BOUNCED Gunboat Journal: End of Game12 min read

I offered the other players the chance to provide an EOG^[1]End of Game or comment on the journal. I wrote my EOG statement without going through my entire journal (I did look at a couple things, but primarily wrote it as I normally would). Below are the EOGs (in the order they were posted) from myself and those who chose to post something and were OK with it being in the journal.

Austria EOG (played be me, knilgau / Robert Segovia)

I started out hoping for a good AI alliance (my preferred alliance) but then Italy tried to sneak into Trieste in Fall 1902. I tried to signal to Turkey to attack Russia, hoping that Russia could be weakened (then Italy and I could take out Turkey and I could move on to Russia). Once Italy attacked, I decided to attack Italy and hope that Turkey would focus on Russia. I hoped that Turkey would see that avenue for growth and that an AT alliance could work. However, I felt that I couldn’t trust Turkey if I didn’t cover my back and I made a critical mistake in Fall 1904 by not ordering SER-BUL (I mostly contemplated SER s BUL, which wouldn’t have protected me either; I only briefly considered SER-BUL, but not long enough to even note it in my journal … I didn’t want to risk alienating Turkey).

Turkey timed the attack on me perfectly (I had planned to build to deter a Turkish stab). I didn’t want to give Venice back to Italy out of fear that Italy would simply attack me with Turkey. At this time, I also figured this game would end as EGT, ET, or possibly an English solo. Then, EG broke up and Russia got a new lease on life. I believed the original England is a player that prefers a strong alliance and was disappointed that Germany didn’t order WAR-MOS in Spring 1906 (hence the stab in 1907 – I hope the original England will post an EOG to comment on this). I thought Russia would see that Turkey was going to come after him too. Instead, Russia enabled Turkey and later paid the price. Well, didn’t completely pay the price because EG broke up and Russia snuck into the draw.

Regardless, I knew I wasn’t going to last once Turkey attacked me because I had no allies and only enemies. I strongly considered throwing to Turkey. Instead, I decided to defend against Turkey and encouraged others to come and attack Turkey (which was futile).

After my elimination, I figured Turkey would either solo or draw with some combination of EFG. Italy obviously had no chance but I am surprised that Russia didn’t get eliminated. England could have convoyed DEN-NOR in the fall, built another army, and then moved to take StP the next year. Turkey could have taken Moscow and get stuck at 16. Then the draw would have been a 4-way instead of a 5-way draw. Germany also could have been taken out by EF but that would have been trickier. If attacked, Germany could have tried to help Turkey get the solo, so I can understand not attacking Germany. From my point-of-view, England missed a chance to thin the draw while France and Turkey missed the chance to encourage that by the use of convoy orders (I don’t think Germany should have encouraged it because then Germany could reasonably be next).

Overall, I think Turkey would have done better than a 5-way draw if he/she hadn’t stabbed me. I also think the new England could have clearly allied with France to gain a better conclusion than a 5-way draw (and eliminated Russia, as I mentioned above). Instead, I believe France never felt safe with England and so Germany survived instead of being eliminated by EF.

Anyhow, congrats again to the survivors and thank you Cal for hosting the game!

Italy EOG (played by Johnny / John Oars)

As a frequent Austrian, AI is also my preferred alliance. And with a well behaved Austrian partner I would never dream of making that stab. In this game, however, I felt you left me with little choice.

When allied, Austria and Italy share an uneasy arrangement early in the game: Italy agrees to be the junior partner for a couple years in exchange for security from most land incursions. Likewise, Austria does not raid his Italian partner because he provides cover to Greece and the Adriatic, along with providing a check on Turkey’s growth.  

So against that backdrop, it was your build of F TRI that initially concerned me in Winter of 1902. Not unheard of, but certainly unusual.  What use would a second fleet be to Austria in such an arrangement? It was a signal to me more of Austrian neutrality than Austrian friendship – at best, Austria is preparing to protect his own coasts without me; at worst, he’s preparing to join Turkey in an attack!

Still, I did not stab immediately in the Spring. Italy’s early gains in an AI alliance would come from Turkey, and I made the usual attempt to advance my fleets, ION-AEG. Rather than receive support from F GRE, I was bounced by it (!) as Turkey predictably advanced to EAS. Moreover, the new Austrian fleet positioned itself in ALB, ready to strike at ION, and the Serbian army attempted to support Turkey to RUM!

No doubt in a press game we could have communicated and worked this all out. But my read then was AT and, even now, your EOG does not sway me from that possibility. AI may well have been Austria’s preference, but if it was then AT was a very close second.

So that fall I did try to “sneak” into Trieste, not because it was a good option but because I had been cut off from all others. The following turn Greece still did not offer support to AEG, but rather gestured with a convoy to Switzerland. A glimmer of hope that Austria was coming to his senses, though I might have preferred the support! And again, I attempted to play the AI alliance by advancing my attack on Turkey and holding the attack on Austria.

But the result was all out AI war, and it ended the way that most AI wars do: with both Austria and Italy dead, and the rest of the board left to cope with an unusually powerful Turkey.    

In a way I’m glad the game played out like this. As an Austrian player, I think there’s a lot to be learned from this one about the dynamics between the two countries.

Congratulations to the victors, and I’ll see you in the next one.

Also, I very much agree with Robert’s conclusion that Russia could have been safely removed from the draw. Likely Germany as well once that was done.

Germany EOG (played by Dunbarton / Frank Easton)

Sorry Robert, I have been around far too long and have played too many game to be able to remember details of this particular one.

I opened with my favourite G opening : DEN, RUH and MUN. I don’t want to bounce in BUR, leaving BEL uncontested for E and leaving the option of bouncing R in SWE if he has gotten off to a poor start in the south. In my experience, a R held to zero gains in the first year is not in G’s best interests unless gunning for the Russian from the get go. Letting R into SWE, of course, means that E will have a rough go of it in Scandinavia. I hold F DEN in about half my games.

Here, E supported BUR – BEL, giving F three builds from the get go. Two new G armies seemed necessary.

The rest is a blur. I was happy to get a five way rather than being eliminated, but it still pulled my ranking down.

Thanks Cal, as always.

Turkey EOG (played by Splash / Peter McLean)

Hello Everyone!

Congratulations to you all for keeping me from my solo! How nice it would have been to have THAT published.

I am delighted to see knilgau/Robert was Austria – payback time for Pandemic Times (only joking)!!^[2]PandemicTimes was a press game in which I was Turkey, Peter was Austria, and after trying to make AT work for awhile, I brutally stabbed Peter.

In a way, I wish the game had been more nuanced – I had a good run and did better than I should have done because others cancelled each other out and let me grow too easily. 

The 5-way is a tribute to those who realised (just in time) what would happen if they didn’t change their plans and reacted accordingly.

I did have my bits set to 6-way, so kudos to France for knocking out Italy at the end.

Cal – thank you.

Austrian EOG Addendum (prompted by Russian message)^[3]The Russian player did not give permission to have his message published; the message was a reply to the other EOG statements.

OK Russia, your note made me feel bad. I decided to go back through the game and only look at your movements and try not to consider anything that I was wanting at the time. What I see is a player who opportunistically took open centers when needed to survive and made consistent orders with allies and enemies to convey what you desired (i.e., support orders, convoys against enemies that became mutual enemies, etc.).

I was the first one eliminated. You not only outlasted me, but (by your movements and the grace of the replacement English player) earned a spot in the draw. We’d have to hear from the replacement English player to know for sure, but I suspect that if you had done anything else to agitate him/her beyond taking Norway and hadn’t been making offers of friendship clear, you would have been eliminated. So there’s definitely some credit due to you for that.

My apologies for the harsh critiques. If I was England, I would have eliminated you, but you obviously did what you needed to do with that English player. Congrats for your success in doing that and taking your place in the draw.

Quickie600 Conclusion

The Russian player didn’t provide their identity and the English/French players didn’t post any comments after the game (nor did the original English player).

In review, I draw the following conclusions:

• Doing this journal did not help me. I put a lot of time into typing it that I could have put into thinking about the game from the point-of-view of the other players. I believe that I would have better understood the Russian player (and others) had I done so. Also, there are times I slipped into thinking what I would do instead of what the other player would do—I need to improve on my empathy.
• Having said that, I think trying to determine the style/mentality of the player did help me. There were some times I was spot on with what the player was doing. I will do that going forward in gunboat games, just not spending the time to type out all my thoughts.
• I made several critical mistakes in this game:
  • After building a fleet in Winter 1902 and seeing that France was not heading toward Italy, I should have done something to assure the Italian of my intentions. The fleet would have been useful if France was going to distract Italy but it did what I knew it might do and risked anyway: alienated Italy (who I wanted to ally with).
  • I ignored my intuition that Turkey would attack me as soon as possible and allowed myself to believe it possible that Turkey wanted an alliance (instead of wanting me to attack Italy).
  • In Spring 1904, I correctly predicted what Italy/Turkey would do. I didn’t think through prior to Spring 1904 that this would mean that Turkey could easily attack me for Greece in Fall 1904. I was too worried about Russia without thinking through Russia being worried about England (not considering the Russian point-of-view enough). Had I thought through the likelihood of Russia risking StP and the fact of an easy Turkish attack, I would have kept everyone in place for a fall attack on Venice. I believe the game would have gone much differently for me had I done that.
  • In Fall 1904, I should have covered Greece and not worried about how it would look to Turkey. It seems that in gunboat, players will almost always take the easiest center available to them. Greece was that center for Turkey in Fall 1904.
• One tactic I didn’t pursue was throwing to Turkey. Multiple times I could have focused on defending against Russia or attacking Italy/Russia as I was being picked apart by Turkey (in a bid to influence the other powers to pay attention to my plight). For example, in Fall 1904, I defended against Turkey, knowing Russia may move into Vienna (which happened). Had I defended against Russia instead, Russia may not have survived and EG may have had more success together. Would Turkey have needed to back off to face that threat? Would Germany have propped me up to keep Turkey at bay? I don’t think it is likely I would have survived, but I do think it would have affected the outcome of the game (and it might have given me better odds of survival).
• Overall, I’m glad I undertook this project. I don’t regret the movements I made, even though it didn’t work out for me. I tried to give myself the best chance to have an opportunity down-the-line to either solo or be a strong partner in a draw (and I could have got there if I had played better).

BOUNCED Gunboat Journal—Table of Contents
Introduction
1901 | 1902 | 1903 | 1904
1905 | 1906 | 1907
Elimination
Conclusion
End of Game Statements