Chris' El Grande playing tips:
 
- It's always important to have guys on the board, and especially in the early turns you should not get distracted from this objective. In general, the low-valued action cards do not have strong enough powers to justify bringing on 2 or 3 fewer Cabelleros - especially early in the game. Just as important, though, is using your guys efficiently. Ideally you don't want to be wasting any cabelleros, finishing first and second in a bunch of areas by narrow margins. It does no good to have a ton of guys on the board, scoring first in only one or two regions. On the other hand, I generally find 3rd place points are not worth the effort unless it's just a single cabellero; when I do well, I routinely get a couple 1sts every round including my Grande and perhaps the King, and then a lot of seconds. Seconds are key becuase they allow you to ride on other player's special scorings. Seconds in other player's Grande regions then become especially important.
 
- That two-point Grande bonus is quite important. Never be afraid to move your Grande if it's in a big-scoring region. 2 points are 2 points regardless of what the base is. In a big-scoring regions, 2nd is fine, but not if it's got your Grande. Ideally, you don't want people messing with your Grande bonus.
 
- The last/first trick before the scoring round is an extremely important one. Never burn your 13/1 for anything but this. It's a two- point bonus for the King, it allows you to move a lot of guys on before the scoring round, it controls where people can move on the baord, and it prevents other players from messing with you too much in your key regions. If you can't go first, going last can work sometimes too if you get the Intrigant card, but often you will get stuck with garbage instead. In K&I it's much more attractive. Watch the "move the king one region" card when it's available, as it can really make things interesting (and in K&I, it's *always* available! - which dramatically changes the dynamics of the whole last/first ploy).
 
- Watch the Decay of Authority cards. This is the Armageddon of El Grande and can have a profoud effect on play. Also watch the "retrieve a power card" cards, as they can allow you to do the last/first trick more than once and confound your opponents.
 
- Cabellero management: you have to get a rhythm going in your court. Ideally, you want to go first on the turn before the scoring round. But if you have very few cabelleros in your court when you play your 13, you are going to pay a very high opportunity cost for being unable to move the maximum number of cabelleros onto the board.
 
- Castillo: I actually don't find religiously counting the cabelleros in the castillio to be all that important. The big thing is just not to get carried away dropping guys in there. At some point the returns start to seriously diminish because you'll end up piling too many cabelleros into one area (creating wastage) and the cabelleros would do a lot more good on the board (don't forget the special scoring opportunities).
 
- Special Scoring: Try to control these cards (although try to avoid taking the dial-a-score ones yourself). The "score any region" cards can be worth quite a lot and are easily worth a big card play if you are in a position to do so and it doesn't screw up your court too much. Try to make sure you are in regions such that you will benefit from the "score all X regions" cards.