Did you take a look at the next turn? I think the game needs one update to the trade routes so that it actually notices things have changed. (such updates taking place at a new turn or signing open borders)
I also think the commerce overview is basically doing a separate calculation, thus the disagreement.
Good point, here's what happened after I ended the turn:
From 53 to 20 gold a turn is a bigger hit, but it's the difference of a 10% slider change. Marginally helpful, I suppose.
Important Note: Carracks can Bombard defenses now (You're welcome! hehe it was my proposal) making a swarm that much more valuable than before.
Thank you for that, I was shocked to find out that when I promoted my carracks to frigates they lost the bombardment ability.
Obviously I took part in this MetaStrat dicussion but I hope we dont get too carried away in this temporal pursuit rather than the grander goal of shaping the Portugal Game for the next big phase. Consequently this might have helped to a degree at least insofar as it exposes a very ahistorical "gamey" play at the heart: reliance on the InstaArmies from First Contact. I works; it just doesnt feel right. I can already imagine a simple tweak to fit the situation that would only consist of readdressing TC targets to those relevant to the UHVs. I've also been mulling over a UP that incentivizes and properly rewards early exploration and settlement in the direction of India (think something like getting the full benefits of a Renaissance-Era settler but with Cartography).
I find playing through the country as designed helps find areas in its implementation that can be done better. For example, the UP being worth 10% of a slider when it expires. Or as you said, reliance on conquerors from the first contact and the TC being mostly irrelevant to your UHV. If the TC targeted Kilwa and the west coast of India instead of Ceylon and Malacca, that would be far more helpful.
I've also been thinking about the carrack as a unique unit. Right now it's in a good place, but historically speaking, the carrack had far more cargo capacity than a galleon, pound for pound. It was also heavier and clumsier. The Portuguese kept using them for the India armadas into the 17th century because they were incredibly economical, stable in heavy seas, and safe from extra-European pirates (their sides were too tall for Barbary, Indian, and Malayan/Javanese pirates to scale under fire). However, they were easy targets for the nimbler, faster, and just as tall European galleons (a design that emerged as a compromise between a lateen-rigged caravel's agility and tacking ability and a square-rigged carrack's speed and carrying capacity - splitting the galleon into the current cargo galleon and a pre-frigate war galleon appeals to me but I'm a naval nerd who wants to overhaul the entire naval unit tree).
My ideal carrack/nao would be a caravel replacement* available with cartography that has less raw strength (and movement? with 3 cargo slots I'd say keep the 6 speed, with 4 give it 5 speed) than the standard galleon, but has a combat bonus against coastal ships (galleasses, war galleys, cogs, and associated UUs). Keep the bombardment ability and give it 3 (or 4) cargo slots. The result is a ship that is powerful in Africa, India, and the East Indies (
and situationally even the Mediterranean), and has an incentive to stick around after obsolescence because of its usefulness, but gets
swept aside by European ships as soon as everyone else has exploration.
*initially I wrote this as a galleon replacement, but this would make the caravel pointless for Portugal, and gives the player a choice: keep the weaker but situationally useful carrack, or upgrade them to galleons and have a fighting chance against the other Europeans. The unit I came up with is probably too strong to be a caravel replacement, though.
Edit: my idea would work a lot better if there was a war galleon unit (upgrade from galleass/caravel) and a merchantman unit (upgrade from galleon). Since caravels upgrade to frigates currently, if they upgraded into war galleons instead the Portugal player would be given a choice between the East Indies-focused carrack and the European-focused war galleon upgrade. The standard transport galleon would be also available to Portugal to build - in reality Portugal built war and trade galleons alongside carracks, and they mostly stayed in European waters during the Iberian Union. By the time of the Portuguese restoration, galleons and carracks had given way to frigates and merchantmen. That might be a lot of upgrades in a short time, but think of all the light cavalry we currently have!