Autumn 1917 – one last solo win attempt

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Developments: France is gone!

• To my great surprise, Italy accepted my invitation to finish off France on the Spring turn (as opposed to the Autumn turn). This is strategically advantageous for me (Germany), which is why I consider it a little odd that Italy would do it. Italy should know that I’m not going vote draw even though France’s units are disbanded (and thus France is functionally eliminated) because France would still get into the draw. So all the other players shouldn’t be expecting the game to end until after this Autumn turn so that we can get a 4-way draw. This gives me one last punch.
  • This final attack is unlikely to work. The players seem really crafty. But I’m going to take my chance. I doubt I can get the game reduced to a 3-way draw, so I have little to lose.
• By the way, if I had somehow anticipated that Italy would attack France this turn and also that Austria would make the moves he did, I could have won the game by moving Brest to Gascony and backing Bohemia up into Munich. It was really that simple. Piedmont and Gulf of Lyon would be empty, so I would be able to conquer Marseilles by poking Spain with Mid-Atlantic Ocean and attacking with Burgundy and Gascony.
  • What a crazy game eh, that it was still possible for me to solo win up until this turn if I had a crystal ball?^[1]I’m joking around. It would have been extremely difficult, verging on impossible, for me to predict what I would have had to do to get a solo win this turn.

Orders: a final (?) attack

• I need to allow Austria to vacate Piedmont. He probably won’t do it, but if he does, then I have a chance to solo win.
• There’s a chance that Italy will back Western Mediterranean into Gulf of Lyons. If he does that, he will back-fill with North Africa probably. So there’s a chance I can sneak in.
• To hold onto Sevastopol, I can’t lose Galicia. An enemy unit in Galicia could poke Ukraine. If I give up Bohemia, in this particular game I just need an army in Silesia and Warsaw to hold onto Galicia
  • Typically, I would not be able to hold onto Galicia indefinitely without also having control of Bohemia. However, in this game Turkey has a fleet in Rumania and no viable way to replace that fleet with an army. Because Turkey has no army in Rumania, I do not need Bohemia to control Galicia indefinitely.
  • But supposing (for the sake of mental exercise) Turkey had an army in Rumania, then if I gave up Bohemia to Austria (as I am doing), eventually those two players would be able to grind back Galicia. Once they had Galicia, they would be able to poke Ukraine and take Sevastopol.

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