Caravels and Missionaries

[Genghis Dhan]

Question: Caravels are supposed to be able to carry a single Scout, Explorer, Missionary, Spy or Great Person, but I haven't been able to get them to load, either in regular BTS or in the Totally Replaced Leaders mod, which I like since it lets me look at Dido This frequently messes me up (the Caravels thing, not looking at Dido) as I tend to go early for a religion, try to be the first to circumnavigate the world, and have opportunities to spread my religion to countries without one before anyone else gets there, and not having to wait for Astronomy and Galleons. Is this an error? Or was there some change in BTS of which I'm not aware? It still defines Caravels in the Civilopedia as carrying one of the above units. I just tried every which way to get a Missionary on a Caravel - loading in a port, trying to run the Missionary out to the Caravel as it sat in the harbor, even trying to unload/reload at sea from a Galley to the Caravel, but no luck with any of those.

 

[*Svart*]

your problem is that caravel can travel across rival lands without open border, missionaries can't. So you can enter in a rival city with your caravel without open border, but you can't unload missionaries, cause it's a war action. Just sign an open border an you'll be fine.

 

[Rathelon]

That's not his problem. He's saying he cant even load the missionary onto the caravel.

Cant say I have the answer though - I usually only build 2 caravels per game to circumnavigate the world. I usually have Astronomy by the time they have gotten me the movement bonus so I bring them home and upgrade them.

 

[*Svart*]

oh sorry... Never noticed that problem. I seldom use caravel for missionaries, it works

 

[Genghis Dhan]

Thanks for responding, guys. Anyone else have a suggestion? Or can tell me definitely that I can't do it, and why?

 

[r_rolo1]

I can't talk about the mod you mention ( but if it is just a civ/leader pack as the name suggests, it should not make diference ), but in Civ IV and all the X-paks caravels can carry missionaries And since I can do that in BtS, I assume you are doing something wrong

So, let's do the dumb stuff elimination ( just because a lot of errors are simply caused by people doing dumb stuff without even realizing ):

-The caravel is empty?

-Are you hitting the load button when caravel and missionary are on the same tile?

If you can't load a empty caravel with a missionary if they are both in the same tile in BtS, please post a save with that , just for everyone to check it and see what is going on.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Just move the caravel outside your city and then walk the unit onto it. If that works then you can't be using the load button properly, if it doesn't work then something else is going wrong. Either way it'll help you narrow it down.

 

[Genghis Dhan]

Thanks for your responses. Rolo, it's happening in vanilla BTS as well as in the mod, so I can't attribute it to the mod. Yes, the caravels are empty, yes, they're in the same tile. How do I do this save thing so that you all can see my game? This is a screenshot?

Manfred, I tried walking it on as well, that didn't work either.

I'll make a new Caravel (converted all mine to Frigates in the meanwhile) and a new missionary so that I can show you all. Thanks for your interest. It's a minor thing. Maybe my game has a very minor error in it; I'm not noticing any other problems.

 

[r_rolo1]

No, I mean, save the game and attach the save file to a post in here. Then everyone can get a look on what is happening ....

 

[Bellringer]

Is it any use loading a missionary on to a caravel, in the first place, if you dont have an Open Border agreement? I normally never allow Open Borders, as they may send Settlers later. However, in my game, I loaded my missionary in a caravel and cruised around the shores of other countries. I did not have an Open Border agreement with any country. However, I found their religion spreading into my continent (I am alone on the whole continent) whereas I could not spread my religion there. Can anyone tell me why?

 

[*Svart*]

because new cities without religion tend to get a religion. Not necessary YOUR religion. To avoid this fact, just use a missionary as you make the city.

 

[Ambidexter]

I normally never allow Open Borders, as they may send Settlers later.

You don't trade with other civs?

 

[*Svart*]

you can trade without open border. I usually open border only when my military is strong.

 

[Bellringer]

At Monarch difficulty many civs refuse to trade anything.

 

[*Svart*]

you can trade also at monarch.

 

[JujuLautre]

you cannot have trade routes without open borders, I think that's what Ambidexter meant.

 

[TheDS]

In the early-mid game, having trade routes with other civs is important to your economy. I find it often makes the difference between leading the tech race and never even being in it. Other civs hardly ever cross my borders to plant cities in my lands, as long as what's mine is obviously mine - that is, if they plant a city, it's gonna flip to me. And I'm not afraid to use my military as a solution either.

Try it some time. It's just a game. Maybe you'll find a better way to play.

 

[Cicerosaurus]

Got me stumped. I use the strategy- I normally have a few caravels on stand by to take missionaries to other countries constantly as I always need the money. I also load an explorer onto the first one to navigate the globe in case there is an unexplored island with goody huts.

Bellringer, religion will spread anyway even without missionaries.

 

[Genghis Dhan]

Is it any use loading a missionary on to a caravel, in the first place, if you dont have an Open Border agreement? I normally never allow Open Borders, as they may send Settlers later. However, in my game, I loaded my missionary in a caravel and cruised around the shores of other countries. I did not have an Open Border agreement with any country. However, I found their religion spreading into my continent (I am alone on the whole continent) whereas I could not spread my religion there. Can anyone tell me why?

Bellringer, trade and trade routes are different. You can trade without Open Borders. But you can only have trade routes - the things that show in the upper left hand corner of your city screen - with countries you have open borders with. Trade routes can be a little mystifying as you don't directly control what cities they are with or how much they generate. (You can get a sense where the number is derived by passing the cursor over it; it'll show you the formula by which the game is deciding that this trade route with Moscow is worth 6 gold per turn right now.) But: foreign and/or overseas trade routes are with much more than domestic ones with your own cities. You don't get more than 2 or 3 gold per turn for each of those. You meanwhile can get 10 GPT or even higher (I think I've seen 12 or 13, rarely) for a single trade route with some major foreign city. You also can make trade routes yield more by building Harbor, Customs House, and get extra ones with civics such as Free Market.

The effect trade routes have on your commerce is MAJOR. It can make a difference of 10 or 20 percent in your research rate. And this is why players opt for Open Borders. This is the payoff, much more than the single point you get from foreign leaders for having Open Borders with them. If that were the only benefit, no one would have Open Borders; far better to keep your borders closed in that case and keep everyone guessing about your strength, your map, everything, than to get just that single positive attitude point.

Trade routes are also a major consideration against going to State Property - you lose the extra trade route Free Markets gives you. I find that State Property is a given if I've got much of an overseas empire at all, more than a couple of cities. But, if you don't, the benefits aren't as great, and meanwhile the benefits of having Free Markets and access to Corporations are significant.

 

[Genghis Dhan]

Also, Bellringer, having Open Borders doesn't mean someone can settle in your lands. If it's your land - got the color of your empire - they can't settle on it period, and colored or not, they can't settle within two squares of any city center of yours. It's three, minimum.

I've found with the latest Civ IV patches the AI is more aggressive, in playing your bordering civilizations, in settling right along your border to limit your future expansion. If they enter into your lands - and by this I mean land that you consider in your sphere of influence, but your cultural borders haven't reached yet, so they physically can settle there - that their cities will tend to dwindle and ultimately flip to you, surrounded as they are by your lands. Or you can, as others have mentioned, conquer them at a convenient moment.

If you played Civ III, city settlement was different, as the cultural borders aspect of the game wasn't as developed, as the game permitted you to settle enormous numbers of cities and you felt forced to do so to keep opponents from colonizing any nook or cranny along your borders, no matter how worthless, small or unviable it was for an actual territory. I once had a game where I had about 200 cities.

Civ IV penalizes players for larger numbers of cities, so you and the AI also have less incentive to settle willy-nilly. And you have strategies for pushing your borders out to cover that last rock; build a theater or a broadcast tower, get a religion, build a temple, up your cultural points and your borders will soon reach it.