WebDiplomacy Quiz by rokakoma: #9: Assuming Austria, Italy, France and Turkey can perfectly cooperate, how can Germany get Portugal by autumn without ANY risk of losing any other (namely: Spain, Marseilles, Brest or Paris) SC?

difficulty: advanced, 100% secure solution is possible. (this is a hard one); phase to come: Spring, 1911

The solution:

It's obvious Austria will take Piedmont.
Also obvious Burgundy can dislodge Gascony, which in case moves to Brest, then can easily be dislodged again from Paris+Picardy (Belgium->Pic)
The real problem arises if Gulf of Lyons + Gascony can cooperate. They can double attack both Spain and Marseilles, which seems rather difficult to protect both, especially by autumn here's why:

Assuming the worst case:
France retreats to Brest
Turkey takes Western Med and Austria is in Piedmont.

By autumn, it means, Brest can take away support from Gascony (holding Spain or Mars). Western can take away support from Spain (holding Mars). Also, Burgundy (not Paris) must take Gascony this spring, because Brest (after retreat) could attack (the empty) Paris otherwise. So Piedmont+Gulf of Lyons can take Marseilles by autumn as neither Gascony nor Spain can hold it. Therefore, Munich must come down to Burgundy, to hold Marseilles. It's solved. Well, it isn't!

This could be viable, BUT:
If Turkey takes western from Tyrr (which retreats to Mid-Atlantic), Ionian->Tunis and Tunis->North Africa then by autumn, Brest takes away support from Gascony, North Africa from Mid-Atlantic, Piedmont from Marseilles, resulting Turkey can take Spain, and empty Tunis, so Italy survives in exchange. This would suggest Western-Med should move to North Africa, which is not good either for two reasons:
(1) - if it succeeds Turkey can take Spain again.
(2) - if it bounces, Germany can hold Spain from mid-Atlantic (after retreat, again), but then which unit will get Portugal, what the goal is in the first place? Actually in this case it's possible to take Portugal and protect Spain, see later in (iii), but this is not a 100% solution, as bouncing in North Africa is 50% at best.

So what should Western Med do?
a) it can be held by Spain, which might fail if a triple attack occurs, leading to (2). This also jeopardizes losing Marseilles as early as spring.
b) it can go to North Africa (not good, already stated)
c) it can attack Gulf of Lyons: this might be good, it protects both Spain and Marseilles (by taking away possible supports), but after getting dislodged we are back to (2)
d) attack Gulf of lyons with support from Spain: if it succeeds, it's good, but in case Gascony attacks Spain, it will fail, meaning we are back at (2) again.

All in all, the question is really down to what should Western Mediterranean do?

So it seems, Western med can move to 5 places (GoL,Tyrr,Tunis,NorthA,MidAtl) or hold, all of them will eventually lead to risking losing Spain or not getting Portugal.

Yet the solution is moving to the 6th possible territory. Spain(!). Yes, Western mediterranian will have to attack his own unit, Spain! And not just attack it, but Marseilles MUST actually support it! :)
And Spain will attack Gulf of Lyons. Let's see why:

Burgundy attacking Gascony and Spain attacking GoL takes away every possible support against Marseilles, therefore saving it.
Gascony can't support an attack against Spain either, since it will be taken away.
If GoL supports Gasc->Spain it will bounce with Western->Spain which is also a double attack (support can't be taken away from Marseilles in this case)

This soluton saves both Marseilles and Spain with the difference it also might save western mediterranean.
- (i) if Spain gets to Gulf of Lyons then Western gets to Spain meaning, that unit can move to Portugal 1 round later and since Spain is only attackable from Western, GoL can protect it.
- (ii) if western is saved by taking away support against him, then Spain moves to Portugal and Western->Spain.
- (iii) if Tunis takes Western, it retreats to mid-Atlantic and Spain takes Portugal, Mid-Atlantic supports Gascony->Spain which defends Spain. (since no-one can take away support from mid-atlantic, only western, but then Gascony saves Spain alone.)
- (iv) Finally! this solution let's Western to retreat to Mid-Atlantic, because it's 100% sure italy doesn't move to north Africa. Because if he moves, western is either saved (ii) since no triple attack occurs, or Spain gets into GoL leading to (i).

This solution gives a 100% security for Germany to secure Portugal without posing ANY risk of losing another SC. SplitDiplomat checked my analysis, and we couldn't find any other solution at all. His first idea was both Spain and Western attack Gulf of Lyons, but that's not 100% either. I leave it to you to figure out, why not ;).