Rebase trade caravans

[McSaucy4418]

Can you rebase a trade caravan across and ocean. Like if I build it in one city but want to base it out of another city that is on a different continent is that possible?

 

[Jampine]

I think so, you can move caravans to any city that has a land connection to any other city, whether it belongs to you or someone else, so you should be ok. Why not try it out next time your caravan route expires, there's no harm from it.

 

[cpm4001]

Yes, it is.

 

[McSaucy4418]

Ok thanks.

 

[Smokeybear]

Can you stop an ongoing trade route and send it to a different city before its allotted time expires? Or are you always forced to lose ones if you end up going to war with a civ that you have active trade routes with?

 

[Scott Jegg]

Can you stop an ongoing trade route and send it to a different city before its allotted time expires? Or are you always forced to lose ones if you end up going to war with a civ that you have active trade routes with?

Always lose it.

It's actually a good way to tell if an AI is planning to go to war with you, as you will notice their caravans start going elsewhere.

 

[compwiz1202]

I don't understand most of it. Caravans/Cargo Ships should at least need to move to the new city and not teleport until airports. I don't see why you can't just break a trade route whenever. Also, if your unit isn't in the enemy's borders when DoW occurs, the route should just end, but the unit shouldn't die. And maybe even make it that you don't get a steady GPT, but you get it in spurts each time your unit gets back to your city. And make the units move further per turn based on roads/railroads and the fastest unit you can build, so you would actually get money faster for building roads/railroads between cities and researching faster units.

 

[Vidszhite]

Can you rebase a trade caravan across and ocean. Like if I build it in one city but want to base it out of another city that is on a different continent is that possible?

Yes. In fact, you can rebase Cargo Ships that are land locked.

I don't understand most of it. Caravans/Cargo Ships should at least need to move to the new city and not teleport until airports. I don't see why you can't just break a trade route whenever. Also, if your unit isn't in the enemy's borders when DoW occurs, the route should just end, but the unit shouldn't die.

It's designed this way to make the decision of who to trade with an important and well-though-out decision. If we could trade with whoever we wanted and then pulled out the minute we see units coming at us, not only would the trade units be teleporting to make it back to port, we could make trade routes with our mortal enemies with no consequence, and if we decide to backstab, we could just pull all our trade routes at the last second and declare war. In this way, you have to trade with people that you don't want to murder eventually, and also with people who you know will not murder you. It also makes a decent (not foolproof) method of discovering who the AI likes, because if they are trading with you, they will lose those trade routes if they declare war.

And maybe even make it that you don't get a steady GPT, but you get it in spurts each time your unit gets back to your city.

Sounds like it makes sense at first, but with how gold works in this game now, it just wouldn't be workable. When you start trading, you need the money *now*, not in 20 turns when your caravan gets home again. It would make spending gold at all very perilous, because you don't know whether you're making enough in lump sums to overcome your losses. The end result is making the game harder to understand, and increasing how much math we have to do in our heads, which doesn't seem like a whole lot of fun.

And make the units move further per turn based on roads/railroads and the fastest unit you can build, so you would actually get money faster for building roads/railroads between cities and researching faster units.

They already do, but instead of "faster money" it translates into "greater range".

 

[Xiao Xiong]

However. If caravans paid off MORE, but only in a lump sum when it returned, then that would compensate you for your risk. It would also make your really work I protecting them (which should be easier). It would also force you to budget your spending.

I wish you could assign a unit to 'protect civilians' when over a trade unit, worker, or settler, which would cause it to automatically follow the civilian/trade unit always staying on the same tile (waking up if not possible).

 

[Lochlann]

And maybe even make it that you don't get a steady GPT, but you get it in spurts each time your unit gets back to your city.

If caravans paid off MORE, but only in a lump sum when it returned, then that would compensate you for your risk.

Another problem there, in addition to what Vidszhite pointed out, is that caravans are meant to represent a constant stream of outgoing/incoming trade traffic, not single trade units going to and fro. Caravans and cargo ships should be thought of not as discrete units, but as infrastructure needed to populate and "fill in" a route. The steady gold flow, gpt instead of lump sums, reflects that constant stream.

 

[Xiao Xiong]

Another problem there, in addition to what Vidszhite pointed out, is that caravans are meant to represent a constant stream of outgoing/incoming trade traffic, not single trade units going to and fro. Caravans and cargo ships should be thought of not as discrete units, but as infrastructure needed to populate and "fill in" a route. The steady gold flow, gpt instead of lump sums, reflects that constant stream.

Until a military unit finds it on a specific tile and plunders it.

 

[Lochlann]

Until a military unit finds it on a specific tile and plunders it.

Not at all. The military unit is not merely plundering a single unit. It is plundering exactly what I identified before: the infrastructure, participants, etc., involved in the route. Just as the route is represented by a single unit, the disruption/laying-to-waste of the entire route is represented by attacking a single unit.

Certainly, this characterization of "what trade routes are meant to represent" isn't a 100% match for real life. Neither is any aspect of this game. Concessions must always be made to the game-ness of the game. But the "caravan = a constant stream of trade along a route" interpretation is a vastly better fit than the "caravan = a single unit" idea. The gpt earning, the inability to stop or change caravans prematurely, the inability to control caravans as individual units, the behind-the-scenes operation and movement of the routes...these are all in line with the constant stream interpretation. To say nothing of the gameplay advantages/necessities pointed out by Vidszhite.