Trade Caravans and Freights

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Just wonder...
Do you ever use them? I've never used freights I guess, and I've rarely used Trade Caravans to collect some gold while I was having financial troubles early in the game.
I know they can be used to speed up wonders in other cities, but I seldom do so. What about you? Do you think they could be boosted up a bit somehow?
 
I make heavy use of them to rush projects / buildings. I've literally never used them for their intended purpose, which is trade. :p
 
What about adding a couple of sea-trading units? Kind of a trade galley and an oil tanker (or something like that, maybe requiring oil) and working the same way as trade caravan and freight? Of course they only work with coastal cities. Could it be an interesting addition? Maybe boosting up a bit their gold income when used for trade and same for trade caravans and freights. I know after industrial era you really don't have financial trouble usually. But I'm planning to look again at the upgrade costs which have been set at a default some revisions ago and make them scaled again with type of upgrade (upgrading from an archer to a modern infantry should cost much more than from a rifleman to modern infantry, but in fact it's almost the same cost now). Then a little economical help might be useful when you need to upgrade all your armies. Just a thought. Joseph and Vokarya, your opinion?
 
Back in the days before AND, teching in the ancient age was so slow, that my economy always crippled when I had only units left to build. After a few games where I had to delete a speaman after I build it just to stay afloat, I discovered caravans. That was a huge boon, they single handedly saved my ancient economy.
Since AND, however, with all the additional economic stuff in the ancient age, I am not using them any more. They might be useful for rushing wonders, I might consider that in future games.
 
99% of caravans and freights I build go to rush either buildings in less developed cities or wonders. By the time I reach Freights, the unit count number for built Caravans is usually in the 100s if not 200s.
Freights I do not build that much, since they cost so much more and by this time it's quicker to simply pay to rush a building and my economy usually allows me to do so.

Seaborne trading units would be fantastic. And I'd probably use them for their intended purpose of trade rather than mobile hammer boosters.

PS upgrade costs definitely need to be revisited, they are too cheap.
 
I use Freight quite extensively, I use them for new cities for initial builds. Mostly new cities will get 2-4 Caravans each, once I have a few developed cities to provide them. I use them for initial hammer buildings, such as Slave markets, Stone cutters and Forges. Apart from that, I'd use maybe 1 or 2 a game for Trade :gold:

Later I'll use them for rushing buildings in slower cities, I use freight for the same purpose, I like to have a Homogenous empire in city builds. ALL CITES and I mean ALL, must have the same buildings available at the same time, once I reach the Modern era usually.

Boosted up, no, they should provide less hammers then they take to build, Trade, well, I don't use them for that.

Shipping trade, Could provide a once off bonus, like when "Your ship comes in", you get a gold boost, using the trade mechanic, but greater bonus, with a risk of your ship sinking, being taken by pirates, privateered. Greater bonuses for trading with a city, that has a resource you don't.
 
I use Caravans quite a bit to both help new cities and rush Wonders, but I don't usually bother with trade missions. I generally find that by the late Classical/early Medieval era, my earliest cities are generally fully mature and don't have anything else to build. Some build military units, but I usually will build caravans in one or two cities. I think the statistics are okay and don't need to be increased any more.

Trading ships have been done before, so it wouldn't be difficult to include them. We probably don't need that many; 3-4 would probably be sufficient.
 
Cargo ships would be a good idea indeed.

I think of two additional options which would make sense imho:

  • Some chance to boost relations with the civ you are trading with, thus giving more reason to use the trade option.
  • Carry food to boost population / feed cities with starvasion.
 
[*]Carry food to boost population / feed cities with starvasion.
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A really nice idea! I'll see what I can do.

Edit: it could be made for trade caravan and freight as well.
 
Did you ever played civ 5 ? There is a really nice idea about caravans.

The caravans are set to make a trade route between town during 30 turns. The income provided to the creator is high, while the receiver get also a smaller bonus. The bonus is continuous during these 30 turns (for ex. +3 gold/turn for creator and +1 for receiver).
A caravan unit move back and forth on the map from the creator city to the receiver city. This is just graphical, but you can attack the caravan and break the trade route (which introduce the need to protect them).

The caravan can be used to do inner commerce but it provide food instead of gold.

However, I guess that concept will need to mod the dll.
 
Did you ever played civ 5 ? There is a really nice idea about caravans.

The caravans are set to make a trade route between town during 30 turns. The income provided to the creator is high, while the receiver get also a smaller bonus. The bonus is continuous during these 30 turns (for ex. +3 gold/turn for creator and +1 for receiver).
A caravan unit move back and forth on the map from the creator city to the receiver city. This is just graphical, but you can attack the caravan and break the trade route (which introduce the need to protect them).

The caravan can be used to do inner commerce but it provide food instead of gold.

However, I guess that concept will need to mod the dll.

Too complicated but I see what I can do about that food idea.
 
I'd also be keen on some sort of food-re-distribution mechanism. Then we could finally have more real situations like farming areas and industrial cities, more like what can be done with Colonization.

Remember in Civ II caravans could transfer food.

:goodjob:
 
What a nice surprise, part of the code was already there, unused.
With some small changes, hurrying food will be in my next update.

Edit: I've also decided to not include any sea-trading-unit for the moment. After all, you can always load a trade caravan or a freight on your ship, can't you? :)
 
45°38'N-13°47'E;13133695 said:
What a nice surprise, part of the code was already there, unused.
With some small changes, hurrying food will be in my next update.

Edit: I've also decided to not include any sea-trading-unit for the moment. After all, you can always load a trade caravan or a freight on your ship, can't you? :)

True, but transporters can enter rival territory only with Open-borders, but for caravans Right of passage is enough. Also, it is less complicated to trade with a spec. cargo ship than with a caravan+galley combo.

And an other thing: If caravans can trade food, imo they should also be built with food.
 
Can caravans be loaded onto Caravels? That would go around the "cargo ship can't enter foreign territory" problem.
 
I believe that it would be nice to give settlers also an option to settle them in an existing city if you don't want to found a new one.
It could be either +1 free population or free citizen or just some food boost.
 
I believe that it would be nice to give settlers also an option to settle them in an existing city if you don't want to found a new one.
It could be either +1 free population or free citizen or just some food boost.

C2C has a similar idea called immigrants.

JosEPh
 
In Civ 3 workers and settlers could be settled in existing cities for +1 and +2 population, respectively. But in Civ 3 to build a worker or settler the city population would also be reduced accordingly, so I don't know how this could be balanced.
 
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