How Do You Remember Your Trade Routes?

[docbud]

Seriously--how do you remember them? While usually when it come time to send them back out again, the computer will remember the previous route for me.

But then there will be turns when no previous route is is shown for any of them.

Do you simply remember? Write it down on a sheet of paper (which seems counter-productive since we are in the computer age)? Or just say screw it and pick whatever looks good?

If the previous route does not appear, I will look real quick and see who I am sending cargo ships and caravans to, and try to remember the other one, but sometimes it's not that easy, especially if I"m sending some to city states as well. Then I just do the screw it method.

 

[Uzael36]

On the top bar, where you see your number of trade routes. You click on that and it brings up a list of your trade routes.

 

[docbud]

I know that. I'm talking about when the "PREVIOUS ROUTE" Is not shown for some reason.

How do you keep track when you've had trade routes for years and years and suddenly the previosu routes no longer show up.

Since this is apparently not a unique issue, how do you and other folks deal with it? Do you take precautions?

Apologizes if I was not clear in my original post.

doc

 

[Uzael36]

I know that. I'm talking about when the "PREVIOUS ROUTE" Is not shown for some reason.

How do you keep track when you've had trade routes for years and years and suddenly the previosu routes no longer show up.

Since this is apparently not a unique issue, how do you and other folks deal with it? Do you take precautions?

Apologizes if I was not clear in my original post.

doc

I've never seen it not show up, unless I built a new route.

I'd guess it can happen if a city is taken by another civ.

And I personally wouldn't care about restoring a route if I didn't see the previous one listed as such. I'd just open up my route window and see what I'm missing for internal routes, and make what needs to be made.

 

[phillipwyllie]

I personally don't. When a route has finished I check who is the cultural leader and send it to them, failing that its the one I'd get the highest gpt, or CS whose has a trade-route quest.

 

[docbud]

Thanks guys. I guess I usually try to keep them going to the same place. Maybe that's a bad idea?

 

[Uzael36]

Thanks guys. I guess I usually try to keep them going to the same place. Maybe that's a bad idea?

It is best if you occasionally reevaluate where the best routes are from time to time. Since they run for 30 turns at a time, it's worth reevaluating every time they need to be sent, though I rarely change my internal routes.

 

[docbud]

^^Thanks.

 

[revelation216]

Thanks guys. I guess I usually try to keep them going to the same place. Maybe that's a bad idea?

Consider the diplomatic and economic implications of choosing a particular route, rather than simply the highest yield. For example I would tend not to make a route to a Civ in a DoF with a Civ I want to go to war with or who I think may attack me because if war breaks out then that money goes away very suddenly and could put you in the red for GPT. You might also use your trade routes to determine who to attack last.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

they are also important for culture victories. they add +25% tourism to the AI you send it to. the only trade routes i need to keep the same are food routes to my cities. it tends to be the only thing keeping them from starvation later in the game. pretty much any non-internal routes get re-evaluated every time.

 

[docbud]

Thanks again gang. And Hammer Rabbi: I definitely keep my city trade routes the same for food.

 

[Trackmaster]

In the lower right corner, you can also turn on a visual that shows you the lines with the trade routes.

 

[Sorinth]

I think they don't show the previous if ownership of the city changes. At that point you probably want to re-evaluate the trade route anyways.

 

[goodolarchie]

I really wish they had a "resume trade route" button/hotkey. Towards the end of the game it gets to be ridiculous reevaluating 50-100 different options every few turns.

 

[Trackmaster]

You can look at your available trade routes (it shows it from every city) and figure out which one to use. Although it can get complicated if you're at war with one of the cities.

 

[docbud]

I think they don't show the previous if ownership of the city changes. At that point you probably want to re-evaluate the trade route anyways.

It still happens regardless. I was playing last night and it was early game, and I only had a few trade routes going. One was to Egypt's capital. For a while every time it came time to renew my trade route, it would say "previous route" in the drop down menu. Then suddenly it didn't say it any longer. Egypt's capital still belonged to Egypt.

Since I only had a few routes, it was no big deal as I knew who it was supposed to be. But in the late game, it gets tedious scrolling down through forty or fifty locations.

 

[Redaxe]

That is something (which others have raised as well) that the UI needs work on. When the trade-route option comes up to have the previous city on the top of the list (under previous route) to save you from scrolling through it.