Possible new Trading Ports

SCG · February 8, 2003, 12:56

After thinking on our lack of transports right now (and lack of potential replacements, and the concern of protecting the ones we have left, I have a proposal using the south pole to protect them. And since we don't have a Minister of Imperial Expansion, I thought I'd toss the idea out there to see if its an option right now.

Right now we seem to want to trade with the Chinese primarily. Beijing is 3 turns by transport from Barcelona, Nanking is 4 turns. Both are within transport range of the south pole.

To speed transport and allow for 1 turn deliveries in some cases, I put forth that we could build 1-3 cities on the south pole, at locations where there are specials (Whales, Fish, Ivory and Game) so that we wouldn't need many, if any structures. These are 5-7 spaces apart. If we build 2-3 cities, we could have the transports end each turn in a city, while having the transport that ended its last turn in that city carry the the freight to the next city, creating a ship chain for 1 turn transport.

If we decide on just 1 city, we would have 2 options. We could use Engineers to build a south pole railroad to that city, and just leave 1 transport to make deliveries to the Chinese island each turn. Or we could let a 2-3 transport ship chain do the legwork to the port city.

Also, we do have airports currently planned for production. instead of transports, we could use airports to airlift freight to the possible cites south of China and ignore transports and railroads as a means to the city.

Then again, I may be thinking too far ahead in a game that may not last that long.

Shortest time frame would be take 1 transport with engineers and sufficient military and found 1 city south of the chinese and rush an airport. Then use the gold from each delivery to rush an appropriate item of need. The transport could end each turn in port after delivery.

Thoughts?

The yellow dots indicate possible city spots.

Six Thousand Year Old Man · February 8, 2003, 13:13

Erm, might be cheaper to just build the transports, and cruisers or a battleship to protect them.

3 cities - means 3 rushbought defenders, presumably, and possibly a coastal fortress per city. Plus we lose 3 Engineers = 120 shields.

One city - means we tie up several engineers for several turns (it's a slow process to railroad tundra/glacier)

H Tower · February 8, 2003, 13:22

i'm not a big fan of this idea either, and since the AI is constantly declaring war on us, freights need to be dropped off right outside of their destination or risk being killed before they reach their target. a polar city won't help us that much, and STYOM is right, the waste in resources would be tremendous, we could instead invest those engineers in building cities near Darkness' Fort or High Tower, and they would provide more to our empire than a polar city that would hang around our next, draining resources needed from other projects.

SCG · February 8, 2003, 13:27

Quote:

Originally posted by Six Thousand Year Old Man
One city - means we tie up several engineers for several turns (it's a slow process to railroad tundra/glacier)

The last suggestion of just using an airport doesn't require any railroads.

Quote:

3 cities - means 3 rushbought defenders, presumably, and possibly a coastal fortress per city. Plus we lose 3 Engineers = 120 shields.

wouldn't have to rush any military units - just bring them on the transport that brings the engineer

As for the 3 city plan, we could get by with 2 cities if we used 2 transports and a naval unit operating out of the last city.

As for the suggestion of using engineers - using the northern trade routes, we have lost 2 50 shield transports, and we've lost military defending the, so using (or building) 40 shield engineers is in the interest of conserving shields

SCG · February 8, 2003, 13:34

Quote:

Originally posted by H Tower
i'm not a big fan of this idea either, and since the AI is constantly declaring war on us, freights need to be dropped off right outside of their destination or risk being killed before they reach their target. a polar city won't help us that much, and STYOM is right, the waste in resources would be tremendous, we could instead invest those engineers in building cities near Darkness' Fort or High Tower, and they would provide more to our empire than a polar city that would hang around our next, draining resources needed from other projects.

Well, again, the idea was to have a trade city next door to the trading civ so that we could deliver the freights right at its destination (along the lines of why freeport was built) and the plan was to protect resources, not drain them, as well as speed delivery (which increases both gold and science). Given that we do seem to have a transport wandering unmolested down along there, it looks like the safest place.

anyway, i'm not military nor imperial expansion, so my influence is limited in this case

Six Thousand Year Old Man · February 8, 2003, 14:11

Quote:

Originally posted by SCG

The last suggestion of just using an airport doesn't require any railroads.

And only allows us to move 1 freight/turn - compared to 8 on a transport.

The idea looks good if we had implemented it earlier in the game... right now, I just don't see how the results for the rest of the game would justify the effort. Yes, we lost transports elsewhere - so we should build some decent escorts, or use shipchains so the freight go from source to destination in one turn, eliminating the risk of enemy action.

CannonFodder · February 8, 2003, 18:46

I think we would be better off building more transports and some cruisers. It's just too much trouble with too little reward.

Ben Kenobi · February 8, 2003, 19:25

I thought you were hounding me for more escorts SCG?

Let's get those ships to protect our transports for freight deliveries.

Leave the south pole for the penguins.

cavebear · February 8, 2003, 19:43

At an earlier point in the game, I had started to build a RR out along the pole from Barcelona, but the project got side-tracked (pun intended)

I don't like the idea of a city out there though. It's going to be vulnerable and will require a lot of support since it won't be able to support itself very well.

SCG · February 8, 2003, 20:58

Quote:

Originally posted by cavebear
At an earlier point in the game, I had started to build a RR out along the pole from Barcelona, but the project got side-tracked (pun intended)

I don't like the idea of a city out there though. It's going to be vulnerable and will require a lot of support since it won't be able to support itself very well.

Agreed, H Tower's railroad plan to freeport looks to be the better plan right now