilles back later. Fall 1906 So. Il faut absolument that I not lose any SCs this Fall. With my usual 20/20 hindsight I now see that I should probably have retreated to Marseilles. :( Ok, so my threatened territories are Marseilles and Brest; each is only threatened by one unit, so a simple bounce should suffice. Meanwhile, Picardy and the MAO are each threatened by two; unfortunately, that means I really need six units for defence, but I only have five. Ah. MAO is only a *true* problem because of Iberia. So if I use MAO to protect Brest, and slide Spain in behind it, then if England successfully attacks MAO I can retreat to Portugal. Unless the move to Brest succeeds, which seems somewhat unlikely. Another thought: Which is more important, keeping MAO or regaining Burgundy? If I just plan to bounce Marseilles, he could always move his army to Gascony, pipelining his Münchner army on into Burgundy, and then he's fucked me up the ass (whereas with MAO the worst I can lose is Iberia, which would suck but at least be more distant). Thus I could use MAO to bounce Brest, while using Paris to support Gascony into Burgundy, moving my fleet back into Marseilles to keep him from going there. And again: I could use *Picardy* to do the bounce in Brest. And MAO can bounce thru English Channel, preventing any support to an invasion of... well, I guess that'd be a useless gesture, but that's okay. No, better to invade the NAO since then I'd at least have access to an English SC. Gaah, I dunno. Winter 1906 And here we are again. *sigh* Where shall my atlantic fleet retreat to? Having expelled the German from Burgundy, I can move my Marseillaise fleet back to Spain, so I suppose I should retreat to Portugal. Then I can (hopefully) play bouncy-bouncy with England over the MAO. Spring 1907 Well. I had thought to move Por-MAO and Mar-Spa, but it would seem to be more sensible to use Portugal to support Marseilles into Spain. That guarantees that I'll have F Por/F Spa by the fall, and then I can squeeze out England (again). All assuming I can maintain the Brest-Paris-Burgundy front, which may be difficult (but it's not as thought the Marseillaise fleet could help there anyway). Even assuming the MAO fleet doesn't help, I still have four units against three, and those three can't even all support each other. Then again, there's Belgium sitting open up there. Oh, but so's the North Sea fleet, he'll just move that in. Feh feh feh. Anything I do now is a gamble of one sort or another. Germany will take Burgundy regardless, so I might as well use that to invade Picardy, with support from Paris (who can't be disrupted). Of course, I'd like to take back Burgundy next round, but that'll just push him into Marseilles. FUCK. I see no realistic way to actually stay in the game here. It's just delaying tactics at this point. Clearly, the turning point was when I accidentally tied up Brest and wasn't able to build a fleet there. *sigh* Fall 1907 Boy, talk about it being time to throw in the towel. Yuck. I predict a three-way win between England, Germany, and Italy. Quant à moi, I just can't manage to get that damn fleet where I want it. I could send it back to Marseilles *again* and it would successfully bounce Germany, but it would continue to just be a placeholder and not very useful. If I can get a fleet into the MAO, maybe I can fight my way back south with one of my armies? I sure as hell can't do much else; at this point they'll just keep pecking away at me. Here then: I'll move from Spain to the MAO, supported by Portugal, who will then disband when I lose Marseilles. From there I'll stick the fleet in Brest and use my armies to fight southward as best I can. 'Course, then I'll lose Spain and Portugal, and the armies along with them. :P At least England can't get another *army* in Picardy, thus can't do inland invasion (he's got Germany for that :P). Winter 1907 Well, that about wraps it up for France.