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trw2264 -> RE: CleverDevils2 AAR (2/13/2008 1:33:51 AM)
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It has been interesting reading the back and forth commentaries about the game and the cookie-cutter strategies that some are presenting. What seems to have gotten lost is that there are humans behind the game countries and that risk is associated with all that is done and negotiated and what might be the medium term plan of the country involved.
Being Spain, it could be argued that I should have not attacked Portugal, but it was a risk. Spain went after Portugal for a particular reason. Yes, most of Portugal’s fleet was destroyed on a suicide run by GB, but what if GB had not received control of Portugal? Again, there is risk involved and Portugal’s fleet in now useless for the short-term in regards to Spain, British and/or French use. Is that good or bad? Only Spain, GB and France know what their plans are and they will not be shared in this forum.
This is a game and every human brings a strategy to the table and, more than likely that strategy will change as the game progresses. If this game had a set strategy that all the players should follow then there would not be much of a need for the diplomacy part of it. Instead we have Prussia that broke a mold that said that Prussia should not DoW on France, especially by himself. Perhaps Prussia knows something that none of us know. Perhaps Austria and Russia failed on their backing of Prussia after the game had started, but Prussia tried to gather allies by forcing Austria and Russia out of their comfort zone and dealing with France earlier than most games do. Again, it was a risk. I am sure that Prussia knew what the risks were and how he planned to react to various situations. Now that Prussia and France have mended their ways, Prussia has an open ticket to question Russian and Austrian allegiance. Perhaps Prussia is now in France’s camp and Prussia might turn its eyes to Russia and Austria to form Poland because you never know what the condition of Austria and/or Russia might be in after France gets done with them that could afford Prussia an opportunity. Maybe I am just feeding information to make Austria and Russia paranoid. You just never know. I, for one, am very interested in seeing what Prussia will do in the next 24 months.
As Spain I might be a bit more worried now because France might be in a different place to do its cycle of countries to get political points from or does the loss of Portugal’s fleet put Spain in a position to better negotiate with GB or France because there are less ships available from 3rd parties, thus affording Spain a better negotiating position? Perhaps the Spanish player is just a knucklehead and squandered the Portuguese navy? Maybe Spain had no interest in Portugal’s navy at all, but was looking at Portugal’s land forces instead for something in the future. I vote that the Spanish player was just a knucklehead and bet the farm on GB not getting Portugal and not suiciding Portugal’s fleet and now the Spanish player is doomed for not hedging his risk and he should just throw in the towel now, because a cookie-cutter idea was not used.
Who knows, perhaps this forum is full of disinformation from the various players. Remember we are still playing the game. Perhaps, being underestimated is an advantage. This is not a quantitative game, but a qualitative game. I am sure that this post can and might be flamed, but those individuals will be acting in ignorance because they do not see both sides of what information the player is being fed and the information that the player is feeding to others.
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