Looking at the Liverpool death - something did break the england deadlock from the outside. the fleet in north sea. If they keep bouncing and the north sea fleet goes to London - London dies. I think Liverpool gambled that London would defend against this instead of just grabbing Liverpool and took action to escape the deadlock.
2:20:40 Black Sea diplo board when? Srsly, its a perfect circle of territories to spin around. Left side bounded by the sahara, ionian, adriatic, and centrla european mountain ranges. Right side of the board ends east of the caspain. Maybe even some kind of coffee-table diplomacy duel board that's literally just Ank Arm Sev Rum Bul Cons Black Sea. hahaha.
I'm really not sure whether that ending was fantastically anticlimactic or delightfully appropriate. I really wish that Italy had soloed; it would be fantastically poetic of Italy, the only player who didn't need to solo, and who was down to a single fleet trapped in Trieste, had managed to solo.
Is the Caspian a real space on this board? Seems like it might add to the fun if Moscow and Sev have a black sea equivalent to fight over, but it could also be stupid.
It isn't, although it might make for a fun variant! But I think Moscow would be super unlikely to build a fleet even so - there's just so much flexibility you'd give up by doing that.
In the last championship game you covered, I felt like I was watching the world's top geniuses. Every move they made was clearly brilliant and calculated. Here, I feel like I'm watching a group of aliens. Maybe I just can't comprehend the European mind, but every decision feels like it came out of left field. I don't think the tight game length helped. Instead of allowing top powers to seriously duke it out, everybody was quickly forced to pick a camp to throw their centers to as quickly as possible. The game was decided by 1904.
I think it definitely changed the dynamic a ton. There's always going to be a bit of a tug of war between trying to keep the leader down and trying to boost your own SC count, and I think in longer games that's a bit easier to handle, because you know you've got time to grow later - in an 08 game, if you focus the leader, are you sacrificing your own shot at victory because you've given up growth to do it? I think that calculation can sometimes lead to more confusing decisions (and less back-and-forth games). I do enjoy 08 games myself, but I do think this game was an example of one that would probably have been better with a longer time limit. Although huge respect to second place here for managing to make it as close as it was!
Watching over 2023/2024 all games I could. Reading 'how2s' and generally catching up to standards, its quite the trip. Enjoy your commented games very much. At some time i shall rejion active play, for real.
I must’ve watched like 40 hours of your videos since I learned of this channel from the valefisk analysis video and got hooked on diplomacy. I’ve since set up two games with family and friends that are currently in progress. The Imperial variant video and the media wars videos have been my favorite so far. I hope we get to see further sequels to those in particular.
That's awesome! The next Imperial video won't be for some months, because the next planned start is August - but Media Wars IV is underway right now so that will be much sooner!
@@DiploStratsThat’s awesome to hear! I’m excited for it. I think the thing that made the imperial variant and the media wars videos stand out was the inclusion of press. They were such great learning tools for the press aspect of the game.
hey diplostrats, a quick video idea I don't think has been done before: It would be interesting to see a full break down on the 1901 situation with Belgium from the perspective of every country on the board. I played a game recently where the eastern/southern powers took a very active role in trying to balance power in the west and attempted to arrange the outcome of the Belgian question. I like the idea of austria, italy, etc having a preferred outcome in who gets Belgium. just a thought. big fan of your videos!
I like this idea! Although I think it'd need to be focused on the western powers and *maybe* Russia/Italy. There are some games where the east gets involved in the decision, but I find that much more often they leave it to the west to decide - if you try to impose your will on the other side of the board very early, people can see you as more of a threat, so it doesn't happen as much.
I didn't explain this well in the video, but countback only affects the powers tied for the win. So if Russia is involved in the draw they'll win - but there can still be a tie all the way back to start if it's between other powers.
I havent watched it fully, but with a name like Fabian the russian player has to pull off some crazy, unconventional tactics that gets everyone confused. Its in his blood
1910 is actually a pretty recent thing! It's a bit of a compromise between the European style (07/08 end) and American style (12-15 end, or no fixed end). Euro style games are mainly like that to ensure a lot of rounds can be completed in a shorter timespan, and their scoring systems change a bit accordingly - every SC really matters in qualifiers! I think I prefer longer games for top boards, but these can be super exciting too. Shorter games are more often very close.
