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I've been puzzling over this and would like to hear other peoples' thoughts. The setup of the French fleet is something to be considered carefully because likely they will promptly blockaded and cannot thereafter be moved.

In the board game the British naval weakness was that they only had seven fleet counters. France could muster five (including Holland) so their optimal strategy was to put each in a different port forcing the British to use five of their counters to blockade them. Given that in order to give invasion supply a fleet could not also have transported troops, this left the British able to move only one corps by sea until they acquired some minor fleets as well.

But in the computer game the naval system has been subtly skewed in the British favour in many ways. Invasion supply no longer requires a spare fleet and fleets in the blockade box automatically move into a port when it is captured so it is a lot less risky for GB to attack French fleets in port. They also have plenty of fleet counters to spare.

So my current thinking is put everything into one port to make it easier to defend. Le Havre looks pretty good, fortified and close to Paris.

On the other hand, while keeping the French fleet in being is definitely a good idea, as France I've found it can distract the British at crucial moments. e.g. When France is heavily under pressure from multiple enemies I've often found the British player takes the chance to knock off part of the French fleet rather than put his army into the field to help his allies. So spreading the fleet around giving the British multiple targets achieves another end.

I usually pick the top four ports (one always in the south) and fortify their cities with troops.

The other way to look at it is statistically: It's easier to force the British to use a maximum number of fleets/ships to blockade the more ports you use.
 
However, your idea has even more merit than what you wrote: Once the beginning of the game is over, and things settle down a bit, France will be stuck with 4-6 ports having ships. Not only is this harder to defend (as you noted), but it's also more expensive. You can use fewer fleet counters if the fleets are all combined.

ORIGINAL: NeverMan

I usually pick the top four ports (one always in the south) and fortify their cities with troops.

Yes that's what I tried to do in my first PBEM game and got creamed. Of course it didn't help that Toulon had mysteriously become a 30 gun port.

I have found that the best strategy for me with the French fleet depends on whether or not you want to eventually take on the british fleet.. If you start from the beginning of the game building 2 - 4 boats per turn.. (England cant afford the manpower to keep up) instead of all the guard and artillery right away, you will want most if not all of the fleet in one port.  This way as they start comming in you can get them into you fleet and start pushing the blockade - another way I have tried without much success is building at say 2 - 4 different ports and not bringing on the reinforcements right away.. keeps the British guessing as to where the break will come from, then when you are ready bring on the new counter and load the ships into it.  Its hard to blockade a fleet that doesn't exist yet, and it kindof throws a wrench into the naval move last to clear the channel if they have to go first to blockade a new fleet and shuffle..  If you don't want to spend the $$ on the ships, split them up ALL over the place placing ALL fleets - this way it ties up all the british fleets early and makes it hard for them to target more than one, as they land to take the garrison and force you out, you can jump on them and make them start all over.  Hit them on the weakness (manpower).
 
 
OD

Yes, the toulon hasn't helped but I haven't played FR in a PBEM game in EiA for obviuos reasons.

That said, I usually spread out the fleet to occupy as many GB ships as possible.

It really is an interesting discussion wether the british should sacrifice his corps to kill a french fleet - or France should use his fleets as bait to kill a british corps.
 
Don't think two players of the same game ever will agree [;)]
 
/eske

great post. I used to do what you outlined, spread out and hope Sp and Rus come around, and give GB massive problems. In this version, I say Le Harve is the best choice. You need to kep troops back to cover paris anyway, so the same 2 corps can pull double duty.