Transports

[Hermann the Lombard]

Personally, I don't think the game system should allow it. Since it does, you lose efficiency by NOT using it (it is handy to get a nice steady one transport load per turn of reinforcements), but the micromanagement is a real PITA. At least you can't pull the Civ3 (or Civ2) exploit of combining ship chaining with infinite rail movement to shoot stacks of units across the globe like--er--stuff through a goose.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by Hayek
the actual gain is not that great. You can ship the initial units a lot faster, but you still need to sail back with the empty transports, making the overall gain rather low - which is probably why the trick is still in the game.

It's not very slow. If your chain is set up properly, it takes 1 turn to get each of your transports back into its original position and repeat the exercise. If you have enough additional transports, you can have an operational chain every turn. The benefit in Civ II was that you delivered a van on the same turn that you built it. This gave you lots of money with which you could rush build another van and repeat the exercise. This doesn't apply in Civ IV. The ship chain will get you one transport's worth of units to their destination very quickly with the benefit that if you lose a transport, it's empty. If you need to get a lot more units into action quickly, a well guarded convoy may be more effective.

RJM at Sleeper's

[Hayek]

Originally posted by rjmatsleepers


It's not very slow. If your chain is set up properly, it takes 1 turn to get each of your transports back into its original position and repeat the exercise. If you have enough additional transports, you can have an operational chain every turn. The benefit in Civ II was that you delivered a van on the same turn that you built it. This gave you lots of money with which you could rush build another van and repeat the exercise. This doesn't apply in Civ IV. The ship chain will get you one transport's worth of units to their destination very quickly with the benefit that if you lose a transport, it's empty. If you need to get a lot more units into action quickly, a well guarded convoy may be more effective.

RJM at Sleeper's

I never said it was slow - quite the contrary. I said the advantage wasnt as great as it seems, simply because the total transport capacity is still the same. Suppose you have a route which takes a transport 2 turns. With 2 transports you can either:
1) start simultaneously, sail for 2 turns, sail back for 2 turns. Takes 4 turns total to get back to the initial position.
2) use the chain. Half the units (1 transport's worth) get there on the first turn, but the next turn they have to sail back into position. the third turn sees the other half of the group moved, and the 4 turn is needed to get back to the initial position.
Using a chain with 4 transports (so one is always ready) leads to the same pricture, but ofcourse with double the transport capacity, since you use twice as much ships.

I think most of us would indeed prefer the more gradual approach of moving a few units every turn, since you usually dont have a huge chunk of units to move at once. As suggested above it can also mean a slight advantage with limited units (spies, misionaries), but you'd have to manage it very carefully, cause half the group arrives later, not earlier. The only real advantages one normally gets out of this trick - which I've been using for a decade - is:
a] when you have to dash for a newly discovered piece of land or resource, and you can preposition your ships while you build the settler/army, and
b] when you have a weak navy and you run the risk of losing the units to whatever enemy ships are around. Still, in such a case the transports are meat anyway and the cahin will be very short-lived.

[coolhandgoose]

My chain was effective for about 5 turns at which point an enemy battlehsip came and made short work of the transports. I did have a strong navy but they were busy bombarding the cities preparing for the siege and couldn't come back in time to protect them. However I didn't lose any units since all the transports were empty after passing off all of the tanks.

Lesson learned, don't leave transports unprotected!!

P.s. I agree the micro managing was very time consuming, but it was a case of needed to be done or I'd lose the beach head. I think this strategy is only effective against an opponent with a very weak navy.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by Hayek


I never said it was slow - quite the contrary. I said the advantage wasnt as great as it seems, simply because the total transport capacity is still the same.

Good point. In Civ II, you had to get the van delivered as soon as possible in order to be able to build another, so it was more about the speed of delivering 1 unit than the total throughput. Here (most of the time) you want to get a lot of units into action, with a big bang at the start! And probably the convoy is easiere to protect than the ship chain.

RJM at Sleeper's

[SebP]

It just occured to me that you really want a chain like that for your missionaries. I almost wish i wouldn't consider it a blatant exploit

[bongo]

This exploit has been with us since civ1

As many here has said already, it is not very helpful to bring over the first wave of an invasion but can be helpful to bring in a steady flow of reinforcements.


My favourite use has been slightly different though, to bring a small (but strong) group to an emergency QUICKLY. Up until civ3, my late-game empires would often be large, but have a relatively small military, emphasizing mobility. Placing transport in select ports and gaps between islands/continents is like having railroads on water. It means that all those irrelevant backwater cities you pick up along the route only need a transport or two to enjoy the full benefit of belonging to the biggest military power in the game


Making transported units lose their movement point when entering a transport has effectively reduced the strength of this exploit. You can still move them round a bit, but you can't unload in a port, send them over land to another port, ship them to a 3rd landmass where the *real* action is etc.