GB diplomacy.

[Revan]

I just tried the central power defensive warplans in order to takes things smoothly and avoid facing GB and blocus.

So, defensive plans, which is written that GB will go a random number AWAY from the Entente.

I finish my turn and....results...."Great Britain moves 10%....TO the Entente"

I take things nicely, thought i had just bad luck. I send a diplomat in GB, which is 91% Entente, hoping to delay their intervnetion for a few turns.

I finis my turns and....."Great Britain moves 10%....TO the Entente" "Great Britain join the Entente"...

So, what's the interest of defensive war plan if UK is at war almost as soon as if i took Schliffen Plan?

Is that double 10% swing to the Entente mandatory and unavoidable? Where are they come from?

[H Gilmer3]

I am playing a game as the WE, and I have to say I thought that choosing some plans would delay Great Britain and that concerned me. But, CP took the Moltke Plan and Great Britain still joined almost immediately. I don't know why, but it I wouldn't be a little annoyed if I was the CP and it happened like that.

[Revan]

It's said in the Moltke plan description that it will drag GB to Entente's side due to the aggressive nature of the plan. The plausability is still debatable (for example, in WW1 gold, if you choose the Moltke plan you could avoid or delay GB's intervention), but, well, it's a choice.

But in my case, it's clearly written in the Kronprinz plan descrption that choosing this plan will drag GB AWAY from the Entente due to the non-agressive nature of the plan, and I have a 10% swing for the Entente for each turn. I could be very unlucky, but at the moment i had the feeling that hoping to only delay GB's intervention is pure utopia.

[HerrDan]

Best chance for Germany is through Schlieffen Plan, even if it fails to capture Paris and destroy the french armies at least it gives Germany good positions from which to defend against the W.E and possibly advance later nach Paris. Moltke Plan gives a damn 10 NM to W.E and in the end Great Britain will join the W.E soon enough, so I can't think of a better possibility to win as the C.P.

I agree to a extent that the british would join the french sooner or later, but perhaps choosing another plan could delay it for at least some turns IMO, otherwise they are completelly worthless.

[H Gilmer3]

Oh. I'm sorry. I must have misread what the plan said.

[Revan]

My plan was to be essantially defensive, waiting for tanks and stormtroopers, and counting on my Superior industry (No blockade, so a full running war economy) to roll on the Entente.

I thought the advantage of Kronprinz plan was to dissuade a bit GB to jump in. Molkte without that is useless and Ruppercht was always useless.
Indeed if the advantage written in Kronprinz description is fals, so you are right and Schliffen is the only valid choice, but if it is like that, i feel the game is too railroaded.

[Shri]

KronPrinz gives -5NM to u and Moltke gives +10NM to the WE, so both are bad in that sense.
See, CP is going to lose some 30 odd NM in 1916, so you need to have a lot of NM at start; this is due to-
Kaiser Franz Joseph of Austria dying +
Czech Rebellion event etc.

[Revan]

I know, but i wanted to see if this games allows a chance to keep GB out of the war, obviously it's not the case.

I tried few games today, with the same plans : there are always this 10% shift of GB to the Entente, even if i'm (as CP) purely defensive and even if WE choose Plan XIX, which include war with Luxembourg (for them) and threatening Belgium. A move which in theroy would greatly anger GB, but then, they join the Entente. Not ver logical in my sense.

So i Wonder why there is this automatic 10% shift even with a battle plan which says precisely that it will appease GB

[fred zeppelin]

GB definitely seems more hard-coded to join the Entente than probably is best. As you say, they usually drift that way no matter what you do. GB neutrality should be rare but possible. I'm not sure it is possible as the moment.

I was a bit disappointed to discover that you can't do any diplomacy during the July turn in the Grand Campaign. I recognize that the main purpose is to provide the various war plan options. But it would have been nice to couple this with some diplomatic options. Otherwise, you're left with a largely hard-coded August turn diplomatically.

[bob.]

Yeah, I do however think that from a gameplay perspective this is good.
Great Britain is extremely powerful in the game. It seems to me that if you could keep Britain out of the war for some time, the East first strategy suddenly becomes very preferable to everything else.

That said, I think it would be great if there were some more decisions to make a la WW1 gold at the start of the war! An option to persuade Great Britain to wait it out at least for 1914 would be great. It would of course need a lot of downsides.

As an aside, what is so useless about the Rupprecht plan? Never tried it yet. On paper it seems OK to me though: it does mean you can strike very quickly against Italy once they join and the BEF has to arrive there first. Swiss infantry in mountanous terrain could be a problem sure, but it also means that the Germans can later defend very well there...

[Kensai]

It is a bug and it shall be corrected. Great Britain should join the WE immediately only with Schlieffen plan. With Moltke and Rupprecht it should join a little bit later (I guess late 1914, early 1915). With the much more defensive Kronprinz, GBR should actually be quite content and not mess unless actively persuaded by the other side.

In my opinion, GBR should get a boost to join the WE if a certain event meets its prerequisites: for example France losing certain cities (Reims, Nancy, etc) or a small nearby nation (Belgium, Luxembourg, Holland, Switzerland, etc) gets a declaration of war. Do you like this abstraction?

[bob.]

I think there should be one single event that IMMEDIATELY makes Great Britain join the war: if German ships are near the French, British or Belgian coast.

As far as I know, one very successful argument that pro-war British politicians used was this: "France trusts us so much, they have their whole navy in the Mediterranean because they are sure our navy will protect their Atlantic ports!"
So, if the Germans would really use their ships to take advantage of the French absence in the Atlantic, I can not imagine GB standing idly by.

So basically, I imagine Great Britain staying out of the war would be with a German assurance that they will not use their navy in the Atlantic (and thus Great Britain's "honour" regarding not protecting the French coast is intact).
Not as an explicit choice in the game, just by not using the German navy.

[Revan]

If i remeber correctly, in WW1 gold, any german warship in North sea or channel triggers an immediate britsh intervention, and i will be fine with that.

I'm also fine with an automatic britsh response in case of Schliffen, as well as a delayed one (i.e no boost for the Entente side, but as GB is pro-Entente in August 1914, there will be the 1% for the entente per turn) in case of Moltke plan and a likely neutrality in case of Kronprinz plan (no more Pro Entente).

Historically there were some demands from the Foreign Office to Berlin that Germany would - or not- guarentee French and Russian frontier. Basically, Kronprinz plan is a big YES to these demands.

[The Lev]

It is a bug and it shall be corrected. Great Britain should join the WE immediately only with Schlieffen plan. With Moltke and Rupprecht it should join a little bit later (I guess late 1914, early 1915). With the much more defensive Kronprinz, GBR should actually be quite content and not mess unless actively persuaded by the other side.

In my opinion, GBR should get a boost to join the WE if a certain event meets its prerequisites: for example France losing certain cities (Reims, Nancy, etc) or a small nearby nation (Belgium, Luxembourg, Holland, Switzerland, etc) gets a declaration of war. Do you like this abstraction?

Sounds good, The possibility of some sort of event locking the high Seas Fleet (Apart from the Baltic fleet) as an added inscentive for Britain to stay out seems pheasable-although that one should come at a fair NM cost, building all that fleet for nothing would hurt. That or having the French and British coasts (outside of the Med) blocked, effectively limiting the war to the Baltic, Mediterranean and scattered operations abroad. Although if the Channel Ports or area around Paris is threatened-not to mention Belgian neutrality infringed, Britain might as well go straight for the warpath to the WE

[HidekiTojo]

If the United States got dragged into the war I imagine that Great Britain would as well.

The one exception to this is clearly the Kronprinz plan. With a minority government under "Squiffy" Asquith I find it extremely unlikely that the hawks could have carried the day when France and Russia would have very clearly been the agressors especially against Germany.

Very hard to justify dog piling on Germany when they're not the ones who started the war.

Take into account that "Squiffy"s government, being a very rare minority government, was cautious in almost every area so as to avoid losing the house, a momentous decision such as a declaration of war without a clear reason to rally the public would be most probably an unacceptable risk.