demonterico
Posts: 292
Joined: 10/16/2002 From: Seattle WA Status: offline
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Alot of excellent advice here. But as I have noted for my last 30 years as a gamer,(boardgames, miniatures, and PC) most wargamers tend to under rate Spain. Spain has always been my favorite Napoleonic country. Remember first which country actually won the Napoleonic Wars, Great Britain, the leading naval power. In EinA Spain is the second largest naval power. I tend to think thats a good position to be in. For example if the British fleet is defeated Spain moves to the top of that list. Don't forget minor fleets; Portugal of course, and possibly Sicily, the Dutch, and with French help even Denmark. Of course its unlikely that all the minor fleets will be acquired, that would be suicide for the British if they allowed the Spanish to do that, but if Spain can acquirer just two minor fleets that will provide enough ships to raise the value of Spanish friendship significantly. On the land side of the game, do not use your armys fight battles against the French that you can not win. Remember in the real war the French held Madrid for almost the entire 7 years of the war. What good did it do them? Over those 7 years Napoleon lost 250,000 men in Spain, mostly to the guerrillas (a Spanish word) and attrition. You can't collect your taxes but you'll have British subsidies, and the gold convoy. Place your army units in strong garrisons in the distant Spanish port cities like Cadiz so that the French will have to stretch their LOC to the limit if they want to attempt a seige. Then if your concerned that the French might win a seige you can evacuate by sea. If you notice a position where the French are weak use your fleets to land and destroy the French units at that location. Its the Russian strategy, when Napoleon took Moscow the Czar sat back and let the French bleed. He didn't surrender, you don't have to either. One other point if the French get very aggresive you can move your armies to North Africa. Let him try to get at them there. To finish I wish to revisit my original point. The Napoleonic Wars were not about "Le Grande Arme", they were about the British Navy. Napoleon's deathblow came on Oct. 21, 1805. Allow me to quote Alfred Mahan; "The world has never seen a more impressive demonstration of the influence of sea power upon its history. Those far distant, storm-beaten ships, upon which the Grand Army never looked, stood between it and dominion of the world."
< Message edited by demonterico -- 7/27/2005 12:39:13 AM >
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The world has never seen a more impressive demonstration of the influence of sea power upon history. Those far distant, storm-beaten ships, upon which the Grand Army never looked, stood between it and the dominion of the world. -- Alfred Thayer Mahan
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