Is Current System of Trade Realistic?

[Trade-peror]

Ah ha! I notice, Wakboth, that you like the strategic and luxury resources trade system in Civ III, and this new trade system merely extends that idea to include "bonus" resources. Therefore, I think the new trade system is no harder to manage than the current Civ III model.

As for workers having to choose between one type of action or another, I think there are still enough options even if roads do not provide trade. In fact, this new trade system may not make much of a difference for players that build roads for movement anyway.

Finally, I do notice that cash generation can be much greater in Civ III than in previous versions, and this trade system may balance that out by requiring trade to have a material basis that is fundamentally limited by the map. In other words, there is no "inifinite" amount of trade possible, since there are only so many resources on the map. All of this may have a balancing effect, because small nations controlling a few key resources will be able to compete just as effectively with big nations that don't have proportionally large amounts of resources.

Anyway, I am actually not really sure what you meant by the last two lines in your previous post. It would be helpful if you could clarify, so I can reply. Thanks! And keep commenting!

 

[Wakboth]

I meant that we're kinda stuck with the road/rail system unless ther e are far more radical changes to the game then what you are proposing.

Have you ever played a game into/past the industrial age? Pollution is a big deal. So what happens if we implement your "roads/rails for trade network only" idea? The whole reason you stated you wanted to do that was to remove the roads from the map becuase they're "ugly". Um... How do you move around then? Taking 2-3 turns just to get your workers to a spot of pollution is pretty annoying.

Militarily, you eliminate the advantage that you have inside your cultural boundaries (you get to use roads/rails while your enemy doesn't).

While perhaps ugly, the roads/rails represent more to the game then just commerce on resource squares. I guess my whole problem is that if you remove the economic/production reason for building roads/rails in all your city squares, then you now make the building of such things less valuable. However, you might still want to build them for military reasons. It just makes the "cost" of building such things higher since you don't get as much back. I suppose people could just build them where they are fighting (or plan on fighting). But that's going to look even worse ("Over here is a huge spot of roads that I build while fighting the persians. Here is a patch of roads built fighting the romans. And over here is where I built an elaborate rail system to defeat the Incas!"). This would look even more ugly then having a network of roads through your entire civ IMO.

There is no historical precident for roads being built just in areas people are conducting warfare. In fact, historically, roads are built for exactly the reasons given in the game. Trade *and* commerce.

That's what I was getting at. You'd have to change a lot of pretty fundamental parts of the game to remove the "ugly" system of roads that people build around their cities. They are required for too many things for people to just choose not to build them, even if you remove the commerce adds. Heck. Just being able to move my workers around quickly is worth building the roads.


I can think of some alternatives however. If all you *really* care about is the graphic, why not just play with the improvements turned off? Of, how about asking for more graphics filters, so you can choose to turn off just roads/rails? That would seem to fix your problem without breaking the game.


As to real game changes, why not tie in road building into both working a square and the presence of improvements in the square? Let's just assume that if you made improvements in a square that you also built the smaller roads and such along the way. Then, we can use some multiple to movement based on the percentage of total city squares that have been improved and are being worked. All squares in the city radius then have that movement applied. This would be a nice way to just represent that the area around a city is all going to be roaded to some extent, but the extent will increase as the population increases and as more land is irrigated/mined. The idea is that with some minimal amount of improvment and population, all the squares inside a city radius should give the same benefit as traveling along a road does now.

This method would remove the requirements to build those "ugly" roads. A small adjustment to normal improvment cost would easily balance out the worker actions (right now, you irrigate/mine *and* build a road, just make irrigating/mining a touch more expensive and you maintain balance). Real roads/rails could still be built, and would show up on the map, but would only be used for trade. You'd only need to build them to connect cities, since all the city spaces are "roaded" to some extent naturally just by applying the movement multiplier.

I think that work work pretty well. It would still be a pretty major change to the game, but wouldn't "break" anything too badly.

 

[Wakboth]

Heh. Just wanted to add that I do like the idea of resources only giving a set amount. So one source of iron would only allow you to build X number of units that require iron at a time, or Y number of rails (or some combination). This would allow the game to naturally balance out "large" civiliations (they'l have more resources in their boundaries, but will be consuming them faster). The current system of corruption/waste is a horrible abomination IMHO that bears no resemblence to any real historical dynamic.

Another alternative for that would be to allow some of the more common resources to be "mined" in any appropriate terrain square. Maybe you have to build a specific mine (iron mine, coal mine, etc) and that mine generates just enough of that resource to allow the production of a single unit at a time. This would alleviate the resource advantage large civs traditionally have a bit, while still allowing the possibility of trade (I'd have to work on the numbers for that though since the loss of a single square of productivity is probably worth it compared to what you'd have to trade for an equivalent amount of that resource).

Dunno. I can think of lots of ideas. The trick when designing a game though is to make the whole thing work and be playable. It's not always about what's the most "realistic"...

 

[Trade-peror]

I absolutely agree, Wakboth, as you and some others mentioned, that this trade system may not actually affect the habit of building roads everywhere, since roads have non-commercial uses.

As for my reasons for implementing this trade system, I only initially decided that a good side-effect is that building roads everywhere will cease. Apparently, that may not be the case, but that is of little concern. My primary objective is to establish a more defined, material basis for trade in Civ.

You mentioned that this system may encourage clumps of roads only near war zones. That would be unfortunate, but I had no original intention of stimulating roadbuilding only near the battlefront. And for historical precedent, I agree that roads were built for trade--but their job was to *facilitate* trade, not generate it. My new system would allow roads to play this role (and generate "traveling/accomodations industry" trade only when they are facilitating other trade).

I do also like the idea of integrating road building with irrigation or mining, since in reality that was generally the case anyway. Therefore, the command to "build a road" would only be for a spot where neither irrigation or mining is desirable. Only the actual route used to reach a city is shown (also) as a road. In such a way, the terrain will appear more natural, and it will be easier to see where trade routes are going through.

Then for resources, I agree that they should provide a definite amount, as I specified in a post somewhere before. It would curb large civilizations by forcing them to secure several sources to remain well-supplied, and small nations can easily sell surplus to boost their overall position.

The idea of "generating" a tiny amount of a resource by building a special improvement on appropriate terrain is very interesting. It could be viable and not unbalancing if the amount generated is, as you suggested, limited to one or two units (enough for only one or two cities, therefore).

Finally, I do say that there MUST be a better way to deal with curbing empires than corruption and waste. Indeed, such models resemble little in real life. And, of course, there must always be a balance between "reality" and "playability"...

 

[TopLaw]

I like the idea of having a more complex trading "option." Thus Bamspeedy could just disable it for the games he plays. On that same note, you could technically make "detail options" for each aspect of the game (ie. a war option, that would allow more detailed and realistic war components)

 

[Trade-peror]

Whew...projects and finals have delayed me for weeks from posting much...but anyway...

While this new trade system will significantly alter the handling of the domestic economy, it will perhaps have the greatest effect on the international economy. Accordingly, many human-AI relationships will be redefined. Here are a few possibilities:

Trade agreements would become incredibly important, as they have been and are in world history. Allowing products to be sold to the AI and/or purchasing products from the AI can increase the possibility of having viable neighbor AIs and having relationships *actually* be mutually beneficial. Currently, in any case, there is simply too little interaction possible between civs--throughout world history trade has been an important link in forging international relationships.

To elaborate on the idea above, there could also be accompanying diplomatic actions such as tariffs, which not only generate gold from imports but also give domestic products a better chance of competing. And I say it is a diplomatic option, because tariffs have played an important role in defining trade relationships, even if technically they are simply domestic laws.

Next, the effect on war will be very significant, because all previous economic links to enemies will be severed, and this will tend to produce noticeable decreases in food, shields, and/or luxuries between the parties--a reality in time of war. Perhaps this could be a more subtle form of "war weariness" because luxuries get cut off, among other shortages (I don't necessarily like the current form of war weariness because it is too "black and white," where representative governments find all wars to be unjustifiable, etc.). Also, in the process of constructing alliances, trade incentives can be dangled to great effect--quite reflective of the past and the present. Accordingly, trade embargoes could truly be devastating, where as the current trade embargo has little practical effect other than reducing AI attitudes. The mere threat of such prevents wars, for how many countries, for example, would attack Saudi Arabia, as it controls a significant portion of the world's oil supplies? On the other hand, how many times in history have nations fought over the control of resources? Since this new system would have resource spots generate only a finite amount, and since there are practically unlimited markets for any product when the world is open, more resources = more money, which, whether fortunately or not, was and is a realistic motive behind actions throughout history. Finally, and perhaps most lucrative of all, is for players to keep out of wars themselves and act as "neutral suppliers" by selling much needed products to warring third parties. Again, by defining the amount a resource can generate, there will generally be strong demand for war time staples like iron (in ancient), rubber, oil, and aluminum. Also, for example, many a time America has supplied warring nations with food as well as firearms, and this will be possible with this new trade system.

The overall effect, most likely, will be a completely new style of playing in industrial and modern times, when industrialization has created the base for manufacturing surplus, and globalization has opened the world as one large market. In Civ, the priorities throughout each of the eras are essentially the same, and I might venture to say the fundamental playing styles are, too. That may, in fact, be the explanation for how some players find playing in the modern era to be somewhat boring. This new trade system will allow for more interesting possibilities and shifting priorities as time progresses through the eras.





Whoa, that could almost count as a rant. I welcome any comments and suggestions!

 

[daimajin]

Being new to the forums, I dont know how many of you feel, but in my opinion, Civ 3 lets you control too much of what goes on in your kingdom.
For example, roads are largely not built by the ruler, but rather sprout up as the citizens decide that links between any two towns become necessary. Even buildings in the city, like marketplaces and temples are built by the people as they begin to feel it necessary for the development of the town. Interestingly, this is not the case under communism, but that can be discussed in a later thread.
Anyway, the state only has a role, realistically, in commissioning important projects, such as roads linking distant areas or very large scale constructions projects. Interestingly, civilization chooses to give the player complete control over these things.
I would view it as a great plus, if civilization left complete control of these affairs to the people. Thus, the player would only have to control the military, his empire's expansion, and large-scale projects. In this way, it would create a very much simplified and far more realistic game at the same time. It would let the player control what is truly important in empire managing.
Just a thought.

 

[Trade-peror]

I understand what you mean. But the fact is that Civ does not exactly define the player's role as something similar to any person's role in reality, so perhaps a direct-realism comparison cannot be made.

By the way, I (and many other civers) would never trust "the people" to do things on their own, since they would be controlled by the *AI*

 

[Gladi]

Bright day to you

Interesting thread.

First. To people that do not like roads and railroads everywhere. You are not Europeans, are you? It actually looks like that in Europe, or at least in the part I usually live.

My biggest issue with current trade system isn't distribution or money. Instead it is trade through third party territory. Okay I send twelfe so many vagons of wine bottles to suffice for their twelfe million population and they send me that 54 talents (or millions dollars if you prefer) and state that all this traffic goes through gets nothing. Does a ruler of this kingdom drink my wine which travel in his territory in thousands? Does he ever see at least a dinarii of all that money? No. Implamenting this could allow you to control trade routes and even lead to another Troyan War (war over control of tade roures)!

Another issue. This not about how much micromanagment is available, but how much you have to do. Player should be able to engage fully in activity he likes and/or excel mosts and be able to leave other to capapable hands of his generals and advisors (AI). Not even the most power-obssesed "ultimate ruler" does not personally take care of everything. Howg that is it, for now.

May all your day be bright.

 

[eromrab]

@daimajin - if you desire to play like this... you can set all your city governors to autobuild and whatever... and if you want to do as the federal gov't does... you can set policies of what is most important to the nation as a whole... you can set them to make military a priority, and hope that they make enough military for you... or you can set them to seek out culturally things... or whatever... it's all in the city governor screen... and if they build workers you can set them to automate, and they will build according to what you have told the governors to prioritize...

@the rest of y'all - i like the idea of a definate amount of resources... that would definately make resources more valuable to others... i know that when i have a world wide country, and i have like 30 of some resources... it's not worth more than like 1 or 2 gold per turn... it's meaningless... if they had a definate amount, then they would be far more valuable...

i don't like the idea of "producing" a certain amount of a resource per turn... i would say to just have a resource have a set amount... for example "100 iron"... you build a road and exploit that resource... if your country is big enough you could use it all in one turn... or for a smaller gov't, trade it out over a longer period of time and use some yourself... it seems more realistic to me.

also, i like the idea of defined trade routes. in fact, i would propose that they be automatically set, using the same method as the "go to" for units... the path of least resistance... but what i would propose, is that if an enemy "blocks" a trade route, they not only stop the countries involved from enjoying that commodity, they also GET to enjoy that commodity themselves...

for example, i'm trading spices to a computer player. a country sends some troops into the trade route... BAM! that benefit now goes to the "pirate" country... the goods are still travelling around that route... but the pirates, or bandits have confiscated them for their own use...

that would provide an increased incentive to attact trade routes... which would provide an increased incentive to defend trade routes... which would give more "strength" potential to smaller nations to wreck chaos on the bigger enemies... they would have to run around putting out small fires and would have to divert some attention from the main attacks... which is essentially what the barbarians did to the roman empire, helping to lead to it's downfall...

i also like the idea of each city having "small roads" that you dont' see... i would suggest to make all terrain within the cultural area navigatable to the controlling nation as if it had roads (maybe 1/2 or 1/3 movement)... that way you would only have to worry about building the highways and interstates and railroads to get troops and goods from one city to another quicker... kinda like the federal gov't does in america... the smallest roads are made by the cities and townships... then the state has their own roads... and the federal gov't has it's own roads (the interstates).

also, i think that trade should affect the way 2 nations deal with each other much more... too often i've had a trade route with a computer player, only to have them attack me... i think that it should severly increase their attitude towards your nation...

so what y'all think?