[GS] Do I waste my early trader on roads?

[jesperben]

I love roads between my cities. They are of course very good for hurrying units around, but in earlier Civ-versions roads also created gold, so I have always had a good network between my cities, and somehow it appeals to my image of a welfunctioning civilization.

Now with traders creating the roads, I will sometime have a trade-off between which trading route will give me the road I want, and which will give me the most money. I often use my first traders for creating roads between my cities. I try to combine the route with an attractive foreign city, but often it is not possible and then I settle for a domestic route.

Everytime I wonder: Is this strategy a waste of my trader? Do I lose money and diplomatic benefits in the very important early years without gaining much?

 

[Victoria]

A road to an enemy through dense terrain is always a good choice and done far enough in advance gives you +3. I feel this is why close civs start sending you trade routes... so if you do not respond you will be -3 in combat.
Saying that, an early government building gives +1 production to trade routes, combines with a harbour/CH/IZ/Encampment you are getting +3 fairly early which is hard to argue against for your new cities starting up... then there is the food/growth benefit which is also strong.
CS connections early without cards to boost may be the worst choice unless there is a quest.
It is not an easy choice, I like it.
The roads thing is damn annoying, Your cities should naturally get connections but I guess they leave it out to make traders more ‘useful’.
BTW if you were unaware, the cost of a trader will increase if you discover more techs/civics while you are building it. One reason some players buy traders when they become available.

 

[Mahi]

I use my first trader to boost production in my second and third city. Usually the third city is quite close to the neighbour's borders so it's nice to have a road to that one. I tend to maintain infrastructure between key cities before I send them out to other civs but it depends on the gold amount of course. In most cases I will use the first trader for infastructure and my second trader will be devoted to highest gold income.

 

[Gilgameshuggah]

I try to get it from one of my cities to a foreign city but so that the route passes one or more of my other cities. I also try to get some send trader CS quests. One envoy instantly is +2 something in your capital.

 

[jesperben]

A road to an enemy through dense terrain is always a good choice and done far enough in advance gives you +3. I feel this is why close civs start sending you trade routes... so if you do not respond you will be -3 in combat.

Thank you, Victoria. I guess you are referring to diplomatic visibility and it's influence on combat? But I don't really understand this mechanism. When you go to war all trade routes are stopped and embassies are closed. I suppose this will influence your diplomatic visibility, and any advantages will be gone before you get to combat? Or have I misunderstood?

 

[Bitterman]

Is there any advantage in trading with a CS besides completing a quest?

There is some proposal in the Congress about double yields when you trade with a determined Cs type but I don't get it.

 

[Victoria]

I guess you are referring to diplomatic visibility and it's influence on combat?

yeah, my bad, I was thinking of having a trading post gives you +1 but that’s just Shaka... hmmm will have to double check though. The in game wiki says establish a trade route.

There is some proposal in the Congress about double yields when you trade with a determined Cs type but I don't get it

If a science CS is providing 2 science 1 culture to you and the proposal goes through it will be 4 science 1 culture. I do not believe and additional science gained through cards is also doubled.

 

[Tech Osen]

It is not an easy choice, I like it.
The roads thing is damn annoying, Your cities should naturally get connections but I guess they leave it out to make traders more ‘useful’.

If one could just cancel a trader at any time I would be ok with the system. But having so little control over something so vital is bloody annoying.
And of course what was discussed a while ago that you can't force them to make a land route when it deems a sea route the better option...

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

If one could just cancel a trader at any time I would be ok with the system.

I've always been a proponent of this. Especially when you have a new city up and running and can really use a trade route to help it grow. Instead you're at the mercy of whenever your other trade routes expire.

Even better it would turn Wilhelmina's ability from a complete joke to something viable. +1 Loyalty for internal trade routes is nothing, but if you were able to cancel and redirect trade routes, you could start sending 5 trade routes from a newly conquered city, and suddenly that instant +5 loyalty turns into a pretty great leader ability.

 

[MrRadar]

Cancelling trade routes at will would be too close to another exploit, there should be some commitment involved, and the roads should become well-rutted
What is needed more is a decent trade route interface, which would tell you how many turns your trade routes have left to run, so that you could at least plan something. Now it tells you neither the correct duration at the start, nor the turns left for active routes.

As for early traders, it depends, as a number of other things at the start of the game. If your terrain is rough, a road can be a life saver, offering greater mobility to your troops or even settlers and builders.
I particularly like situations, where I can send my trader from one city to some international destination, and it would also go through one or even more of my other cities, thus connecting them with a road.

 

[James_Champagne]

I've been replaying Civ V recently and one thing I miss about that game is the ability to create roads with builders, as I like having all my cities connected with a big road network. I never even thought about using traders to connect roads with my own cities in VI... that's something I may need to try out next time I play it.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

They should make it so that the military engineers can build endless roads. That would make me want to invest a bit in an encampment, as I have a really great urge to road up all my towns as well.

 

[leandrombraz]

They should make it so that the military engineers can build endless roads. That would make me want to invest a bit in an encampment, as I have a really great urge to road up all my towns as well.

It could cost strategic resources or even gold to build roads with military engineers instead of using charges, similar to railroads.

 

[bengalryan9]

I just wish you had the option to force trade routes to go over land instead of sometimes defaulting to the sea. Just because I have two coastal cities doesn't mean I don't still want a road between them.

 

[Aurelesk]

Sometimes, Trade Routes are infuriating:

• When you send a Trader to a very close city, instead of doing 1 really short round trip, it does up to 3, making longer to do.
• Trade Route are slow and do not go faster when using more advanced road, railroad, or marine route (why not up to 2 tiles per turn on Modern Road, up to 4 tiles per turn on Railroad, up to 2, 3, and 4 tiles per turn on sea with Mathematics, Square Rigging, and Steam Power.
• When there is already existing road, the Trader may take a longer route for no real benefit because it goes over an already existing road (instead of creating one). For example: you send your Trade Route from your City A to an other civilization City B but, due to fog of war, the route taken isn't optimal. When you redo the Trade Route with fog of war cleared, it does the same trip from A to B instead to go directly to the shortest way. Furthermore, Trade Route from others of your cities to the city B that goes through your city A will then take the longer trip instead of going straight to the point.
• When you build Canal or Tunnel, you need to wait 1 turn before all Trade Route actualize and may consider using those.
• You have no control about the Trader route, between using mainly sea route, land route, the shortest route, the more profitable route, or focusing on creating new roads or using already existing one.

 

[Pure24]

Cancelling trade routes at will would be too close to another exploit, there should be some commitment involved, and the roads should become well-rutted

I completely agree. I can only imagine the exploits one could use if they could cancel trade routes willy nilly.

However, I have a couple of suggestions. You could either:
- make cancelled trader routes take x number of turns to be able to be deployed again, like the way it is with spies. It would be more like the trader is getting back home. A tech/civic could half the number of turns it takes the trader, but that's optional.
- or add the ability to recall traders as part of a Governor promotion. I say Liang, because giving Magnus would just break him completely. Alternatively, it could be a Civ-specific bonus (can recall traders at any time). So this feature would be there, but situational. Annoying? Yes. And that's the point

 

[Jarms48]

A road to an enemy through dense terrain is always a good choice and done far enough in advance gives you +3. I feel this is why close civs start sending you trade routes... so if you do not respond you will be -3 in combat.
Saying that, an early government building gives +1 production to trade routes, combines with a harbour/CH/IZ/Encampment you are getting +3 fairly early which is hard to argue against for your new cities starting up... then there is the food/growth benefit which is also strong.
CS connections early without cards to boost may be the worst choice unless there is a quest.
It is not an easy choice, I like it.
The roads thing is damn annoying, Your cities should naturally get connections but I guess they leave it out to make traders more ‘useful’.
BTW if you were unaware, the cost of a trader will increase if you discover more techs/civics while you are building it. One reason some players buy traders when they become available.

I just wish that improvements created roads when built. Just like wonders and districts do. That way my cities will eventually have connections as I improve my land. Which makes it a choice between getting early connecting roads and internal trade route yields or international trade routes for gold, envoys, or military roads.

 

[Victoria]

I just wish that improvements created roads when built.

Districts do, I guess they are not officially 'tile improvements'
I have many times purposely dropped adjacency to get a road over a river by placing a district.

 

[Socrates-]

From a optical point of view I'm very glad with the low amount of roads in comparison to the spiderwebs of Civ 2, 3 & 4 (didn't play civ 5). It makes the map look a lot cleaner & calmer. Which is nice for someone like myself who easily loses the overview.

Aside from that: Knowledge is power so especially in the early game I think it's a good thing to lay down a road towards a possible aggressive neighbor for the extra intelligence bonus. However, I always place a military unit halfway the road as somewhat of a roadblock in case the neighbor wants to use my road for his warmongering

 

[Disgustipated]

I do like the less roads as well (compared to games such as Civ2 and 3). And I'm okay with the traders making roads, it's actually a cool little feature. But it still would be nice to have a way to make roads when the traders can't really do them correctly. And military engineers 2 charges don't really count. 2 charges isn't enough for anything. I sometimes find myself waiting until steam power and railroads before I can connect my cities properly. And god help me if I don't have coal and steel. I've had games where I finish the game without roads connecting some of my cities to anything.

I generally try to move my traders around to all my new cities and have a route from that city to my capital to form a road. I'm OCD about having a road network to my capital (not an issue when playing Rome). Unfortunately this sometimes means less than desirable trade routes and gold income.