Trade

[Kleptomayn]

How do you benefit the most from trade? Most often I set up internal routes, as the net food/production-income seems greater than CS-gold (unless quested) or Civ-yields.

Does trade with foreign powers have any hidden bonuses, not displayed when setting up the route?

 

[Stalker0]

The Trade Route UI should show you the full value of a trade route with 1 key exception (which I hope we can add one day). You get a growth bonus if your trade route goes to a civ that you have some cultural influence over. For example, if your influence is exotic to them, you get 5%, and it increases 5% for every level above that.

Another note, buildings like the caravan and customs house increase the gold you get from TRs (which is normally reflected in the UI), but this only applies to new trade routes. If you have a trade route active and build the building, that route's gold is not changed.

Internal vs External Trade Routes. Early game I find ITRs very useful. The food bonus is quite strong at this point to get your initial cities going. One thing about Trade Route bonus is that normally they are not multiplied by any of the cities' multipliers. So if your city has a 50% bonus to production for example, production get from Trade Routes doesn't get that multiplier. The one exception to this is Food and Growth bonuses, growth does magnify your food TR bonus. So one technique is timing your trade routes to go together as one. Trigger a WLTKD in your capital, set it maximum growth, and then give it a lot of ITRs with food. It will ramp up to a high population in no time.

Later in the game, its usually worth having 1 ITR that stretches through your Civ, as a trade route that goes over your roads will improve any village and town that is on the route. Only 1 TR is necessary for this bonus, any additional TR will not help further.

Once the early game is gone, I find ETRs are generally preferable, however, this is very difficulty dependent. The trick is ETRs get stronger the further behind the opponent you are, so generally the more difficult the AI you face the greater these bonuses get. On Emperor the ETRs are pretty strong, but ITRs still have a place. Talking to diety players, usually the ETR bonuses are so great that they are always using them. Its not the gold you get but the science and culture bonuses that make them so useful.

Lastly, Trade Routes to allied CS can actually be very good, often stronger than a ETR to another civ late in the game.

 

[Kleptomayn]

Awesome info and tips, thank you Stalker0!!!

 

[lunker]

Late-game Food ITR are quite good if you are struggling with food. Consider how much yields you can gain from filling specialist slots with that extra food as opposed to sending an ETR.

 

[tu_79]

Late-game Food ITR are quite good if you are struggling with food. Consider how much yields you can gain from filling specialist slots with that extra food as opposed to sending an ETR.

It depends. An ETR to an influenced civ may count as +20% growth. Now look at how much excedent food you are producing in your city (after food consumption), and calculate its 20%. If this is greater than what your internal trade route can yield, then you are not gaining more immediate food. Then add whatever yields the external trade route is fielding for you.

The real power of internal trade routes is their safety. If you are a very aggressive warmonger, or you are surrounded by aggressive people, external trade routes are very risky, so you have to do with ITR. There are a couple of policies that make ITR a little better, if you know you are going to be put in that place beforehanded.

 

[Stalker0]

It depends. An ETR to an influenced civ may count as +20% growth. Now look at how much excedent food you are producing in your city (after food consumption), and calculate its 20%. If this is greater than what your internal trade route can yield, then you are not gaining more immediate food. Then add whatever yields the external trade route is fielding for you.

The real power of internal trade routes is their safety. If you are a very aggressive warmonger, or you are surrounded by aggressive people, external trade routes are very risky, so you have to do with ITR. There are a couple of policies that make ITR a little better, if you know you are going to be put in that place beforehanded.

This is true to a point. The thing I find is inevitably I want ETRs to the strongest civs to get the best yields. And this civs tend not to be heavily influenced by me unless I am in full CV mode (and in that case I often have a ETRs to my least influenced civ to get more tourism). So 5–10% growth is a much more common number in my experience.

 

[lunker]

It depends. An ETR to an influenced civ may count as +20% growth. Now look at how much excedent food you are producing in your city (after food consumption), and calculate its 20%. If this is greater than what your internal trade route can yield, then you are not gaining more immediate food. Then add whatever yields the external trade route is fielding for you.

The real power of internal trade routes is their safety. If you are a very aggressive warmonger, or you are surrounded by aggressive people, external trade routes are very risky, so you have to do with ITR. There are a couple of policies that make ITR a little better, if you know you are going to be put in that place beforehanded.

I knew there were bonuses for influence but I thought they were simply more stuff like more Gold. What are the bonuses exactly?

 

[tu_79]

I knew there were bonuses for influence but I thought they were simply more stuff like more Gold. What are the bonuses exactly?

+5% growth in the city for every level of influence you have with said civ. Only applies once per civ. To maximize you have to send trade routes to different civs.
In addition to the explicit bonus, that is.

 

[Stalker0]

+5% growth in the city for every level of influence you have with said civ. Only applies once per civ. To maximize you have to send trade routes to different civs.
In addition to the explicit bonus, that is.

Oh had no idea it wasn’t per trade route!

 

[tu_79]

Oh had no idea it wasn’t per trade route!

Well, I'm not 100% sure. Can someone confirm?

 

[JMA2286]

Trade is actually very powerful in VP

The way you can benefit most is the pursuit of a Diplomatic Victory, using trade via the Statecraft policy to secure alliances with city-states, use the Industry policy and wonders like Colossus and Petra to expand your trade routes, and crush everyone who tries to stop your ships and caravans.

If you're planning on conquering your way to the top, then doing internal trade helps more because there's little point in trading with countries you're planning on going to war with. The extra production in your unit production centers is better, as is food in a city you want to grow.

Finally, if you're just interested in culture, setting up trade with another civilization enhances your tourism output, and buildings like Caravansary and Harbor, along with diplomatic Open Borders agreements, boost the amount of Tourism you gain over time, so "free trade" works - if you are at peace, and you know you're going to win the culture war that entails.

 

[Leondegrance]

"a trade route that goes over your roads will improve any village and town that is on the route"

Huh. I never knew this. How exactly does it work ?

 

[neo_arcadia]

You have basic yield of village and town right? something like 3 gold or more. A caravan that passes that village and town increases its basic yield by some value. Caravan usually prefers to travel using road/railroad than non-road so when it passes that village or town it buffs them up. Multiple caravans do not have stacking effect regarding this extra yields though.

 

[chicorbeef]

"a trade route that goes over your roads will improve any village and town that is on the route"

Huh. I never knew this. How exactly does it work ?

If a caravan passes over a village, it gets +1 production/gold. It stacks with the road city connection effect, but not across multiple caravans.

 

[tu_79]

Bonuses to villages:
1. Having at least one passing trade route.
2. Having a road tile which connects two cities.
3. Having a railroad tile in a road or railroad that connects two cities (replaces road bonus).
4. Rationalism policies.

Hover the mouse over a village or a town, and EUI will tell you what you do gain with each improvement and policy.

 

[Leondegrance]

Was this present since vanilla ? Does this apply to trade routes coming from other Civs and passing my lands too ? Is there a way to observe the trajectory of a caravan before I click SEND trade route? And also do you think this is a major aspect of the game I was not aware of, like any theories behind it's usefulness ?

 

[neo_arcadia]

I don't remember what vanilla trade routes looks like.
Any trade route from any source will increase the yields of village and town but the bonus yields still limited to one trade route.
You can see the trajectory by hovering your mouse over the trade route options before you hit send button. You can observe the route by positioning your map on the city where the trade route originates and from there just follow the flashing arrows.
From balance perspectives I think it's because by design, you can't have village as abundant as other normal tile improvements so it need to be buffed somehow.

 

[Leondegrance]

Cool. I shall play a dedicated village strategy to see how it goes. I probably will not be able to count my money.

If I win the mega million tonight I will buy Firaxis too.

 

[neo_arcadia]

Go play Netherlands if you want to have super-shiny villages and town. Polder, Dutch unique improvements, gives bonus gold to every adjacent towns and villages. I think that's the only unique improvements that interacts with towns and villages. Currently, there are no unique improvements that replaces village.