This game was organized by Michael Kaczmarek and Robert Buki. I suspect that this game was sparked by some comments in the EMG Newsgroup ‘verbally’  sparring between myself and Rene “Older than Dirt and occasionally places” Bisson and the newer players such as Paulo Gomes and a few others. The one unusual feature of this game is that each capital has one extra squad/corps to the defense of the capital.

The placings were:

1st-Austria-Richard Woo 394%
2nd-France-Alex Paci 348%
3rd-Germany-Chris Kaye 310%
4th-Japan-Evgeny Rarov 290%
5th-China-Michal Kaczmarek 260%
6th-England-Rene Bisson 247%
7th-USA-Robert Buki -12%
8th-Russia-Rene terBraak  -17%
9th-Ottoman Empire-Tim Sjoberg -20%
10th-Spain/Portugal-Richard Foster  -21%
11th-Italy-Max Salmi  -23%

GD0313 gave "the Comeback Kids" a chance to reform. England (Rene "older than dirt and occasionally place" Bisson), France (Alex "faster than a Ferrari" Paci), Germany (Chris "no nickname yet" Kaye), and Austria (Richard "older than Rene Bisson and places more often" Woo). First coming together in a rather insane and rough start in GD0250, we figured that if we could band together from the beginning, we might be able to do a better job of taking the top four spots.

The first casualty of the game was Spain. Unfortunately Richard "Not Woo" Foster, forgot his DA's the first turn and being that you have most of the seasoned players of GD, he kind of signed his own death warrant. Alex and Rene agreed that Spain would be a mutual target for them to work on.  It was also agreed that Germany and Austria would move on Russia and that we would work with Ottoman Empire to do so, and when the time was right, we would then take on the Ottoman Empire.

France and I agreed that we would have a mutual defense pact against Italy. If Italy was to make an aggressive move against either one of us, the other would also DN Italy and attack him.

So with England/Germany/Austria/France in an alliance to the end, we figured we had a good chance to take on the world and win.
 
 
 
 

The early stages:

Around turn 3-4, Germany/Austria/Ottoman and eventually China and Japan in the eastern part of the realm are indeed besieging Russia. What can one say? Everyone loves a party! ;-)  Ottoman Empire has made some very big inroads and with co-operation from myself, we divide Russia’s territory. Ottoman takes Sevastapol (55) and most of Central Russia. England makes a landing in Norway/Sweden and Germany and I must discuss who will get into Moscow. The decision is Germany.

France is working over Spain/Portugal and Italy decides that this indeed the time to strike at France. He had DN’ed France and left our (Austria) common border unguarded. As per our agreement, Austria DN’s Italy and in a matter of four-five turns all of European Italy is firmly in the hands of Austria.  England/France/Germany clean up Italy in Africa. Sorry about that Max! ;-)

The middle stages

Turn 9 comes with France and Austria in position to strike at Ottoman, Germany has gone to war a round earlier and England is not quite positioned to join us, but will do so shortly after. Slowly French fleets have closed in through the Mediterranean to bottle up the Ottoman Fleet.
 
Turn 12 we begin our move against the Ottoman Empire. Tim’s been a good ally but I’ve run out of room to grow and I’d sorely love to grab a first place finish with Austria.  The campaign begins fairly quickly. In one turn, Austria has grabbed Greece(51), Bulgaria(52), and Sevestapol (55). Six sp’s and a total of  9 vp’s. Now the negotiations over Constantinople come heavily into play.

I have 6 sp’s surrounding the Ottoman Capital. I’ve captured Rome(34) from Italy, had a chance to take Moscow but acquiesced to Germany to take Moscow(56) and now am finding myself torn regarding giving up Constantinople(62).

The next turn Armenia (74) falls to the Austrian invasion and I have 8 sp’s to build with. One of the nice things with playing Austria is that because of the concentration of two point sp’s around the Black Sea, it makes it easier to make gains and to hold lands as your forces are by nature more concentrated.

The closing turns

Turn 14 sees Syria(66) fall into Austrian hands and Constantinople into French hands.  That turn almost ran differently. I had set my original orders in with support for French occupation of Constantinople but then re-sent orders for myself to take Constantinople to end the game and assure my first place finish. In the end the orders for support of France into Constantinople. (Yes Alex, it was that close!)

Turns 15 and 16 are  a series of  all of us trying to figure when the game will end. Scrabbling for the last few vp’s of Ottoman and in the end, Austria declaring war again China to end the game.

In the end, it was a great game with great players! I thank all those that participated in the first Relic’s game.
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