PTWDG AAR (After Action Review)

[GhengisFarbâ„¢]

I figure we've ALL been looking forward to an AAR (After Action Review for you civilians, where military types review the good, bad, and the what the f after a military action)

Not sure if the game is over but from the sounds of it, it almost is.

Any discussion of the game?

Icebreakers:

1) ND and GoW were allied for a shared victory from almost the beginning of the game.

2) Roleplay has to have the WORST diplomacy of strategic history.

Continue with your own comments.

[UnOrthOdOx]

No, it wasn't a shared victory, it was a "we'll have a big war between us at the end" alliance.

At least, as it was presented way back when.

And from my perspective:

Diplomacy with GS was far worse than with RP. It was practically like pulling teeth. At least at the beginning. I think Theseus and MZ worked well together. After I believe GS relaxed some of their wierd philosophies of waiting 2 weeks to decide anything.

[Master Zen]

The GoW and ND alliance to win the game was signed in 1030 AD as the buildup to the Lego War began.

We informally contemplated such a thing one more than one occasion in the past but never really did anything about it. When the prospect of sending 90% of our army to fight overseas arose, we knew we had to do something to ensure that ND did not backstab us, hence the deal was signed.

The deal also has a lot to do with Darekill taking over the reigns of ND after Zayxus' term. While Zayxus was leader of ND, our relations were good but very paranoid. In fact, ND spent alot of the post-Bobian war time building up forces and even on one occasion held the turn when they saw a huge stack of GoW units near Killdaria.

Darekill was far more open to the idea of a shared victory, and the agreement was signed without much trouble.

[Master Zen]

And GS does not stand for "generally sucks" and if that was a troll, it was in very poor taste.

GS diplomacy up until the Bobian War was, IMHO, quite deficient. We felt like we were dealing with a team which looked at the game as if they were playing a SP game rather than looking at the far more complex human strategies of MP. After the war a lot of the leadership changed and things became different, GS became more open and cordial and in general, I can say they were a pleasure to deal with, particularly Cort Haus and DeepO with which I had 90% of my diplomatic dealings with.

A big to both of them.

As I mentioned in the GoN thread, I was very surprised why GS never openly courted GoW to establish an alliance against ND when it became obvious that ND was turning into a massive powerhouse even greater than Lego. I think part of GS's success in this game was that their aggressiveness more than compensated their territorial limitations. They were not afraid to do things that looked far beyond the means of what they were capable of (like attack Lego). The post-Lego War cautiousness frankly astounded me, particularly in regards to said alliance with us, as well as being so hesitant to colonize the Uranium in Lego which was clearly on their side.

[Master Zen]

Regarding RP, suffice to say that when this game started we thought ND was going to be our prime target since they were closest and were expanding rapidly.

Then came the "Writing" incident (I have no clue what that was) and the scounting incident when RP demanded that we stop scounting land that they claimed. That pissed GoW off so much (particularly since they never restricted themselves) that we decided to ally with ND instead. Plans to destroy RP were drawn up even before I joined GoW and the rest is history.

Moral of the story: piss someone off, they'll get revenge.

[Hot_Enamel]

Games not over yet.

I dont trust GS or the RNG.
Next turn, all our uranium will probably pop over to their territory.

[Hot_Enamel]

Originally posted by Master Zen
Then came the "Writing" incident (I have no clue what that was) and the scounting incident when RP demanded that we stop scounting land that they claimed. That pissed GoW off so much (particularly since they never restricted themselves) that we decided to ally with ND instead. Plans to destroy RP were drawn up even before I joined GoW and the rest is history.

Moral of the story: piss someone off, they'll get revenge.

"Writing incidient" was that RP wouldnt trade it to us until our scouting warrior was well out of their claimed (unpopulated) territory.
That left GoW with nothing to study for 5-6 turns.

Plus there was confusion about if we even had a deal or not.

[Master Zen]

Talk about a decision that cost them the game...

I seriously don't understand why a team would "claim" land that they didn't possess and have the nerve of threatening any other nation that scouted it. I agree that has to be one of the most stupid decisions in the history of demogamedom. Probably the worst decision in the story of this game at least.

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Hot_Enamel
Games not over yet.

I dont trust GS or the RNG.
Next turn, all our uranium will probably pop over to their territory.

Big deal, we have enough Nukes in reserve to last us a lifetime

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Master Zen
Talk about a decision that cost them the game...

I seriously don't understand why a team would "claim" land that they didn't possess and have the nerve of threatening any other nation that scouted it. I agree that has to be one of the most stupid decisions in the history of demogamedom. Probably the worst decision in the story of this game at least.

I would be the last to defend RP's diplomatic style, but it's only the demogames we have played that taught us demands and claims of this sort inevitably lead to serious repercussions (or generally, that "bullies" are the first to go). Saying RP's decision was stupid is too harsh. It was wrong and they paid for it. We all learnt from what happened to RP and why.

I can imagine that in a regular MP (non-demo) game, I could make such claims against my scouting neighbour and even get away with it. They are not "impossible to justify" from my PoV - any invader not knowing lands he is attacking is at a disadvantage. RP knew or assumed those lands would eventually be settled by Spanish cities and tried to keep their geography secret. It turned out to be a futile effort that cost them the game. But's let's be fair and keep in mind we are speaking quite some hindsight here.

[Master Zen]

I agree vond.

Part of what I find amazing in this game compared to all others is that all of us started with no friggin clue on what was the best strategy to pursue, how to best deal with other civs, etc. In short, we were all n00bs, trying to win but nobody with any clue on exactly how to.

Still, there's one piece of logic that I cling to not only in demogames but in real life. Don't demand of others what you would not be capable of doing yourself. I'm sure RP would have liked to have the liberty of scouting all through Bob (and from the screenshots i've seen, they apparently did) so it takes a lot of nerve to demand to another team what you would not be willing to give up yourself. I guess that's what pissed my team off so much, not just the fact they didn't want us to explore their land, but the fact that they didn't want that, yet considered it their right to explore ours. Assuming such a strategy would not generate grudges and repercussions isn't wrong, it's stupid.

[bischop]

Hi everybody

One point of my short history is not mentioned now
the war of nd against rp and the fact nd claims the uran in legoland!
about these both facts we had big discussions with mz and the just told us that would mean war and gow´s army is not strong enough in legoland to protect us. But we thought it is the right time to show the world how strong nd has become.

[Darekill]

Please... can we do the AAR after the action?

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Darekill
Please... can we do the AAR after the action?

DeepO

[Beta]

Originally posted by Master Zen
I agree vond.

Part of what I find amazing in this game compared to all others is that all of us started with no friggin clue on what was the best strategy to pursue, how to best deal with other civs, etc. In short, we were all n00bs, trying to win but nobody with any clue on exactly how to.

Vox Controli would agree with that last statement.