trade questions

[the argus]

Hey all, thanks for all the work everyone puts into this site (and the other one). As I've said in other threads, I've become convinced its easily worth the effort to do the micromanagement required to increase trade. I play large map deity against the AI and in order to stay ahead and eventualy win, trade is essential.

I've found alot on trade here and its all very good, but there's alot of it. There are only so many hours of my life that can be sacrificed to researching trade issues so I need to learn slowly. Can someone post a link to the simplest, most succinct summary of trade advice? There's just too much out there. For instance, somewhere, I can't remember where, I read that it matters from what direction your caravan enters the city (why that should matter eludes me). That's the kind of detail that drives me crazy, but on the other hand, I have to admit something like that is helpful nonetheless.

Some things I've already learned and apply as I play and questions to go with it:

1) An SSC can in itself provide an empire with enormous trade and science benefits. Set up the best trade 3 routes possible and replenish them later in the game as commodities change.

Questions on SSC:
a) I've often read something like "build an SSC.... send caravans from all your (inner) cities to your SSC." Why? If you can only have three trade routes why would you send caravans from more than 3 cities other than to build its Wonders? Is it for the one time bonus? And if so I thought the one time bonus would be higher if there were increased arrows in the source city, not the destination city.

b) Related to question a: Should I focus on sending caravans _to_ my SSC for things it demands or _from_ my SSC for things it supplies, or both?

(And yes I also know about building a courthourse in my SSC early on if its not my capital)

2) You can increase the one time bonus in gold and beakers by paying attention to things like distance, size of the cities, whether they are foreign civs, on other continents, connected by roads/rail, the amount of trade arrows in the source city, etc. You can find all kinds of charts on this site with more information than you would ever want regarding this.

Sure its nice to get the one time bonus, especially because its beakers as well as gold. And its easy to remeber to do some of these things. But how do people feel about the relative importance of this as opposed to just getting good trade routes set up for the long run. Sometimes waiting for a road to be completed or getting a trade route to a very far flung place risks the caravan getting destroyed or the commodity changing on you before the carvan gets to its destiantion. In your opinion, what's more important and to what extent?

3) Certain commodities are better than others for trade. There are charts for that and even a pattern as to what commodities will appear as supply and demand, based on the proximity of your cities to various things on the map.

That is way too much detail for me. Or is it? Should I be less lazy?

Also, a general question on trade and approaches to city improvements:

For trade junkies, which improvements do you build or make a priority? I used to always build marketplaces/banks, libraries/universities before I got around to caravans. Now I always make sure cities have at least two trade routes before I build market/lib. And then I might not even get around to those imporvements unless the city has a lot of trade arrows. But I feel like maybe I've gone too far in that direction.

Again, I play deity large map against the AI. This is what I do with my cities as I expand:

1) Build new new city, give it a name that helps me remeber where it is (so i don't get confused when I'm buiolding trade routeS)
2) Build defensive units and settlers (in varying # and order depending on city location)
3) Build temple (I have mikes and bach's, but this is deity and I use rep. then demo. until late fundy for conquest)
4) Maybe Build a granary (you can't build Pyramids in deity and manage happiness early on but later on you want your cities to grow. Of course there is the opportuinty for growth from celebrations, but I often go with a granary)
5) Build Caravans
6) Build other military unit(s) if needed, or a diplomat/spy (or more caravans for local wonder building)
7) Build anything special the city might need or be good for (harbor, city walls, transport ships, etc.)
8) Finally build marketplaces and libraries, banks, etc.

So that means it is a very long time before i get to marketplaces and libraries, etc. Sure there is the occassional rush build and the order is sometimes different depending on the situation of course. But in general, I don't get to them until much later because I have shifted the focus to caravans and trade routes. Should I reassess this approach?

On the current game I'm playing its 1850. I'm in Demo and I've got a huge empire on one ginormous continent with many trade routes, but my income isn't so hot (maybe 150 per turn). New discorveries are every 4 turns. (Lux at 30%) I don't have as much foreign trade as I'd like, for various reasons, but still my economic picture should be far far better. I have alot of trade routes but very few marketplaces/banks/stock exchange. I'm slowly conquering my neighbors but I should be much further ahead. Sigh.

 

[ElephantU]

Can someone post a link to the simplest, most succinct summary of trade advice?

Kinda hard to find the "simplest" - but the Early Landing Guide has a good intro that is pretty "succinct":
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?threadid=82209

I read that it matters from what direction your caravan enters the city (why that should matter eludes me).

There was a rumor to that effect a long time ago, before Samson did his major study on Delivery Payments and Supply/Demand Changes. It was a suspicion based on the way Dips and Spies bribe cities. It is bunk.

1) An SSC can in itself provide an empire with enormous trade and science benefits. Set up the best trade 3 routes possible and replenish them later in the game as commodities change.

NO to the last part. Set up the 3 best routes you can and try to preserve them as long as possible, unless another destination city will significantly increase the routes. The point here is that as time goes buy your commodities will change, freeing up the SSC to produce new commodities while the routes stay locked in. If one of those new commodities gets locked into a route the SSC has lost its ability to repeat the delivery. Aim the new commodities for delivery to cities smaller than the ones that are locked into the old trade routes. See if you can help the old route cities grow some, too. But the advantage of repeating newer commodities (which usually have higher payoff, too) usually outweighs the advantage of locking in a newer trade route to a better city. My rule of thumb is usually to shoot for at least 50% better route, and I often hold out for 100% better if the newer commodities are Gold or Oil.

a) I've often read something like "build an SSC.... send caravans from all your (inner) cities to your SSC." Why?

I would not call this a rule of thumb for the early game, but in the mid game this can be advantageous. The point is to have the SSC/STC lock in three great outgoing routes first, after which it can accept and benefit an unlimited number of incoming routes. The routes that affect commodities are only the top three that get listed, but note that when you deliver a caravan from a city with less than three routes to a city with three or more, and if the delivering city is not big enough to displace one of the existing routes, a new "one-sided" or "incoming" route will be established that only shows up on the sending city's list. So a large STC can "pull up" a bunch of one-way routes if it has a lot of terrain-based trade arrows and Colossus.

I thought the one time bonus would be higher if there were increased arrows in the source city, not the destination city.

The bonus is based on combining the trade from both cities, then multiplying or dividing by different factors. If the destination is AI you cannot expect much from them in trade arrows, but if it is yours you can switch workers around and work on the terrain to increase the trade arrows.

b) Related to question a: Should I focus on sending caravans _to_ my SSC for things it demands or _from_ my SSC for things it supplies, or both?

Both. If you have a caravan that is demanded by the SSC the payment should be pretty good, BUT make sure you don't disturb old routes unless you know you will get a significantly better route. WHENEVER the SSC has an unblocked commodity supply, build it at once and send it as far as you can get it quickly. Be careful about the destination city - if it is big enough to cause a lock-in on the route, you will have a blocked supply commodity for a long time. If you can find a medium/small sized city that demands, though, the payoff will be enormous.

Sure its nice to get the one time bonus, especially because its beakers as well as gold. And its easy to remeber to do some of these things. But how do people feel about the relative importance of this as opposed to just getting good trade routes set up for the long run. Sometimes waiting for a road to be completed or getting a trade route to a very far flung place risks the caravan getting destroyed or the commodity changing on you before the carvan gets to its destiantion. In your opinion, what's more important and to what extent?

There are no rules of thumb here, this is part of learning to play well. Some players fuel their whole research effort by caravan/freight deliveries (especially if they have switched to Fundy). I would not suggest waiting for that road to be completed (unless it was only one turn away), but I would suggest you try to build ship chains and road/rail links that allow the fastest possible delivery of newly produced caravans. Since a good delivery often leads to a good route, consider them together rather than separately. Beware though that you are also benefitting the AI cities you deliver to. Some players prefer to switch to own-city deliveries only in the mid game.

3) Certain commodities are better than others for trade. There are charts for that and even a pattern as to what commodities will appear as supply and demand, based on the proximity of your cities to various things on the map. That is way too much detail for me. Or is it? Should I be less lazy?

You should have the basic list of commodity bonuses immediately accessible when you decide what you are going to build and where you are going to send it. The more complicated rules that Samson listed in the "Changes in City Supply/Demand" thread allow you to calculate what the city will probably supply and when that supply may change. This is probably not worth spending much time on, if you have minimized your delivery time with ship chains and railroads. If you are playing One City Challenge it is worth considering for city placement decision as well as knowing when supply commodities may change or become unblocked.

For trade junkies, which improvements do you build or make a priority? I used to always build marketplaces/banks, libraries/universities before I got around to caravans. Now I always make sure cities have at least two trade routes before I build market/lib.

I consider a Temple and a Marketplace to be minimal requirements for any city I want to grow beyond size 2-3. Both are practically required for WLTCD growth, at least up to size 8 with some Lux. At Deity level getting the key wonders is sometimes a race, so I may neglect getting trade routes set up early in all but my STC/SSC. If the deliveries are going well you will have excess gold sitting around. Figuring out the timing and balance between rushing infrastructure and rushing more caravans is another of those "gotta learn by doing" things.

An under-appreciated city improvement is the Harbor. With it you can usually get insta-3 coastal cities (create city with 1st Set/Eng, join 2 more immediately) to celebrate on their second or third turns of existence, and if you have Mikes and Bach you can have a size 8 city in 10 turns (with a Market along the way). This is part of the Power Democracy strategy, where you also have large numbers of freights bringing in lots of gold and many production runs being rush-finished on their second or third turns.

Again, I play deity large map against the AI. This is what I do with my cities as I expand:
1) Build new new city, give it a name that helps me remeber where it is (so i don't get confused when I'm buiolding trade routeS)
2) Build defensive units and settlers (in varying # and order depending on city location)

Try to keep the defensive units to a miniumum, and build more Settlers till you get Trade, then Caravans as you are able.

3) Build temple (I have mikes and bach's, but this is deity and I use rep. then demo. until late fundy for conquest)
4) Maybe Build a granary (you can't build Pyramids in deity and manage happiness early on but later on you want your cities to grow. Of course there is the opportuinty for growth from celebrations, but I often go with a granary)

Try to use WLTCD celebration growth more than food-box growth as you civ develops - you do it in "bursts" when you set Lux higher, which allows you more control as you pay more attention to happiness issues for only short durations, rather than having cities suprise you often with disorder due to unexpected growth. One of the big things missing from the reports screens is a flag on the F4 screen to show which cities have filled their food box and will grow next turn.

5) Build Caravans
6) Build other military unit(s) if needed, or a diplomat/spy (or more caravans for local wonder building)
7) Build anything special the city might need or be good for (harbor, city walls, transport ships, etc.)
8) Finally build marketplaces and libraries, banks, etc.

This whole area is where you should be spending several minutes at the end of each turn deciding what is right for production. use the F1 screen as well as the map, looking for threats as well as opportunities for high-pay caravans or available wonders. Sometimes #8 should be the priority; sometimes #6. When nothing else is a priority, though, follow #5...

So that means it is a very long time before i get to marketplaces and libraries, etc. Sure there is the occassional rush build and the order is sometimes different depending on the situation of course. But in general, I don't get to them until much later because I have shifted the focus to caravans and trade routes. Should I reassess this approach?

I'd divide between the two improvements you list. Marketplaces are good for happiness since they multiply the Lux (far more important than the effect on Tax). They need to get priority when you are getting near to your first round of celebration in Republic (they can also pay off if you can celebrate several cities in Monarchy, too - harder to judge when this pays, though). Libraries should not go into low-trade cities, and never if you are keeping Sci rate below 60%.

 

[the argus]

I obviously still have alot to learn. Thanks for your help and for the link. The Early Landing Guide is well done. Thanks again! (and sorry for such a long, rambling, confusing post)

 

[sethos]

Try my CIVILISATION II Strategy Guide [ http://www.sethos.gmxhome.de ].
See "Book Of Trade".