German sentence questions

[PunkJesus]

My native tongue is US English. But I have a few questions about German sentence structure and a few other things. So correct me if I mess up.

I've been doing Assimil German with Ease, and already have completed it. But still go through it and a few sentences have confused me.

1) „Und heute stehe ich hier von Ihnen als einer der wichtigsten und reichsten Männer dieser Stadt" the translation gives "And today I stand before you as one of the city's most important and richest men." The question is how to do you about determining the gender of einer in this case? Is einer in this case due to Männer being plural and in the dative case? I'm only really guessing at this point.

2) In this sentence „Ich brauche aber ganz dringend eine, ich bitte Sie!", I know this is a standard German word order and I completely understand it, except the position of „aber." Since I am so used to the way English is done, I am always wanting to place aber in the first position like „Aber brauche ich ganz dringend eine, ich bitte Sie!" That makes a lot more sense than the German way. How do I get used to placing it like „Ich brauche aber ..." and reading it that way?

[Kraut]

1) „Und heute stehe ich hier von Ihnen als einer der wichtigsten und reichsten Männer dieser Stadt" the translation gives "And today I stand before you as one of the city's most important and richest men." The question is how to do you about determining the gender of einer in this case? Is einer in this case due to Männer being plural and in the dative case? I'm only really guessing at this point.

"Einer" is masculine, "der ...Männer" is genitive.
Compare:
Das Kind:
Eines der Kinder trug einen blauen Mantel. Ein Kind trug einen blauen Mantel.
Die Frau:
Eine der Frauen hatte einen Führerschein. Eine Frau hatte einen Führerschein.
Der Mann:
Einer der Männer hatte einen Hund. Ein Mann hatte einen Hund.

2) In this sentence „Ich brauche aber ganz dringend eine, ich bitte Sie!", I know this is a standard German word order and I completely understand it, except the position of „aber." Since I am so used to the way English is done, I am always wanting to place aber in the first position like „Aber brauche ich ganz dringend eine, ich bitte Sie!" That makes a lot more sense than the German way. How do I get used to placing it like „Ich brauche aber ..." and reading it that way?

These two sentences are ok:
"Ich brauche aber ganz dringend eine."
"Aber ICH BRAUCHE (word order!) ganz dringend eine."

[tarvos]

Ich stehe hier vor Ihnen als einer

I stand here before you as ...(followed by nominative), als is always followed by nominative. Einer is the nominative, the noun is implied.

One *of the strongest and richest men*

[PunkJesus]

Ich stehe hier vor Ihnen als einer

I stand here before you as ...(followed by nominative), als is always followed by nominative. Einer is the nominative, the noun is implied.

One *of the strongest and richest men*

Thank you. I guess, I learned something new today about als.

[Josquin]

"Als" is not always followed by the nominative. It can be followed by any case you like:

Ich kenne ihn als einen sehr zuverlässigen Menschen. (I know him to be a very reliable person.)
Es gelang ihm als einem der ersten, Strom zu erzeugen. (He succeeded as one of the first to generate electricity.)

"Als" doesn't take a special case. The case is determined by the case of the corresponding (pro-)noun that "als" is referring to. In the first sentence, it's "ihn" (accusative), in the second it's "ihm" (dative). In the OP's sentence, it's "ich" (nominative), so "als" is followed by nominative "einer" as well.

[tarvos]

True. But here it requires the nominative. (You need to mentally finish the sentence).

[Josquin]

True. But here it requires the nominative. (You need to mentally finish the sentence).

Yes, here it does, for the reasons I gave. It doesn't, however, always take the nominative.

[Speakeasy]

Basic Grammatical Concepts
If I might make an observation, it seems to me that the OP’s original question suggests a need to reinforce some basic concepts of German grammar. Otherwise, in posing questions of this nature, he will incur an increasing risk of not receiving much attention. Please note carefully that I am not expressing fault with the OP!

Rather, I am expressing my oft-stated opinion that (a) for a number of fairly sound reasons, most introductory language courses devote very little time and space to explaining the points of grammar used in the dialogues which serve to illustrate the target language, and (b) a number of otherwise well-conceived language courses, notably those published by Assimil and Linguaphone, do a particularly poor job of explaining grammar. As a result, many beginning language learners may be able to express themselves more-or-less correctly in their chosen foreign language, but are often incapable of identifying or correcting their own errors. For this reason, I often advise that anyone wishing to study a foreign language using either the Assimil or the Linguaphone courses should do so with the aid of a simple grammar of the language. In this case, the OP has already completed his study of Assimil German and I would not advise that he redo the course. Nevertheless, as it is likely that he has deficiencies in this area, he might wish to consider working specifically on grammar.

Some Materials
In many cases, the study of foreign language grammar in colleges, universities, and the like is reserved for Intermediate Level students for whom specialized courses and materials exist. For the more popular languages, such as German, there are simply “too many” good resources designed to reinforce one’s understanding of grammar to list them all. Nevertheless, I will boldly make the following suggestions:

Schaum’s Outline Series: German Grammar
A self-study guide to German grammar containing concise explanations, numerous exercises and an answer key. No audio component. The Schaum’s Outline Series manuals are inexpensive and are justifiably renowned for the assistance they provide to Senior High School and College students.

Practice Makes Perfect Series (McGraw-Hill)
A series of self-study guides to German grammar containing concise explanations, numerous exercises and answer keys. No audio component. The author, Ed Swick, has an uncanny ability for explaining complex issues of German grammar and for composing interesting examples and exercises. Generally speaking, the “Practice Makes Perfect” series has been well-received by reviewers in this forum and on Amazon. While the manuals are individually inexpensive, collecting the complete set could represent an onerous charge on one’s finances; so, think about this before jumping in. As far as I know, the following titles exist in this series:
Practice Makes Perfect Complete German Grammar
Practice Makes Perfect German Grammar Drills
Practice Makes Perfect German Conversation
Practice Makes Perfect German Vocabulary
Practice Makes Perfect German Sentence Builder
Practice Makes Perfect German Verb Tenses
Practice Makes Perfect German Pronouns and Prepositions

Übungsgrammatik Deutch as Fremdsprache (Schubert Verlag)
As series of study guides, for use either in a classroom or for self-study, containing concise explanations, exercises and answer keys. Includes one (1) audio CD per volume. Although these manuals are written in German, translations of much of the instructional points are include in minute characters in English. Well-conceived. There are three volumes in the series:
A Grammatik (Sprachniveau A1-A2)
B Grammatik (Sprachniveau B1-B2)
C Grammatik (Sprachniveau C1-AC)

Handbuch zur deutschen Grammatik (Houghton-Mifflin)
A handbook and manual for use in a classroom but which may be used in a self-study context, containing detailed explanations, exercises and answer keys. Includes six (6) audio CDs. This is a very intensive course! There are two volumes in the series:
Handbuch zur deutschen Grammatik
Arbeitshelf / Workbook / Lab Manual

Revisiting the Basics via the FSI German Basic course
While it might not be received as a popular suggestion, the OP may wish to consider revisiting his study of introductory German by completing the FSI German Basic course and, more particularly, by focusing on the sentence-pattern drills, variation drills, vocabulary drills, et cetera, many of which are designed to illustrate specific points of grammar. I would recommend beginning at Unit 3 of the course. As these materials were designed for presentation in a classroom, the accompanying notes are rather sparse. Thus, I would recommend that one accompany these materials with a simple grammar, such as: German Verbs & Essentials of Grammar (McGraw-Hill).

EDITED:
Tinkering.

[Random Review]

If I can add my two cents:

I think the confusion here is not only case but also part of speech.

Even in the nominative with a masculine noun:

* Und heute stehe ich hier vor Ihnen als ein wichtiger Mann

Here "one" is a determiner and declines as such (note that the adjective (if, like here, there is one) expresses the case/gender ending and the noun is explicit anyway, so no information is lost from the clause**. This is undoubtedly what the OP is used to seeing frequently.

* Und heute stehe ich vor Ihnen als einer der wichtigsten Männer...

Here it seems to me that "one" is a pronoun and so declines that way. I haven't been able to find a source to back this up, so if I am wrong on this, I am very open to correction. "Männer" is in the genitive case for its own reasons (note that in English also we will use "of") and "einer" is still in the nominative, since it is not an object.

This declension difference between ordinal numbers as determiners and as (I believe) pronouns occurs in the masculine and neuter singular in the nominative case, so a further example would be:

* Und heute stehe ich hier vor Ihnen als ein wichtiges Schwein...
* Und heute stehe ich hier vor Ihnen als eines der wichtigsten Schweine...

As I say, I can't back this up. I'm very keen for correction (if I'm wrong) or sources (if I'm right). At any rate, I recommend the OP try the first half of the FSI course and this kind of structure will soon make sense to him/her.

As for word order with "aber", I find it quite beautiful; but as a short-term crutch, sometimes it is helpful to think of "aber" as "however". In the long term, I reckon it's best seen as neither, but rather as a discourse particle in this kind of use. German likes these little words (eben, doch, etc) for expressing subtle discourse meanings. You should make a study of these on their own terms.

Disclaimer: I am not an advanced learner of German, if you have completed Assimil, we are probably at a similar level; so any of this analysis could be wrong and indeed even my German sentences could be wrong.

** The information is obviously still there in the sentence, in the very next clause; but somehow languages generally seem to have constraints on what information can leave a clause and when, presumably to help your interlocutor put everything together easily.

[Kraut]

"einer" is numeral.

Ich stehe heute vor Ihnen als einer der besten Investmentbanker der Londoner City.
Wir betrachten Gomez und Ginczek als zwei der besten Stoßstürmer der Bundesliga.
Wir sehen Steinmeier, Gauck und Wulf als drei der schlechtesten Bundespräsidenten der deutschen Geschichte.