Epic - Mad Padre's PBEM Diplomacy Game is over

There have been two games in my life thus far that I can call truly epic. The first was a double blind umpired game of Squad Leader I played back in my 20's. The second was the Diplomacy game set up and run by Michael - The Mad Padre that wound up this week: Diplomacy Game: Peace Breaks Out, We Have Winners.

That's my last army - withering away in the beer halls of Silesia

When Michael put the call out for interested players, I put my name in and drew Germany. I had played before but not since high school so naturally I went on line and read up on the best strategies to follow for this august and important nation.  Two main points came up: 1) you must ally with Austria or you both will die and 2) you have to talk to other players.  Armed with these words of wisdom, I sent a flurry of messages across the map even to Turkey but most importantly to Austria.  All was well at first, then after a couple turns, Austria went silent. Unfortunately the player had to withdraw. Life happens and I bear him or her no ill will but it left me in a bit of a pickle. I had antagonized Italy while I tried to defend a passive Austria, England was leaning hard on the Low Countries and Turkey was pushing hard for Vienna.

In retrospect, an alliance with Italy would have worked out well in the long run - he turned out to be an honourable player and good neighbour to the end. However, faced with no prospect of winning, I decided to focus on in no particular order 1) surviving and 2) making the game interesting for the rest of the players. So rather than keep the persona of a sober and solemn diplomat, I went with the bat-crap crazy but mostly harmless unfortunate street person down at the bus station that everyone leaves alone.

There were numerous conversations with a predatory Uncle England about the high failure rate of Royal Navy compasses. I may have accidentally on purpose misquoted different messages I received before sending them on to other parties and I thought I found an interpretation of the rules that would have allowed for a 3 or 4 way win with me holding the swing vote.  Most regrettably I was utterly wrong about that last bit.

However, the most epic bit of epicness was the all out charge against the forces of compass sabotaging Bolshevism. Figuring I was dead anyway, I headed east putting more pressure on the Czar than he really deserved. And England and France did nothing... So I kept going and they kept doing nothing. In the end I had to turn back and defend Munich and thus survived far, far longer than I had any right to expect.  In the Fall of 1906 mere moments before the outbreak of peace, my last army fell and the Kaiser went into well deserve exile in Canada.

A wonderful game and a wonderful experience.  Many many thanks to Michael and all the other players.

My one regret is now my inbox is regrettably lacking in content.