Ship Chaining

[cpemma]

Theory is:

Daisy chaining cargo ships, offloading cargo from one ship to the next at sea is the way to go. This way you can move cargo right across the map in a single turn.

Can someone explain how to work this? My tries result in 1 transfer before the caravan goes to sleep till next turn.

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

You have to select the sqaure that has the ship and the cargo, it will then bring up a box showing both units. Click on the caravan units icon to wake it up then move it into the next ship. Once you start moving the ship the caravan goes back to sleep, but you just wake him up the same way as above and move him to the next ship. You can keep doing that as long as you like.

Hope that is descriptive enough.

 

[Sodak]

To clarify, you must end the first ship's movement in the same square as the second ship. Don't move the caravan, just activate him and then tell him to sleep. The next ship to leave the square will carry the caravan as cargo. End ship 2's movement on the same square as ship 3, repeat caravan wake/sleep, ad infinitum.

If you move the caravan from one square to another to board a ship, it will no longer be able to move. The above method will still work, but its movement point is used up.

 

[cpemma]

Thanks, Sodak, I was moving my caravan to an alongside ship, not one on same square.

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

Actually my post above was talking about the ships in the same square. I just didn't write it very well. Guess that's what happens when I try and do a 'quick' post. Sorry.

Believe it or not, most people have the problem of how to actually wake up the caravans.

As a side note, you can actually just wake up the units, then move the next ship and they will all go in the new ship. It saves a little time when your doing it to full transports.

 

[Anunikoba]

There has always been controversy surrounding transport chaining. But in truth, it isn't that effective (it takes one turn to get your transporting finished; and then another to get them back into the 'start' position) because of the hassle and the number of transports you need.

But it still works.

 

[Smash]

huh?..ship chaining is one of the most powerful things you can do.

 

[Magnus]

Damn right! Ship chaining can get cargo from one port to any other port in the game in 2 turns, one move onto the first ship, and one move off the last ship.

 

[Smash]

if you load your boats inside a city you can build freight/caravans-load em-move em 50 squares-deliver em-all on the same turn.Using this you can fly thru the tech tree and land early.
A trick you can use is to re-support freight/caravans from your SSC or other high trade cities.You get huge bonus for every freight this way.

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

If you pick up the cargo in a city and deliver it in a city it can be done in one turn and have it where there is still movement left for the cargo once it is delivered.

It certainly makes fast delivery possible for caravans before the discovery of railraods or airports. I use to run strings of triremes along the coast just to move troops to the front faster.