Another well-deserved trading screen rant...

[Smokeybear]

So why can't they implement a simpler trading interface where you can see at a glance what other civs are willing to trade for? What they are willing to pay for your goods would be nice too, but I'd settle for the first part for starters.

As it is, you go in, and you face a bunch of other civs leaders with no information whatsoever on what they might want... 11 of them usually, in my games. So you clickclickclick, and ask "do you want to buy some horses?", "nope." clickclickclick "Do you want to buy some cotton?" "sure, but I won't pay you jack." clickclickclick "Do you want to buy some coal?" "nope." clickclickclick "Do you want to buy some oil?" "sure, lets make a deal!" Click... And of course, that didn't even include all the extra keystrokes in tiny, hard-to-click-on boxes to repeatedly type in your best guesses of what they might be willing to pay for each individual item. "Will you give me 7gpt?" "nope." clicktype "Will you give me 6gpt?" "nope." clicktype "Will you give me 5gpt?" "nope." Will you...." on and on till you give them the finger for being cheap, tight sob's.

Then repeat the whole mess 10 more times for each civ until you are ready to puke. None of this process is any fun whatsoever, and defines 'tedious'. Seriously, Firaxis, if you want to increase the player's enjoyment of the game exponentially, you'll take some time out to make a trade screen that doesn't totally suck, like the one we've been sick of now for years. Thanks in advance.

 

[sadpickle]

Not an expert but I think if you click "what will you give me for this?" they will automagically fill in their best offer for you. Don't know how this works with diplo modifiers.

 

[Smokeybear]

Not an expert but I think if you click "what will you give me for this?" they will automagically fill in their best offer for you. Don't know how this works with diplo modifiers.

Like I don't know that after four years No, that is little if any help. Often as not they will not offer anything, even though they WILL pay you some amount if you keep up the clicktype fest long enough... or they ask for way more than what it is worth. And negative diplo of any amount will mess it up too. That button is still irrelevant to the fact you have to do a bazillion clicks for every civ you may want to trade with, and you still don't know till after most of those clicks if they even want anything of yours, wasting endless amounts of time. This needs to be changed so you can tell at a glance, from a master screen, what civs are interested in trading with you for any of your stuff. This would save so much time and aggravation, it is unbelievable that they haven't done it yet.

A simple example of a good trade screen, would be one where you saw a spreadsheet-style listing of each civ in the game, followed by each resource and lux in the game. If a civ will buy, and is capable of buying, any of your items, there would be a bright green number in the corresponding box(s), indicating the amount of gold-per-turn (or bulk gold, or both) that they are willing to pay for it. If they want to buy but didn't have enough gold and might have other things to offer in a deal, it could be a smaller yellow number. Or better yet, doing a mouse-over of the box would give you a popup with a listing of all the things that civ is willing to offer for your goods. Then you just click on that item and make a deal for it with the interested civ. If they aren't interested in any of your goods, then there would just be a gray '0' in the boxes. So simple. So much more fun. So needed!

 

[Mylor]

General rule that I use at standard speed is:
Luxury resources = 240 gold but only a max of 6 gpt, unless that changed with the patch.
Strategic resources = 45 gold each
Open borders = 50 gold
Embassy = 25 gold (I think the patch changed this to 35 but I haven't verified that yet)

These are with 'friendly' relations.

The AI won't trade you its last remaining luxury for less than 3 to 1.

If they don't like you, then it's a clicking game. I generally don't bother with that.

If you want good trade relations, make friends.

There are trade changes with the new patch and I haven't played with it yet so I don't know how much this may have changed.

 

[Smokeybear]

General rule that I use at standard speed is:
Luxury resources = 240 gold but only a max of 6 gpt, unless that changed with the patch.
Strategic resources = 45 gold each
Open borders = 50 gold
Embassy = 25 gold (I think the patch changed this to 35 but I haven't verified that yet)

These are with 'friendly' relations.

The AI won't trade you its last remaining luxury for less than 3 to 1.

If they don't like you, then it's a clicking game. I generally don't bother with that.

If you want good trade relations, make friends.

There are trade changes with the new patch and I haven't played with it yet so I don't know how much this may have changed.

I know all of that too. And the fact remains, despite any and all of that, the whole process is still an utterly inglorious, painstaking, time-wasting guesswork clickfest. It just needs a complete revamp, end of story.

 

[Mylor]

I can agree with that.

So I don't bother with it unless I'm going to get what I want or I don't mind giving my stuff away for little or nothing.

I don't like the clickfest either.

 

[Smokeybear]

I can agree with that.

So I don't bother with it unless I'm going to get what I want or I don't mind giving my stuff away for little or nothing.

I don't like the clickfest either.

Problem is, since BNW came along, early gold (and later gold too, frequently) is mighty hard to come by sometimes, and you have to scrounge through every civ you know to try to sell those 2 horses or 3 iron just to keep from being a speedbump in history. A tradescreen revamp is needed more now, than ever.

 

[mice]

I know all of that too. And the fact remains, despite any and all of that, the whole process is still an utterly inglorious, painstaking, time-wasting guesswork clickfest. It just needs a complete revamp, end of story.

I agree.

Also if you watch the Deity guys play lets plays, you see them spending an awful lot of time clicking around to get that optimal deal. Optimal play requires time consuming drudgery. Better to let the brain do the ticking with the suggested revamp.

 

[Forkandles]

I honestly dont think its that bad. If you can see they have surplus strategic resources already, then you know they probably wont want anymore.

Finding a seller for your luxs can be a little more annoying, especially when you have a few copies.

As for prices, they are almost set in stone. You know what friends will pay, you know what neutrals will pay. The rest Ill only haggle with if I really need an extra 3gpt.

One thing that is a bit time consuming - trying to find the AI with a single copy of a lux, who is also getting that lux from a CS and will therefore trade it at standard price...

 

[Quineloe]

Doesn't your AI now come to you with offers for your spare luxury resources?

I rarely offer myself anymore

That the AI still doesn't trade away their last unit of a luxury resource for less than 3:1 is still unbelievably silly. Even at 2:1 they'd walk away with +4 happiness and probably a few more we love the king days in their cities, I don't get why anyone would turn that down.

I also don't get that no matter how much you dislike someone, if they offered 4 luxury resources for 1, you'd reject that offer.

 

[McSaucy4418]

While I agree with Smokey that it can be tedious specifically when you play on Huge maps (or above) it isn't really as bad as he makes it seem. Other civs will now come to you with trade offers and once you have a favorable offer (usually a lux for a lux) it is easy to just auto-renew it every time it expires. All in all as far as annoying mechanics or ui designs go the trade screen is pretty low down the list in my opinion.

 

[TLHeart]

Smoky is this before or after the fall patch?

Makes a big difference in my games. Now, after the patch, the click on what will make this deal works is a reasonable trade.

And the AI will come to you with offers, not just demands

 

[Forkandles]

The AI will happily rip you off if you do ask 'what will make this deal work'

for instance, you ask them for open borders and say what will make this deal work?
9 times out of 10 they will say you need to pay 2gpt and give them open borders. Here they dont actually value your open borders they just want the standard 2gpt. Remove your open borders from the deal and accept it. If they valued your open borders their response would have been open borders for open borders.

Thinking about it I think if you select something of theirs and ask what will make this deal work .. this is when they always add cheeky items on top like 10 gold or some of your strategic resources that they wouldnt even buy if you offered them.

If you select something of yours and ask what will they pay for it, you will get a reasonable offer. Usually a whole load of crap you dont want tho (eg horses when you just want gold or a lux), but at least value.

 

[mageta621]

That the AI still doesn't trade away their last unit of a luxury resource for less than 3:1 is still unbelievably silly. Even at 2:1 they'd walk away with +4 happiness and probably a few more we love the king days in their cities, I don't get why anyone would turn that down.

I also don't get that no matter how much you dislike someone, if they offered 4 luxury resources for 1, you'd reject that offer.

This. Soooo this. It's just so the developers can make it more strategically difficult, but it still doesn't make any damn sense from the AI Civ's point of view.