Q about trade

[Lemmy]

Is there any info out there about how trade works in moo3?
Like what you can and can't trade.

Would it be possible to survive on trade, by trading technologies and resources for units you built?

[Stormhound]

We want the same kind of "anything for anything" model as Civ3.

You can probably make a decent income trading as you suggest, though you'd need regular sources of income as well.

[Lemmy]

sounds good, what if you trade a tehcnologically advanced ship to a player that doesn't have the tech required for building such a ship, is there a possibilty to anaylze the advanced ship to get the technology?
something like in se4.

and is suppose that as soon as you agree to trade a ship, the ship is instantly owned by the other player, no matter where it is?

[Stormhound]

You can only trade a ship that's in your reserves (off-board), and then it goes into his reserves to await assignment to an active task force.

If you sell ships with advanced goodies, the other guy may decide to study them. Trade with caution.

[Lemmy]

uhm..reserves?

is there a faq or something about trade?

[Stormhound]

No, there isn't a trade FAQ.

Your reserves are where you put ships that you don't need on active duty. This allows you to build up a fleet in case of war, without having to pay the greatly increased maintenance costs of keeping the ships on active duty.

During peacetime, you'll still need ships for basic border defense and anti-pirate patrolling, but you certainly don't need to keep the entire war machine on full alert at all times.

The reserve is also the means by which your ships get upgraded to the newest designs.

[GePap]

When I build a ship, it will be placed on reserves until I assign it a combat duty. During this time I will pay decreased maintanence. While on reserves it will upgrade instantly (depending on how much I spend on ungrading ships), as opposed to ships out on duty, which must return to home to be upgraded. Is that accurate?

Also: can ships on reserve be attacked? (can I seek to destroy my enemies fleet before it even gets into the position to defend itself in a pearl harboresque attack)?

Back on money: Will treasuries accrue interest? will trade be in direct goods or abstracted money as in moo2? Even if its direct trade in goods, does your treasury still earn more money ? (by increade tariff duties, internal taxes, so forth?)
BIg question: What's the taxation system? Do you get to play at will with all your races money, or do you have to set a tax rate to get any money into the treasury? Will different races have different economic models?

[vmxa1]

I liked the "mothball" feature in SE4, sounds like reserve does the same thing.

[Stormhound]

Originally posted by GePap
When I build a ship, it will be placed on reserves until I assign it a combat duty. During this time I will pay decreased maintanence. While on reserves it will upgrade instantly (depending on how much I spend on ungrading ships), as opposed to ships out on duty, which must return to home to be upgraded. Is that accurate?

I believe so, yes.

Also: can ships on reserve be attacked? (can I seek to destroy my enemies fleet before it even gets into the position to defend itself in a pearl harboresque attack)?

No, ships in the reserve cannot be attacked. I'll point out that under our model, the ships at Pearl Harbor would not have been considered to be in the reserve, but instead on active status.

Back on money: Will treasuries accrue interest?

They can, yes. Of course, that also works both ways; if you get into deficit spending, you'll have to pay interest.

will trade be in direct goods or abstracted money as in moo2? Even if its direct trade in goods, does your treasury still earn more money ? (by increade tariff duties, internal taxes, so forth?)

It'll be money, not goods.

BIg question: What's the taxation system? Do you get to play at will with all your races money, or do you have to set a tax rate to get any money into the treasury? Will different races have different economic models?

You get to set tax rates, and these rates are important because they affect the economy and unrest. The way in which they affect things depends upon several factors that I can't go into here. Races will not have different economic models, but will respond to the level of taxation differently.

[Lemmy]

Originally posted by Stormhound
No, ships in the reserve cannot be attacked. I'll point out that under our model, the ships at Pearl Harbor would not have been considered to be in the reserve, but instead on active status.

not even with spies?
So if the ships can't be attacked, does this mean that they don't even appear on the map? Cos if they were on a planet or something, you could still destroy the planet and with it the ships.

[paulmagusnet]

It would be interesting if you could devleop a trade empire by installing commerical units on other empire's planets.

One problem with Moo2 is there are only two strategies, kill eveyone quickly before AIs had lots of ships, or invest in chirisma and keep all the AIs from attacking you with their 40+ groups of death stars until you maxed your tech and had your own killer group.

[Stormhound]

No, they're not on the map. That's what I meant earlier when I referred to the reserve as being "off-board".

You can't really install commercial units on other peoples' planets, but you can choose whether to have your borders open to trade with them, and then develop the infrastructure on your side such that you're making money...and if they want to make money, they'll develop their side as well. Such decisions on cooperation are important to the game.

[Zealot]

Can those ships in reserve be affected by an event card? I can just see:

Cataclismic event wipes out all ships in reserve from Civ x!

Pretty handy when you signed a convenient cease-fire, and induce the opponent to put its fleet in reserve! Then, WHAM!