Matrix Games Forums

Originally posted by DodgyDave
so John Umber, i guess you see battles happening differently.

ok lets see, Spain joins with a bunch of others vs France, france is losing, france surrenders to all except Spain, who is now the fallback point to get political points, spain lose.

This i have seen too often, spain might get those rebels, but its just a matter of 6 months and france, not even with all his army, can have wiped spain out, i know, i have done it myself a few times as france.

This is what I usually see also. No one in the alliance is going to stick it out just so Spain can get a surrender, because Spain is not real threat to Pr, Au, GB, or Ru. Personally, I agree with the dental surgery guy.

Noone likes Spain's position?

I must agree with you that playing Spain is not easy. But I have played games where Spain has a tip of scales role. It only matters how good you are as a diplomat. It is true that Spain facing France alone is in a hard spot and getting harder. But how is playing Austria or Prussia to eliminate the spanish ally? They will never see Spain threatening the south of France. They should consider once again. Spain could easily be France's lapdog and take a little bite from south of Italy or Austria.

But true, it is a difficult country if you lack the diplomacy style of gaming...
In open war is Spain not a major power and probably never will be.

its worse then that, France will never allow Spain to be in Italy, nor would Austria for that matter, as they both want all of italy.

and spain in Italy, that normally ends with about 2 spanish corps and perhaps both of Napoly corps in a fight vs either 8 french corps or austria with that amount.

Spain never is able to fight in Italy, because the war tends be to stack war, of 8 vs 4 corps and since spain dont have very good corps, then have they no say in italy.

so that leaves Africa.

Spain's choices are truly sad. Taking Portugal will annoy the Brit. Moving into Africa will pit them against the Turk...who, if not busy with ivan or austria seems to always whip Don Diego.

I agree...Italy...forget it

Best bet for spain would to be to ally with France (TO THE END) and make as much trouble for the Brits as they can. If not, the French invasion would devastate them, despite guerillas.

I am glad to see so many responses to the original post. I’ll just say this, imho, many here are underestimating Spain. Though, if playing in a game where users do not want to make big France pay for every aggression she tries, I can see indeed why Spain can have some trouble.

spain will always get its *** kicked, even if france surrenders unconditional to everyone else, then will spain be the one to pay.

I have never seen france accept to a peace with space, unless spain surrendered, sometimes conditional, but normally its unconditional.

Depends on the options being used. Spain needs the three
province max loss rule very badly. W/o it France will simply conquer all of Spain.

But Very hard to save your fleet from the Brits w/o French help.

yeah and its down to how the game is like.

Spain cant fight stack wars, due to limited corps and size of those corps, but guess nothing can be done about that.

The game design and the nature of the historical time period, Spain was not able to stand up to France (1v1), and so it should not be in the game. Whether fighting stack wars or not.

Everytime I have played, we always agreed to the 3 province rule. It's a must in my book.

Having just read a book on the Peninsular war, a book which gave more time to Spanish affairs than either british or french, I think that what should be done is that despite treaty of cessation, the guerilla war should continue.
It did, in fact. The Spanish population had no love for any foreign invader, and the guerillas, far from being just heros of Spain were a large part in fact brigands who made life difficult for even the Spanish population.
yes, this makes spain poison fruit... Truly, the greatest can of worms.

1. Turkey: It is a country that is viewed as small in stature but can turn the tide of a continental war or even a naval war. If I play with a strong French player then I play most gracious lap dog. If the French player is weak or does not view Turkey as a longstanding ally, then I play Turkey as a thorn in Austria, Prussia, and Russian sides. You have to love the instant army and brutality of the Turks.

2. Austria: Can be the European linchpin or Pin cushion. All depends how the game plays out. It also has the ability to reach out for some good minors and has the leadership to be an autonomous nation for short periods of time.

3. France: Power Power Power with a little grace thrown in for good measure. The game is about you and your destruction. The whole world against you. The possibility of great victories or staggering defeats is awe inspiring.

4. Britain: In the navy is their motto. Small but powerfull land army. If you love money and the influence you have with it then you go with the redcoats. Nelson is a gem and not a bad naval officer to.

5. Prussia: They are a contradiction of countries. They are both weak and strong at the same time. If I play them then I do my best to bend over for the pleasure of the English throne for the Cav money. I also play with the hatred of the Austians and find a way to go to war with them as much as I can.

6. Spain and Russia. Spain I do not like to play. Russia I like more since you can add influence to the continent and can domeinate or be destroyed by the Turks. I like the great potential for the Grand backstabs that you get with Russia but can't stand the overall landlocked economy.

The worst thing Spain had in 1805, her politicians, you can avoid as you are in fact the King of Spain. Spain is not obviously France or England, but is a good complement for them both, (normally them two feel concerned with what Spain thoughts are). Most commonly you will be at war with one of them during the game, but also you will usually have the other help. With that help is almost imposible for the agressor surrendering Spain.

England will seize all of spanish overseas possesions, but wont be able to conquer Spain herself or Portugal longtime if allied with France.

France wont be able to occupy Mallorca (cannot then occupy every spanish provintial capital), Spanish army can resist in Morocco or elsewhere overseas, with France not being able to support whole ocupation of Spain forever (is a great resources eater), or avoid every english or spanish landing.

Finishing off Spain is really hard, you need otherwise be patient.

Un cordial saludo desde España

Rafa.

all you need to force Spain to surrender is taking all manpower yielding home nation proviences, so africa is not important, Majorca is 0MP so also not important.

Main land Spain is easy to take as france.

Spain unless it sticks with France or England really helps out, is lost cause. Of those i play with, people will not want to be Spain, Prussia or Austria, due to them being kicked around too often.

Spain, Austria or Prussia.

These middle powers are all in the hands of diplomacy. Their road to power can only be by diplomacy. They can never go alone against France or Russia. But Russia need them badly and so do the French (or rather keeping them away from Russia). I played once a strange game, as Russia. The diplomacy went straight crazy and the prewar declarations started a war Austria, Prussia and France versus Russia. I was beaten badly and the Turks could not just let such a good event go unnoticed. Russia never realy recovered. Funny thing was that France was so sure of herself that her battle in Spain bled her to much. The Prussia-Austria alliance changed to pro Brittish and attacked. By 1808 the middle powers were both all muscles and noone could hold them back. I don't remember if it was Austria or Prussia that became the dominant land power, but it didn't realy matter. They were unseperable, it was like fighting one nation... a very, very big nation.

I think people just give up too easily. IMHO spain has some interesting things to her. Her navy for example makes quite a high bargaining chip.
One thing im noticing is a lot of people here like France. I know a few not on this forum who absolutely hate it, as they can't stand having what seems the rest of the world continualy ganging up on you.

Russia is my favourit as I like to have my back free...

Brittain second, partly for the same reason.

I'm also one of those that doesnt like to play France, as she always has to be on the prowl and generaly anoyes everyone at some point in the game...

France must be the "favorite" of those wanting the "challenge of the period". If it is not the ultimate, then the game fails to instill the nature of the period. Even contemporary Englishmen were quite taken by Napoleon's France and, had it not been for the (quite rational) rejection of divine right, as Napoleon and his "household" practiced, he would've had many more followers throughout Europe. After all, Beethoven wrote his 3rd Symphony about Napoleon, before he crowned himself "Emperor" (not sure what he was supposed to do; perhaps be France's G.W., but not sure that was a realistic option given France's proclivities).

There is, obviously, good play with any country, but playing France is like playing Germany in a WWI or WWII game.

Could not put it better myself.

Anyone not interrested in playing Germany in a WWII scenario?

France is the warmachine in the era, but outnumbered against the rest. If fighting one on one, no nation should be able to defeat the French...

The French player should be a ruthless manipulator with a touch of "toss the dice" spirit. Most war in the era is with or against the French. But you must always be on your alert and as mentioned in the posts above, not wishing to be the nice friend with everyone. You will make people angry as you destroy their plan of the grand future.

Here is an archive I came across the web a while ago...


Empires in Arms

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July 12, 2001 News:
David Swithers wrote to tell me that the EiA tourney at World Boardgame Championships (formerly AvalonCon) needs more players! So mark your calenders for next year to pack your bags and head on over to Hunt Valley, Maryland (just north of Baltimore - the inner harbor is a great place to visit, by the way!). For those who want to know, Jeff Slater of Minnesota won this year, his third time in five years! And he won playing Spain, if you can believe that! Hooray for the underdog! Though David does say his Dutch allied fleet managed to run the British blockade and won three battles in the Channel before Nelson chased him back into Amsterdam, but this daring move enabled the French navy to sail freely out of Cadiz [how'd it get there?] and up into the Channel.
David also says there is talk of an EiA only world championship, separate from the World Boardgame Championships. I'll post more details as I receive them.

Pip, if you look at my last post on the "changes" thread, you'd see that the EiA event at WBC was cancelled due to lack of participation and failure to find a GM.