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HARLEQUIN RASBORA END-GAME STATEMENTS
GM:
Ally Bain [EGS]
Started: 5th August 2002
Finished: 17th June 2003 (Autumn 1906)
Result: England, France, Germany & Italy draw
| Country | Player | 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | Result | | Austria | Cies De Theije | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Eliminated | | England | Doug Livingstone | 5 | 6 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 8 | Draw | | France | Mark White | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | Draw | | Germany | Tal Lessner | 5 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 7 | Draw | | Italy | Jon Hucknall | 6 | 8 | 8 | 9 | 11 | 13 | Draw | | Russia | Owen Richards | 5 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 1 | Anarchy | | Turkey | Jason De Boer | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 2 | Survived |
AUSTRIA (Cies De Theije) Hi Ally,
Here they are, my EGS for Harlequin Rasbora. Thanks for GMing the game.
Austrian EGS Harlequin Rasbora
Being eliminated by the end of 1902 is even for Austria a record. There are games in which Austria went into anarchy in S02 and still had units on the board at the end of 1903. How did I get this record? And for those wondering, I did not do it on purpose. What went wrong?
Austria is considered by many as their least favourite country to play with. I am no exception to that. In the past I had always problems getting some kind of decent result with Austria. My intention was to change this in HR. To prepare me for the coming battle I spend some hours reading EGS of succesfull Austrian leaders and read some articles on Austrain strategy, in order to come out of all this reading with a good plan.
The problem was, I did not get such a plan. To me, it was still so confusing and complicated playing Austria. Time to write with the neighbours, when they are friendly towards me, something nicely might develop in the latter stages of the game. With Jon/Italy I had the best correspondence before the S01 and I decided to trust him. I was most worried about my Russian neighbour; Jason. And as the literature, statistics did not give me the idea that conventional Austrian openings are very succesfull, I tried for something not so common. Instead of opening to Ser I went for Rum.
The S01 adjucation. Italy had stabbed me and had moved into Tri. I also ended up in Gal, where I thought there would be a bounce.
What to do next? My situation was all but good. The one I thouhgt I could rely on stabbed me and my other two neighbours were not at all amused by what I had done in S01. Time for some damage control, but soon I realised that the damage I had created was too big to be controlled. The only thing I could do was trying to convince my neighbours (or at least one of them) not too attack me and even help me against the others. I knew that helping me and/or not attacking me was not in their best interest. But did they know it as well? Yes they did, so I was doomed to make a very early exit. I have learned a lesson and right after me elimination I joined another game as Austria and I have made it into 1904 and still in a position to stay a bit longer in that game.
CiesReturn to Top
ENGLAND (Doug Livingstone) Ally
Many thanks for GM'ing here is my EGS
England EGS
Well the Western triangle didn't prove much of a dilemma - I had played with Mark before - he doesn't communicate much and if you threaten him he threatens to proxy to your enemy. Tal did communicate well but not often due to other factors.
I went with Germany - attacked France - not very well. Made some progress, tried to stab Germany on a couple of occasions, but misordered and had to retract quickly.
Meanwhile Austria had suicided against Russia, leaving Italy to walk in the back door. Russia and Turkey didn't say very much at all, but Mark, Tal and I managed to settle our differences in time to stop Jon walking a solo. I am surprised Jon voted for the draw but maybe he was as bored with the game as everyone else seemed to be.
A dissapointing game!
Doug LivingstoneReturn to Top
FRANCE (Mark White) As France I faced the usual problem of trying to entice either England or Germany to work with me..I obviously failed. From the outset I was determined that the price of any deal would not be too high. I was therefore not prepared to make promises that I would not deliver on.
Clearly England and Germany very quickly avoided this problem and almost immediately I realised that I had been left out in the cold. I was particularly aggrieved by England's performance as Doug had assured me that he would not enter into an anti -French alliance with Germany. I had high hopes of working with England in the long run as we had played cooperatively prior to this game. At this point I became determined that whatever happened England would not win the game.
Luckily for me the Austrian collapse diverted Italy's energies Eastward and I was able to slow down the Anglo-German advance until Italy decided to support me in the Med. I was so grateful that I was tempted to let Italy order my units .however that never happened. I was mystified as to why Germany continued to work with England as he didn't seem to benefit from it.? Anyway finally got some points on the board..yippee
Cheers for the game
MarkReturn to Top
ITALY (Jon Hucknall) "Harlequin proved to be a very interesting game and one which for a time I thought I might just win, but in the end it wasn't to be. Congratulations to the others for making it good game, although it was a shame it finished with an anarchy and an NMR.
So where did it all go right? wrong? Im still not sure, it was the first time I had played Italy and was very aware of the need to address the Austrian issue very early on.Early exchanges with Cies were good and he was happy to move away towards Russia and the Balkans, I had decided that instead of honouring our agreement I would take advantage move in to Trieste. As it happened it worked out perfectly and I managed to move to six centres after A01.
At this stage the aim was to move through Austria as my French border seemed very solid, and to convince Russia to join the attack on Turkey. It was around this time that England attacked France and Mark offered me his units, whilst it seemed appropriate to turn down the offer at this time, had I accepted then I probably would have won.
Once Austria had gone the aim was to take out Turkey, initially this would need Russian help, although I think Owen never quite trusted my motives. In A05 I finally managed to manouvre the situation to ensure that I moved Russia out of the Balkans and into Turkey, so I followed him into the Balkans, Turkey was now open.
More confusing was the situation in the West, I never fully understood the relationship between Eng and Ger and found myself proping France up against the pair of them.
Disapointingly despite opening up Southern/Central Russia and being in a position to take Turkey, I could never get Ger and Eng to come to the sort of blows I would have needed to get the victory.
To sum it up it was a game that started at a frantic pace for me but one I could never quite force into the position i needed.
Thanks to Ally for his excellent GM'ing, Cies thank you for some great correspondance at the start and sorry for lying through my teeth the whole time. Mark, we worked together well never really coming to blows, even though the correspondance was "frustrating" in its brief manner. Jason, we never really spoke a great deal, but thanks for sticking with it. Owen was probably my biggest ally for a long time and it was a shame I had to move against you but thats the game. Doug, if only I could have convinced you to attack Germany or maybe joined in the attack against France with you!
Anyway thanks to you all and see you again in another game!
JonReturn to Top
TURKEY (Jason De Boer) Can't really remember much about this one so I'll be brief. My Turkey skills obviously need a lot of work as this counts as one survival on 1 centre and one survival on 2 centres - not an illustrious record!
Thought I'd start with a fairly aggressive anti-Russian opening, but a bounce in BLA curtailed any immediate thought of capturing Russian territory. Eventually, Russia and Italy and I banded together to see the back of Austria by 1902 - an excellent result. In retrospect, though, I probably should have made more of an effort to work with Austria - after a stab from Italy and Russia in 1903 and 1904 my only hope was for survival. Everyone stopped talking to me and I didn't really have much to say after about Spring 1905 as I was grimly holding on. With Russia slipping into Anarchy my survival was assured so I'm glad the draw was agreed.
Congratulations to all players who drew and especially Ally for prompt and reliable service.
JaseReturn to Top
GM (Ally Bain) Prior to explaining a situation, I enjoyed the game. Now back to the situation, which I feel Jon will dislike reading & perhaps the rest of you.
In S03, an EGP was mentioned. With the exemption of Jon, no other country voted. I’m aware that I wrote in the ‘press’ that failure to vote counts as ‘yes’ but as you know, I didn’t do that. It took me about half-hour to think of it through. As we know, it should have been given as an Italian win BUT the reason I didn’t was for a number of factors.
The first was one voted but five didn’t (obviously Austria was eliminated). In other games, I’ve often had three or four votes but not the full list but I do as the rules to state. Seeing one of out five seemed, to me, a big problem & I haven’t been in that situation. Together with that the game is a three-weeks & many orders arrived not long before the deadline. The reason being on that last comment, players often look at the maps without re-reading ‘press’. The very fact that I was doing A03, not longer in the game, I thought those many of you would be upset that the game has finished when it happened been played that long. Due to these factors I decided to say the voting was turned down.
The reason I now know I was wrong is in a discussion amongst GMs about the ruling. During the discussions I mentioned that I did in this game & two GMs wrote back & said they think I was wrong. Having read their e-mails, I’m afraid to say that I was wrong & that Jon should have won the game on that EGP. Jon, I’m VERY SORRY & will accept any complaints sent to TT about this.
Take care
AllyReturn to Top
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