Intermediate: Attacking

Taken from player maxroloefs on Stratego.com's forum

I think attacking is a very complex matter about which much can be said.

## Intro

Let's start with pointing out that a successful attack that is not a blitz almost never goes via only one lane. You need 2 or three lanes at least to pull of a good attack. Now after you do some scouting, you try to get to a position which I like to refer to as *domino attacking*, meaning that an attack on one side of the board helps you to determine your next attack on the other side of the board. I will explain this in some more detail:

## Step 1: Find information

For this to work you really need to have some information, so this is not a strategy that will work from the start. This is a midgame-strategy, a position on the board that you want to enforce during your game.

## Step 2: Put pressure on the opponent

Now that you have figured out a major for example, try to sneak in some pieces, in the ideal situation you will be able to put a colonel in front of that major with his major being stuck there. For this example let's say this is happening on the right side of the board. This will likely happen versus lower players, but will be hard to accomplish versus higher players. Now that you have a colonel in front of a major you have a very strong weapon. The major is likely to be covered by either your opponents marshal, or the opponents general. In case it isn't, you can take it later on with the major, for free. Now the process of getting more information is starting, you can attack on the other side of the board with a major and say that you figure our your opponents general, what happens next?

## Step 3: Figure out your domino attacking sequence

You just lost a major to your opponents general on the left side of the board, on the right side you still have a colonel in front of the opponents major, now you can manoevre your general to the middle in case he has some moved pieces there (best case scenario: a colonel), you can attack with your colonel on the right side to take out his major, and either get the major for free, or get killed by the opponents marshal (the general was exposed on the left). This brings you to the next step of the sequence: taking out the pieces in the middle, best case scenario a colonel.

Now if you know for sure that you can find a colonel in the middle, this is a 100% advantage situation, but there is a big grey area to it as well. Very often you will have to combine this domino attacking with an estimation of the likelihood of the pieces being exactly in the right spot for your opponent to save himself from everything.

Last thing I want to say about this for now is that this strategy might not always get you an advantage in pieces straight away. You did lose a major and a colonel in the example, and you did take back a major and a (let's say it was a colonel in the middle) colonel. So that is equal right? Of course this is wrong, where your opponent has figured out your general, you have figured out your opponents general + marshal, a huge advantage.

This is just the very basis of domino attacking, as mentioned before there is a huge grey area with this many many more factors come into play.

## Offensive Attacking Strategies

Taken from player Enigma's Stratego.com forum post

You have to play against other strong players to really learn how to do this, but your attacks should generally follow a basic pattern:

1. Scout your opponent's pieces with one of your low ranked pieces (ie. 2, 4, 5, or 6).  This gives you information about your opponent's setup

2. Remember the information you just acquired.  For example, you used your 6 to capture your opponent's 4, and then your opponent uses his 8 to capture your 6.  Now you know his 8.  Use this information to plan your next moves.

3. Counterattack his known piece and other surrounding pieces.  Some of your attacks should be real (ie. a 9 or 10 to capture his seen 8), other attacks should be bluffs (ie. a 4, 5 or 6)

Attack with 2-3 pieces at a time (ie. one highly ranked piece and two lower ranked pieces) - use lower ranks to scout your opponent's pieces and to hide the identity of your higher ranked piece.