The UK Gambit aka 1914 Diplomacy to keep Britain out

[katanatan]

Hello, in a recent game i tried to keep britain out of the war as long as possible during an east first strategy as germany.
Key stats
Campaign date: 27 March 1915 (Turn 19)
Britain at 99%
Diplomacy (into britain) invested Ger: 1350, Aus 600, Tur 450. Fra 150. So 2400 MPP vs 150 MPP spent to keep britain out till march 27th 1915.
In the end there was up to a 60% chance till now but britain got one of its prepare for war moves pumping them to 99%.
Total diplo swings 4 times: 7%,5%,5%,4% were the swings.


Research
invested: Bri 1305, Fra 325, Ru 550, Ger 1385 (Of which 900 only during the last 2 turns), Aus 765, tur 340.
So 2180 vs 2490/1590.

Since the western front is quite the stalemate yet before artillery british units could have achieved little in the west. The time enabled the ottomans to assemble an upcoming suez offensive (arguably a UK player with a decent defense aswell). Germany is only halfway to trenchlevel 1 since selling research chits and spending ALL on diplo crippled its tech. The russian player retreated from novogeorgievsk and warsaw turn 13 without stationing troops there.
My opponent is i believe not so good.
The MPP losses for each relevant nation are so far
Fra:3149, Rus 6577, Ser 1983 (holding uskub falling next turn)
Ger: 4617, Aus 2776, Tur 566

I sunk as germany which 1400 MPP in the beginning costing UK mostly a couple % MPP and UK units would most likely not done anything major in serbia or arabia. This will likely prevent any german artillery snowball that could have inflicted unsustainable losses in a normal game. This was against a rather light opponent (no offense).

I am very uncertain, this strategy might seem like an exploit but it is super expensive, UK gets MPP anyways and sometimes the 15% swing which will make them enter automatically in spring 1915.
Any opinion/analysis? Is it a fail? Consider in the losses please, that some for the entente are because the enemy refused to move anything last 2 turns and just called for a rematch (despite UK now being at 99% entering next turn and UK not being able to do much at the west anyways (ignoring sending units to russia)). He quit another match before in spring 1915 which i dislike because he lose 6 naval ships near kiel as Uk (2 predreadnaughts and 4 lc/dd, nothing too major imo).

[mdsmall]

Hi - that is a completely new gambit and a good demonstration of the scope for lateral thinking that exists in this game. However, it is hard to imagine that sinking that many German MPPs into buying expensive major power diplomacy chits to at the start of the game is a good investment. Germany's relative tech lead in 1914-15 is one of their more important assets; while the UK does not really make itself felt militarily until mid-1915 when it can start to deploy a number of new army corps in France or Egypt. I don't really see the strategic benefit to the Central Powers of keeping the UK out of the war until the spring of 1915.

Michael

[katanatan]

Hi - that is a completely new gambit and a good demonstration of the scope for lateral thinking that exists in this game. However, it is hard to imagine that sinking that many German MPPs into buying expensive major power diplomacy chits to at the start of the game is a good investment. Germany's relative tech lead in 1914-15 is one of their more important assets; while the UK does not really make itself felt militarily until mid-1915 when it can start to deploy a number of new army corps in France or Egypt. I don't really see the strategic benefit to the Central Powers of keeping the UK out of the war until the spring of 1915.

Michael

[/quote]

Hello, i wholeheartily agree. If it would go on till say 1916 (while britain still gains all the 80% MPP it gets pre entering the war) it could be worth it and it definetely hits russia a bit by denying convoys to it.

You layed out the reasons, why this approach is bad, do you have an idea how bad it is? Like how bad it feels, say MPP wise or NM? Is it as bad as loosing 5 additional corps in the west or having serbia still holding all hexes and belgrade in 1916 or loosing konigsberg posen and graudenz to lone russian cavalry in 1914. I dont know how much i shot myself in the foot here, i just know i did.

Diplomacy affecting minor nations seems trivial but the other gambit (besides belgium aka open west xD and montenegro which i never did) i want to try is attacking italy first. I will likely make a forum post in couple weeks or months. If one goes esrbia/east first one has enough german corps to attack italy while having a small front int france and holding russia at bay. Italian corps and HQs are abysmal and while italy doesnt count into the normal german win condition of having 2 majors capitulated its drop out of the war would give huge MPP boosts and a decent NM debuff to the western powers at least. Feel free to comment on any of the above

[mdsmall]

I would say that the only reason to invest that much in diplomacy to delay Britain's entry into the war is if it enables Germany to defeat France and capture Paris in the first few months of 1915. That is much harder to do if Germany has to attack through France avoiding Belgium and it is impossible until Germany gets artillery weapons 1 - which will not happen until about May/June 1915. And that is completely impossible if all their MPPs are going into diplomacy. It's a fun what-if to try against the AI but it is a guaranteed losing strategy against a human player.

I would say the same about concentrating too much force in the first half of the game to take out Italy. I have enjoyed defeating the Italians with AH forces once Serbia is crushed and the Russians are pushed back far enough not to threaten Galicia. But as an early game strategy, it seems like a losing one to me in a competitive game against a human opponent.

But hey, give it a try and report back here what happens! That's the point of war-games is to explore alternatives and there are lots of them in SC World War One. And don't discount the value of diplomacy against minors. When things seize up on the battlefield, you can sometimes outflank your opponent by swinging a conveniently placed minor to your side using diplomacy chits.