Trade related to geography

  • Game lacks a very simple mechanic to have an important relation with neigbours, its trade advantage. Trades in stock market or in agreements should have carriage cost(also carriage time if developers wants more realizm). Carriage cost should be a logaritmic function of amount of resources carried and distance travelled. For example from Greendland to France, transporting 1000 iron, pay %10 transportation cost, for 5000 iron pay %3 transportation cost etc. If you buy from near country, (Spain) you almost pay 0 transport cost, which makes Spain more important for France. This nerfs trade a little, thus starting money can be increased by %10 or so....

    It's just that simple, and countries with close borders will be afraid of simple ambargos, will try to form dynamic alliences because of it. Even this is enough to make diplomacy more meaningful...

    Other details to consider:

    -Trade Harbor: Just like how harbors reduce embark time on military units, harbors can also reduce imaginary embark time of trade convoys, reducing the cost of transportation. For sure railroad too must reduce transport cost drastically. With this some countries may literally play merchant style(Britain), buying and selling from overseas...

    -Impactful ambargos: Lets say you are northern russia, and you want to import material from sweden, from game mechanics the cheapest road is sweden --> finland --> home, yet if finland ambargos you, you have to pay more for longer transportation, (sweden ---> northern russia by sea or sweden --> livonia ---> russia ---> northern russia etc. )

    -Tariffs: On the perivous example, sweden ---> finland ---> northern russia, finland may put tariffs for transported goods instead of ambargo, such that finland gains little amount of money because of strategical position


    . Now just a small land piece connecting northern russia to sweden would be more valuable, giving provinces geographical importance in addition to military and production importance.

  • This is quite a complicated addition it be a massive diplomacy overhaul.

    1st .one has to set trade routes and what determines the trade route. most games have predetermine trade routes so are players able to create pathways or will it be auto generated.


    2nd. blockades which has been suggested in the past. without how to work the pathway one can not simply blockade plus along with which units are able to do a blockade. will it be captured or destroyed shipments.


    3rd. on doesn't need the cost of money for transport look at railroads. one could use other resources as consumption. with this the harbor will need changes from increase production to that of trade unless its a fish resource which would increase that production. overall you don't need to have a trade harbor just a regular harbor.


    4th tariffs are a complicated matter. governments are the ones to determine how much of a tariff. this could be simple to add it in with the trade and be like the stock market.

    I can see this being more engaging for players and possible to help prevent abuse from trade as it would be slower. But with the addition of this the entire map, diplomacy, and balancing will need to change. the biggest problem is balancing.

    It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one that is most adaptable to change. -Charles Darwin

  • Well core idea is simple and basic, as i said details are to be considered. If you trade from far away you pay more, it motivates you to care about countries close to you.


    for your worries

    1. Just like how you click one unit to a province closest is chosen, same can be done with invisible trade convoy unit(to express similarity how it works). It's destination is between capitals.

    2. Blockades via. ships etc. would be indeed more detailed but if you ambargo X country, invisible trade convoy unit of X country can not pass from your realm, just like military units.

    3.I didnt quite understand what you meant but Trade harbor is regular harbor, i used adjective to express its additional benefit. I agree money is not a must for transport cost, it can be a resource.

    4. I agree, if tariffs to be added, you should just create default tariff mode.


    About blockade more:

    I didnt thougt about it but looks like cool idea, in order to apply blockade:

    trades should be non-insant, requiring time.

    - previously mentioned trade convoy unit should be visible and manually controllable. It should move way faster than infantry, like x10 more speed, and on seas should be faster relative to land. Unit can not pass from countries who ambargod, otherwise can pass from anywhere. If meets with an enemy unit engages to a fight and will likely loses.

    -Tariffs should be made simpler since trade requires time&manual control. For coalition members %0, for map share %0.5, for right of way %1, for peace %2, cease fire %5, ambargo no pass. Numbers are to be tweaked.

    -You wont pay transportation cost on deal, but convoy will consume resources(money, coal etc.), related to amount of resources transported.

    -When convoy enters a foreign country during transit, it pays tariff cost automatically, if there is no money convoy waits until enough money is gathered or another order is given.

    -When deal is done, convoy unit will be genareted from exported and will move to importer's country automatically(shortest distance), which can be tweaked manually. Players may create trade routes deciding on safety&tariff costs.


    Overall i think blockade mechanics is more trade detailed, requiring micro manegement of trade which is not a taste for everyone for a military focused game, its a more like Paradox Game mechanic... But my first trade idea is cool and simple.

  • IT is only difficult if you aim at implementing ALL of the above in one HUGE overhaul.


    But in a step by step approach? one step at a time.

    And after every step you can still decide it is not interesting enough to take the next step