Ah Russia....Moscow is one of those centers that are neglected for most of the game. There are really only two times when you find yourself thinking about it very intently. The first is in Spring 1901, and the second is when someone is trying to creep across the stalemate line toward the end of the game. In the early and mid game, nobody thinks about Moscow much. You don’t generally build anything there. You’re not worried about protecting it until you’ve already lost one of the centers around it. But it’s actually extremely important. It’s a lynchpin of sorts. Spring time in MoscowWhat Russia does with army Moscow on her first move speaks volumes about what Russia’s going to do. You don’t learn much form what Sevastopol does. You learn nothing from what St. Petersburg does. And even Warsaw, which clearly has options, is more supplementing Moscow's move than anything else. So how should you open with Moscow? That’s always the hardest decision with Russia. With Warsaw and Sevastopol it’s just the eternal question “to bounce or not to bounce?” With Moscow though, you set your course for the first couple years. The most popular opening is probably to Ukraine. There’s nothing wrong with this. It’s safe and conservative. It doesn’t offend your neighbors much, and puts pressure on Rumania. One of the great problems with Russia is that that although you start with that fourth unit, you probably stand the greatest chance of the 7 powers of not getting a build in 1901. Moving Moscow to Ukraine is many players approach to that problem. Put the weight on Rumania, and make sure you get that build. And if you’re thinking of attacking Austria, then send that army from Ukraine to Rumania in the fall with the fleet supporting it. There’s nothing wrong with that option, but as you’ve probably gathered from my tone, it’s not my favorite choice. So what about Sevastopol? Yuck. I don’t often like opening to Sevastopol. If you’re fleet is opening to the Black Sea then you stand a tremendous chance of having both units bounce. You need Moscow to be somewhere where it can do you some good after that first move. You really don’t want it getting stuck in place. Unless you’re very sure that Turkey is moving Ankara -> Constantinople, I wouldn’t waste my time bringing that unit South. On the other hand, if you CAN set up Turkey to go west, then this is worth thinking about. If you see me with an army in Sevastopol, there’s a good chance it’s going to Armenia in the fall. If you get in, Turkey’s heading for the bar early, cause it’ll take 3 of his four units in spring 1902 to defend Smyrna and Ankara, and that’s probably more temptation to take Bulgaria than Austria will be able to withstand. Moving to the west, we’ve got Warsaw and Livonia as options. I don’t think either of these is very attractive. Unless you’re planning to throw everything you have at Germany, it’s hard to imagine why you’d open to Warsaw. Opening War -> Pru and then Pru S War -> Sil puts you in a great position to, um….have two units next to Germany right before he builds. Usually not what we’re looking for. Sending one unit at Germany (that would be Warsaw) is almost as disruptive as two It takes Germany two defending units to be sure of defending Berlin and Munich anyway, so having that extra Russia units showing up a turn late just doesn’t help very much. As for opening to Livonia, while there are some intriguing options, it probably isn’t a sound a plan as some make it out to be. Where will you go from Livonia in the fall? If you’re going to Prussia, you’d probably be better off going there in the Spring from Warsaw. The suggestion of convoying to Sweden comes up every now and then. But the fact of the matter is, you’d usually rather have a fleet in Sweden than an army anyway, and if you’d worried about Germany bouncing you out of Sweden (which you probably are 75% of the time); you’d rather only have one unit sitting doing nothing in the fall than have two. Besides, you can convoy there from my preferred opening… St. Petersburg. I open Moscow to St. Pete probably more than half the time. From there you’ve got two good options in the fall. In the games where England does well, he usually ends up in St. Petersburg eventually. Clearly this is not in Russia’s interest. A good friend of mine said of playing England that “I always go after Russia eventually”. If this sentiment is true of very many English players, then the Russians should really consider returning the favor. Certainly having a unit next to Norway gives Russia some leverage they wouldn’t have otherwise. But that being said, a lot of the time England will have two fleets next to Norway himself (making your chances of depriving England of that build less), and besides, just because England is a concern for Russia, doesn’t mean that you necessarily want to go attacking him in 1901. In fact despite the fact that I open North regularly, I can’t actually remember the last I ended up going St. Pete -> Norway. If Russia is going to be strong in the North, what she needs more than position is a friend. As with most (and maybe all) of the power relationships in Diplomacy, the board doesn’t dictate who your friends are. Russia needs to quickly get one of these two on board against the other. By opening North, you can offer more to both England and Germany than you can if you open South. You go from being “concern for later in the game” to someone who affects their lives right now. But back to where to go from St. Pete. As I believe one of the other articles in this issue is telling us, Germany seems to bounce Russia out of Sweden way too often. If this is that you think is going to happen, you’ll probably be a lot happier going to Finland. Now, you’ve got two units on Sweden, and if you build in St. Pete, then you’ve also got two on Norway as well. This of course is the other reason that moving to Finland is, in my opinion, usually the better move. Unless you’re getting clobbered in the South, you’ll want to build in St. Pete, and moving to Norway usually means bouncing. It’s been said that Russia has to win one front with units and one front with diplomacy. I think this is certainly true to an extent. Most people try to deal with this by sending three units South – and trying to win the Southern front with force – and leave only the lone fleet in the North, and cross their fingers that neither England nor Germany will come after their Northern front. Splitting your forces, so the conventional wisdom goes, makes you weak on both fronts. But in fact Russia really has to win both fronts with diplomacy, and the units are secondary. If Russia has an ally in the South in the early years, she can get by with two units. Any by having two or three in the North, she has the option of actually participating in events when Germany and England eventually come into conflict. The Russian WinterAs mentioned, the other time Moscow comes into play is in the end game. For 5 of the great powers – Italy, Austria, Turkey, Germany, and England – Moscow, along with Warsaw, Munich, and Tunis are usually that proverbial 18th center. As soon you get a whiff that either yourself or another player are thinking about 18, you need to take a long hard look at how Moscow can be defended. This is a little less true for England and Germany, since Moscow is easier to defend from the North than from the South, but it can be done from either side if you’re prepared. On several occasions I’ve seen Southern powers especially – Italy, Austria, and Turkey – take Warsaw and Moscow for granted. Often players will try to get 16 centers elsewhere, and then try to come back to Russia to put them over the top. This isn’t very difficult for England and Germany (and Russia, if she’s still alive) to defend, if they realize what’s going on early. Moscow – even more than the other centers I've mentioned – is one of a relatively small number of centers that you can relatively easily defend from both sides of the stalemate line. There are a number of excellent articles on stalemate lines, and I won’t get into describing the details, but if you're interested they are indexed here. The nice thing about Russia’s position straddling the stalemate line though, is that if she is always conscious of her ally’s position, she can actually risk letting her ally get pretty big, and know that she can fall back to a defendable position that preserves at least some of her centers. This is one of the reasons I enjoy playing Russia. During the mid game, you can take what some might consider to be unreasonable risks, and know that you have a defensible position you can fall back to, as long as you have friends one side of you. This is especially true if you've opened and developed in the North. Russia can get away with pressing forward in the North, leaving defense of the South to her Turkish or Austrian ally, and as long as you keep a few units reasonably close to the stalemate line, you can fall back and defend if you ally gets it in their head that they can stab you and go for the win. Hopefully, this fact can impress upon your ally the ultimate futility of the stab, and they won't go for it at all.
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