Mercantilism is terrible?

[Virtual Alex]

When i first got this game, I was in love with specialist so I loved being in mercantilism. Just recently I figured out how trade works, and now I have to ask isn't mercantilism just totally horrible?

In my current game, when I really started giving it thought. I was playing specialist economy with Bismark (my capital had 4 seafood, corn and grassland pigs). Once I unlocked mercantilism I was about to switch when I decided to quickly scan my cities for trade routes. My capital was getting +9 +9 and +7 from trade. My other cities were getting less, but still around +3 to +5 from each route. There is NO WAY have 1 free speciaist in each city can make up for that kind of loss. Even with representation I would rather take 25 gold over 1 free specialist.

Am I missing something here? I know that i still get "local" routes. But they are only 1 or 2 gold.

 

[schwartz]

You are missing something. If you have a large empire, your trade routes benefit the AI more than they benefit you, since you have more cities, the specialists are for you only.

 

[Shadowkx]

Rep + Merc = good when you have a lot of cities. If trade routes still bother you get a vassal as you will have trade routes with them even in Merc.

 

[DaveMcW]

If you can't get a vassal, get 3 island cities for double domestic trade.

 

[silverbullet]

There is a period in the game when almost all the AIs are in mercantilism. They usually switch as soon as they get banking. In that case there is no harm is switching.

The other case is as other have mentioned - if you have a lot of cities, probably most of the trade routes you will have will be internal. Every foreign city can only provide you 1 trade route to only 1 of your cities, and the rest are internal. You can exhaust foreign trade routes pretty quickly on continents map before astronomy.

 

[Winston Hughes]

It depends on what trade routes are available to your cities.

You'll get no trade from civs running Mercantilism, civs you don't have an open borders agreement with, or civs you aren't connected to. If the available foreign routes are few, and especially if they aren't overseas routes, then a switch to Merc is a no brainer.

It's also worth bearing in mind that Merc doesn't block the routes you get from colonies and vassals, and that the civs you trade with are also profiting from the arrangement.

 

[Jerrymander]

No, it's insanely powerful. Even a population 1 city can make use of the extra hammer that the free citizen provides, or (with Caste System) can pay for itself with a Merchant. I usually get nearly the same commerce in trade from domestic cities as I do from foreign cities. Sometimes it is a tossup between Free Market and Mercantilism. Trade can be powerful, specialists can be powerful. I usually quick save, switch, and compare the results. Don't like it? Quick load.

Notable times to not use Mercantilism occur when you're smaller or the same size as your AI counterparts, and almost no other AIs are in Mercantilism themselves (and you have trade routes with them). I think that's about it.

Dave's point of island cities is true, sometimes the raw trade they offer offsets their maintenance costs. I haven't experienced much with it. Or trade at all, to be honest. My statements about the values of foreign vs domestic trade may be off.

 

[SnowlyWhite]

the issue with internal cities on islands is that you don't benefit from the custom house, which is quite a powerful building

that being said, if you can stir enough trouble between ais so they don't have too many obs between them, free market/sp is clearly the way as you'll hog all the routes; if they're friendly with each other then you won't be auto picked and merc. starts being appealing.

also, there's the bonus of stalling everyone; you might be abit on the - side by switching, but the ais will be too. Basically, I switch, look at what I get, look at demographics at how much the best gnp dropped and decide(really a shame the civics panel is so primitive and doesn't give you any info beside civic costs)

p.s. - as an "feeling" - if you're on your own landmass then fm/sp seems better; if you're on a pangeea type probably merc. is better(again, taking in acct. how much you stall the rest too)

 

[Virtual Alex]

Hmmm thanks for all the info. Looks like I am going to try the save/reload option and check it out next time I am skeptical.

 

[Jerrymander]

Hmmm thanks for all the info. Looks like I am going to try the save/reload option and check it out next time I am skeptical.

Note that reloading instantly disqualifies any Hall of Fame game.

 

[Refar]

Mercantilism + Rep can be worth a lot . It's usually best for big empires - if you give more trade to the AI's, than you get from them, it is worth switching to Merc, even if it hurt you a bit - it hurt them more. And obvioulsy - the more cites, the more specialists.

Note that reloading instantly disqualifies any Hall of Fame game.

So those have to be played in one sitting ? My condolences to all the Marathon players out there.

 

[Jerrymander]

So those have to be played in one sitting ? My condolences to all the Marathon players out there.

I think so. They might allow loads. I haven't used the Hall of Fame liberally since 1.09 was the eminent Civilization IV version.

I'll go look.

Reloading/Replaying

Reloading/replaying is not allowed. A reload/replay is when a new session is started using a save prior to that of the end of the previous session. To avoid accidental reloading:

* Perform a manual save at the end of your session.
* Start the next session with the manual save created at the end of your previous session.

You may not play the game through again with the starting save. You must submit your first attempt at the game, otherwise you are replaying with knowledge of the map.

Ouch, but it seems that you can manually save.

 

[Grames]

The free specialists from mercantism accrue GP points. If you are in Pacifism or have the wonder giving +50% GP rate then this still another great point in favor of mercantilism.

 

[TheDS]

Don't assume that assigning your free Specialist as a Merchant in every city will balance things out, even with +100% gold in all cities. That's just 6 extra gold, compared to the loss of 4-40 Coins. Even with Rep and Pac and +100% Science everywhere, that's still not going to make up the difference for most empires, compared to Free Market.

Merc is best when you have so many cities that half or more of your cities only have internal trade routes, whether this is due to you being huge or most everyone is refusing Open Borders or is Merc themselves or you can't get to them. It's good to have an extra 3-6 island cities to double your minimum Coins, Merc or not. Merc is also useful if AI cities are mostly small.

My rule of thumb is 50%+ of my cities having internal trade AND external trade averages only about 6 Coins or less. A lack in one area can be made up in the other area. Having vassals can complicate this, but usually you don't have enough vassal cities to make a difference.

Still, not a bad idea to take careful note of your stats before and after a switch, and see which wound up being more to your liking, then reload or switch back, whichever you feel better about. 5 suboptimal turns shouldn't kill you if you're wrong.

Merc is also good for an expanding civ, both for the free hammer or if you combine with Caste you can pop your border quick with an artist. Too bad Merc comes so late, when the rush is over (unless you have an empty continent handy).

 

[MrCynical]

I regard Mercantilism as a rather dubious civic once the later ones are available (unless no one will open borders with you). One specialist is not likely to repay the loss of trade route income, even with Representation as well. You could argue there's some value in depriving the AI of trade routes to your cities, but I'm never very convinced by approaches that damage both AI and the human player. Since the human player is smarter, they can probably make better use of the extra income than the AI - hence I don't really consider this a plus.

There's also the point that these arguments aren't answering the question: "is mercantilism worse than the other civics?" It's answering: "Is mercantilism worse than useless?" When you factor in say the extra trade route of Free Market, it's a very unimpressive civic. I suppose you might want to use it if you're nearing the domination threshold, and don't want to use State Property due to corporations.

 

[SnowlyWhite]

fm is good due to corp reduced maintenance mostly; otherwise, I was always convinced that barbarism or whatever's the starter, is better. Mind you, the added trade route is also the crappiest.

Unless a good coast and oversea neighbors that keep picking you(like in an isolated start, or when they're on different landmasses between themselves too, but don't have ob, so they'll keep picking you since you're the only target that provides 100% intercontinental bonus) you're probably talking on average of about 2c from one crappy internal trade route added somewhere. Now 2c/city for a civic with medium cost or the initial low cost civic - the low cost one might be worth.

fm got boosted in bts, but pre bts and custom houses... I seldom used it; it's vaguely on the + side, but given the turns of anarchy might just finish on the -.

Since the human player is smarter, they can probably make better use of the extra income than the AI - hence I don't really consider this a plus

on deity I assume every non stupid ai city(not those tundra crap where they work only coast, since they might get half priced buildings, but they still make only 1 hammer/turn) has a custom house. While it's no guarantee I'll have enough hammers available to put them up everywhere. Even on immortal, all their relevant cities have one.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You can have trade routes with vassals too even under merc, which cuts a lot of its drawbacks.

Merc is basically a pre-communism warmonger civic, or used when you don't have foreign trade routes anyway (and this does, of course, include civs you're at war with - there's no OB there!).

Very large empires with rep + merc are pretty scary, and transition to state property later really easily.

 

[UncleJJ]

Mercantilism can also be very useful for a SE trying to maximise its GPP production. A well run SE might have 5 cities that can produce another GP before the end of the game and so any GPPs added by the free specialist are valuable. Mercantilism is effectively 2 free food added to these cities where food is critical.

Ghandi is probably the most able leader to use this ploy as he's Spiritual and Philosophical. In the middle game, post Constitution, he can switch to Representation, Caste System, Mercantilism and Pacifism for 5 turns and his 5 cities producing GPPs will each get a free specialist over and above what his food production can support. That specialist will produce 15 base GPPs in the 5 turns and that will be boosted by +200% to be 45 per city and a total of 225 GPPs. If he has the Parthenon, the NE in one city or there's a golden age then this is effect boosted even more.

That will speed up the production of all the next 5 GPs and massively outweighs a few extra commerce from trade routes, which is questionable anyway as it usually helps the AI more than the player. This is another important reason to run Mercantilism several times during the game using either Spiritual or golden ages to switch civics for free. Taj Mahal comes at just the right time to make the first switch for non Spiritual civs and a second golden age using one of the GPs can allow an anarchy free switch out of these civics, or alternatively just run these civics during a golden age switching out at the end.

 

[Jerrymander]

Don't assume that assigning your free Specialist as a Merchant in every city will balance things out, even with +100% gold in all cities. That's just 6 extra gold, compared to the loss of 4-40 Coins. Even with Rep and Pac and +100% Science everywhere, that's still not going to make up the difference for most empires, compared to Free Market.

I was referring to Merchants purely being used in population 1 cities, not much else.

 

[Larklight]

Remember, extra trade routes suffer from, diminishing returns. If you have a +6 route, a +4 route, and a +2 route, an extra free one will only be +1 or +2