Italian End of Game Statement
Kirk Peterson Played Italy
This was my first email game and, for the first few turns, I really enjoyed having so much time to think about tactics. I setup my board at home and walked through various combinations. I also had time to read various web pages on Diplomacy openings and strategies. This is definitely a great exercise for beginners.
France, Germany, and I started talking about a three way alliance immediately. We had all met and played together a couple times in real-life, so we thought we could make it work. The rough plan was for France to go after England, Germany to split forces between England and Russia, and for me to... well, try to hold off Austria and Turkey. The plan obviously wasn't perfect but I figured I could get help from my allies.
Since I didn't see myself making any big gains against Austria and Turkey with the units I had, Germany and I decided to use one of my armies to help move on Russia. I ended up capturing Warsaw in Fall of '03, which was sooner than expected.
Deciding what to do with my unit in Warsaw was a turning point. I was thinking it would be best to fall back to Galicia and move on Austria but I let Germany talk me into helping him take out Russia.
In Fall of '05, Germany took Moscow from me. I suspected that it might happen but was hoping that Turkey would try for it too and the unit would be beleaguered. Germany claimed he was thinking the same thing, but I knew he would've told me before if it weren't malicious.
So I decided to retreat to Livonia and pull a different unit during the adjustments phase. This was probably a mistake. I wanted to get back at Germany but couldn't seem to convince Austria or Turkey to use my support to take Moscow.
With my enthusiam waning and having pulled the unit I would need to protect my territory, I started thinking of interesting ways to distribute my centers. Austria took his home centers via force, I suggested France take Tunis to help against Germany, and I thought giving Rome and Naples to Turkey might do interesting things to his relationship with Austria...
Kirk