Trade Routes

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 00:17

I know how they're established, but how do they work midstream? For instance, if, four turns into a commodity deal, the route is severed, does the deal continue? The reason I ask is that I always try to cut trade lines ASAP when I go to war, but in my most recent game, even with only one coastal city (no harbor) and a jungle separating Hannibal from every other civ but me (no roads), he somehow is still showing active trades with Greece and Egypt in the Foreign Advisor screen. Is it maybe a bug that keeps showing the trade active, even though the effects are no longer seen? I'm at a loss.

EDIT: Forgot to add that we're still in the very early Industrial, so airports are out of the question entirely.

badams52 · August 15, 2003, 00:52

If routes are broken, the deal's severed.

Maybe you need to have Hannibal take his turn to see the trades as inactive?

A .sav or screeny would help us to unravel your problem.

vmxa1 · August 15, 2003, 00:55

That should not happen, if in fact there is no connection.

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 02:22

I thought about Hannibal taking his turn, but also thought the delay when a city is taken is, in part, due to route recalculation. I was hoping it would be a simple answer (like that

), but here come the screenies, the FA screen first, then a city investigation of the capital and only coastal city (made peace just to get that and show the absence of a harbor), and lastly two shots encompassing all Carthaginian territory.

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 02:24

Second shot...

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 02:24

Third...

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 02:26

I'm playing as the Celts (dark green), and this, along with the above shot, is all that's left of Hannibal's empire. I traded for the Greeks' world map this turn, so there shouldn't be any "hidden" roads.

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 03:30

And here's the FA screen from the next turn. Since this is apparently the trade(s) that wouldn't die, I went ahead and killed Hannibal this turn

. Still, for the life of me I can't figure it out. This is but one of the least screwy things it's done to me this game, from giving a badly damaged Carth. galley 6 moves in a single turn (yes, I used reloads to verify what I'd seen) to not applying the 50% democracy bonus to captured workers (so now it takes 3 to equal one native worker, and I'm intrigued to see if it'll go to 6 when I get RP), to telling me my people want to build the Iron Works, even though my only source of coal at the time was nowhere near any of my iron sources. Oh, well, one more obstacle to my inevitable victory.

CerberusIV · August 15, 2003, 05:03

Difficulty level and version?

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 05:24

Monarch, PTW 1.21.

CerberusIV · August 15, 2003, 06:10

I asked because I thought I had seen something similar in a couple of my recent games but assumed I was imagining it. That was Monarch with 1.21f.

I don't know for sure what is going on but I will certainly be watching out for it in my games.

PeaSoup · August 15, 2003, 06:59

Actually I've had similar experiences recently where a civ without any harbors actually used an enemy civ's harbor to trade resources with me (while both AI civs are at war with each other)

vmxa1 · August 15, 2003, 12:24

It looks like they are connected to you and maybe to other as a consequence?

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 13:25

vmxa, connected to me, yes, but at war with me, as well. Could it be that the AI gets to keep its routes up through enemy territory?

Cerebrus, I've got one other Monarch game that I think I may have seen it in. I'll have to see if I can pull up the right saves.

badams52 · August 15, 2003, 15:11

Quote:

Originally posted by Solomwi
I thought about Hannibal taking his turn, but also thought the delay when a city is taken is, in part, due to route recalculation. I was hoping it would be a simple answer (like that

), but here come the screenies, the FA screen first, then a city investigation of the capital and only coastal city (made peace just to get that and show the absence of a harbor), and lastly two shots encompassing all Carthaginian territory.

Actually, you don't need peace to show the absence of a harbor, that little anchor thing in the main map is always visible and denotes a city with a harbor.

My only guess at this point would be that somewhere in the fog of war lies roads that you don't know about which connect him to the web of the trade network. But if you traded maps with him, or bought his map before the war, then that couldn't be the case.

And wars do block trade routes. I was truly annoyed one time when I was using an AIs trade route to trade with other AIs. Then the AI whose trade route I was using declared war on me and instant rep hit for breaking my trade deals with other civs.

So his connection to your cities should not allow him to connect to the network, but if a route lies outside of the cultural border, then it's free game to be used by any civ.

I don't have civ anymore, but your savegame file when Hannibal is cut off can enable others to search the routes and see if indeed you have encountered a bug.

CerberusIV · August 15, 2003, 15:12

Thinking back, my somewhat hazy recollection is that an AI civ on an island showed up as having an active trade with another AI civ (blue line connecting them in F4 screen) whilst the F2 screen said I did not have a sea route to trade with them and the map showed no harbours in any of their cities. The really annoying thing was that I could trade with the second AI civ by land.

I wonder if the game checks for harbours in trades involving the human players but misses this in AI to AI trades? It would explain the screenshots posted above.

badams52 · August 15, 2003, 15:18

Cereberus, maybe you didn't have the required tech for the sea or ocean terrain available for trading whereas the AI did.

vmxa1 · August 15, 2003, 16:39

I do see roads (I think) going through open spaces. That is not in any cultiral borders. This is surely what is being used. This are treated as if they are yours for movement and such.

Solomwi · August 15, 2003, 18:09

Quote:

Actually, you don't need peace to show the absence of a harbor, that little anchor thing in the main map is always visible and denotes a city with a harbor.

That's what I thought, but wanted to nail it 100%, in case you need an active embassy to "see" new harbors (i.e., if he built one during the war, which I couldn't see because it had never been there while I had an embassy).

Quote:

I do see roads (I think) going through open spaces.

I don't think so. The road going southeast from Pergamon does go into my borders immediately, and the only open country roads (the one with my MI on it and the one between Ereen and Baruun-Urt) go into my borders as well. I'm ready to chalk it up to a bug. Btw, once I got RP, the captured workers caught up, and are back to half speed rather than third speed.

CerberusIV · August 16, 2003, 08:28

Quote:

Originally posted by badams52
Cereberus, maybe you didn't have the required tech for the sea or ocean terrain available for trading whereas the AI did.

I had the Great Lighthouse so that definitely wasn't the problem. If my recollection is correct no-one should have been able to trade with that AI as it had no harbours.

vmxa1 · August 16, 2003, 13:44

Astronomy is required to do trade over sea tiles. Of course you need a harbor as well on both ends,

plattfuss · August 16, 2003, 14:12

I encountered a similar problem some days ago. My only source of iron was on another continent. I had a city one tile away which was connected by road to a civ (and its capital) on that continent. Though I was able to trade with that civ my iron was shown to be not connected. Any ideas on that one?

cnich29 · August 16, 2003, 14:59

I think they can maintain trade through your land. Detatch your highway from theirs, it's the only way to know for sure wether it's a feature or a bug. Good luck.

Catt · August 17, 2003, 01:09

Apologies in advance for the length and the uncertainty of the answer . . .

I believe that the game operates in such a way that allows a neutral country to trade goods through your territory with an enemy of yours. Your enemy cannot trade goods through your lands, but others can trade goods through your lands with your enemy. I suspect that Carthage is importing either a luxury or a strategic resource in exchange for a tech, a lump sum payment, or gpt. In other words, Egyptian resources are passing through your trade network to Carthage. If Hannibal had paid for the resource deal with a resource of his own, the deal would have been broken through your control of outgoing trade routes. However, if Carthage had made other arrangements for the trade (other than resources going to Egypt), it would take an act of war from you against Egypt to interdict Egyptian goods traveling to Carthage or a trade embargo with Egypt against Carthage (which would probably cost you a pretty penny). The only other alternative is for you to sever all roads, even those passing through your territory, that go to the Carthaginian capitol. So, you can isolate the enemy capitol, or you can secure trade embargoes -- until you do, resources will continue to flow to your enemy so long as the trade deal struck doesn't involve your enemy's goods moving to its trading partner.

In sum, I believe it is possible for goods from a neutral country to pass through your trade network to your enemy's capitol though it is not possible for enemy goods to make the reverse trip.

Catt

Solomwi · August 17, 2003, 03:36

Show of hands, now, who else somehow expected Catt to come up with an explanation just like this that makes perfect sense?

Now that you mention that, I did know beforehand that Carthage was importing luxuries, if not resources, with these trades, but had always thought of trade routes as all or nothing, so that would explain it.

Now for my mini-rant: If a neutral country is shipping a strategic resource to my enemy through my territory with no problems, my people need to get off their asses and DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Does this strike anybody else as flawed?

Thanks, Catt.

I figured out the Iron Works one, too, as a coal source regenerated right next to one of my supplementary Iron cities the turn after I took Carthage's coal city. Naturally, it's in the tundra, surrounded by mountains, with access to a couple of hills and one grassland. IOW, permanently stuck at size four.

I've yet to figure out the captured workers working at 1/3 speed between Democracy (gov't, not tech) and RP, though, unless it's something off the wall like one other AI civ having to be in Demo, too.

Catt · August 17, 2003, 13:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Solomwi
Now for my mini-rant: If a neutral country is shipping a strategic resource to my enemy through my territory with no problems, my people need to get off their asses and DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Does this strike anybody else as flawed?

Yeah, it's kinda screwy. On the other hand, I can see how it might have been intended to impact gameplay and how it can be justified "rationally" -- the gameplay impact might be an attempt to strengthen the role of trade embargoes, and the "rational" justification is that interdicting foreign goods, even if destined to an enemy, would be an act of war.

That said, I'd favor a simpler trade route system that operates more intuitively -- i.e., you isolate your enemy and no goods get through.

Quote:

I've yet to figure out the captured workers working at 1/3 speed between Democracy (gov't, not tech) and RP, though, unless it's something off the wall like one other AI civ having to be in Demo, too.

This happens in every game, actually. I believe that this occurs because only your native workers enjoy the benefits of democracy -- your slaves remain slaves and don't feel particularly excited (or more productive) about the institution of democracy since they get no vote. On the other hand, the 1:2 ratio for worker jobs returns with RP. The 1:3 ratio only seems to occur while in demo but before RP -- the "slaves don't benefit from democracy" explanation doesn't continue to fly once RP is researched. Bug or feature, you decide

Catt

Solomwi · August 17, 2003, 13:36

Quote:

This happens in every game, actually.

In that case, the good news is that I now no longer have that nagging seed of "how in the world could the extra memory I added be screwing the game up? That can't be it, can it?"

The bad news is I'm an idiot for never noticing this before.

Now I just need to go back and get the right screenshots to show the 6-move AI Galley.

Sheik · August 17, 2003, 13:57

In my current game I recently conquered an Arab city and gained two sources of spices, I then immediatly started trading one source with the Chinese. Within a few turns the Arabs retook the city but it appeared that I was still exporting spices to the Chinese and it did not appear like I took a rep hit.

Solomwi · August 17, 2003, 14:31

Did you already have a source of spices before conquering the city? I've noticed if I have two of a resource, am trading one and lose one (usually by random exhaustion) that it will use my sole remaining source in the trade, which I don't really disagree with at all.

vmxa1 · August 18, 2003, 01:32

Look in the trade advisor to see how many you own.
I never heard of luxs exhausting? Can that happen?