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Johan

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Welcome to another Tinto Talks, the final of four on the economy system for our secret game with the code name “Project Caesar”.

Today we will talk about all the things related to trade, including markets, merchants and trades. This talk is heavy on tooltip screenshots, and a lot of concepts to digest, so I recommend checking it through multiple times.

Markets
Let's start with the markets themselves. These are dynamic and will change through the playthrough, as countries can create new markets and disband their old if they so desire.

Each market has a center in a location, and the owner of that location is in control over that market.

Every location and coastal seazone will belong to the most fitting market, which depends on the market attraction of the market, the distance between the location and the market center, diplomatic factors, and more.

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The Riga market has control over much of the Baltic region in the start..

A market has merchants, who have a power depending on buildings and maritime presence in the market, and a merchant capacity which depends on the infrastructure for trade that country has in that market. The Merchant Power impacts in which order exports from a market are executed, as there is not an endless supply of goods in a market. The Merchant Capacity impacts how much goods the merchants can ship.

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This is the source of the Hanseatic League’s merchant capacity in Riga.



As you can see in the market screenshot, every good has a local price, and a supply vs demand value as well, let's take a look at the beer price in the next tooltip.

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Cheap beer, must be paradise…

Prices change every month towards the Target Price, which depends on the supply and demand of the goods in the market, and the current price stability. Price stability can change through the ages as well.

Supply & Demand
The supply of each good in a market depends on several factors.
  • The output from RGO’s
  • The output from buildings
  • Base Production
  • Burgher Trades

So what is ‘Base Production’? Some goods like clay, lumber, sand and stone are produced in every market, without the need for specific RGO’s, even if an RGO with that raw material can produce much more, and there are buildings that can be built to provide these as well.

Also, your burghers will trade on their own, if they have the capacity for it. They will attempt to address needs within the market, and can trade in a slightly shorter range, thus enriching their estate. There are laws and privileges that impact them, like the “Trade Monopolies” estate privilege that the Hanseatic League has granted in the earlier screenshot, which reduces their own merchant capacity by 25% to increase the capacity of the burghers by 100%

So what about demand? This is primarily from the maintenance, input, and construction of buildings, recruiting and maintaining armies and navies, and the demands of the population, but there are more sources as well.

Of course, trades themselves impact supply and demand as well.

Trade
You can use your merchant capacity in a market to either export a good from that market, or import a good from another market. Of course that market needs to be within your trade range, which is not world-spanning in 1337.

A trade is a variable amount of goods shipped from one market to another market, purchasing it for the local price in the exporting market. The longer the distance between the markets, the more capacity each good will require to ship, and higher the maintenance costs will be.

Trades have an impact on the last land location they are in before leaving the market, and the first one they enter in the importing market, giving boosts in development to them over time. A trade always has to trace a path on the map.

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Our merchant power makes us get the amount of goods we want in Riga.

There are also the Sound Tolls, if you pass through Öresund or the Bosphorus to consider.

Diplomacy and Trade
There are many diplomatic factors that impact the trade and market mechanics of Project Caesar.

First of all, you can “Deny Market Access” to a nation owning a market, which will reduce the attraction of their markets on your locations, but also make anyone with merchants in those markets upset with you.

You can also request and/or offer market access preference making it likelier for a country’s locations to belong in a certain market.

If you dislike paying Sound Tolls, you can always try to ask for exemption for it through diplomacy with the country controlling the strait.

Some countries have isolated themselves completely, so you need to negotiate a specific exception to allow you to export or import from their markets.

There is also the possibility to embargo a country, which would block the merchants from that country to trade in your markets, and also to not be allowed to move through your country. Of course, this a legit casus belli, so use with care.

Other aspects to Trade
Each market can have specific goods banned for export or import, with one common example being that muslim markets will ban import and export of wine, beer and liquor.

We mentioned in an earlier Tinto Talks that Markets will have stockpiles, so that surplus can be stored for a rainy day. There are buildings that will increase the amount that can be stored.

There is also food in the markets, with prices adapting to the supply and demand of food as well.

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Västra Götaland är Sveriges Kornbod!

There are also automation options where you can assign trading completely to the AI. You can also lock some trades so that the AI will not interfere with them.

Stay tuned, next week we’ll be talking about mercenaries, levies and regulars!
 
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What happens when you are at war with someone in your own market?

You fight a war normally? If you control the market center you can always embargo them ;)
 
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Were Lowlands dependent on English trade at that time? Maybe it's better to separate them?

Yeah, we had seperate markets before, but removed it as the low lands got too small and weak, as London, Cologne and Lubeck would become stronger.

These setups with markets you see now is 110% likely to not be what the game will look like when its released.

And remember, the gameplay is dynamic, so markets change over time as you and the AI plays.
 
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are sound tolls only limited to straits or could other countries get a fee for allowing the trade to pass on their land during the transportation?

currently straits only..
 
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The market around sourthern France in particual is interesting. There's seemingly some areas that are not wasteland that don't seem to have their part in a nearby market. Could it be due to being sieged? I am also curious about the meaning of the stars inside the market centers. Likely the importance of that center compared to others, but I might be missing something

its wastelands only.

the stars inside market centers I got no clue about what they are, gotta ask @SaintDaveUK but he is away right now.
 
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Any chance of differentiating the land and sea colours on the trade map mode betore release? Looks a bit weird right now.

Why? You need to see the color of which market it belongs to, and if its land or sea does not matter, only the market access does.
 
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This definitely makes me want to make a mod where the number of starting markets is tripled or more. I wonder how much it impacts performance.

Not super much, but consider that the AI creates and disbands marketd depending on what is optimal for then, i'm not sure how your mod looks like after a decade or two has progressed in a campaign.
 
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How will goods travel from distant markets? Say, from the Spice Islands to Europe?

Ships and/or Caravans, ie the merchant capacity you built.

You need to build up infrastructure to get that in a market.
 
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Can the maket be moved (other than by creating a new one and disbanding the old one)? E.g. could the owner of Hamburg create a commercial base so big in that location that moves the market seat (and any associated perks) from Lübeck to Hamburg? I guess it will trigger a change in location assignation (some would become closer or farther than before the seat change). But it may create a different kind of competition (other than creating a new market being often a preferred path).

yes, you can manually move your market to another location you own inside that market. That will impact what locations will belong to it.. so if you move from Lübeck to Hamburg, you are likely to get reduced access in Norway and Sweden, but MAY get a bit further into the Low lands..
 
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Can a country own multiple markets? I'm just looking at Bordeux, which is a PU of England at the start(?) and wondering how France could control all of France, or if it is even benifitial to do so vs making two markets.

yes ofc.. you can have as many markets as you want.

its usually beneficial to have a significantly sized one that provides you with enough of the resources you need so you only need to import a percentage of what you lack.
 
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Since there is fish as a good, I'm hoping it's not an RGO, because to have fish as a trade good, you have to dry it or (most commonly) use salt. Just being able to generate tradeable fish in random locations without access to salt or a history of drying them like in Norway, wouldn't be historical and remove an important source of demand for salt.

its both an RGO and output from buildings.
 
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Not sure how I feel about needing to manually send merchants to move goods between markets, I worry about micromanagement. That said it does seem trade flow is fully dynamic depending on where supply and demand is, which is a HUGE step up from EU4's static system.
Unless you make your country into a trader nation, you don't need to care all that much about trade.

Some players run with fully automated trade.
Some do depending on country and situation, as you can automate most and just lock certain specific trades to not be ai controlled.
Some love the manual micromanaging.
 
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Why the color gradient darkening outwards from the main city of the market. Is it the extent to which a location belongs to a market, as in darker = easier to make it switch markets?

yes
 
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