How do resource trades work?

[Conqueror Worm]

How do the resource trades work? If I have two cows and trade one, do I lose access to one of those cows for food and city growth purposes? If I trade one for rice. does the rice get applied to one of my cities for food and city growth? Do any other bonuses acrue from such transactions?

 

[svv]

I'm pretty sure that trading the resource does not affect the food, commerce and hammers the item generates on the city square. What it affects is the happiness and health bonuses you get. If you trade away all your cow resources, you won't get the health benefits in your city.

One resource will give you the health and happiness for every city in your entire empire, so long as it's connected by road/river/sea.

 

[cabert]

When you trade a resource, you only trade access to the resource, not the tile's output.

If you have one cow, tile worked by a citizen,
- the city will have food and hammers from the tile;
- all cities connected by a trade network will have access to the cow resource = +1 health.

If you have 2 resources and trade 1, you still have acess to it.
If you trade the second one, you won't have access to it anymore and will lose the benefit of +1 health.

 

[KinesongPayaso]

but.. if you have 2 cows.. will that be +2?

 

[Thedrin]

No. The second cow is not giving you any benefit beyond the tile bonus if you don't trade it.

 

[Welnic]

On the city screen you can see what is going with those resources on the upper right of the screen. There is a little icon of a cow there. If there is a parenthesis next to it that is the total number that you currently have, counting trading both ways. To the right is the benefit that you are getting in that partucular city. For example you get one + if you have wheat, but if you have a granary you get two. You get two for cows if you have a supermarket.