How to you manage a large invasion force across the ocean?

[Craftsman]

Yes, this is the big question. How to you manage a large invasion force across the ocean?

The anwers is no, because It's not manageable. It's just a bag of pain. A knightmare. Your highly promoted, expensive and precious units are just fresh meat floating on salty water, praying to not be eaten alive by barbarian or other enemy ships (regardless of their strengh).

Example, from my first game (Tiny Map, Prince):

Spoiler :

I spent eight turns (from 1956 AD to 1972 AD - 16 years!) to cross an ocean on a tiny map (imagine this on a huge map), trying to protect 14 embarked military units (one Great General among them) with 4 ships (just what my production allowed me to have - two destroyers, one caravel and one frigate). Meanwhile, a barbarian destroyer (!!!) popped up, as several enemy ships as well. As the attacked units may not die immediately after a combat, the injured enemy ships always manage to pick at least one of my poor embarked units. It's a knightmare to try and protect those poor rubber defenseless ducks.

Now, talking specifically about the movements (over water or ground): my hopes are almost nonexistent that we'll see multiple units movement (or even stacking, for that matter) someday in Civ 5 for the following reasons:

1) One Unit per Hex (1UPH) is at the core of the new Civ 5 gameplay - they'll stick with this until Civ 6;
2) Path planning algorithms aren't effectively dealing with 1UPH, or with the hexes themselves, as the units keep stopping and asking for orders again and again. This is happening because each unit path crosses another unit path at some point much more frequently than before (when we had square tiles). Therefore, resolving this issue for multiple units movement would be a dauting task.

Civ 5 is an awesome game in many, many aspects but, as a game about war (even with all the peaceful stuff around), the burden of dealing with a large number of units on the battlefield, at the moment, is unbearable. And we'll always need a large number of units if we plan to, at least, survive until the end of a game.

Please, let me, and the others, hear your thoughts on this matter.

Best regards!

P.S.: Disembarking combat units on enemy lands is another bag of pain, since they are not allowed to stack after disembarking (well, they're never allowed). The enemy civ will throw everything (even the kitchen sink) against the heads of the disembarked units, while the other units (remember the fresh meat) are floating hopeless on the ocean, waiting to be eaten alive in a moment or two. Heavy air or naval support won't help much - it takes forever to build these amazing war toys and, as the injured enemy ships are still able to destroy the embarked units, it's almost pointless.

 

[bitparity]

I for one, welcome this change, as I was subjected to a massive naval invasion of my island japan, outnumbered 2 to 1, that I held off because i wisely chose to invest all my land units into artillery.

Only two russian invasion units got off the boat and they were quickly decimated.

This basically gives smaller countries a much better chance, and likewise, forces people who're used to domino style expansion, to think about how to invade.

Artillery Artillery Artillery. I think a 3 to 1 artillery to fighting unit ratio would be very good for anything, offense or defense.

 

[Ykai]

A simple transport would solve this. Embarking is great, and incredibly useful, but it should not have come at the cost of the regular transport units. One unit per hex is no obstruction; it sure wasn't in Civ 1. Load them all on a transport ship and find a good landing beach where you can unload three, move on, and unload the rest of them. All that would require is some planning which is what strategy is all about, right? Send some carriers full of planes that can bombard and take out the enemy fleet from afar, and I can see this being a lot of fun.

 

[Abremms]

you have to defend your embarked units better. keep some warships in close for defense, but put some smaller faster ships in a wider formation so nothing can sneak up on your out of the fog of war without seeing it at least a turn before it reaches your vulnerable units. a strong navy is VITAL to any trans-oceanic invasion. if you can't field the ships to protect your land units, stay home until you can.

 

[duxup]

I can't say I've had a big problem with this. My invasions have gone well. The vulnerability while in transport and just on the beachhead seems pretty realistic / logical.

Now maybe I'll change my mind and decide it is unbalanced later but so far the challenge of landing seems like a fair challenge in my experiences.

As others have noted I use a ring or two of ships if I think I'm going to meet a big challenge.

 

[spoooq]

Destroyers, basically. They aren't that expensive, if you are in a position to go inter-continental. They can help bombard the land defenders as well. I've found they aren't much help against cities though. Maybe battleships are better for that, I'll have to get one and see.

 

[Bhoy]

Every criticism of the game mechanics is met with similar response here a.k.a. get over it.

I've had the exact same issue, taking hours of my time to try do anything over the sea. I find a cheaper route is just chancing your arm and hoping you won't be met by enough enemy ships to kill a sizable amount of troops, cheaper than producing the defenses that won't work anyway.

I really don't want to be constantly complaining about the game but I'm finding it so hard to see the positives - maybe once I learn the different ways to get round these annoyances I might resepect the way it's been done, well I bloody well hope so.

 

[luchofeio]

i had a Multiplayer landing that was awsome
so it can be done even agaisnt a human player

 

[spoooq]

Are you seriously suggesting that it was easier to invade over sea in cIV?????



I get a headache just at the thought of building all those transports!

Why should you get to run your troops all over the ocean if you don't gain control of it first???

 

[Abremms]

its not "get over it" so much as "adapt your tactics to a new situation"

many of the people who complain about these things appear to still be trying to apply civ4 strategies to civ5, you cannot do that if you want to enjoy civ 5.

I am simpathetic to most of the more legitimate complaints, i had lots of concerns myself on my first few playthroughs. however, I have adjusted my playstyle to the new mechanics and i find the game infinately more enjoyable this way.

 

[duxup]

I've had the exact same issue, taking hours of my time to try do anything over the sea. I find a cheaper route is just chancing your arm and hoping you won't be met by enough enemy ships to kill a sizable amount of troops, cheaper than producing the defenses that won't work anyway.

That taking hours to do anything over the sea sounds like Civ IV to me rather than V.

 

[spoooq]

I remember trying to adapt CivIII tactics to IV... now there was some pain!

 

[NZV]

If naval units did more damage to other naval units, it wouldn't be such a pain in the ass. As it is, it sometimes takes my destroyers/battleships multiple turns to destroy some horribly outdated ship like a barbarian trireme. Meaning that trireme gets a free kill on any embarked unit. Gets even worse when the tech gap isn't so ridiculously large. You just cannot effectively destroy an enemy naval force before they cheesily move onto your transports, taking them down instantly. I'm playing Elizabeth on a tiny islands map right now and really regretting not picking Askia. Especially when my level 16 units get killed off in some lame way like that and I reload the game (which is a 7+ minute ordeal with plenty of crashes in my case)

I can't say I mind the vulnerabilities involved in the 1UPT while landing units on the shore, though. If you don't want to deal with that, land them farther away. It should be kinda risky to come out of nowhere in the sea and unload everything you've got at the enemy doorstep. Certainly went poorly for more than a few guys at D-day.

 

[Frasco]

Embarked units must be protected by a strong navy. The best way to avoid enemy ships rounding up to take the defenseless transports is by using your own ships ZoC (Zone of Control) by setting your ships in a clever formation that won't allow enemy ships through it. Then bombard. In any case... one couldn't protect 14 transports with only 4 ships effectively in [cIV] either

 

[swatmp5]

I had a game with continents on Prince. Me on one continent (eventually) and Bismark took over the other one. Bismark was way ahead of me in terms of gold and had a small tech lead. I mounted a concentrated force, very concentrated, with two nukes (one in the sub the other on the carrier) and made my way across to Berlin: their one objective was to take the city. Needless to say, they took it.

Spoiler :

 

[mattavich]

I see what you're saying but all this tells me is that you were not ready to make an invasion.

There needs to be a lot of preparation to make an invasion by sea. For a start, you need total naval superiority. You should have stationed units outside the barb encampments which create the naval units and sweeped the oceans for any still about.

I would have also waited for bombers/stealth bombers and cleared the area before the landing.

Then once close to the country you're invading you move your naval units in and bombard any units on the coast with your ships/aircraft.

I'm not having a go but your tactics seemed to be "build some ships to escort my units and hope it goes well".

Civ5 isn't a sim on real life but in real life it's even harder to make a naval landnig. No expense spared when trying to invade by sea, it is difficult. How do you think england survived so many invasions!

 

[spoooq]

How is a slow barb trireme getting through the huge visibility zone on your destroyer?

 

[mattavich]

swatmp5, that looks awesome, i bet you were well chuffed! haha

 

[Dorkhan]

How to manage? Play Songhai.

 

[dvandyke]

You need to defend your convoy.