Autumn 1908 – Germany/Russia doing well vs France and England 

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Developments: Russia stayed loyal!

• Since Russia didn’t betray me on this turn, I don’t foresee Russia backstabbing me at any point this game. As of now, I don’t think Russia would backstab me unless the strategic situation changed drastically (e.g., it appeared I would be positioned to solo win if Russia didn’t take action). I doubt Russia would attack me just to take 1 supply center or something, since we have shown only goodwill for 8 years’ worth of gameplay.
• @#$%ing Austria, back in the Silesia again. Boy am I glad I kept my armies around to guard against something annoying like this. Everything this turn went very well and smoothly for me, except for Austria creeping into Silesia again.
• Italy put his army in Venice. I wonder he will do with it? Backstab Austria ? Hold? Move into Piedmont to hold or back-fill Marseilles next year? Move it up into Tyrolia to harass me? I guess I’ll find out. I wonder if Italy will make Austria paranoid.

Strategic thoughts: 2 builds?

• For this Autumn turn, I have to figure out if I can get 2 builds. The challenge is not just going from 7 to 9, but also having my home centers all open so that I can build the new units. This is a difficult task I think – I want to avoid scaring my allies, getting backstabbed, and somehow have 2 of my home centers open so that I can build. I might consider trying to gain 2 points while leaving just 1 home center open (or only building 1 unit instead of two).
• I am starting to think now about what end-game situations are viable for the smallest possible draw size. A solo win is pretty much impossible in a high level game and not really worth thinking about until a specific opportunity appears.
  • I’m not saying I never solo win or go for solo wins; in fact, I think I am unusually aggressive in attempting solo wins in most games I play, even risking defeat in order to attempt solo wins. That’s really how I play. What I’m saying here is that I don’t waste my time thinking about how to get a solo win when nothing special has happened to make it seem possible, like taking at least one supply center that is a “stretch goal” for my power.
    • For Germany, that would be Spain, Portugal, Moscow or Vienna, and I’m nowhere close to taking any of those centers. Even though I am probably the strongest power on the board right now, I don’t have any viable solo win strategy because all the centers I have aren’t strategically important to getting a solo win; I would easily stall out out at 17 or less, even if I played like a genius.^[1]When I later attempted a solo win, this became a very serious problem for me.
• Probably the best I can hope for is a 3-way draw. If that happens, probably the draw would be either Germany–Italy–Austria or Germany–Italy–Russia. So I have to (eventually) figure out if I’m going to play my alliance with Russia all the way to the end, or betray Russia (to join up with Austria) in order to get more eliminations.
  • Play it out with Austria: From the positioning that Italy and Austria have, it will be extremely difficult for the two of them to coordinate against Russia and Turkey – it could take a huge number of guesses for them to grind away even one center from Russia/Turkey. But if Russia  collapses (due to my intervention), then eventually Austria can backdoor Turkey and get him eliminated as well. This is why central triple is a powerful alliance – there is a simple, realistic path to a 3-way draw.
    • The biggest danger of this plan is that Italy might backstab Austria on a critical turn and go for a solo win. Italy doesn’t need Warsaw or Moscow to solo win if he has Marseilles, Spain and Portugal. If Italy creeps into the north that far or further, he could try to solo win by attacking me (Germany) and Austria right after we attack Russia.
    • Let me add that Austria really angered me by attacking me one time for no reason, and in contrast Russia displayed some pretty high levels of loyalty to me. I can’t just ignore that.
  • Play it out with Russia: Although I can’t be sure, I suspect that Russia is thinking, as I am, that in the end game we can eliminate Austria together with Italy. Russia may see that this is a viable path to a smaller draw because I (Germany) will probably never be in a good position to backstab him (Russia). I think to attack Russia and dig him out of Scandinavia, I would require 2 fleets at a minimum, and Russia could still hold me off for a while with good guesses even if I used 3 fleets. I can’t build or commit that many fleets against Russia without giving away what I’m about to do (attack Russia), so I am in no position to make a “backstab” against Russia in the narrow sense of the word (attacking him without warning while his units are out of any defensive position).
    • If I attack Austria with Russia and Italy, I think Austria would be eliminated much faster than Russia, since Austria doesn’t have as many points or as good of a defensive position as Russia. After Austria collapses, Italy and Russia can likely make short work of Turkey. I think Austria and Turkey would be faster to eliminate than Russia and Turkey.  
      • The number of turns a war would take to finish are more important than you might think. The longer a war lasts, the more opportunity another power has to slowly creep into a position for a solo win. I also think that if the game drags on for too long, the players can become impatient and try desperate moves, crazy attacks, and backstab other players out of boredom. If I were losing, that would be awesome, but I am doing well this game and don’t want any surprises.
    • Probably the biggest dangers here are:
      • Turkey starts expanding when Austria goes down, which could make Turkey VERY difficult to eliminate, especially if Russia refuses to ever attack Turkey. That would end the game at a 4-way draw perhaps.
      • If Russia gains too many builds (builds in both the north and the south), Russia could become a solo win threat – especially if Italy does something annoying and tries for a solo win first and forces me to abandon my defenses against Russia. (I call it “annoying” here because that would be very bad for me, but I attempt last-minute solo wins all the time myself and just gamble that either the game will still end in the same draw, or possibly my solo win; sometimes that gamble causes me to lose because I trigger a solo win for someone else, but sometimes I am able to win and most of the time there is no effect on the final outcome of the game because the other 2 players know what they’re doing).

Orders: I’m going to trust Russia 

• The army at Picardy move to Brest.
• The army at Paris support move to Brest from Picardy.
  • These moves were pretty easy to figure out. With my armies moving this way, I can guarantee that I guard Brest while taking Paris. It’s not possible for my army to be dislodged from Paris or for any attack to take Brest.
  • There is one downside or risk here, which is that I don’t want to vacate Munich to occupy Burgundy from either a desperate French move or an insane Italian backstab (or even Italy somehow getting dislodged through incompetence while also moving Venice to Piedmont, so he has no choice but to retreat to Burgundy).
    • I rate the chances of France moving to Burgundy or Italy getting dislodged as really low. Italy must understand that France could try to retake Marseilles and will hopefully make his moves to prevent this.
    • As for France, he already blew up his Paris army at the end of last year, so he’s clearly going to try to hold out in Spain and Portugal for as long as possible. I don’t see why he would use Gascony to go for Burgundy, which isn’t a supply center, when he could fight for Spain, Marseilles, or Brest (which are). In other words his incentive to move to Burgundy is even lower than during the spring turn, and France didn’t do it then either.
  • I could protect Burgundy without vacating Munich by bouncing Paris and Munich off of each other. But if I did that, I would have to support-hold the fleet in Brest with Picardy to ensure France can’t take it, and I would much rather move that fleet to English Channel or at least bounce England out.  
• The fleet at Brest move to English Channel.
  • I strongly believe that this is an important move to make. I need to trap England on Great Britain if I am to eliminate him. My goal here is not merely to take all 3 English home centers for myself, but to bring England down to zero. If England gets a unit out of Great Britain and into a supply center somewhere else, he could be a nuisance for a long time. Even worse, another player might backstab or attack me if England becomes a nuisance to me in the way I described. I’ve mentioned several times that I have personally avoided elimination in past games as England by doing that.
  • Furthermore, if I somehow do get into the channel, then likely next year I can pick England apart.
• The army at Edinburgh hold.
• The fleet at North Sea support hold the army in Edinburgh.
  • This is pretty obvious to me. Unless Russia betrays our alliance by poking my North Sea fleet, I will capture Edinburgh. That hasn’t happened in all 8 years, so this move seems very powerful and likely to succeed.
• The army at Munich support move to Berlin from Kiel.
• The army at Kiel move to Berlin.
  • I thought really, really hard about these moves. I could move Kiel to Denmark to guard it, and then try to 50/50 guess against Austria lunging for Munich or Berlin (or wager that Austria doesn’t make a greedy attack like that after I kept guarding and even blocked him). If I guarded Denmark, then I would prevent Russia from sneaking in with Sweden (which Russia might try because it looks like I’m going to get 2 builds, and maybe he wants to offset one of those and get one for himself; Russia probably would be extremely difficult to eliminate if he had 3 fleets in the north). It’s a really obvious move for Russia to make, since I didn’t move to Denmark last turn and now I have even more of an incentive to guard against Austria than I did in the spring. So basically it comes down to whether I trust Russia, always my ally,  to NOT backstab me over a single supply center when it’s really easy for him to get away with, or do I trust Austria, who lunged for Munich already once, not to attack me again when it looks unlikely that he will get away with it.
  • In addition, I have to make a cost-benefit analysis. If Russia takes Denmark, it’s probably not part of a major backstab that will result in Russia committing to war against me – it’s probably Russia just trying to ensure his place in the draw because he fears me getting 2 builds and none for him. If I succeed in getting 2 captures but lose Denmark, I can still build a fleet and retaliate against Russia. The worst case scenario is Russia poking North Sea AND seizing Denmark so that I get no build and also I’ve vacated Kiel so I can’t even immediately try to retake Denmark. That would really suck, but the chances of Russia backstabbing me in such a severe way after we’ve shown each other a pretty good amount of trust and loyalty seems small. Russia would only be doing that if he intended to go for a solo win, since he would, by doing that, likely ensure that England and probably France are never eliminated. If I fought Russia off with Austria, the draw might be huge. Plus I could, with my armies, help Austria break through Russia‘s defenses and get into the Russian home centers. Furthermore, Russia can’t all-out war with me right now because he has to use nearly all his forces to guard against Austria. Why would Russia risk his alliance with me over just 1 center? Well, actually, he might do it for the reasons I just explained… but in Diplomacy you have to trust someone sooner or later.
  • And I don’t trust Austria. He attacked Munich out of greed once already.
  • I realize my moves mean that I won’t get a 2 builds even if everything works out. That’s okay we me. I’d rather save the build for another year than risk losing supply centers to Austria (and also not getting 2 builds). If I build and grow slowly, I won’t destabilize the alliance structure.
  • I just don’t merely distrust Austria – I want to show everyone else that I don’t. If Russia keeps his faith with me, he will see that I am prepared to, in the long run, help him against Austria (hopefully with Italy). I hope that’s what Russia will think about me if I support myself into Berlin.
  • If it all works out, I can build a fleet in Kiel (hopefully without scaring Russia).

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