Sea battles

[Crayno]

This has probably asked before so feel free to post a link(No search option?)
How can you prevent an enemy from moving back and forth in sea zones.
I mean as long as only one ship is moving around it's disrupting my trade routes and there seems to be nothing I can do about it. :
Any other info on how sea battles work (Especially when you can attack etc) is welcome as well.

[Despot of the English]

The vagaries of the sea has been discussed a lot. Suffice to say an enemy who keeps on moving back and forth and making merry hell of your trade might just have fast ships, i.e. if a ship has a faster speed than any of yours then it can come and go as much as it likes until you take it on with a fast ship of your own or it decides to attack you and you sink it.

[Essex_Cohort]

Hmmm....well, to attack enemy ships, click on your ship unit, then mouse click on the enemy ship unit, and it should ask you if you want to attack or something, so click yes. Then the battle will be run after you click the turn button. Unfortuanlty you dont get to control the battle yourself

Make sure you send sufficent ships against them, at least 2:1 ratio in your favour to avoid dissapointment


Good luck, and BOARDING PARTYS AWAY!!!

[Ludens]

If their fleet is as fast as your fleet it has a 50% chance of getting away. The speed of a fleet is equal to that of their slowest ship. Each fleet has an independent chance of catching him so using several small fleets instead of one large fleet will increase your chance of catching it.

[CherryDanish]

I had a stack of 9 caravels and baraques (sp?) off of Gibraltar in my current campaign. In another thread, a helpful board member advised me to split stacks to cut the odds of a fast and slippery enemy escaping. While this advice almost always pays off, the fast eggy bastard's dhow eluded all 9 of my individual ships. I figure the AI realised how badly I had just owned him in a 7 province blitz and wiping out what was left of the HRE in the first round (no warning from the pope) and gave the eggys a chance ;). I'm currently blitzing the eggys for payback for all that clicking on splitting my fleet (not as big of a blitz as I'm downsizing my army a little).

[Quietus]

Make sure you sink the enemy ships before you attack on land. Make you you have at least 2 ships per lane (with more ships than the AI, obviously ). Attack simultaneously with all your ships. During war, keep an eye on your enemies' ports ( whether, they can build ships). Position your ships correspondingly. If it gets too annoying just invade the port that is making the ships.

[Crayno]

Thanks a lot,didn't know about the speed and the several stacks thingy is a good idea as well.
By now the sea is mine though and i'm almost finished with this campaign
However,the fastest ship is dromon and as I'm playing the Danes I don't have access to those.
Seems like playing a faction that can produce Dromons has a distinct advantage.