In an old west gun fight,.....(Not OT)

[Verjigorm]

Spies and scrying devices are the most important units in an MP game. No single aggressive or defensive strategy will generally be so dominant as to be able to take down multiple adversaries. Knowing who is doing what and what they have is the best way to determine your opponent.

Selection based on opportunity and political value is generally a good way to go. Attacking the aggressive people is always good since if they've attacked multiple nations, they'll have no aid and may end up with multiple attacks. Aggressive posturing is usually the best bet. For a good part of the game you can only attack your neighbors, so that restricts your choice of targets to an obvious group.

Problems can occur with the quiet ones who stay in the background cooking up schemes. Generally speaking, quiet players have selected strategies which are powerful but take a while to concoct. It is important to try to figure out if anyone is doing something like this and then block it before they can bring it to fruition because once it goes down, they and their allies will generally have a big advantage.