And of course, you didn't dodge the torpedo because you were not expecting him to stab you in the back like that.
A number of years ago, I spent quite a bit of time playing one of the strategy games online. I learned then that BSing (backstabbing) is great fun among our impressionable young. We would all form these alliances and build this excellent camaraderie. When our enemies had been defeated, the game was supposed to automatically end. But they wouldn't. That's because one of our crew would have switched sides at the 59th minute of the 11th hour. But we wouldn't know who it was. Sometimes, more than one person would go turncoat.
So picture this:
You just won the war and everyone is congratulating everyone else. Good job guys. (Of course, you could only communicate in chat at that time.) Kudos all around but the game doesn't end. You need for it to end so you can gather up your badly needed points for better positions in future games. Everyone realizes that at least one person has switched sides. We wait and we wait. No one makes a move. People begin to accuse each other and everyone denies their treachery. We can basically see which player is the strongest, meaning he survived the war with the least damage. So it may be him but we can also see who is the weakest. It is almost always guaranteed that the weakest player is not the turncoat because you have to be strong in order to find success in your treachery. After all, the traitor is about to declare war on all the guys who just WON. It's a dicey move. The only advantage is surprise and so, suddenly (and usually) the weakest player is attacked. If the non-traitors can rally fast enough, the turncoat will be defeated. But if not, the turn coat can often wipe the map clean and gain ALL bonus points. The surprise attack will most often carry the momentum needed to win.
While I can see the "fun" in it, I can also say that I never liked it because any game could run for several hours. In almost every case, I just wanted to quit and take a break from gaming for a while. I also wanted the points I had honestly earned and I didn't want to develop a reputation of being a dishonest player. People would not want to play with me in future games. I finally was able to solve the problem by playing with my cousin. We would set up two computers in the same room so that we didn't have to communicate through chat. We could just talk to each other. Then we would be on the same side online and it worked very well. Anyone that betrayed us had to take us BOTH on.
Now, in retrospect, I remember is quite a lot of fun.
