Virgin Queen Again

In an amazing feat of organisation, we were able to assemble six players for Virgin Queen, the sequel to Here I Stand.  We had familiarity with the rules and game, but suffered from time elapsed since our last game, so had to look up and check a few rules from time to time.  That said we got through three turns in about six hours with only a few mistakes.

Pascoe, new to the game, was the Ottomans, Mike was Spain, I was England, Jeff France, Simon The Holy Roman Empire and Richard the Protestants.

The board from the English perspective.

Spain (22) has a strong lead in VPs, followed closely by the Ottomans (20) and French (19).  Then there is a gap to the HRE (15), another decent gap till England (11) and then the Protestants (3) a long way back.  Things can change quickly and iirc a few players are just two keys short of automatic victory.  Plus there a random prizes, some of which are VPs.

From England's history book the war with France was brought to an honourable close, but the Spanish fomented an Irish rebellion which, with the Protestant's prodding, produced a war between England and Spain as well as some ill-advised piracy on the Dutch coast.  Piracy in the New World was more successful, and England also established two colonies, with modest success.   

The was a bit of a slowdown in the middle period as England had very few cards, but things picked up at the end and troops were landed in Ireland to reclaim the island for the Crown.  Unfortunately, bad weather (for which Spain can take the blame) saw this enterprise delayed.

The highlight was a successful marriage between these two: