Establishing those early trade routes/early movement

At start of game, when no roads are yet built, it takes too long to establish long trade routes by land. Daisy chaining cargo ships, offloading cargo from one ship to the next at sea is the way to go. This way you can move cargo right across the map in a single turn. You can also use this tactic with units. It has the added benefit that you don't leave a ship full of cargo in the open as an easy target.
If you get Magellans Expedition you can move 5 squares per turn. In my opinion one of the most important Wonders, because it allows you to explore that much faster, and uses less ships to create the chain.



[This message has been edited by CivGuru (edited April 22, 2001).]

That's one way to do it, but I think it's all little too expensive and inefficient. I just wait untill I get magnetism and Magellan's expidition and then just load galleons up and send 'em to the other side of the world. I rarely use land routes because they are so slow at that point.

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Well, routes are important early on because the science boost is something significant in the beginning especially if you switch to republic.

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I've played Civ all this time and I didn't know you could transfer cargo at sea!

Since I'm at work and don't have a Civ game next to me right now (more's the pity), please tell me how you do this. Do you simply move one ship full of cargo onto another ship and then move the second ship? Or do you wake the cargo up and step them on to an adjacent ship? (But wouldn't that use up movement points so you'd never get across the world in one turn?)

Still learning...

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Originally posted by stormerne:
I've played Civ all this time and I didn't know you could transfer cargo at sea! <IMG SRC="http://forums.civfanatics.com/ubb/blushing.gif" border=0>

Since I'm at work and don't have a Civ game next to me right now (more's the pity), please tell me how you do this. Do you simply move one ship full of cargo onto another ship and then move the second ship? Or do you wake the cargo up and step them on to an adjacent ship? (But wouldn't that use up movement points so you'd never get across the world in one turn?)

Still learning... <IMG SRC="http://forums.civfanatics.com/ubb/smile.gif" border=0>

Click to expand...

You put the two ships in the same square, then ACTIVATE all the units but don't move them. (I like to tell them to sleep again just to be safe). The new ship will gladly take all these units further along on the same turn and the units don't use any movement points. You can set up chains of ships and move units across the world in one turn.


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Thank you Tim. I feel such a fool for not having known that.
Now I'll be able to get even better scores. Everyone beware!

Remember that in the early game, it is well worth your while to establish trade routes between your own cities, especially with a city that has built the Colossus. This generates extra arrows that are converted immediately to increased income/science/luxury.