France here. First off, good game to everyone involved. My strat/tactics were pretty obvious as well -- I'm very new to the "live gunboat" style, so I had a few moments where I misinterpreted signals from my neighbors, but in general the plan was to hit Germany hard right off the bat, and then swing around to Italy. And, more or less, that's what happened, though I got *severely* hung-up trying to get into Germany. Between bad guessing and bad luck, I was stuck at that damn border for years until Russia and England rescued me.
About 1905 I finally broke through, at this point best of chums with England and very worried about Austrian aggression. I'd never seen Tunis free that long, so I decided to grab it in '06 to help break through Austria. Got locked up with Austria's home SCs from '07-'09, and right when I had *finally* broken through and had my sights set on a 3-way draw.... Achillies happened :)
I will readily confess that I am horribly unknowledgeable when it comes to stalemate lines, and anyone who sees my play in the later years can attest to that. Moreover, the stab was perfectly times -- all my units were behind a ready-made line, or stuck on the wrong side of Switzerland. Still, we had a decent shot at holding it, especially with Turkey's excellent play.
But, alas, I made my first biggest mistake of the night -- miscounted in MAO and let England in, when I could have stopped him with Gascony breaking Brest's support. Not sure it would have done much but delay the inevitable, but it was still a horrible misjudgement.
And then, in a panic a year later trying to count supports, I managed to make my other biggest mistake of the night, and NMR, and then I got gutted by Austria, and threw in the towel and gave in to the inevitable.
Again, great game to all -- hope to play with such auspicious players again soon.