It royally pissed france off.

Of course it would. But did France recover from it, or did he wither and die?

Does it work well against an expected Franco-German alliance?

It shouldn't work at all unless Russia is giving you peace in Scandinavia and Germany is at least neutral (read: on your side).

If France and Germany are teamed up against England, there obviously isn't much hope anyway. It's very hard for an English player to offer great assistance for either Continental power to invade the other.

Oh no, on the contrary England's control of the northern waters is absolutely vital to breaking the inevitable Benelux stalemate in a Franco-German war.

It's just that if you're putting all your fleets in ECH and MAO, away from that stalemate line, you actually aren't able to help. lol.

gameID=64973 not quite but similar

I've seen that used against me (I was playing France) in a gunboat game
gameID=67346

Oh come on, Lando. You've played in ~850 games and you can't find an better match? ;)

It only works if France backtracks MAO to Brest and blocks his fleet build and doesn't pick up Portugal at the same time.

gameID=73901

This was done to me as well. It did not work out so very well for the Brit.

I think your better off taking the sure thing in Norway, unless you can be absolutely sure of German support.

That opening series of moves by England is one I have used and several times.

As always it depends on the "Diplomacy" and the aspirations and strategies
chosen by other players.

First you need a player for Germany who has his own plans to attack France
& it helps if Italy is also interest'd in going for Marseilles & Spain in 02
it also helps if Russia is keen to make an alliance with England.

I encourage Germany against France in pre spring 01 chats,
& make a "deal" with France to leave Eng Ch empty telling him England will
"go north strong"

Then I play the moves, fleets to Eng Ch & North sea, army to York, or Ed. in spring 01

France kicks up a stink about the Eng ch & I do not send him any messages
in reply, but tell Germany I am with him against France, provided he does not
build a 2nd fleet. with luck France has moved army Paris to Picardy in spring 01.

Play the Autumn 01 moves, army to Norway, fleet to MAO
this works brilliantly if France uses army Picardy to Brest & fleet MAO to Spain sc
I negotiate a deal with Russia, no build in St P & I will support Sweden against
Germany
Build a new fleet London
In spring 02 I secretly negotiate a peace with France on the condition that he
confines his fleets to the Mediteranean, I still encourage Italy and Germany to
attack France, ( Germany helps by building a 2nd fleet despite our agreement,
I appear to accept his excuse that he needs it for the Baltic & to attack Russia,
but I have an excuse for switching my alliances. )

Spring 02 move- fleet London to Eng Ch, fleet MAO supports French fleet to Western
Med
Germany attacks Burgundy & maybe Picardy as well

Autumn 02 move, fleets to Heligoland bt, or Skag, North sea & Eng Ch

Spring 03 declare war against Germany

This is just a general outline, there are variations, such as moving
fleet MAO to Eng Ch spring 02 and fleet to Heligoland or Skag,
or continuing in alliance with Germany and attacking France.

The fundamental principle for playing England, in my opinion, is to keep
France & Germany ( & Russia ) in conflict with each other and to prevent
any two of the three forming an alliance against England,
and to prevent any one of the three becoming a naval threat to England & having
the ability to invade England.

One trap to avoid when playing England is that of building too many fleets
and not enough armies.
It's a generalisation, so allow for exceptions such as Denmark, but I think
that fleets are best used to control seas and you need to use armies to capture,
and more importantly hold your sc's in Europe.
for example, yes you can capture Brest with a fleet, but build an army & get that
into Brest, or Picardy asap
a fleet in Brest cannot influence events in Paris, an army in Brest can attack Paris.

I learnt this from looking at another players past games & one where he had won
playing England, and this player did not build a 3rd fleet for England until he had 8 sc's

now I often build a third fleet for England for the 4th sc, but after that it's armies
as much as possible.

I am still learning. for example, I was a firm believer in a Russian opening
set of moves that sent 3 units south, typically
army Moscow To Ukraine, army Warsaw to Galicia, fleet Sev to Black sea
& fleet St P to GoB

I am now coming to the view that the best Russian opening is to play
army Moscow to Ukraine & fleet Sev to Black sea, fleet St P to GoB, and
army Warsaw to Silesia,

the strategy being to cripple Germany early & turn Germany & surrounding sc's
into another "Balkans in the north" in which Russia gets the Lion's share

I stumbled onto this after getting continually hammer'd when playing Russia
and continually gettting blocked in 01 for Sweden, by Germany

I had a horrible run where i drew Russia 5 times and Italy 4 times in 9 games
at roughly the same time, so i figured i would experiment with Russian openings,

and tried, 2 north 2 south
and then 1 south (fleet Sev) 2 north fleet St P & army Moscow,
and one up the centre, army Warsaw to Silesia
( fortunately Turkey opened as if he was in CD ) but this is not suggested.

The revelation was the change in attitude by France & England when they saw
a Russian army in Silesia after the first move, suddenly Germany became an easily
recognisable victim and the German and surrounding nuetral sc's became gettable,
England suddenly wanted Holland & Denmark, France wanted Belgium & Munich

Regrettably I have not worked out a German counter strategy apart from an alliance
with Russia & that doesn't always work out well anyway
I am almost of the view that capturing Sweden is perhaps more important for Germany
than getting Belgium

the point I am trying to make about playing Russia is that I used to think of playing
Russia with just the southern and northern flanks, ie 2 fronts only
Now I think of playing Russia with 2 flanks, north & south and a CENTRE

Obviously Russia cannot fight on all 3 fronts at the same time, that's where the
diplomacy comes into importance, it allows you to punch units into 2 of the 3 "fronts"
whilst "resting" on one front, but you have to be flexible, for example,
after going hard in the centre and north, and "resting" in the south for say two years,
then easing on either the north or centre and throwing an extra unit, even two into the
south to take advantage of an opportunity, or simply to shore the south up defensively.

Nicely done Yeb... you did it basically the same way I did but your opener was stronger and your movements were generally a bit more elegant (in that you had to fight germany too and still made damn good progress).