How to circumnavigate the globe without really trying

[galafor]

FYI-

I accidentally managed to become the first civilization to circumnavigate the globe when I had no access to any ships at any point in the game, and had no coastal cities.

What I did was to trade maps with other civs every so often relatively early on but when I traded them, I did not include my map in the trade. Apparently the game awards the circumnavigation bonus at the beginning of the next turn after the first player has a clear path across the entire width of the world map, NOT actually sailing around the world. Trading maps apparently is good enough to trigger the condition.

I'm not able to find anything about the circumnavigation movement bonus in the manual that comes with the game, so hopefully this isn't useless information.

It didn't help me directly in that game (landlocked OCC game) but I could see how it might be handy if for no other reason than to deny the bonus to your enemies even if you can't use it.

 

[Smirk]

This is odd but expectred and known. Its non-trivial to do in any other way, and basing it on what you've uncovered on your map makes the most sense. However in most games you'll have to do at least some sailing even if its just connecting land masses over a large ocean.

 

[galafor]

Yeah, given the choice of keeping track to see when a particular ship has managed to sail around the world, or simply check to see if there's a horizontal path through the map for a given player, I know I would have coded it the same way.

I think it's probably fairly repeatable, plus it may let you circumnavigate the globe with nothing more than a galley to plug a few gaps. Knowing that you only need to plug the gaps in your map as opposed to going all the way around to get the bonus can be useful too.

 

[M37]

I don't know if this would still work but back in civ2 I used to use a trime to cicumnavigate the globe. since you could not go over the pole the top/ bottem of the world were land as far as the game was concerned and on medium/small maps you could find lots of other civ's this way. great for getting an early tech lead.

 

[MDenizen]

They seem to have corrected that since. You still can't cross the poles, but now it isn't lined with coast anymore so you can't take a galley around the world the way you could in Civ2

 

[peugot]

What is the circumnavigation bonus?

 

[Doctor Love]

What is the circumnavigation bonus?

+1 movement for naval units

 

[solowoo]

Thanks for sharing it. I just lost my circumnavigation bonus because I traded my almost complete map with another civilization.

 

[Gen.Rommel]

Lol thats messed up, ive had Civ IV for about a month now, and i only figured out what the Circumnavigation Bonus did about a week ago, lol!

 

[GenericKen]

I like that trading for cirumnaviagtion is a possibility, as the alternate history aesthetic is really appealing.

Like, the super savvy traders discover the path around the world not on some foreign beach, but in some deep dark study by candlelight.

 

[Innocence]

Lol thats messed up, ive had Civ IV for about a month now, and i only figured out what the Circumnavigation Bonus did about a week ago, lol!

Ditto Rommel All the games I've played so far the AI beat me to it and I only got the 'XXX is the first to circumnavigate the globe' (or whatever the message is). Didn't much care for it since I had no idea it carried some kind of reward

Wonder why they didn't list this in the manual (which I *did* read matter of fact )? Still, I like they feature better than building the Magellan Wonder to discover that the Earth is round. Good call by Firaxis

 

[Aarontu]

I just noticed the way you can circumnavigate the earth without ships while playing around with the world builder. I was giving an AI civ modern techs and when I went back to the game, it said that they circumnavigated the globe on the first turn! (satellites reveals the whole map)

 

[Krupo]

I was very pleasantly surprised when I stumbled upon this; I was glad that I had, up to that point, been pretty zealous about not giving away my own world map. Sending out that caravel halfway around the world to find the hidden English and Indian islands didn't hurt, though.

 

[Imaginactra]

In my first attempt at a circumnavigation, I used two ships and sent them in opposite directions. The map I was on had most of the equatoral areas as ocean so it was fairly easy to dodge the land masses. I was going to have them meet in the middle and simply do a "go to" back to the city they left. To my surprise, once the two caravels met in the middle, I was given the reward.

This backs up the idea that it is rewarded to the first civ to "verify" the world is round.

 

[The Lardossen]

I was trying to do this, and at once the camera shot up, and I got a message I've circumnavigated the globe. I hadn't done that yet, but was close to. That was very wierd. Don't know what triggered it.

 

[Innocence]

Don't know what triggered it.

You probably *did* circumnavigate. Note that you don't need a connected path all the way round - you only need a discovered tile on every map X-coordinate (maybe some native English speaker can explain better? )

 

[Arngautr]

I did this in my last game, built three landlocked cities, on a mostly ocean map, but got paper and traded for the AI maps, got the bonus ... which I used on two fishing boats in the last 50 turns of play, that was a good game. Also, as Innocence did a fine job of explaining I couldn't see a clean path around the world at the time.

 

[The Lardossen]

You probably *did* circumnavigate. Note that you don't need a connected path all the way round - you only need a discovered tile on every map X-coordinate (maybe some native English speaker can explain better? )

Indeed this was the case.

 

[eric_]

Weird...there was one game where I was 99% sure I had circumnavigated first, but when I connected my line with the largely discovered area I was generally operating in, nothing happened. Either I missed a prior notice or something was off?

 

[Innocence]

Either I missed a prior notice or something was off?

Probably just missed the notice - it's only one line followed by the sound usually indicating something bad has happened (same sound they use when you loose a fight or have a meltdown).

Indeed I wonder why they do it this way - it's very easy to miss, and AFAIK there's no backlog where I can check if an event has already taken place.