Are there any fast ways to cross the ocean/sea?

[Chaos]

Hi,

Right now in the game, my civ is the only one on the huge island (I exterminated evryone else). Everything is going great, I have large army, quite a few veterans and tons of gold. But to reach enemy civs I have to cross large body of water. Now galleys have to end turns near the shore so I can't get to the other side. I looked in help and it advised me to build Light House and its gonna take 300 turns!! I can't wait that long for it... The game will probably end by then (its year 1575 now). I can't even pay to speed the build process, so are there any other ways? Or am I stuck on my island for a VERY long time?

I am seriously starting to get pissed off at sea/ocean restrictions, why couldn't they just let us go anywhere in galleys without building wonders?

 

[Buecephalus]

You're 100% correct, the ocean/sea restrictions suck. Unfortunately they exist, I don't know if you can change those values in the editor. As for your current game, yer kinda screwed. Unless you're close to getting Astronomy or Magnetism you've got a long wait ahead of you.
Oooh, wait! Do you have any great leaders? If you've exterminated everyone on your island you might have created some great leaders. If you have, you can use one to build the Lighthouse in one turn. Select a city to build the lighthouse in and send your leader there, then click on the "hurry improvement" icon and POOF! Lighthouse.
Now, the Lighthouse MAY solve your problems, but if you've downloaded the patch, the Lighthouse won't allow you to end your galley's turn on an ocean square. My suggestion is to either play on worlds with less water or set Map Making as a 1st priority when you start a game. A neat trick is to get several cities established and then start building the palace in a high shield producing city. This process takes a LOOONGG time. By the time you've discovered Map Making you can switch production of the palace to the Great Lighthouse and get it built much more quickly.
Those are just some suggestions. Hope they helped.

 

[Hattman]

So I can guess correctly that you do not have helicopters so i can't help you. If you did have helicopters you could just load troops up and relocate the choppers to a different city on another continent -> first you would have to have cities on other continents

hope this helped

 

[BillChin]

You can send your galleys across, but many of them will sink. In the January Game of the Month, I crossed to the other continent with galleys only. Two sunk, the third one found a way to cross. It can be done. Best to send empty galleys until you find the shortest route. Later you will get Caravels and magnetism. If you can get the Great Lighthouse, it helps a lot as it increases movement by one, and lets galleys end their turn in sea squares as well as coastal squares (but not ocean).

 

[muppet]

Originally posted by Chaos
I am seriously starting to get pissed off at sea/ocean restrictions, why couldn't they just let us go anywhere in galleys without building wonders?

'cause then the 'historically accurate' police would arrest firaxis.

 

[Chaos]

Well, I guess I am stuck. I had a leader once, but I used him to create an army

Ah well The island I am on is absolutely huge and my civ is well ahead in technology, military and culture so I will still win, it will just take longer...

...And if anyone tries to unload on my island, they can be expected to be crushed very quickly.

BTW I am researching gunpowder at the moment

 

[Buecephalus]

Chaos, I'll probably get flamed for this, but never build armies with your leaders. Save 'em for important wonders. I've played tons of games, a lot of them "conquer" games and never used an army. Maybe that's a failing on my part, I don't see the point in armies. The infrequent times a great leader is created I've always saved 'em for things like the Sistine Chapel, and J.S. Cathedral. Once, I saved a leader for almost 5000 years to build Hoover Dam. I was playing archipelago and had only one city on a river, but it certainly paid off.

 

[cephyn]

What convinced me not to use armies is when i watched the computer throw two armies at me, and my single unit defeated both of them.

I'd rather have a wonder than a plodding unit that's not really all that more likely to win.

Then again, i rarely have leaders since they always seem to get killed before i can move them to the nearest wonder city. Since I play French a lot, I end up getting my leaders from defensive battles, from musketeers stationed on the edges of the empire. Since the computer attacks en masse, I defend, I win, I get a GL, then i get swarmed and lose the city, along with the GL.

Best deal I ever had though -- used a GL to hurry the Iron Works. Now THAT'S fun.

 

[macaskil]

Back to the original topic....

1. You don't need the Lighthouse Wonder - discover navigation or magnetism instead. In fact, I would fire your science advisor if you haven't got these advances in the year 1575. It seems to me your campaign of conquest has been carried out at the expense of your research.

2. Why will the Lighthouse take 300 turns to build? Build it in a city with lots of production.

3. The sea/ocean restriction causes me no problem at all. Sure, I can't invade other continents in the early game, but then other civs can't invade me either. If I am on an island by myself, or have conquered the other civs on my island, I settle down to build up science so that I can get to magnetism first, then build up a D-day force of galleons and frigates. If I really can't wait I build 20 galleys and send them across the ocean using the arrow keys - since they have a 50% chance of sinking each turn if you send enough of them one will eventually get across.

4. The restrictions do make sense. The Aztecs wouldn't have survived into the 1500s if the Chinese or Romans had been able to cross Oceans.