I'll share some notes on playing England -- if there's interest, I'll do the same for some other countries as it comes up. To sum the following mini-article up in one word, what I'd like you to reflexively think about when somebody tells you England is PATIENCE.
In gunboat, even more so than with press, England is a country for the moderate to advanced player. A weak player can win a game with Austria if everything breaks correctly, because once you start getting builds, as a central power there are always places to grow. England is tougher, but if played well should be much more enjoyable than Austria, too. Austrias can play wonderfully and die in 1903. When England dies in gunboat, it is almost always because of the decisions England has made.
The secret to playing England in gunboat is, ultimately, recognizing that there isn't one. If you open strongly anti-French and Russia goes north, you're in a lot of trouble. If you open strongly anti-German, well, is there such a thing? You can open strongly towards Scandinavia, with NTH - SKA, build F Edi/Lon then send it to NTH, if Russia opens southward.
Geography dictates much of your thinking, so let's start by discussing geography and what it means:
1) None of your neighbors need you dead to win.
That's right, none. France can reach 18 with, for example, Iberia, Benelux, Germany, Italy, Tunis, and pushing armies into Austria or Russia. For Germany, subtract Iberia and Brest, say, but add three of the Russian home centers and Austria + Serbia. Russia has many ways to win as a southern power plus some of Germany. So, all of your neighbors can reach 18 while you reach about 10 -- none of them are beginning the game thinking "At some point I'm going to have to deal with England if I want to win, so should it be sooner or later?"
2) You are very far from your 18th center. England cannot win without taking one of Moscow, Warsaw, Vienna, Venice, Tunis. If you get into Moscow/Warsaw, you probably aren't going to end up taking Marseilles or all of Iberia, either. And the various places you can cross the lines are far apart. From very early on, you always need to be thinking about where 18 might be coming from.
3) Also like Turkey, reinforcements are always far away from your front. Therefore, everything you do must be planned in advance. This is, again, an important skill in Diplomacy, but England demands it more than any other country in gunboat with the exception of Italy. [And it's probably no surprise that players who struggle with England also struggle with Italy]
The combination of these three factors dictates that England, more than any other country in gunboat, needs to be playing a patient, balance-of-power game. There may be times that you should be happy, in 1904, to be sitting in Lon/ENG/NTH/Nwy, supporting everything, and waiting for the situation to develop. Austria gets to be played by cobras, blindly striking at their foes and hoping to survive the encounter. You must be an anaconda, slowly and methodically crushing the life out of your prey.
So, what does this mean for some specific advice? First off, it means that your foremost goal as England in 1901 is to be able to look at the entire board before choosing what war to fight. Is a two-build England in 1901 nice? Yes, but it's very rarely sustainable. Better to ensure you get a build out of Norway and look at the board. Will I start a war in F1901? Yes, if it is already clear to me what war I want to or need to fight. But I am happy to sit out a few turns and let things develop, too. When England is not sticking its neck out, it's a very hard target for France and Germany, and they will usually find juicier prey. On the other hand, remember that your nice defensive position is both a blessing a curse. Great defensive position, but for the same reason, you can't shift units easily. So if you pick one of France, Germany, and Scandinavia to strike at, you had darned well better have made the right choice. Which is all the stronger argument for delaying it until you are able to get it right.
Finally, a couple of notes on the midgame. England is always going to struggle as it grows to get the right units in the right places. You want fleets on the water and armies on land, of course. And a 8-center Scandinavian England with, say, F ENG,NTH,NWG,SKA,BAL can shift an army from Picardy to Livonia in two turns, and all points in between. But, invariably, that's not how it turns out. You usually first grow by putting fleets where you need armies, and then have the problem of extricating those fleets to put armies in there places, while trying not to go too far backward in doing so.
Again, the watchword is PATIENCE. England is for the long-term planners. Imagine that you're about to be able to take a center when you attack Germany, but it involves putting a fleet into Holland which will need to be replaced by an army amidst hostile presence. Should you do it? A simple tip: if you take the center, you know what happens next. You build a unit and Germany disbands a unit. Imagine the board after that happens. What will your next turn look like? It sounds obvious, but a general rule of playing any game is that if doing X will immediately lead to you making another decision, and you're unsure whether to do X, figure out what decision you'll make first, and that will help you decide whether to do X.
And if that means delaying a build or two until you can take things in the right way, well, you're England. PATIENCE is what you do. And remember, you're in a position to be damned good at it. After all, Lord Palmerston invented the idea. :)
The problem of NMRs
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