Trading Luxuries in Deity

[Vedder]

From GOTM#14, I've had some success using this strategy and would like some thoughts...

As usual in Deity, my civ was much smaller than other other civs, esp. in the beginning. I had three Dyes and traded my extras to other Civs for gpt and techs. The Zulus were much larger than I was (about 15 cities to 8 for me) and as such, I was thinking that a luxury was worth much more to them than to me. So, I traded my last Dye, the one that says "(0) Dyes" in the Trade Advisor screen, to the Zulu for 1 Ivory, techs and gpt. As far as I know, my happiness was unaffected, since my civ still had the same amount of luxuries...I just gained off of the fact that he needed it more than I at that particular point in time. When my cities grew to the point where I needed the luxury back to control happiness, I just didn't renegotiate the deal.

I guess this would work on any level, as long as your trading partners were larger than yourself and had extra luxury items. Is this smart? Is there a negative aspect of this strategy that I'm not thinking of?

Speaking of luxuries, and I realize that this might not be the right forum but it's on a similar topic, does a player who trades a luxury from a certain city's radius still receive the happiness bonus from that city's marketplace?

 

[RobOz]

A temple is always one of my first buildings, so when I have a smaller empire I too trade off all my luxuries. Especially in a situation where you are outclassed by your opponents. I have done this on a number of occasion and found there to be no detrimental effect, but perhaps someone will have an opposing opinion.

As for your second question, personally, I am still not aware of the exact effect marketplaces have on luxuries. I know they make you get more happiness from them, but how much more? So, I am not sure about your second question.

 

[JMK]

RobOz
Market place brings you some happiness efter you got the third luxuries.
first and second luxury (W or W/O market place) is one smile
third and fourth luxury will be one smile W/O market place, but two smiles each with a market place, fith and sixth luxury will bring you three smiles with market, only one W/O and so on.
Furtheremore, you need to build market place first if you want to build a bank.

 

[JMK]

Veder
As far as you deal your last (0) luxury for another one, there is no change in happiness for yourself.
Thank you for your strategy item, to me it looklike a good idea. But I do not understand reason for not renegotiating the deal as it will not change your own hapiness. Getting tech by dealing luxury is good for you. Whatever the luxury you have, it brings the same amount of smile, it is not the quality of the luxury you got that brings you more happiness but the quantity of different luxury you got.

 

[Yndy]

Veder,

This is quite good thinking of you. I knew that the luxury worth more for the larger civs but I never did a similar deal.

Now the difference has to be pretty big (like in your case) because AI wants better deals for himself (like if you try giving an AI 1000 gp he would only give you 49gpt on Emperor and Deity but if you try the other way they would probably ask for 56gpt).

I guess that when your cities grew you didn't sell the dyes anymore but still bought the furs. this is the only way it makes sense to me.

 

[Gothmog]

The problem with this approach is that you have made lots of AI workers happy! Unless they have traded their only one of the lux (which they never do), they have gained happiness and you have not. This can be quite important as the AI is not great a managing happiness (although they do use the lux slider on occasion), and some AI civs don't build happiness type city improvements much. I will often do this type of trade early in a game if I must (at diety) just to keep up. Later in the game I am wary of even trading too many extra luxuries. Especially if the AI is at war, or I think they might be soon (which is almost always). This is because it is a great advantage to have the AI go into revolution due to war weariness and then go to a less efficient government. I almost never trade lux to a powerful civ in democracy and at war.

Bottom line: as Yndy says the AI always wants a better deal for himself (esp on diety due to the cost weighting), so they wouldn't be doing it if it weren't to their advantage. OTOH, if it is early in a diety game and you just are just trying to hold on for a brighter day then it is a good move.

Edit: the AI will take into account the # of gained smiley faces, thus how many markets you have vs. they have is also a factor.

 

[DaveMcW]

Using the GOTM14 example, the tech rank is Persians, Zulu, Babylonians (human). It would be better to do the 0-luxury trade to the Zulu so the Persians don't get too far ahead.

Unfortunately by the time I got map making I was bigger than the Zulu.

 

[RobOz]

JMK -
Yeah, I knew about the marketplace to bank thing, but didn't know how that luxury bonus worked. Thanks a lot.

 

[Vedder]

Originally posted by Yndy

I guess that when your cities grew you didn't sell the dyes anymore but still bought the furs. this is the only way it makes sense to me.

Let me clarify...when my cities grew to the point where I wasn't receiving Ivory AND additional gold or techs, I stopped renegotiating. As I grew, the Zulus gave me less and less for my "(0) Dyes".

I had enough luxuries that I was almost in a constant state of WLTKD anyway so an additional Ivory (or Fur, as you say) wouldn't have helped.

 

[Vedder]

Originally posted by Gothmog
The problem with this approach is that you have made lots of AI workers happy! Unless they have traded their only one of the lux (which they never do), they have gained happiness and you have not.

You're absolutely right but I didn't get off to a good start and they were often giving me 2 techs at a time...this was the only way I'd get back to tech parity.