OClub_Imp wraps up!

[Bcnu]

After a year and three months, 71 turns (35 and a half game years), and the demise of all but three Powers, this monster game is OVER!

It was celebrated by England, Holland, and China with a world-wide convoy participated in by each of their fleets:

China: Army Sapporo -> Kuril -> Westerlies -> North Pacific -> Counter Current -> Eastern Pacific -> Pacific Basin -> Chilean Basin -> Drake -> Antarctic Atlantic -> South Atlantic -> Middle Atlantic -> Sargasso -> North Atlantic -> North Passage -> Barents Sea -> St Petersburg.

The gamemap is here:  

http://www.floc.net/dpjudge/gamemaps/oclub_imp.pdf

And now, without further delay, England's AAR statement.  I'd appreciate it if the other Powers could also chip in with their viewpoints...

Portmeirion Press
-------------------
   Final Edition


Jolly what, and all that, and we're treated this day to a private
interview with Prime Minister 6, who revealed that in fact he was the
second cousin of King BCNU and had been carrying out the old King's
orders the whole time!

Well, 6, this is your moment.  Britain stands with her allies in
command of the globe, and now our readers would like nothing better
than to hear how it all happened.

(ooc:  this is, in other words, my end-game statement).

Originally, I was hoping to be assigned Japan or Brazil, or some other
small Power, since I was the WBer amongst the AHers.  When I saw
"Britain" I blanched.  I figured everyone would instantly fear and go
straight after the big power especially as I was only really an O'Club
lurker.

Looking at the map I didn't put much hope in good news from France or
Holland, as they were the other naval Powers.  So, my original plan
was:  ally with Russia, lay low for a year hoping to get some of the
close centres locked down and then see about dismantling France or
Holland with help.  If that worked, I could assist Russia to victory in
Europe and Asia while remaining unconcerned about a stab from a
landlocked Power.

That plan lasted about a day.  Two things happened:
1.  It became immediately obvious that there would be no Civil War, so
I had to make very nice with the Americas;
2.  China came up with the bright idea of allying with Britain,
Holland, France, and Japan in a southeastern meta-alliance.

This meant that to say 'no' meant not maybe fighting France at sea with
Holland's help, or vice versa, but getting blitzed by both with only,
again, a land-locked power as friend.   So I said 'yes' but thought
well, let's see, what are the chances this alliance will be real?  So I
also said 'yes' to Russia, but with the caveat that I wouldn't take any
offensive action in year one.

The Tzar elected a full frontal assault on China.  Sorry, Tzar.  From
that point everything to the Tzar was an attempt to get him to act
indecisively until force could be brought to bear against him, a tactic
I'd employ several times.

The other interesting thing in '61 was that amazingly, nobody attacked
me, except for the unscheduled taking of neutral Canadian centres by
Russia.  Also, Brazil pooched their first year, electing to move *out*
of two centres in the Fall.  This created my long-term strategy.

England had the opportunity to hit Brazil while he foundered, making
France and Holland much happier in their efforts, but I chose not to.
Instead, I directed my efforts to Russia and Turkey, who were behaving
(Spring '62) like a Juggernaut.  Why?  One, I couldn't afford to start
hostilities with the large USA/CSA/MEX/BRA alliance, and two I still
had some thoughts of winning outright, which is impossible with a
strong French navy.  So, I went all mushy in the South Atlantic and
while being 'shocked' that Brazil eventually drove me out, it did
manage to tie up France and keep him from being the rulers of the seas.

I was somewhat surprised by the rapid change from first-year blunder to
strong tactics; good work, Brazil!  If you hadn't quit trying I would
have petitioned to grant you survivor status.

I'd like to apologize to Japan, though.  I don't know if it was because
you were new or whether you actually were trying to side with Russia,
but you did a great job of *looking* like you were betraying the
"AHOA."  Sayonara.

I never did understand the Tzar.  Obviously a bright player, but
nonetheless he was convinced repeatedly by both China and myself that
we were just about to stop beating him to a pulp and make nice.  Well...

Turkey was also an odd duck; he had a chance to give me real trouble
with Russia's help but both of them, after advancing right up to me,
essentially folded up shop.

Germany and Austro-Hungary should have been best friends; it was their
only chance of survival.  If they'd made a deal with Russia/Turkey,
they would have been formidable.  If they'd attacked either to West or
East together, still powerful.  Instead they listened to the
insinuations of the Frenchman and fought among themselves while being
devoured from both sides.

I think the biggest snow job I pulled off though was somehow, despite
Russians in Canada, a weak position in the North, and despite the fact
that the U.S. has zero other opportunities for expansion, convincing
Washington that I was his good buddy for four and a half years.  By the
time he struck I was already sending armies back from the successful
Scandinavian  and Turkish campaigns.    Good thing the French had not
yet decided to attack England.

France, ah, France.  I was, and I think I speak for the other victors,
perfectly prepared to share the spoils four-way.  I was happily moving
French armies into America, and suddenly there's some fly in your soup.
France decides to make a supported attack against my NAT fleet, which
is very odd, then he decides to stop supporting army moves in North
America, then total paranoia takes hold.  England is going to stab
everyone!  He's got black helicopters!  Cairo is the center of the
universe!  Actually, I think your whole game was to maintain a position
from which, eventually, you could launch a stab for the game win.  I
wasn't going to leave my arse exposed; so we were at an impasse.
Fortunately, AHOA sided with good sense; if it had gone any other way
the remainders of the ATO alliance would have won the war; or maybe you
would have been able to play both sides and win.

Next time, wait longer before launching your attack, or shut up about
it long enough to make it a true stab.

Last word, about the very end.  As France expired, I had myself
carefully kept an army here, a fleet there, and we'd reached such a
point of cooperation that China wasn't even bothering to issue support
orders.  The plan to keep the other naval powers busy had worked
perfectly; with the end of France I was in Fall 1884 up to 73 centres,
and the moment was right to push the big stab button, if I wanted.

(Bring that Fall '84 map up and think MEX, SFO, SEA, MER, STP, HOL,
CRO, SOF, GEO, AMN, CAN.  Poof, 73 turns into 84, game over.)

After all Herr banana does remember me as the Sultan of Stab...

... but no.  Just once it's nice to do, as Manus Hand (the guy whose
software we're playing on) said when I asked him about the 70 vs. 84
centre end-game, the right thing.  Plus it was far more fun this way,
especially as a raspberry to all the dead Powers who swore up and down
that England was up to No Good.

I think the Imperial map is a bit too much, and too little.  It almost
requires that you form a mega-alliance to get anywhere or else be run
over by another big team.  Besides, do you know how long it takes to
make sure 70 units are ordered correctly?!

If I have any grouses, it's over the several people who thought that a
graceful exit involved making everyone wait and wait and wait for
retreat or disband orders that weren't going to show up.  It takes 30
seconds to select 'disband' or 'retreat to the only choice I've got.'
Thank you to those who stuck it out even when all hope was gone.

----

Final note that wasn't in the writeup I sent by Press:  Kudos to my allies China and Holland for consistently and skillfully managing to establish neutral zones and well-balanced lines of demarcation so that our alliance wasn't at great risk of disaster due to betrayal.  (Hint, China:  next time your friend might not be as nice as I was; you should always maintain your supports).

[Sandman]

Damn long game. I think I lasted less than a month as Turkey.

[Nefarious]

I lasted for like 8 years, Good Job on wrapping it up fellas, I was still getting all the emails down in my underground hideout in the Rockies

[sling322]

All I remember is it didnt matter who I tried to work with, they ended up stabbing me in the back.  So I eventually gave up when I realized that there is no way to win this game starting as Prussia.....you are completely surrounded by potential enemies.

[Nash]

Yeah Sling... You were pretty much in a pickle the second the territories were drawn. We considered bringing you in, but it just didn't make any sense. It had nothing to do with you - it was about where you were located. Same goes with pretty much everyone.

The deal was...

I looked around and, like everyone, I got kinda spooked. Surrounded. So I'm like, okay, there's lotsa free supply centers for the taking - so that should keep everyone occupied for a coupla years. All ya needed to do was manage it well. To just make sure nobody tripped anyone up.

And what better way to do that then open relevant lines of communication? And while we're at it, what better way of getting those that surround you to not attack you, than being an ally to all of them?

This was a different beast than the normal European variety diplomacy. In order to get through it intact, you just had to team up. Not through little peace treaties here and there. But in a big, formidable, immovable way.

So that's how the idea of the AHOA was born. It's short for the Angry Home Owners Association. Don't ask... it's just the mood I was in that day. Originally, it was the AHOASEA which meant the Angry Home Owners Association of Southeast Asia.

It got off to a rocky start. Nobody was buying it. During this time, everyone was making all sorts of little agreements with everyone else. I had made the argument that said "Look, this is a crap shoot. With the AHOA you are guaranteed a spot in the final six. You may still wind up losing, but with this - your odds of winning have automatically tripled.

But... no takers.

Then, perhaps due to some friction during the separate country to country negotiations, or perhaps something else - I'm not sure - SOB finally said "Amen" to it a few days later. And then it was like dominos. Everyone came on board within 48 hours, and our ship set sail.

Our alliance was always meant to include Russia (Nuke), Japan (sorry - forget), Britain (BCNU), Holland (SOB), France (Bodhi), and myself - China.

In the first move, Russia (Nuke) stabbed me. Everyone else moved just as discussed and agreed to. Strike one AHOA member. While I was dealing with that, Nuke had gotten into Japan's brain. Those two began to feed off of eachother's fear, and pretty much took themselves out. It wasn't much of an accomplishment, but the AHOA managed some pretty neat feats of disinformation during this period that not only saw the end to Russia and Japan, but also made us huge strides into the rest of the world.

And it was at this point that our alliance gelled such that we were no longer regional, but global.

Our communications became solid, fast, and transparent. We began to share openly our orders completely. As in: "Here's what I'm doing: (copy/paste the entire orders window) and here's what I need."

So it went like that for a while.

And we reached a point, somewhere in the middle of the game, that we realized that we had already won. We watched as the rest of the world scrambled to catch up to the threat we posed, knowing that they were far, far too late. It was already over for them.

That's when another bit of weirdness took foot. France began to consolidate his forces. And do it at the expense of the AHOA's broader goals. Orders requiring France's cooperation started to get muddled and botched. We began to lose our footing, and the missteps ended up costing us numerous seasons to repair. Finally, France requested of me that there be no retaliation if he attacked Britain. Huge mistake.

We had a charter, and... well... along with no running in the halls and Friday Night Potluck dinners, the first rule is that an attack on an AHOA member results in his immediate dismissal and a counter attack by every other member.

The whole entire success of the AHOA relied completely on trust. It was the most important thing. Members had know that should any of us screw any of us, they were immediately done for. And that trust had to be demonstrated. I left myself vulnerable all over the map. It would have taken a single turn to cripple me. I never issued a support order along any of the borders between myself and an AHOA member. Numerous SC's were left completely undefended. But it was important. Nothing in Diplomacy is more important to achieving your goals than having and garnering trust.

France had different ideas...

Like BCNU said, I was expecting to ride things out with him to the end. It was a self preserving measure (and just plain common sense), but as soon as an alliance member turns on his alliance - it required immediate no holds barred punishment. Less to make things right for the transgression, but more to reinforce the message to everyone else that should you get funny ideas, we aren't gonna be laughing. And you're gonna pay.

HUGELY important. It keeps the whole thing intact.

There was no shortage of people warning us about Britain's growing power. I didn't worry about it. Not only did I trust him, but a stab by him would result in this game lasting another year - at least - as he fought the remaining alliance members. There was a point where he could have stabbed and won single-handedly on pure game ending numbers, but still... there wasn't a worry of that. It's kinda like... well... BCNU is just one of those guys that you size-up, then trust. Same with SOB. And if they end up screwing you, then ya can't feel bad about it because at that point you examined/judged character as best ya could. If it ended up bad, then there's really nothing you could have done.

I commend BCNU and SOB for being truly great teamates. Very communicative, smart, trustworthy and solid. Congrats you two.

And I gotta say a big kudos to everyone who played. Most were not in as good a spot as we found ourselves in, but played hard regardless. Some, like Habu of Brazil, impressed me with a resourcefulness and tenacity. Many, like Sling or Sandman, were dead from the starting gun but played hard despite that. Even those new to the game like Nuke, who made multiple errors, still impressed me with good humor and sportsmanship.

Good game, guys.

[SOB]

Ahh, the smell of victory.  It smells like . . . gouda!

The Dutch (me) started off with a weak presence in and around Holland, but a fairly strong concentration of forces in SE Asia.  It was there I felt I had the best chance of holding territory for a base of power.

In a quite heavy-handed email to Britain (BNCU), I advised that I would gladly convoy his one army out of Australia to save his troops the trouble of swimming back to Britain after I took Perth, but he didn't seem concerned.  Rather, he made a friendly counter-offer of allowing me to keep my homeland (Holland), instead of him blowing up all of my windmills and sending my countrymen packing - in exchange for me steering clear of his Australia, on which he would only build armies, so as not to be a sea-faring threat.  I was intrigued enough to agree, on the condition that all of the surrounding islands be mine.  He further solidified the deal with the unsolicited and generous offer to give up Singapore, which was at the heart of my current center of power (and clearly set up to be a point of contention on this Imperial Map).  From then on, Britain had as much of my trust as I could give in a game of Diplomacy.

In the meantime, Bruce Lee of China (Nash) sent out the idea of the AHOA, which I immediately thought was a nutty idea that would never succeed.  Helping this train of thought along was the child emperor of Japan (Skull) sending me requests to ally against China & Britain while at the same time he was joining up with them in the AHOA.  Contrary to Nash's memory, I was the last to join the AHOA, which I decided to do after Britain, France & Japan joined up, lest I be fodder to their alliance.  Even if it didn't hold together, I would have been necessary AHOA fodder almost immediately.

The early years of the alliance were plagued by misteps from the child emperor, due to his distrust of his allies, and his hope to appease the Russian Tzar (Nuke) who wanted nothing to do with the AHOA.  France was instantly disgusted with the emperor's failings, and wanted to be done with him.  However, it took the rest of us a couple of years and more stumbling by the emperor to finally come to the decision, but we finally vowed to rid our alliance, and the world, of Emperor Skull.  Though shortly after this decision, the boy emperor seemed to be making a turn for the better, we held our course, and dictated his orders to him with some gentle persuasion, only to stab him mercilessly in concert with the orders he executed for us.  He was only a child, but still, his failings could not be forgiven...this was, after all, World Domination!

And on to France (Bodhi).  Ahh, France.  From the start, it was clear that France was going to be, well, typically . . . stereotypically . . . French (No offense Frenchies except for Straffo ...I don't think they're true, just stereotypes).  At the best of times, a royal pain in the bellybutton to work with, constantly demanding the world (go figure), and only giving what was absolutely necessary.  Still, I found it charming that the French in this world were decidedly French, and was happy to live through the frustration, and was absolute in my aim to have a four-way endgame with Britain, France, China & Holland sharing the world.

Alas, it was not to be.  France became mightily paranoid.  Constantly worrying about the threat of a stab from his allies that was never (as far as I knew) there.  He was building up his fighting strength in areas that were under the control of the alliance, while ignoring the enemy fronts.  He was constantly missing support orders, and even the orders he made for his own troops here woefully inadequate, and often doomed to failure due to lack of thorough planning.  He had become the child emperor that he had so despised for ineptitude.  Still, he was an alliance member, and I was willing to live with his Frenchness, even if it was becoming more frustrating than it was quaint.  But then, came his request for China and Holland to sit idley by if he were to attack Britain.  And then the spearhead, when he set himself in a position to hit at Britain in the Middle-East.  Whether he intended to hit or not, enough was enough.  We set a plan in motion, and Britain, China, & Holland stabbed him simultaneously, nabbing as many supply centers from him as we could.

But then something strange happened.  The bumbling, stumbling, paranoid Frenchie did an about face.  As if his anger at the betrayal transformed him from Gomer Pyle into Rambo, and suddenly he was steaming along like a seasoned vet.  None of the mis-steps and poor planning that plagued his stay with the AHOA.  All replaced, with what seemed like a cingular purpose to steamroll his former allies.  And along with a staunch ally in Brazil (Habu), and the likes of the USA (Nefarious), CSA (Reschke), & Mexico (Dowding), he certainly had some power behind him.

Alas, the stab was calculated, and the writing was on the wall.  Britain was a dominant force, and combined with the militaries of China & Holland, the AHOA well outnumbered the rest of the world.  The CSA fell, followed by the USA.  Then, the hard work of cracking Mexico & Brazil, and France.  They put up a hell of a fight, and we'd still be going if they stuck it out, but once Mexico fell, France was decidedly French, and simply surrendered.  Brazil was with him, and surrendered too.  What was left was just cleanup, and waiting for delay after delay, as deadlines were constantly missed by the players who were no longer playing.  Thankfully, the civil disorder deadline was shrunk down to 8 hours instead of a full day.

The world is ours.  It belongs to the AHOA, Britain, China, & Holland.  Long live the AHOA, and long live the memories of this game.  'Cause it sure as hell is the last flippin' Imperial variant game I'm getting myself involved in.  Yowzers, that took a long time!

Thanks to my enemies for the spirited strategerizing (is that a word?), and big thanks to my final allies BNCU & Nash!  It was fun, even if it was a bit looooong.

Regards,

Jan van der SOB
Prime Minister & Minister of Cheese
Holland

[Sandman]

So... who's up for a standard game?

[Ripsnort]

Geeks...

[SOB]

What Ripsnort said.  I'm in!

[Swoop]

I'll play if someone tells me how.

[Gunslinger]

I'm still thinking Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is "Imp"????   But Hey I'm in.

[SOB]

The Imperial variant of Diplomacy.  Instead of being Europe, it's the entire world.  And instead of taking a few months, it takes over a year.

[Swoop]

Reading all about it on DPJudge now......

[Nefarious]

I fought a two front war that started in the Pacific.

I allied with Reschke and the CSA from the beginning. I figured a war between the USA and the CSA, would lead to both of our downfalls a lot sooner.

The entire time, it was a game of "To tell the truth" Who was going to break there promises first. Although BCNU and I were in negotiation's, I never trusted him. Soon, the English and te Russians were at war. And the French and Dutch moved closer in the Pacific.

Mostly, until the near end my war was a war at sea. The British allowed the French to occupy the United States & Confederate States and war raged against the British in Northern US and Canada.

Eventually the Pacific Northwest is where the Valiant army of the United States took there last stand against the Brits.

President Nefarious, hid in a cave and commanded the troops until his army was a shambled mess.

Good fight, I would like to get into another Imperial game.

[Pei]

Originally posted by Swoop
I'll play if someone tells me how.

Basically lie, double-cross and backstab as much as possible and you'll do OK.