EC3 Fix #1 - TRADE

[raingoon]

"Trade - the interface is clunky and frustrating"

DaveV

[Tilemacho]

I would definite vote for the Cctp trade system. It's easy and fast. A great idea that should be continued

[Tiberius]

The trade system must be improved, there's no doubt about it. There are a lot of good ideas in the List.
But, what do we send to Firaxis: just a short message ("better trade system") or should we be more specific?

[Matthevv]

A trade system linked to the resources available to a city, and commodities that it manufactures would be something I would like to see.

[MadWoodster]

Shouldn't trade effect your diplomacy ie if you agree to trade goods then you have a better relationship and vice versia, they started implementing the reverse of this in CTP with opponents who didn't like you refusing to trade and also trade embargos.

[Tiberius]

I agree with this. More trade -> better diplomatic relations. Better diplomatic relations -> more trade. In war, no trade at all. And there must be options for trade embargo (but this is a diplomatic option, I think).

[Sergeant Sheets]

The trade enterface should be similar to one in the game COLONIZATION (which is the only strat game superior to Civ 2).

First off, for this to be effective, we'd need more terrain types, say 18, 14 that interconvertable between forest and plains, each terrain producing its own commodities, as well as food, and four terrains: mountain, hills, ocean, glacier.

Anyhow, assume City X produces cotton. They can trade cotton outright to another Civ with a cotton gin [read: Confederacy and England], OR the Civ can turn their own cotton into cloth, and then their cloth into something even more complex. This can be traded via trade routes, but you can see the caravan or the ship move from City to City, and interrupting the ship interrupts the trade. Also, you can set up a shop in your city and people will come to you to trade. This way, in each game there are evolving trade meccas, with each game having two or three Hong Kongs, Amsterdams, and New Yorks. This would be a cornerstone of revenue for the civ controlling the port. It'd also be a prize city to conquer in war, but you'd risk running off the traders.

Also, a civ could empose terrifs. With the idea of the populace having independace from the government, so comes this idea: The people [run by the AI] can trade independant of the player with other civs, or other populaces. If this hurts an industry in you civ, then you can empose tarriffs to counter this. And with this you could also have internal trade, city with city, but also you could have a list of things the entire populace wants, and you could satisfy these on a whole, gaining a larger profit.

[korn469]

DaveV

first can you define what the problem is? is it a significant problem? how does your ideas fix that problem specifically? does your fix effect any other areas of the game? if it does effect another area does it upset game balance in those other areas? is there a simpler way to fix the problem? does your idea hurt gameplay? why out of all of the ideas does your fix belong on this list?

everybody with a trade thread needs to get together and work out a system...i will set up a thread for that

[Tosssen]

I think that the trading items must follow you as you advance through time. In the year 2000 we have lot more important trading items than just the usual ones found in the terrain around the city. Why don't let the game contain that?
How about selling inventions to other civilizations who are technologically weak?

[Imran Siddiqui]

First off... read EC Ideas on Trade (mine deal with utalizing supply and demand based on where your city is).

Secondly, more trade doesn't lead to better relations. In fact, there is no correlation between trade and peace. That has been proven in International Relations.

[Matthew]

Other than a few interface improvements, trade should stay EXACTLY THE WAY IT IS!!!!! There's nothing quite like being able to get 700 gold and enough science for the next turn with a well used caravan, and it adds so much to the game to be able to use your navy for something other than warfare and lugging settlers around.

Improvements:

1. You should be able to designate a caravan to a certain city. That way while the caravan is en route, and you forgot where it was going, you can just double click it and have the name of the city it's going to pop up. This feature should also tell you if the destination city still demands the item.

2. At any time you should be able to right click on the caravan and have the names of all the cities that demand that item come up, rather than having to go through the trade advisor screen. It would also be nice if their distances from the home city, as well as the distance from the current caravan location, would be displayed.

3. An improved go to function would work wonders for reducing micro management here also. Again if the city that used to demand the item no longer does, the go to should end so you will know and can change course.

I believe these features would greatly reduce the tedium of moving caravans about. Granted, the CtP model may be easier, but it would also be easier to build a unit in a city and let it fight another unit half way around the world without having to do all of the "micromanagement" of moving there. But I doubt many would like that idea either. Trade is just as important in history as is warfare, and the game should reflect that. There are plenty of ways of reducing the tedium of the current model without taking it out completely.

[Einherjar]

There are several threads here and it may be difficult to make a sensible argument for one without detailed examination of the others. I will try to keep to the point.

Underlying all this is the control and monopoly of rare raw materials as a cornerstone of civilisation and subsequent conflict. Few leaders have ever risked war simply out of love of head bonking.

I too have always liked the Colonisation concept of resources and would like to see Civ3 support a much more dynamic and interactive map in a variety of contexts. Yes I do agree that Forests Jungles Swamps etc. should be overlays across a wide variety of terrain types just as rivers are, and that forests can be managed or cut down according to requirement.

My ideal would be for each tile to support in addition to food a range of other finite resources; tin, copper, Iron, Uranium etc., which only become apparent to the player as:

a) Their technology advances to point where they appreciate their value

b) Subject to survey by settlers or Engineers subsequent to technologies being discovered. So you have to keep looking at your patch to see what you have. This should tie in with Raingoons excellent energy idea and also forms the basis of complex (realistic) trade and also realistically effect other aspects of game play.

Building on other contributors comments about Raw Materials and Finished products it follows to the trade system itself. Irrespective of how trade routes are established i.e. agreements or Caravan Units, I am not fussed, the main issue for me is to have visible trade routes on the map as per CivCTP.

Civ CTP had a great idea which it followed through poorly and to my mind for no good reason. I liked the way they have multiple trade routes lying together and would propose a modest enhancement which will improve the game tremendously.

I) That trade routes seek the easiest and best protected route on the map, i.e. travelling through existing cities.
ii) That each city through which a trade route passes gains trade or resource bonuses, based on the value of the trade and the trade based improvements within that City.

This to my mind is the best way of developing real Silk Routes and real Hong Kong’s Singapore’s etc.
It will also make unsettled territory along trade routes prime real estate!.

I realise that this may appear to increase Micromanagement dramatically, but I would counter with suggesting that Government and Economic advancements could increasingly be used to automate much of the minutia of trade (Ext and Int), leaving the player to concentrate on creating new markets whilst effectively leaving businessmen and ministers to administrate existing ones.

Sorry if this is overlong, but I have tried to summarise as much as I can and would be pleased to expand on specific points in more detail if requested. I hope you found the above of interest.


------------------
The Einherjar

[Pythagoras]

This is with only reading Imran and my threads, but I'm gonna get on Daves in a sec.

DaveV/Imran/Everyone else-> see how you like this for an overarching trade final draft:

!!PROPOSED!! For Discussion till midnight
Tuesday.

FINAL DRAFT

New Trade Model
Trade routes are automatically set up with cities that supply a comodity and cities that demand a comodity within the explored territory of that caravan's home civilization (similar to Alpha Centauri's system, but with commodities) using autopathfinding (pathfinding in Alpha Centauri was superb and up to this task) these routes are displayed as lines on the map, and with blocking such lines with a military unit you could either pirate or block all together. There is still a maximum number of trade routes your city can support, but as technology progresses and/or your city size increases you can support more and more routes. Also as in Alpha Centauri, your amount of trade is proportional to the relationship with that civilization. The screen could get messy with this idea, but by default these trade routes would be off and viewed only in the city view. You could toggle them on and off with a hotkey or in preferences (much like city support lines in SMAC/CivII), or perhaps just show a city's routes one city at a time.

There is a downside to this that I believe can be solved easily. Implementing this in the game could take up a lot of memory if one stores every map location that every trade route goes through. However, simply invoking the auto pathfinding function each time someone wants to view a route (calculating the path of the caravans instead of loading the positions from memory) not only solves this memory problem, but provides more realism. Auto pathfinding should only work on explored territory, so as you explore more and more, your civ will find ways to shorten the travelling distance between two trading cities.

With this model, trade and diplomacy would be interelated. First of all, the more trade routes one has with a civ, the better each's attitudes towards each other. And vice versa, better diplomatic relations would provide for more lucrative trade. It doesnt matter really which one starts first (economic or diplomatic relations). Perhaps the option to allow players to establish trade routes "the old way" could be included, but by default 'auto trading' is on. Also if autopathfiding fails, or if a civilization wants to define its own path to take, a waypoint trade route path defining system would be included.


Argument
This model is prefered because it requires little to no micromanagement and gives trade importance within your economy without having to deal with cumbersome caravans. International trade also becomes more important as time goes along with this model as more technology and more population allows citys to expand into new trading ventures. The so called ICS (infinite city sprawl) problem can also be averted if trade is linked to city size. Large citys become meccas of trade, their income and attitudes with other civs growing exponentially as there population increases. Many small cities become unpreffered since they would not provide these great benefits. Also, since these larger citys become dependant on lucrative trade, pirating and tarrifing trade routes (by putting a unit over the route) becomes a viable options for poorer civs and barbarians. To sum up, this model provides a way for intercity commodity based trade to highly effect diplomacy, warfare and the 'royal coffers' without the cumbersome usage of caravan units and without the unwanted micromanagement of a game like colonization.

Imran seems to like this idea, let me know DaveV/Imran if you want to modify this idea at all. My ICQ# should be up in my profile.


<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Pythagoras (edited March 06, 2000).]</font>
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Pythagoras (edited March 06, 2000).]</font>
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Pythagoras (edited March 06, 2000).]</font>

[Pythagoras]

<center><table width=80%><tr><td><font color=000080 face="Verdana" size=2><font size="1">quote:
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1>
</font>Shouldn't trade effect your diplomacy ie if you agree to trade goods then you have a better relationship and vice versia, they started implementing the reverse of this in CTP with opponents who didn't like you refusing to trade and also trade embargos
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1></font></td></tr></table></center>

<center><table width=80%><tr><td><font color=000080 face="Verdana" size=2><font size="1">quote:
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1>
</font>I agree with this. More trade -> better diplomatic relations. Better diplomatic relations -> more trade. In war, no trade at all. And there must be options for trade embargo (but this is a diplomatic option, I think).
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1></font></td></tr></table></center>
ahem.. idea 30, trade effects diplomacy, started by Pythagoras .

<center><table width=80%><tr><td><font color=000080 face="Verdana" size=2><font size="1">quote:
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1>
</font>The trade enterface should be similar to one in the game COLONIZATION (which is the only strat game superior to Civ 2).
First off, for this to be effective, we'd need more terrain types, say 18, 14 that interconvertable between forest and plains, each terrain producing its own commodities, as well as food, and four terrains: mountain, hills, ocean, glacier.

Anyhow, assume City X produces cotton. They can trade cotton outright to another Civ with a cotton gin [read: Confederacy and England], OR the Civ can turn their own cotton into cloth, and then their cloth into something even more complex. This can be traded via trade routes, but you can see the caravan or the ship move from City to City, and interrupting the ship interrupts the trade. Also, you can set up a shop in your city and people will come to you to trade. This way, in each game there are evolving trade meccas, with each game having two or three Hong Kongs, Amsterdams, and New Yorks. This would be a cornerstone of revenue for the civ controlling the port. It'd also be a prize city to conquer in war, but you'd risk running off the traders.

Also, a civ could empose terrifs. With the idea of the populace having independace from the government, so comes this idea: The people [run by the AI] can trade independant of the player with other civs, or other populaces. If this hurts an industry in you civ, then you can empose tarriffs to counter this. And with this you could also have internal trade, city with city, but also you could have a list of things the entire populace wants, and you could satisfy these on a whole, gaining a larger profit
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1></font></td></tr></table></center>
I disagree with using colonizations system. 1. It requires TOO much micromanagement, which is one thing that turned a lot of people off to col. Basicly your ideas seem pretty jivin with my outline with tarrifs and stuff. I'd like trade to be affective in gameplay but NOT as much as colonization. That game was economics.

Pythagoras,

I don't think the current system should be entirely eliminated as you propose. The need to physically traverse the route to the destination is important. SMAC's system is somewhat reasonable given the assumed electronic communications and transportation modes available. Such assumptions don't hold for Civ3.

Even well into the steam era the safe arrival of your cargo was anything but guaranteed. It took about 9-12 months to procure trade goods, sail from Europe or the Americas to the Far East, trade, and return. The famous slaves/molasses/rum triangle also took 9-12 months. The vulnerability of trade units in transit, etc, is a good aspect of the game.

The model can definitely be improved with ideas on piracy and blocade. It is reasonable to allow new trade routes to be set up to a city that already has a trade route with your civ, but doing so would forego or greatly reduce the cash and science bonus. You should have to get the bonuses the old fashioned way: you earn it (thanks, Smith Barney).

I have some hope that improved forms of movement generalization will be implemented that should help reduce micromgmt. Numerous suggestions about the interface wrt/trade management should help, too.

[Pythagoras]

<center><table width=80%><tr><td><font color=000080 face="Verdana" size=2><font size="1">quote:
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1>
</font><font size=1>Originally posted by don Don on 03-06-2000 09:33 AM</font>
Pythagoras,

I don't think the current system should be entirely eliminated as you propose. The need to physically traverse the route to the destination is important. SMAC's system is somewhat reasonable given the assumed electronic communications and transportation modes available. Such assumptions don't hold for Civ3.

Even well into the steam era the safe arrival of your cargo was anything but guaranteed. It took about 9-12 months to procure trade goods, sail from Europe or the Americas to the Far East, trade, and return. The famous slaves/molasses/rum triangle also took 9-12 months. The vulnerability of trade units in transit, etc, is a good aspect of the game.

The model can definitely be improved with ideas on piracy and blocade. It is reasonable to allow new trade routes to be set up to a city that already has a trade route with your civ, but doing so would forego or greatly reduce the cash and science bonus. You should have to get the bonuses the old fashioned way: you earn it (thanks, Smith Barney).

I have some hope that improved forms of movement generalization will be implemented that should help reduce micromgmt. Numerous suggestions about the interface wrt/trade management should help, too.
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1></font></td></tr></table></center>

Well another addendum to my argument would be that in real life merchants trade with whomever they want until a government official stops them. Trade routes are set up not by governments, but by merchants seeking money.

Transit of things was generally reliable back int the day, not nearly as reliable as today, but I'd say about 90% reliable. Why else would people rely on such modes of transportation to get them around?

Anyway I can see where this model could be changed to show the physical traversal. Instead of having lines between citys, have caravans that 'auto caravan' between 2 trading citys. Enemy units can raid these caravans, or charge them a fee to to go through there lands. Anyway as each caravan moves back and forth it would act much like a train does in RR Tycoon, taking what each city demands from one city and bringing it to another.

How you would innitiate trade with this model is the following:

1. You build a caravan
2. You use the goto function to go to a city that you wish to establish a route with.
3. Once you arrive, you are asked if you would like to establish a trade route.
4. The caravan then goes back and forth, each time it arrives it gives you flat out cash, and some science and lucturies.
5. If the city you are trading with is very far away, you may decide to build more caravans and trade more with that city.

This trade route would improve relations with the civ you are trading with, since everyone is making money and is happy, as I said in my original proposal, and as your city size increases, and as tech progresses more trade routes can be supported. In fact, you could just throw out the notion of only being able to support n trade routes per city if each caravan costs one shield to support. You would just decide for yourself if you want to support lots of caravans or if you want to support a larger military or whatever. And as tech gets better, and your city gets bigger more shields become available to support more units, and hence more trade.

With this method, the physical traversal is there and required by the caravan, without the micromanagement. The option to hide caravans should be included, so the screen doesnt get cluttered... I propose that there be a 'trade move phase' whereby caravans move on their own. Perhaps also a waypoint system could be included for these caravans if a player wanted to avoid certain enemy territory.

Another side note, military units could be assigned to guard caravans, follow them around and protect them...

Hmmm, the "Caravan Tycoon" idea has been proposed before... I still think it is a quirky idea, especially given the low movement rates we can expect (even the "fast" rates I proposed as extreme limits are slow IRL). It probably also goes beyond the range of a "Fix" and is more a "New Idea."

On the other hand there is a middle ground here. The option of establishing a trade route without disbanding the caravan, but without getting the bonus, might be a good idea. It would make internal trade worthwhile. I almost never routes between my own cities unless my empire is stretched out enough or has expanded to a second continent.

PS, I don't mean to impose jumping in late. I just didn't know about EC3 until it was well underway and haven't had much time to spend online to pursue this stuff.

[Seeker]

Everybody who posted here should look at Imran's "Improvements to Trade". Let's hear it for resources and Supply and Demand!!