I have seen this happen in more than one game. :confused:

My caravel is out mapping the oceans, and there in the middle of the sea is an AI work boat. Mind you, this is way before Astronomy has been discovered by anyone. What gives?!? :gripe:

Don't suppose you have a screenshot? I've never seen anything like this before.

Don't suppose you have a screenshot? I've never seen anything like this before.

Lemme check tonight. I also remember seeing an AI workboat sailing along the polar icecaps.

self-deleted: I apparently have poor reading comprehension skills

I see it all the time. The AI is using the work boat to scout. Rather smart of it, I think.

I see it all the time. The AI is using the work boat to scout. Rather smart of it, I think.

Yeah, but until they discover Astronomy, a workboat cannot enter the ocean. Yet somehow they do. :crazyeye:

If they stay inside of the cultural borders (with an open borders agreement), the boat can sail where ever. Granted, this doesn't explain the middle of the ocean scenario, but it explains so of the boats away from shore.

I see it all the time. The AI is using the work boat to scout. Rather smart of it, I think.

Yes, it is smart. Rather then making a trieme or a galley, they make fishing boats to use up less production. Shaka loves doing this for some reason?...

A game I had, where I had turned on "Complete kills", I had taken out all of hannibals units - except this annoying workboat. Had to build a galley just to take out this one unit (this was on the great plains map, so there was almost no sea either)

I'm glad they make work boats to scout, I used to do it in vanilla but I stopped because the AI never did it. The funniest part is when a barbarian galley is chasing one of them around.

did you say it was sailing along the ice caps?:confused:
maybe that explains it...

I discovered this the hard way.

If your (or AI) cultural border overlaps an Ocean square, ships like Galley and Workboat can traverse them. This can give them the ability to hop over to the next continent.

Where this bit me was a rival nation was able to send ships to attack me, but I could not send ships to attack them. So I had to be defensive as my border did not allow me to "bridge over".

I have not seen the ice caps "bug"