The Misadventures of the Gobbledy Gooker

[Jowy]

Spoilers ahead, yo.

[Jowy]

^ For my own reference.

Well then, let's assess the situation!

My three picks were:
1. Turkey
2. Italy
3. France

I expected to end up with Italy. Google says it sucks.
I got Turkey instead! Wow!
Why these picks? Well.. They were the most interesting to me.

Turkey seems easily defendable, but also has lots of neutral SC's to the west. The key point is to get the Black Sea or atleast prevent Russia from getting there. So my goal is to get atleast 2 extra SC's and to control the Black Sea. From there on it gets harder. You know, this whole diplomacy part starts kicking in.

Now I've gotta go take a closer look at the rules. I fully expect to make lots of mistakes, both strategic and rule-breaking. But it's all part of the fun, right?

[Jowy]

Let's see if I understand it correctly.

Spring 1901 - AKA Order phase. I need to give orders to my units.
Fall 1901 - -''- as above, EXCEPT only during Fall I can capture provinces.
Winter 1901 - AKA Build phase. I need to either build or disband units depending on my SC's. Or alternatively do nothing.

So basically there's a cycle of three phases:
- Order
- Order /w capturing
- Build

Except that in this game, Winter moves will be given at the same time as Fall. Which means I have to write moves based on different scenarios that can happen during the fall. IE if there's a possibility that I lose an SC, I have to write two sets of builds, one in which I lose it and one in which I don't.

So it's more like:
- Order
- Order /w capturing & /w building AFTER the orders

Then there's also retreats, in which I have to decice where my unit goes if it's forced to move by an attack on it. There's also Summer, but I have no idea what happens during it. I hope nothing too important.

Please correct me if I'm wrong. Should be less painful than finding out during the first year.

[scooter]

Spring 1901 - AKA Order phase. I need to give orders to my units.
Fall 1901 - -''- as above, EXCEPT only during Fall I can capture provinces.

Minor clarification... You can "capture" territories in the Spring in that you can move into them... But you can only capture in the fall in that only the territory count happens after the Fall turn. So sure, you could capture Bulgaria in the Spring, but the territory adjustments only happen after the Fall, which means tactics are often different in the Spring and Fall.

I think you knew that already, but I thought I'd clarify just in case.

Except that in this game, Winter moves will be given at the same time as Fall. Which means I have to write moves based on different scenarios that can happen during the fall.

This seems like a bad idea, especially for a rookie game, so I hope you guys don't actually do that. My understanding from reading the Organization thread was that this idea got veto'd by several people.

[Maniac Marshall]

Turkey is my absolute favorite country to play in large part for reasons you mentioned. It's one of 2 countries usually recommended for new players to play. Congrats on getting it.

Without getting specific, I'll just say if you don't get huge immediately, as long as you don't get crushed either, keep your head up and bide your time. I've won with Turkey being still at 4 SC 6 or more years into the game. Time is usually on your side.

Good luck.

[novice]

If you move into a neutral sc during spring, and move out again during fall, does it count as yours?

[Sareln]

If you move into a neutral sc during spring, and move out again during fall, does it count as yours?

Nope.

[Jowy]

Turkey is my absolute favorite country to play in large part for reasons you mentioned. It's one of 2 countries usually recommended for new players to play. Congrats on getting it.

Without getting specific, I'll just say if you don't get huge immediately, as long as you don't get crushed either, keep your head up and bide your time. I've won with Turkey being still at 4 SC 6 or more years into the game. Time is usually on your side.

Good luck.

Thanks. That's exactly what I'm planning to do.
Also thanks for the clarification Scooter, I did knew it already, but better to be sure!

I had a long chat with both Gaspar (Russia) and TT (Italy) at the same time. I'm confident they were chatting with eachother as well. It's quite great for me that the three of us happened to be online at the same time, before speaking to anyone else. We've exchanged greetings and initial thoughts, and most importantly all of us have shown interest in going aggressive on Austria. That's perfect for me, because Austria will be my main opponent in taking those neutral SC's. This whole deal might still fall through of course, but it's better to have anti-Austrian talk in the air than anti-Turkish.

Gaspar unfortunately knows the importance of the Black Sea. He's saying he wants it to be a no military zone, but I'm pretty sure he's going to move that fleet right there no matter what. I could have lied to him and agreed on the DMZ, and then went in there. But I think I would have been bounced off by him. So I told him the truth that I won't take that risk and I let him know that I could have lied to him. That's to build trust with him. Imo it's better that we have an agreement on that than to both distrust eachother when we both try to stab eachother lol. I think Gaspar was a bit anti-Turkish at first, but seemed to warm after all the chatting. Atm the plan is for him to get Rumania which seems to be pretty normal for Russia and then working together against Austria. I hope we'll manage to work together despite the Black Sea issue. For now.

TT I'm a bit worried about. Obviously I know him from before from PBEM4. Normally, knowing people wouldn't be a problem, but the fact that we had bad blood between us - ironically - because he let out of game stuff heavily influence his gameplay, means that it'd be pretty damn stupid to trust him not to do that again. Regardless, I'm gonna SAY that I'm over it and I don't care about the past. But I'm gonna be extra careful with him. We planned some anti-Austrian moves. He'd get Greece and I'd get 2 of the 4 neutral SC's. That would not work. He also said he'd move his armies north to put pressure on Austria, which sounds great. That means he can't use the Lepanto opening I read about. Anyway, then he had a plan for us and Russia to work together against Austria. I'll have to look into that in detail..

Overall, good and fascinating stuff. My general plan with diplomacy is to be friendly with everyone. That does NOT mean being allied with everyone. When I'm against someone, I'll tell them I am, and that it's nothing personal and we could still work together if something comes up. Of course, I won't go shouting to everyone that I'm always open to stabs like Gaspar did in our chat Another reason not to DMZ Black Sea...

My moves will be:
Ankara Fleet to Black Sea
Constantinopole Army to Bulgaria
Smyrna Army to Constantinopole

Regardless of what I'm going to do after that. I still haven't talked to four other players, including Austria.

[Jowy]

Had a chat with Bobchillington (France). Just greetings so far, he's still reading the rules, looking at the situation etc. I hope I can get good info from someone over there so I know what's going on.

Chatted with Sciz (Austria) as well. He's only spoken to TT, but atm is planning to send a fleet and an army south as expected, and capture Serbia and Greece (as he should be able to unless I team up with somebody). He promised to support me to Rumania. Apparently he's scared of Russia, or atleast tells me so. If TT's attack north happens, then he should only get Serbia. I could then let Russia have Rumania and let him support me to Serbia. Leave Greece for TT I guess. Should be easy enough to capture from him later on. Or I could get Rumania for myself, build a fleet in Constantinopole and support myself to the Black Sea and be in a much stronger position. But that's only if I get supported to Rum. I would probably have to give Greece to Austria as a payment.

I have a question. Can armies support fleets, IE my army in Con support my fleet in Ank to the Black Sea? I'm pretty sure that's a no, but just confirming. But how about the other way around? If for example I have a fleet in the Black Sea, can I support my army from Bul to Rum with it?

[Sareln]

Had a chat with Bobchillington (France). Just greetings so far, he's still reading the rules, looking at the situation etc. I hope I can get good info from someone over there so I know what's going on.

Chatted with Sciz (Austria) as well. He's only spoken to TT, but atm is planning to send a fleet and an army south as expected, and capture Serbia and Greece (as he should be able to unless I team up with somebody). He promised to support me to Rumania. Apparently he's scared of Russia, or atleast tells me so. If TT's attack north happens, then he should only get Serbia. I could then let Russia have Rumania and let him support me to Serbia. Leave Greece for TT I guess. Should be easy enough to capture from him later on. Or I could get Rumania for myself, build a fleet in Constantinopole and support myself to the Black Sea and be in a much stronger position. But that's only if I get supported to Rum. I would probably have to give Greece to Austria as a payment.

I have a question. Can armies support fleets, IE my army in Con support my fleet in Ank to the Black Sea? I'm pretty sure that's a no, but just confirming. But how about the other way around? If for example I have a fleet in the Black Sea, can I support my army from Bul to Rum with it?

This is an illegal order: A Constantinople Supports F Ankara to Black Sea
This is a legal order: F Black Sea S A Bulgaria to Rumelia

As a general rule of thumb, a unit can only give support to hold or move on a province if the unit itself could move into that province. Eg. an Army in Constantinople cannot move into a sea space, and so cannot support moves/holds in those sea spaces.