Autumn 1912 – nothing I do tricks Italy

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Developments: Dang Italy!

• Dagnabbit, Italy got into Gascony! Italy seized the initiative (and Gascony) shortly after I stopped support-holding the position with Burgundy. Obviously, Italy is still afraid of me. In fairness to Italy,  I am trying to feel out whether I can solo win, and he’s made a move here that really throws a wrench in my works.
• What else happened? Well, Italy and Austria continued to waste each others’ time. That’s pretty good I guess, but I think at this point I wish Austria would make a more powerful attack on Italy.
• Russia made progress against Austria? That’s baffling to me! Austria could have made a powerful attack on Russia into Rumania and, apparently, squandered it.
• Russia and Turkey are back to teaming up I guess. They blew up Austria’s army in Bulgaria.
  • This concerns me a little bit actually:
    • Now that Turkey will get a build off of Austria, Austria will probably give up and try to play for a draw, which means Austria might start cooperating and fight against me (Germany). That will likely bring my solo win attempt to a close.
    • When Turkey gets a build, Turkey is likely to build a fleet. While that might be good in the short run because it could scare Italy, it will probably be bad in the long run because I think I want as few fleets in the Mediterranean as possible so as to maximize my chances of getting Portugal, Spain, and/or Marseilles.

Orders: do what I can against Russia and…Italy.

I don’t see a reason to give up my plan. I can take Norway from Russia this turn and maybe another center. As long as I don’t make a blunder of a move against Italy, I will get a build.

• The fleet at North Sea move to English Channel.
• The fleet at Skagerrak move to North Sea.
  • These moves are obvious; I need to bring the fleets into position for later
• The fleet at Irish Sea move to North Atlantic Ocean.
  • You might be thinking: “Why aren’t you moving to Mid-Atlantic Ocean?” For a while, that was what I thought my move would be, but then I realized this:
    • Italy is very likely to move to Mid-Atlantic Ocean. He’s REALLY onto me and hasn’t let up despite all my overtures. So probably all I would accomplish is bouncing him out.
      • Another reason Italy is likely to move to Mid-Atlantic Ocean is that, tactically, Italy can move Spain to Mid-Atlantic Ocean and back-fill Spain with one of his armies. That means he can guard Mid-Atlantic Ocean without risking Spain.
    • France might even support Italy, if France guesses well, in which case my move will fail without even bouncing Italy.
    • I think there’s even a small chance that Italy will move Spain to Mid-Atlantic Ocean and not back-fill with his armies, thus leaving France the opportunity to move into Spain. That would be awesome because Italy would have to disband a unit.
  • If I move to North Atlantic Ocean, I can slowly get into position to take Mid-Atlantic Ocean by force. Even when Italy has a fleet in Mid-Atlantic Ocean and France is support-holding that fleet with Portugal, if I get three fleets to the north (North Atlantic Ocean, Irish Sea, English Channel, and/or Brest will work) then I can break into Mid-Atlantic Ocean later on. If I later decide I need to have a fleet in North Atlantic Ocean in order to make the attack, I will have to spent a whole turn repositioning and Italy could even block it with a timely bounce. But if I get into position now, perhaps I can break into North Atlantic Ocean in Autumn 1913:
    • I would support English Channel into Irish Sea and back-fill with North Sea. If that worked, I could successfully attack Mid-Atlantic Ocean the following turn (Autumn 1913) as long as no additional fleet got into position to be able to support-hold Italy’s fleet (which seems likely now, but I think Italy and/or Turkey will be sending fleets to bottle me up very soon).
  • I believe my move here is rather crafty; most players, I think, would try for Mid-Atlantic Ocean at this point. I wonder if, diplomatically, any of the other players will be thrown off and think I am not going for a solo win.
• The army at Brest move to Paris.
• The army at Burgundy move to Paris.
  • I think Italy is likely to move Spain to Mid-Atlantic Ocean and try to back-fill with one of his armies, but if he doesn’t then there’s a chance he will attack me. I am fully aware that he could attack me by making a supported move into Burgundy to set up for a future harassing attack, and that him getting into Burgundy would compromise my line and be extremely bad for me. However:
    • I think it is more likely that Italy would lunge for Brest or Paris, because denying me a build this turn would be a more immediate setback and also help him out because he would build a unit to guard his home centers.
    • Furthermore, Italy can see that I can support-hold Burgundy with Munich, so maybe Italy will (wrongly) predict that I will do that.
    • Finally, it would be far worse for me if Italy were to take one of my supply centers this year and deny me a build. Once I reach 14 or 15 supply centers, I don’t need any more builds anyways and the centers don’t matter except for reaching 18 points. But right now it will still make a difference if I can get builds.
      • And, importantly, Italy will get a build for himself if he takes Brest or Paris, which would likely permit him to send more fleets west to guard against me.
  • This self-bounce guards my centers no matter what, and only leaves Burgundy as my weak speak against a supported attack. I can’t make moves that are 100% assured to defend me against Italy (that’s the boon Italy gets from getting away with his move into Gascony). I could be making the wrong play here, but I just have to do the best I can. If Italy makes the right guess against me this turn, he might shut down my chances of a solo win. I think that the self-bounce is the most likely way to block Italy, but if he is in my head and has a good read on me, maybe he’ll make a supported move into Burgundy.

Holy CRAP is it difficult for me to come up with the best possible guess against Russia. I have the possibility of taking Norway, St. Petersburg, Moscow, and/or Warsaw, but also the possibility of being limited to just taking 1 center from Russia if I guess incorrectly.

The first question is: will Russia go all-out to hold Warsaw or will Russia cover Moscow? If Russia support-holds Warsaw with Ukraine and Galicia, then I cannot take Warsaw but can walk right into Moscow with Livonia. If Russia does NOT support-hold Warsaw with Ukraine (in order to cover Moscow), then I can take Warsaw with a supported attack. Dang this is stressful; I sort of have a 50-50 guess against Russia that could result in my taking of the key centers I need to solo win.

• The army at Livonia move to Warsaw.
• The army at Prussia support move to Warsaw from Livonia.
• The army at Silesia support move to Warsaw  from Livonia.
• The army at Munich support hold the army in Silesia.
  • I can’t really provide reasons, but my gut tells me that it is slightly more likely that Russia will guard Moscow than that Russia will double-support-hold Warsaw.^[1]I wonder if I was sensing that most Russian players prioritize a defense of Moscow, because that is a more defensible position in the long run. In other words, if Russia loses Warsaw but not Moscow, it is easier for Russia to defend and recover than if Russia loses Moscow but not Warsaw.
  • Even if Russia makes the correct guess here and supports Warsaw, if Russia doesn’t move Rumania to Sevastopol, then I will get another guess next turn.
• The army at Norway move to St. Petersburg.
• The army at Sweden move to Norway.
• The fleet at Baltic Sea move to Sweden.
  • Probably my move into St. Petersburg will fail. But if it doesn’t, I’d rather have my army in St. Petersburg than Norway for obvious reasons.
  • The other two moves are to back-fill Norway (so that I capture Norway even if I get into St. Petersburg) and Sweden (so that if Russia tries for something crazy he doesn’t end up taking my center and also become impossible to get rid of).
  • Similar to my moveset against Italy, there is also a move here Russia can make to counter my moves: move his Gulf of Bothnia fleet to Baltic Sea. That would REALLY screw up me up, because if he kept that fleet after disbanding units, he would menace several unguarded supply centers, etc. etc. It would be bad.

So on final evaluation, there are some risky thing happening for me this turn. I don’t know if my moves against Italy will work, but at least I will guard all my supply centers no matter what. Similarly, I don’t know which of my moves, if any, will work against Russia, but no matter what I will at least take Norway and Russia can’t possibly take any of my centers.

I am willing to risk Burgundy and Baltic Sea because I value supply centers so much on Autumn turns (because that’s when captures happen), but also because I almost always predict that other players also value supply centers on Autumn turns for the same reason. Once in a while, someone takes advantage of my style of play by going for important-but-not-a-supply-center territories on an Autumn turn. However, in general, I think my general philosophy of guarding supply centers as much as possible during Autumn turns works out for me.

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