April 1635 - April 1636Hamburg fell to Tilly in June 1635. He quickly follows up and captures Lubeck in September and Kiel in November. No other Catholic forces were active this year.
The French executed the worst siege in TYW history, suffering from a lack of supplies, disease, poor leadership and drunkenness
(OK, I just made up that last bit but it was probably true!). The city defenders finally laughed themselves to death in November 1635, and the good Catholic citizens of the city opened the gates to the ragged remnants of the French army solely out of Christian charity. It was not a stellar moment in French military history.
As the 1636 campaign season opens the situation is as follows:
Tilly has one more city to capture in northern Germany (Luneburg) and then will remain in garrison at Hamburg. Aldringer will remain at Kassel unless the French cross the Rhine north of Frankfurt. Feria will stay at Heidelberg to guard the Palatinate. The other Spanish force at Brussels is too weak to challenge the French in Alsace and is separated from that region by the Ardennes and northern France - too much distance and not enough supply. Bucquoy (who, it is rumored, is developing a drinking problem of his own...) remains at Prague.
With still no sign of the Swedes the French are the only game in town for the Protestants. The fall of Hamburg removed all the Protestant leaders except Brunswick who is now holed up in Luneberg with no forces at all. The Danish fleet retreated to Copenhagen before Kiel fell, but there are no Protestant land forces left in Germany.
The French face the same supply challenges as the Spanish (In addition to the 'blocked' regions along the left bank of the Rhine from Koln to Breisach, shown in a darker shade on the map. No one can enter a blocked region.) and will have difficulty coming to grips with the enemy. Also, French military leadership at this point is questionable, the great Turenne having not yet risen to army command (he was only 25 in 1636). I suppose a push on Brussels is not out of the question, but it will take a few months to recover from the debacle at Trier before an offensive can be started.
Barring the intervention of the Swedes it may be a fairly boring campaign year. I may join Count Bucquoy in a glass of wine or two, or three...
(In game terms the CP is 24%(!!!), and NM is 82 for the heretics and 121 for the Catholics. The Protestants have 53 gold, 117 WS and 42 EP, to the Catholics 210 gold, 188 WS and an amazing 513 EP. I remain committed to finishing the campaign out of sheer pig-headedness, however!)