El Grande Strategy: Turn Order, King Control & Castillo Pressure
Editorial analysis: El Grande rewards being strong in the right regions at the exact scoring moments. Majority that scores two rounds from now is less urgent than a smaller swing immediately before round 3, 6 or 9.
Power cards are an economy
High Power cards improve Action-card choice but bring fewer Caballeros into your Court. Low cards build future capacity. Use each according to whether the current round is tactical or preparatory.
Preserve Court supply before scoring rounds
A strong Action card is useless without Caballeros to place. Refill the Court one or two rounds before a scoring turn rather than discovering too late that your board position cannot be changed.
The King creates safe and unsafe fronts
Moving the King can protect a lead, open a new placement frontier or block another player’s preferred entry route. Treat King movement as positional control, not a small side effect.
Castillo Caballeros create hidden leverage
The threat matters before scoring because opponents cannot know where those Caballeros will emerge. Keep destination options open so one hidden group can influence several possible majority races.
Second place can be efficient
Do not overpay to convert every region into first place. A cheap second-place score in two regions can outperform a costly fight for first in one heavily contested region.
Round 9 has no future setup value
In the final round, reinforcement and long-term positioning matter only if they change final scoring. Spend Power and Action-card value directly on majority swings and bonuses.