Miniature Trading

This fleet allows a player to clear a map of gold in a minimal number of turns by moving only one ship.

Turn 1:
Leave Banshee's Cry and HMS Patagonia docked at your home island.
Use Calypso to put out one whirlpool next to wild island #1 and one next to your home island (reroll with Lady Baptiste if needed).
Use Lord Mycron on HMS Patagonia to give HMS Mirage two actions that turn.
Have Banshee’s Cry unload her oarsman to your home island – you’ll probably need it later

HMS Mirage Action 1:
Move through the home island whirlpool to wild island whirlpool (if you roll badly for the whirlpool trip ditch the oarsman).

HMS Mirage Action 2:
Move to the wild island, explore it with Rothschild’s explore ability, and load up on gold (Ismail gives the Mirage a total of four cargo spaces). Rothschild’s second ability (allowing a ship to move S after loading cargo) then kicks in and allows Mirage to move S. However, since Mirage is a windcatcher, this distance can be measured from her stern, allowing her to move back through the wild island whirlpool to the home island whirlpool (lose a mast or the oarsman if still available if you roll badly for the whirlpool trip).

Turn 2:
Use calypso to prepare for a trip to the next wild island.
Again give two actions to Mirage with Lord Mycron.
Move Mirage to your home island and unload your loot. If you lost an oarsman replace it from your home island. Move back through the whirlpool to wild island #2 with your second action and continue the cycle.

Turn 3:
Move to the wild island and back through the whirlpool with Rothchild’s S bonus. Then use the second action to move to your home island and unload your second load of gold. As you can see, if you roll perfectly you can clean out two wild islands every three turns.

Potential weaknesses: rolling and rerolling poorly with Calypso and Baptiste, rolling so badly in the whirlpool trips that you lose all your masts and oarsmen, running into bad UT’s, enemy gunships following Mirage back to her home island through the whirlpools.

All of these except for the bad UT scenario can be avoided with reasonable luck in your rolls and careful planning with respect to the order in which you visit the wild islands. Favor of the Gods protects against negative events.

For a weaker but nation pure build:

HMS Mirage
Rothschild
Oarsman

HMHV Plunder
Calypso
Countess Diana Doone

HMS Patagonia
Lord Mycron
Robinson
Oarsman

Total: 40