Poll: Land / Sea TRs "Merging" in the Late Game

[Stalker0]

Currently there are two types of trade routes: Land and Sea.

The idea is, at some point in the end game, the two types of units would "merge", creating a single trade unit that can cross both land and sea. In other words, any city could trade directly with any other (assuming proper range of course). That could be a cargo ship, or an airship, or a blimp, or just some generic "trade unit".

This thread is NOT about the logistics of that idea. This poll is to get a sense of the community's interest in the idea, to see if its worth detailed discussion.

Is this a topic worth further discussion, or is it best left to a modmod?

 

[balparmak]

A big yes from me, but I'm a King noob that doesn't care about the balance that much. Honestly I'd prefer them to be merged from the start, as in the new trader unit would replace the cargo ship and the caravan would be upgraded to that.

Edit: Or to keep things more balanced, the new trader unit (which replaces the cargo ship) wouldn't be allowed to change domains on a trade route. Simply put, it'd be a land unit or naval unit depending on the origin city, and it'd allow either pure land or pure sea trade routes, preventing the case where any city can trade with any other. This would come in the late game like you suggested, through a new technology or another unit upgrade.

 

[looorg]

Won't this risk being weird? For sea-routes it does not matter but for my land-routes I want to send them so they hit a maximum of towns and villages. That might become wonky if they switch and swap between sea and land to create the shortest routes, whatever they might be. So while nice in some regards I would prefer not to tweak it.

 

[CppMaster]

Won't this risk being weird? For sea-routes it does not matter but for my land-routes I want to send them so they hit a maximum of towns and villages. That might become wonky if they switch and swap between sea and land to create the shortest routes, whatever they might be. So while nice in some regards I would prefer not to tweak it.

You could used the new trade unit as a Caravan or Trade Ship, so it wouldn't mess with passing through villages and towns

 

[STEPHEN HOFFMANN]

Aren't yields better from Cargo Ships than Caravans? I also think could change early decisions on whether or not to place next to the water. I think it would be best left to a mod

 

[shaglio]

The ability for a single trade unit to run both land and sea trade routes is one of the few things I actually miss from Civ 6 since coming back to Civ 5.

 

[CppMaster]

Aren't yields better from Cargo Ships than Caravans? I also think could change early decisions on whether or not to place next to the water. I think it would be best left to a mod

Yep. It doesn't change anything, though. Sea trade routes could still yield better yields than land trade routes, even if it's done by the same unit. It's more like QoL for late game.

 

[InkAxis]

Yep. It doesn't change anything, though. Sea trade routes could still yield better yields than land trade routes, even if it's done by the same unit. It's more like QoL for late game.

Well what if it goes over both land and sea? Which does it yield?

 

[CppMaster]

Well what if it goes over both land and sea? Which does it yield?

Hmm, maybe a weighted average, where weights are number of tiles for given type of trade route. Or just sea, because it's a higher anyways, so it could reflect more cargo per trop flavor-wise

 

[looorg]

You could used the new trade unit as a Caravan or Trade Ship, so it wouldn't mess with passing through villages and towns

How would you chose and differentiate the two? You have the "new trade unit" in town, pick up the route screen. Then select there. But the system is going to want to run the shortest route which might be some kind of mixed route, it won't follow the road system anymore or it will get on and off between roads/land and sea. Sea routes as mentioned already have higher yield rewards then land routes. So what if it's splitting the journey to create the shortest route?

 

[CppMaster]

Honestly, I prefer convinience than balance here, so whatever calculation that makes sense is ok with me

 

[Stalker0]

I would probably just use the calculations for sea units, aka the goal is to give you the best of both worlds as much as possible.

 

[Teholb]

You cannot take a ship and walk it onto land, nor can you sail a train/truck onto water. The interchange happens at port cities, which is closer to what we have in-game than what is being proposed here. I do not think simplifying this aspect is worth it either thematically, or in terms of QoL.

It also introduces more complexity to the back-end, I would imagine, which is not ideal.

 

[usadefcon1]

I would like to be able to convert caravans to trade ships immediately and vice versa, however I still think they should be separate units.

 

[Fluffball]

I voted yes but with a couple of proviso's.

As it is stated as a late game change it may not be worth the effort as at that point you can usually either delete and build a different unit in a single turn or just purchase one with gold so it would be a minor QoL improvement.

Although from the concept it would also entail trade routes being able to cross land and sea at the same time and while this may be useful in some cases (without testing) i assume it would only be useful in a minor number of cases and thus again the potential improvement would be minor.

If it is a simple change then most certainly, if it is going to be a lot of work or complicted i am not sure it would be worth it.

 

[Rekk]

It would definitely take a lot of work to implement.

 

[greenfieldpark]

I dont see why we would do this so i voted no.

 

[balparmak]

I dont see why we would do this so i voted no.

For me, it takes one instance of unfun micromanagement out of the game. Case in point, I was going for diplo victory in my last game so CS quests were important. Many times when one of my cargo ships completed its route I've received a trade route quest from a landlocked CS, or vice versa. Not the end of the world, I could easily disband the cargo ship and buy a caravan, but it just adds a few frustrating clicks and waiting.

 

[pineappledan]

If it's easy and doable, then I can see this as a nice Atomic/Information gadget. But, if it's hard to do, then it's fine as is.

 

[looorg]

For me, it takes one instance of unfun micromanagement out of the game. Case in point, I was going for diplo victory in my last game so CS quests were important. Many times when one of my cargo ships completed its route I've received a trade route quest from a landlocked CS, or vice versa. Not the end of the world, I could easily disband the cargo ship and buy a caravan, but it just adds a few frustrating clicks and waiting.

I guess this is one of the fundamental differences between players. I kinda like the micro aspect of the game and there appears to be a lot of suggestions to remove those aspects to make the game easier / or less frustrating or whatever we should call it. Which is not really something I find very appealing or interesting.