Quote Originally Posted by Sinan
Point taken.

In a moment of SHEER BRILLIANCE ! ... I got the idea of putting some merchants on ships and sailing them around. I think it'll be faster than walking... *ahem*
This would be faster, agreed. However, I'm not sure this is faster in terms of merchants gaining additional stars. When walking them, I tend to leave them on some resource at the end of the turn (before walking further): this seems to accelerate them gaining new skills. Not sure what would happen on the boats.