Chain-Link Galleons

[lymond]

I've been trying something fairly recently in situations in which you are conquering overseas rivals and have a bit of water to traverse and interested in whether others here do the something similar. If not, maybe it's worth considering. Post Astro, I build a lot of Galleons initially to send a large amount of troops to attack the unsuspecting rival. Sometimes this army is a enough but often it's good to have reinforcements in the pipeline, especially if you are going for conquest or plan to continue the war on to another civ.

Once the Galleons drop off the army. I send them back toward the homeland but in a sort of chain link fashion. In other words, I space things out so that the initial ship at the home dock loads up new recruits and then sails over to a waiting ship that then loads up those new recruits and so on until they arrive on the battlefield. (Note: the circum bonus helps a lot with speed but not necessary if you have enough ships) I'm often able to get these new soldiers across the sea in 1 turn. One thing I like to do is have the ships unload in a port city for defense initially which allows me to send those troops defending currently out in the field. Or you can just drop them on some poorly defended port city outside the central battle area or whatever suits the opportunity - the key is speedy reinforcement.

Seems pretty logical and I'm sure others do something like this but I've not heard it mentioned before in my time on the boards. I'd say the one major caveat is the naval military tech situation of the civ or civs you are fighting against. In which case you may need some frigates in the chain to protect your ships. I often exploit this though just after teching or Libbing Astro so I'm first to those ships. It's also saved my butt a few times getting those troops over faster. It really seems to save a lot of turns, especially when you are trying to take the other guy out before he gets some tech that will make it much harder to do so.

 

[Duke Blackstone]

Good call. I cant belive i havnt thought of that yet. hats off to you, sir

 

[michmbk]

I always loved the double stack approach when attacking by sea. Having a first wave hit with 5-8 galleons & a couple frigates, and a second wave with another stack of galleons a few turns later - constantly alternating them back and forth between the homeland and the warfront, shipping troops over. some of my old games in the monarch student series definitely did that.

 

[z0wb13]

you could do that trick at least since civ 2.

but although you can get one boatload of troops some place a bit faster, note that it doesn't actually increase the number of reinforcements that you can send.

 

[BarrageQueen]

One thing I like to do is have the ships unload in a port city for defense initially which allows me to send those troops defending currently out in the field.

This, I also use very often. As for "chaining" ships, I suppose you're talking about a ship unloading in a port and the troops advancing some tiles in the same turn to board another ship, right? I do use this move sometimes. But such "chaining" isn't really useful to me for faster ocean travel, generally. If I had some landmass in the middle of the traversed ocean, I guess I could use it. What types of maps do you do this in?

 

[mirthadir]

but although you can get one boatload of troops some place a bit faster, note that it doesn't actually increase the number of reinforcements that you can send.

Depends. Sending everything without chaining risks a large number of potential reinforcements not getting there before the war is over. Using chained ships lets you have a faster flow rate for units, but a lower carrying amount. This is highly valuable if you are operating on just in time production - you lack a unit stockpile in your core and are producing at the capacity of your logisitics network. For a 6 ship long chain this means that on turn one you get 3 units over, reset the chain, 6 units on turn three ...

With unchained shipping you spend get 3 units on turn 6, none on turn 7 (assuming 3 units every 2 turns production), 6 on turn 9 ...

So if you don't have a stockpile of units, chaining gets you more reinforcements (assuming a finite length to the war). Conversely if you have a stock pile then you can get 18 units on turn 6 without chaining compared to 9 with; chaining catches back up at turn 12, and pulls ahead until turn 18 (where it is again down until turn 24).

Using a just in time logistic system allows you to leverage more units on the front sooner in most cases. Even with a stockpile the rules of n-squared warfare mean that you should expect to come out ahead via chaining just because you get more units there sooner.

For optimal logisitics you should actually build galleys to meet the ones chaining back and begin the chain sooner; this then puts chaining firmly ahead in getting more units there sooner.

****The one major caveat to all of this is that we are assuming control of seas are not contested. A handful of frigates can easily disrupt the chain, even caravels can cause you to lose moves and delay reinforcements. Due to the need to police the entire length of the chain, your naval supremacy costs are higher than if you adopt bulk convoy logistics.

 

[lshockley]

@Lymond, the major disadvantage to your "chain" is that you have to manually reload the units at the relay point each time... that's a lot of extra clicking!

Here's what I do, you might like this better too - I build A LOT of galleons - enough that I can always have 2 or more waiting at each load point of my empire, regardless of distance to war. The trick is to never have your land units waiting for a ship. Ideally, I sail a galleon at the end of each turn, unless it only has one unit. Then I wait one turn, and then send it next turn if it still has one unit. They sail all the way to the drop point, and then turn around and come back to the on deck position.

As you mentioned, the naval landscape (navalscape?) is important to consider. If I have Galleons and everybody has Caravels, I send naked Galleons. If anybody else has Astronomy, I use two Galleons stacked (still sailing at the end of every turn, even if they're partly empty.) Once Chemistry comes around, I pair each Galleon with a Frigate.

For short distances, this is usually on 5-8 galleons. For cross-world voyages, though, you need a ton of Galleons. But, I like having them around, I just send them on kamikaze pillage missions if I end up with too many.

Also, don't forget about amphibious attack - it's useful pre-Marine if you can get the odds,

 

[Iberian]

This was true in Civ 1. I used it on one of my greatest Emperor wins to channel chariots off my main land. Civ 1 had so many exploits.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

"Bulk convoy logistics" also allows you to land a 2nd stack to start capturing cities from a different location in the enemy empire than your present stack. Depending on the kind of war and how it's going, that is often preferable.

There's actually a strategy article on this already, though it doesn't get a lot of posts and probably isn't on the first page.

 

[michmbk]

I've done this in a number of games, and am likely to do it in the colonial challenge when I finish it up tonight. Two separate stacks of galleons is my typical preference. Once I have enough ready for the first wave, I send them, and then immediately get a second wave ready - love dropping new stacks every few turns.

It's especially great with a bit of a tech lead and a good economy - switch to US, buy all those new units and get them transported even faster.

 

[Bostock]

you could do that trick at least since civ 2.

Since Civ I in fact. Actually IIRC you could get even more gamey in Civ I, can't be arsed to look up the details though.

EDIT: Didn't see Iberian's post.

 

[kosiosko 1]

The trouble with stringing them out is after a few turns your found , the AI tends to stack its units ie 4 East Indimen, Issy with 4 frigets , etc. your 2Gal+1Frig +Cargo go down. The ai gains exp your chain is broken-- do you group up into bigger convoys or run. Running --- might as well have sent a large convoy to start with--- grouping up-- if you group into 2-3 stacks you might win the sea battle but loose a 1/4 to 1/2 of your ships. If you still have enough ships for the chain its been out of use 4 maybe 8 turns. your cargo starts moving (3-5 turns) 7 to13 turns you've sent replacement ships ---no land unit production

Issy's second stack shows up -- No problem this time-- still takes 7 to 13 turns thoe ---thats 14 to 26turns. All that while on a 6 point relay 6 frigates maybe 6 gallions (12 maybe)

As a convoy you would have won the sea battle, gained exp. lost no land unit prod. no cargo lost

Over the 26 turns till your up and running again it could work out even ---if your lucky ---if your lucky why not send unescourted ships fully loaded--- forget i said that.

but the opportunity lost was a 6 gallion stack 18 units arriving back 15 turns ago, if you don,t have the units, wait your 6 frigets should wreak havock on the ennemy if you loose 2 -- 4 should be avalible (+exp0 for escourt

If things go bad you actually lost all of your ships to Issy's first attack of 2 stacks -- probally 2frigs 3gall each returnig from somewhere empty

 

[Iranon]

Interesting, I didn't know this works - I'd have regarded it an obvious exploit that would be fixed by now.

 

[kosiosko 1]

It could have been -- but i recently swapped units at sea and moved, just so i could disband one ship--- don't know if it's still possible to repeat in the same turn, it just feels like an exploit thoe

 

[MadmanAtW]

Interesting, I didn't know this works - I'd have regarded it an obvious exploit that would be fixed by now.

In fact, IIRC, it got "fixed" as the side effect of fixing something else in the unofficial patch and so many people complained that it was reverted back out. I also look at it and think this is obviously not intended, but...

 

[yanner39]

Ok, I'll ask.

I think I understand the basic concept, which I could see as being very useful.

But after the first wave is sent and dropped off, the Galleons line up. The military units at the home port use one movement point to load on the first Galleon. That Galleon moves to the next Galleon. Doesn't it take another movement point to move the units on the next Galleon and so on? I know that when I unload my units, I can't move them until the next turn.

 

[kosiosko 1]

Ok, I'll ask.

I think I understand the basic concept, which I could see as being very useful.

But after the first wave is sent and dropped off, the Galleons line up. The military units at the home port use one movement point to load on the first Galleon. That Galleon moves to the next Galleon. Doesn't it take another movement point to move the units on the next Galleon and so on? I know that when I unload my units, I can't move them until the next turn.

As it appears to have been fixed---- At sea two ships same tile--- unload say an archer--- it can't sit there --- so load it on other ship, it happens next turn

BUT move that ship and the archer goes with it--- think that still happens ---but the bug or cheat allowed it to happen again---posibilly useing the ships load unload action repeat 10 times and the archer travells 30 tiles in one turn

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