Jeff Goldsmith (jeff@gg.caltech.edu) asks the following Age of Exploration
rules questions:
 
1) May one look at outfitting cards before making decisions
   about leaders, ships, and starting base?
Yes.
 
2) May a land expedition "scuttle ships?"
No.  The decision to scuttle ships is done when *forming* an inland expedition,
see 7.14.  An inland expedition would have to move back to the space it left
its ships in to scuttle them (by essentially reforming its expedition).

3) If one's leader dies and the second in command makes it back
   alive, does the player draw a new leader for free, or does he
   still need a letter of credit?  Is the dead leader retired yet?
   (If so, when?  Upon death or upon return to base?)
The player draws a new leader for free.  See section 11, step 3.  The dead
leader is NOT retired but removed from the game (denoted by leaving the leader
card *facedown* (second-in-command side up) in the retired pool, thus
guaranteeing that there are always some leaders in play, though they may only
be second-in-commands).  Note this case is different from the case when an
expedition is aborted (while the leader is still alive) as noted in the card
draw boxed information on the summary sheet.

						Tom Lehmann, Prism Games