Strategies for the Sea

[Scooby_Doo]

Hello,

I've never been a fan of naval units in any of the Civ games as I don't feel there's any need to control the seas. However, I understand that BtS has made a lot of changes to naval units and I was wondering if anyone had any interesting strategies/advice in relation to them? Ordinarily I'll build maybe 2 transports as my entire navy and I wonder if I'm missing something...

[ybrevo]

I think naval units can be useful in many ways: 1. If you have a coastline with many resources, you can place units on each to protect from pillage (or you could visit an enemy and sink all his fishing boats). 2. You can make a line of strong units along your coast to catch a naval invasion. 3. You can use some units to bombard coastal cities, thereby decreasing "culture". 4. Submarines can really make life hard for an enemy´s fleet ;-)

[Unimatrix11]

Originally posted by ybrevo
3. You can use some units to bombard coastal cities, thereby decreasing "culture".

To clarify: You do NOT reduce the culture of a city by bombarding it (be it by ship, bombers or artillery), but merely the defence-bonus it provides for units inside.

[yooperdrew]

The value of sea units of course depends on the map. On a lot of maps, I hardly bother with naval units either. You have to park a warship on your fishing sites, tho, or they won't last long. Aircraft carriers are the most useless, mostly because they don't carry enough aircraft. Missile subs are the best.

[wodan11]

Beeline Privateers. Make a LOT of them. Send them out to get free XP by "cleaning out" all the str 2 and 3 ships the AI has scooting around. This will give you between 2 and 5 great generals.

In addition, use them to blockade the bigger AI cities. This will give you an income of of 2-10 gold per ship per turn. (So if you have only 10 privateers, that's an extra 20-100 gold per turn. This is offset by unit maintenance but only a teeny bit.)

Give your privateers either Combat 1 and Medic, or all the way up the Combat line until they get Blitz. Then, send them home and "save" them until later in the game when you upgrade to Destroyers.

When (not if, but when) the AI sends an invasion fleet of frigates and galleons, all you need is a single blitz destroyer nearby and you can clean out the entire stack.

Wodan

[egavactip]

I am not particularly experienced with Civ4 (though am with 4x games generally), so take what I say with a grain of salt. I find navies not usually worth the trouble, as long as you have a land hex close enough to another continent you want to invade that you can do the "transport boogie" and get them in and out fast to minimize attrition.

However, you need convoy protection for longer invasions.

Also, I have found it useful to have carriers with fighters to get increased air cover in situations where I only have a limited number of cities within range of desired targets. Of course, they need protection.

[Theben]

I blockaded with a privateer 3 island cities, generating 6 gold/turn. Also it starved 2 of those cities down to size 1 and 4, respectively.

[johnmcd]

Privateers are the only naval unit worth it
- free money
- free generals
- free top class destroyers if you need them later

That said, if you are really able to get a fleet of privateers out far enough ahead of the AI's frigates you've already won.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by johnmcd
That said, if you are really able to get a fleet of privateers out far enough ahead of the AI's frigates you've already won.

How do you figure?

It gives you benefits, at the same time as costing the AI, sure.

But, basically you're looking at hurting the top 2-3 (at minimum) of the AIs, and on most maps that amounts to 20+ cities to blockade. Plus you're trying to kill caravels, galleys, and galleons running around; and you've got privateer healing after every battle.

Maybe it's just me but I usually struggle to get between 10-15 privateers out there, and while it definitely is a good thing, there's no way it means that I've "already won" the game.

Wodan

[Kuciwalker]

What he means is that if you have the tech and industry advantage that lets you do that, then you've got the tech and industry advantage to win anyway.

[wodan11]

That kind of thinking says that any beeline = win.

It's a gambit... you give up on other opportunities (such as getting Democracy early) in order to get privateers early.

Wodan

[Crossfire]

On maps where it matters, it just comes down to where do you want to fight your battles; on your shores or on the high seas. I often am the object of a major sea invasion in the late game and if I can intercept most of the invading fleet then the chances of me losing units or infrastructure is greatly reduced. I prefer that to letting the AI pillage all over the place.

[Modo44]

Originally posted by wodan11
Maybe it's just me but I usually struggle to get between 10-15 privateers out there, and while it definitely is a good thing, there's no way it means that I've "already won" the game.

I do this: Get 3 privateers per top AI civ. Put them in groups, in spots where they can block 2 or 3 big cities at the same time (after pillaging most sea improvements, of course). If left single, they get picked off, so forget chasing enemy ships, unless they come very close. I'd say the damage to AI economy via trade interdiction and city starving is way more important anyway.

[Ming]

Usually you don't even have to chase enemy ships. Put a stack of them out there, and the AI will send wave after wave of caravals at them... and that's why I use stacks bigger than 3. 8 to 10 can blockade a city, and the injured ships can heal while the others defend and blockade... I try to build 2 to 3 stacks like that and send them out to annoy the civs that are doing the best (assuming they have costal cities)

Granted, this assumes that the game situation/map calls for it. It's a great way for a builder to get some generals without ever having to go to war early. It has really changed the tech path I go down in some games.

Another reason why BtS is so good... now if they can only finish up the latest patch

[wodan11]

It depends on what version is being run, Ming. I'm running the latest Bhruic's and the AI no longer suicides caravels at privateers, like lemmings.

If it spots a single privateer, it'll sometimes send 2-3 caravels to try and pick it off (which seems smart to me, it's what I would do).

Wodan