24-01-2004 01:55									#1
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As the game continues moving forward, we need to seriously look at our navy.

Our own geography makes a navy a very useful and important aspect of our military (currently we only share 2 tiles with our neighbor ), as well as a powerful advantage in the future. If we want to either thwart an invasion from the other continent or launch one of our own we will need a very large fleet. If CFC gets frisky we can use ships very effectively against them where they would least expect it.

Basically, no matter how you slice it naval action will be an important part of any future wars, especially once we get Navigation.

That having been said, we're currently working on 2 Galley builds and have 2 more heading for the lake. However, we should not take a blind eye to building more boats once GWT has sailed on and GCA's Galley in the lake is sunk. Our navy should be the most important part of our future military buildup (as sparse as it may be).

	24-01-2004 02:26									#2
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Here's what I think we should do. Build galleys on the east coast and then send them over to get to CGN, we will lose many of these, but once we get 5 galleys over there we will have the capability(with astro) of sending 10 units at a time through an unloading at sea. Correspondingly we should have 5 units here after that to participate in such a ferrying. Perhaps we can negotiate a town with a harbor on the other continent so we can upgrade said ships to Carvels when we get astro. Thus raising us up to 15 units that can be transferred.

Aggie

	24-01-2004 05:02									#3
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As we will need to have the Great Lighthouse to get our GA, this would go well with both plans.

E_T

	24-01-2004 07:58									#4
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quote: Originally posted by Aggie Here's what I think we should do. Build galleys on the east coast and then send them over to get to CGN, we will lose many of these, but once we get 5 galleys over there we will have the capability(with astro) of sending 10 units at a time through an unloading at sea. Correspondingly we should have 5 units here after that to participate in such a ferrying. Perhaps we can negotiate a town with a harbor on the other continent so we can upgrade said ships to Carvels when we get astro. Thus raising us up to 15 units that can be transferred.

In order to do any sort of transferring we need 2 things:

- Our ships to be able to move 4 tiles per turn.
- The capability of staying afloat at sea.

Without these two (which both require either Astronomy or the Lighthouse) we can't ferry units across.

	24-01-2004 08:53									#5
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One major problem with a galley-based navy: remember that the upgrade path for galleys leads exclusively to high defense/low attack transport craft. This means that for at least until Astronomy comes onto the scene, galleys work as both warships and as transports, but once the world starts progressing even to caravels, our ability to use warships to stop an enemy amphibious invasion sinks. Then we have to wait for Magnetism and frigates to build our first force of warships truly able to defend our shores.

As such, until the advent of Frigates and later Ironclads, our primary defense is going to need to be provided by fast horse-based units (knights, cavalry) in enough numbers to meet and kill amphibious invasions at the time they are made. In short, we will need to overpower the enemy ON LAND, since meeting and overpowering their force at sea is both unlikely and uneconomical compared to simply building more knights/cavalry.

However, building a fleet has two areas of utility for us in the pre-magnetism era of the game: transport capacity (and, especially in the era of galleys, transport protection), and reconnaisance. In terms of the second use (recon.), there is little question that building galleys and then upgrading them to the harder to kill caravels is worth more than its weight in shields and gold. Pickets in the right locations could warn us of an impending invasion by GWT/GCA before it arrived at our shores and give us chance to move our reserves into the correct locations to meet and kill the landing force.

The other use, transport capacity (and transport protection) is something which requires more thought. Building enough galleys (and later caravels) to transport a USEFUL army to the other continent and protect it during the journey is going to cost a motherload of shields, on top of the price in shields and gold upgrade costs to build the landing force itself. If we're going to start building a fleet for the purpose of having it available to spur an invasion of the other continent, we better be willing to put out the resources to back that up.

Personally, I think we should build enough galleys/caravels to act as reconnaisance pickets only, adding only a few extra galleys and caravels to give us at least SOME transport capacity for use in helping CGN to what small extent we may wish to help and to give us a headstart on building up our transport capacity for the next era (when we upgrade these ships to galleons).

With the rest of our available shields, if we're going to build military units (though I think IMPROVEMENTS will be more valuable), we build knights/cavalry, cannons, and musketmen/riflemen. If GWT ever looks to try to invade us (or CGN, eventually), they're going to need to build both an army that can take ours AND transport capacity for that army. If we're buiding just army (being defensive), we're more efficiently using our resources to meet their potential invasion. The fact that they won't even be able to reliably attack us until Astronomy and Navigation (and thus caravels rather than galleys) means that any combat fleet we build before frigates would be horribly ineffective anyhow.

Once magnetism is researched and especially once we have ironclads, the picture changes. True warships make a naval-based defense strategy far more feasible and perhaps we can upgrade our current land forces with available gold while building mostly fleets and improvements with our shields.

	24-01-2004 09:20									#6
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quote: Originally posted by Trip In order to do any sort of transferring we need 2 things: - Our ships to be able to move 4 tiles per turn. - The capability of staying afloat at sea. Without these two (which both require either Astronomy or the Lighthouse) we can't ferry units across.

Thats why I mentioned we'd need astro for the actual transfer or of course the lighthouse. Meanwhile we could move the galleys over, we'd lose a few but they'd be in position for when the time came. The idea of CGN giving us a city with a harbor also makes sense, we could both upgrade AND get our catapults back at theat time if we desired/needed them. This latter idea of course depends on the adoption of that idea.

Additionally, as mentioned by arnelos, the units we built would also be able to provide an early warning radar so to speak.

Aggie

	24-01-2004 12:44									#7
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By the time we finish the Lighthouse, started now from scratch, we'll Astronomy and many Caravels.

	24-01-2004 23:34									#8
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hmm... I've been an advocate of naval power for months, I see it is finally getting some serious thinking

I believe that building a number of galleys is not a wasted investment. The upgrade path leads naturally to the better transport units and assuming that no other nation makes any attempt at a powerful offensive naval force, our large number of transports can be used more or less with impunity.

	25-01-2004 04:45									#9
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It seems that no-one read my post on the subject

	27-01-2004 03:44									#10
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Give me time you lazy bum.

quote: Originally posted by Arnelos One major problem with a galley-based navy: remember that the upgrade path for galleys leads exclusively to high defense/low attack transport craft. This means that for at least until Astronomy comes onto the scene, galleys work as both warships and as transports, but once the world starts progressing even to caravels, our ability to use warships to stop an enemy amphibious invasion sinks. Then we have to wait for Magnetism and frigates to build our first force of warships truly able to defend our shores. As such, until the advent of Frigates and later Ironclads, our primary defense is going to need to be provided by fast horse-based units (knights, cavalry) in enough numbers to meet and kill amphibious invasions at the time they are made. In short, we will need to overpower the enemy ON LAND, since meeting and overpowering their force at sea is both unlikely and uneconomical compared to simply building more knights/cavalry. However, building a fleet has two areas of utility for us in the pre-magnetism era of the game: transport capacity (and, especially in the era of galleys, transport protection), and reconnaisance. In terms of the second use (recon.), there is little question that building galleys and then upgrading them to the harder to kill caravels is worth more than its weight in shields and gold. Pickets in the right locations could warn us of an impending invasion by GWT/GCA before it arrived at our shores and give us chance to move our reserves into the correct locations to meet and kill the landing force. The other use, transport capacity (and transport protection) is something which requires more thought. Building enough galleys (and later caravels) to transport a USEFUL army to the other continent and protect it during the journey is going to cost a motherload of shields, on top of the price in shields and gold upgrade costs to build the landing force itself. If we're going to start building a fleet for the purpose of having it available to spur an invasion of the other continent, we better be willing to put out the resources to back that up. Personally, I think we should build enough galleys/caravels to act as reconnaisance pickets only, adding only a few extra galleys and caravels to give us at least SOME transport capacity for use in helping CGN to what small extent we may wish to help and to give us a headstart on building up our transport capacity for the next era (when we upgrade these ships to galleons). With the rest of our available shields, if we're going to build military units (though I think IMPROVEMENTS will be more valuable), we build knights/cavalry, cannons, and musketmen/riflemen. If GWT ever looks to try to invade us (or CGN, eventually), they're going to need to build both an army that can take ours AND transport capacity for that army. If we're buiding just army (being defensive), we're more efficiently using our resources to meet their potential invasion. The fact that they won't even be able to reliably attack us until Astronomy and Navigation (and thus caravels rather than galleys) means that any combat fleet we build before frigates would be horribly ineffective anyhow. Once magnetism is researched and especially once we have ironclads, the picture changes. True warships make a naval-based defense strategy far more feasible and perhaps we can upgrade our current land forces with available gold while building mostly fleets and improvements with our shields.

Use of pickets is obvious. We should obviously use all of our current Galleys in that usage in the near future, and hopefully get 6-8 pickets total eventually (prior to Navigation).

On the subject of what would become a transport fleet, we have some tough questions to ask ourselves in the merit of the possible construction of one.

What do we honestly think is the greatest threat to our chances of winning this game - either CGN or GWT taking of their continent, or a possible invasion of our shores?

Quite frankly, I believe if either of the other powers takes over their continent we're in for a much rougher game than people might think. If that were to happen, they could win the game without having to invade us. And then we'd have to be the ones to engage in a massive naval invasion. Probably having to deal with RRs against a superior army. That is what I'm worried about, not an intercontinental invasion.

I'm growing quite fond of Aggie's plan of having 5 Caravels on each continent which can be used to quickly ferry units from one side to the other. With 1 Caravel-chaining effort we can get 15 units over to the other continent with just 4 or 5 turns notice.

If we honestly want to have a chance in the end game, we should be prepared to intervene on the other continent should things ever get too lopsided. As long as we maintain the status quo we will win this game. With our economic planning and superior city, FP and Palace placement we will be the strongest team going into the end of the game... unless CGN or GWT gets the upper hand on the other continent. We must do everything we can to prevent that.