Importance of Blockade?

[henyo10]

whats the purpose of it?
what does it really do to the enemy?
How many ships must be used to effectively blockade?
It seems useless?

 

[oranges]

It prevents the city from working the blockaded tiles, effectively starving the city in question. It also blocks trade routes, but that is less effective as the city is likely to have land routes that would still work.
The number of ships needed depends mostly on how many you need to defend. One or two is usually enough to blockade everything you want blockaded, but you don't want them destroyed.

 

[killmeplease]

land trade routes are much less profitable

 

[Refar]

It can deal huge damage given circumstances - for AI cities higly reliant on seafood for example. And it will usually force the AI to produce lots of naval units, which helps a lot, if you are preparing or running a land based invasion.

 

[oranges]

land trade routes are much less profitable

Are you sure the game makes a distinction? I thought the only difference is being able to build harbors, customs houses etc, which makes them more profitable, but I don't think a blockade will annul those benefits if the city is still trade-connected.

 

[Pir Lan Tota]

I think sea trade gets you more because of the longer distances involved. And yes, blockading rocks. If you plan on doing this, in early ages, beeline Metal Casting, build stacks of 3 trimines (or how ever it is written) and see them sink those bloody Galleys...give Great General Points too

 

[IagoAlberto]

Blockade definitley varries in usefulness, if your enemy has a lot of seafood supported cities then it can really cripple him. It can also be very powerful if the AI only has a certain resource on an island, say oil to blockade that island. Yes overseas traderoutes are more profitable so a good blockade in a war where you aren't making much progress on land can really hurt an AI's tech speed giving you a longer term advantage.

 

[J-man]

On archipelago you can sometimes blockade an entire Civ and that can can have a huge effect. I've seen AI's falling from nr 2 in score to last due to a complete blockade.

 

[nbcman]

land trade routes are much less profitable

Rather, trade routes between continents are more profitable than non-continental trade routes.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If I plan on taking war to a civ (or even 2), I will blockade them to maul their teching ability while I build up...especially good in the time of privateers although if you already have a war on your hands blockades with ships of the line before they even have chemistry can pretty much screw a coastal AI. If it relies on seafood its workers will farm over cottages, and it will spam caravels. Neither of those things are winning strategies...you can destroy a civ damaged badly enough by this at your leisure.

 

[CCRunner]

The only time I ever blockade is with privateers. With privateers it's basically free money while hurting a rival.

 

[Wolfshanze]

There's something else that nobody else covered here... if you're planning a naval invasion of an island, and can effectively blockade the entire island prior to invasion... if that island is dependent upon overseas resources such as iron, horses, oil or whatever... a proper blockade of the island can also completely nerf the island's ability to build it's own defensive force of troops.

 

[Balderstrom]

I just wish there was some kind of ingame notification that You [ARE] Blockading, or a turn by turn notice of how much commerce you have impacted. Something. As is, theres no notice at all, and nothing mentions if you need to blockade every tile the City could have a trade route thru, ie 2 ships if it touches the ocean in 2 spots.

I think one of the CIVs gets profit from the blockade or maybe it was the privateer, I don't recall - nothing I have experienced in-game as of yet.

It would also be interesting if it prevented resources from entering the city from overseas.

 

[neckface]

some more points on blockades, mateys:

dont forget that one ship can blocade multiple cities within its effective blockade range. (is it a 6 tile-radius?)

while a ship is blockading it will not heal, so send yer pirates in pairs if ye can.

use one privateer to maintain the blockade, and the other to experience-farm on all the helpless caravels the AI sails around ye! soon, you'll be farming GGs and have monster ships to unlock west point and to upgrade to destroyers in a few years

you only gain gold per turn per blockaded city using privateers, and only then during peacetime. during wartime, the trade-routes and water tiles are still denied, but no gold per turn.

blockade all yer enemies ports, and he won't have access to overseas imports, yaar!

and last, don't be blockading a water-dependent city ye are about to plunder, 'cause once the port be closed, it shrinks in size faster than ye can imagine!

 

[Wolfshanze]

It would also be interesting if it prevented resources from entering the city from overseas.

It does... that was the whole point of my previous post.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I just wish there was some kind of ingame notification that You [ARE] Blockading, or a turn by turn notice of how much commerce you have impacted. Something. As is, theres no notice at all, and nothing mentions if you need to blockade every tile the City could have a trade route thru, ie 2 ships if it touches the ocean in 2 spots.

I think one of the CIVs gets profit from the blockade or maybe it was the privateer, I don't recall - nothing I have experienced in-game as of yet.

It would also be interesting if it prevented resources from entering the city from overseas.

It *does* block overseas resources. If you completely surround an island civ and blockade it there will be no access to overseas resources of any kinds.

You can get a rough idea of the damage you do based on the tiles the AI would be working in the water...it's usually just the seafood resources but not always. Getting them to farm over cottages though......!

Also, if you click on a ship after it's been told to blockade, it will show the blockade range. Which, by the way, is pretty much 3 tiles in every direction, blockade ranges are HUGE.

 

[say1988]

Blocades are VERY powerful. in one of my first BTS games I beelined privateers to play around with them on an archipelago map. Monty was my neighbour and far stranger than me (I had the most advanced techs, but was missing some important early ones). I blockaded every single water tile he had. He went from first in score, to dead last, and same with power. By the time my other enemies started sending destroyers after me and catching my privateers forcing me to give up, Monty still didn't have optics!!!!!!! He had virtually 0 commerce. No sea tiles, no rivers (tiny islands after all), no trade routes, virtually no commerce resources, no happy of health in his cities, and all his hammers going into triremes and galleys (at times there would be literally dozens on a screen).

 

[troytheface]

"Monty was my neighbour and far stranger than me"

I know the feeling.

 

[Wolfshanze]

Monty is my vassal biatch in my current game. He does what I tell him to do!

 

[pxpdoo]

The only time I ever blockade is with privateers. With privateers it's basically free money while hurting a rival.

ditto.