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Tinto Talks #10 - 1st of May 2024

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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Hi Johan,
Can the same country (the same state not including vassals) host multiple markets?
i.e. could you be say a completely unified Italy and have a Milan and Naples market? I dont think this would be advantageous but am curious
 
Hi Johan,
Can the same country (the same state not including vassals) host multiple markets?
i.e. could you be say a completely unified Italy and have a Milan and Naples market? I dont think this would be advantageous but am curious
Given the map we see and statements he's made, the answer is yes.
 
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Given the map we see and statements he's made, the answer is yes.
Oh word thats cool

The only time i can imagine it making sense is if youre like Denmark and own Estonia directly or smth like that, cause I believe he said colonial nations ie vassals are a practical necessity over seas due to how control works
 
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Oh word thats cool

The only time i can imagine it making sense is if youre like Denmark and own Estonia directly or smth like that, cause I believe he said colonial nations ie vassals are a practical necessity over seas due to how control works
I guess it will depend if it's an advantage to have locations in a second market you control or to have them in someone else's market instead, because they can give you a lot of leverage to import goods from that other market.
 
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While it would be historical, it would probably suffer from being too small (though it could/should also draw from Wallachia), and get disbanded quickly. At the and of the day it's still a game, and stuff will have to be sacrificed for the game's systems to work properly.
I was thinking it could encompass all of Transylvania, Wallachia and future Moldavia, the Danube Delta and maybe some other Eastern parts of Hungary too or the Bulgarian areas North of the Balkan mountains.
 
Super unhappy that France is so fractured.
You are going to do a very strong estates system?
Then kneecap the french by giving the Noble Estate privileges en Masse. Don't make extra tags out of french nobles.
 
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For France and similar situations, I think it could be modelled more organically if control is reworked.

I believe that income unextracted by the state through control should go to local estates instead of disappearing into the void. Having a constant 50% of the world economy evaporating does not strike me as good design. If local nobles could use local wealth not taxed by the state to strengthen themselves, we could realistically simulate France without a specialized game mechanic just for them. Having powerful nobles would mean the French king is vulnerable to them, but if threatened by England the nobles would support the king and provide a lot of power.

Without local wealth France can't be modelled without a custom French system because half of their economy would be gone.
Not having a special mechanic for a country is not necessarily lack of flavor, in this case playing France would be very different than England. It would just mean that their situation fits better with the other game mechanics instead having their special cut-out.
 
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Since trade will be need to trace a path, will there a neat map mode to see all the trade routes (perhaps filterable by country, market and good)?

Actually, if you have a market selected you see all exports and imports it has as nice animated arrows on the map.


Also, when creating a trade that map mode colors the possible markets green, and outlines the possible path on the map depending on which market you have the cursor over.
 
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How much will geography affect trade routes? Will mountains make markets significantly less likely for a location to be in a market on the other side, and will rivers make it significantly more likely for a location to be in a market down or upstream?

It feels very strange for Bern to be in the Genoese market across the alps, rather than a market on the Rhine

It has a fair bit of impact, but the river logic is not great yet.
 
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Can anything change the city which "controls" the market? Or is that meant to be modeled by someone establishing a new market and competing for market size?

Thats creating a new market (or you can move it if you own it)
 
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So the gold is completely wasted,and after some time your main market city also moves back to its previous market?

no, the market will not disapear, but it will at least be one location, MAYBE the neighbors
 
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If embargoing countries blocks them from trading through my land, does that mean i can starve a country that is completely surrounded by my country of all trade (that isnt in the local node) by embargoing it ?

In the same line of insane thinking, if i am a fictional country that conquers a continous line from northern finland/norway all the way to the cape, and i embargo everybody, can i completely stop trade between europe and asia, or at the very least make everything have to go all the way through whatever unclaimed sea tile there is south of the coast of the cape, thus increasing transport cost by an incredible ammount ?
 
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  • When connecting 2 different markets that span sea zone will there be a certain percentage of goods that might be lost due to say weather? If for example I'm in London and trade with the new world will that cause me to have a chance of paying for the goods and just loosing the goods altogether because I loose ships to rough seas? If a ship is lost do I temporary have reduce capacity for say a year or two until it can be replaced?
  • Will this just be reflected in a different way that is baked into the route such as carrying capacity reduction along a the route or cost of transporting the goods? I'm assuming if so this cost will change as the game progresses as trade routes become safer/easier to navigate.
  • Will having friendly ports along a trade route increase the efficiency of trading certain items from the first node to the final? Example being transferring goods from from say India to South Africa and the finally onto England. Will owning South Africa help the controlling nation, in this case England, do this transfer more efficiently than other non controlling nations? Or will it be the cost be the same since the distance between the first and final nodes are the same? I'm thinking that it might just be a trading ports along the coast.
 
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If embargoing countries blocks them from trading through my land, does that mean i can starve a country that is completely surrounded by my country of all trade (that isnt in the local node) by embargoing it ?

In the same line of insane thinking, if i am a fictional country that conquers a continous line from northern finland/norway all the way to the cape, and i embargo everybody, can i completely stop trade between europe and asia, or at the very least make everything have to go all the way through whatever unclaimed sea tile there is south of the coast of the cape, thus increasing transport cost by an incredible ammount ?
Given that embargos provide a CB against you, I imagine such efforts wouldn't last especially long.
 
Given that embargos provide a CB against you, I imagine such efforts wouldn't last especially long.
I hope the AI has the ability to figure out how problematic such an embargo is for them to make correct decisions wich embargo to fight over and wich aren't worth it
 
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What determines a location's ability to actually pay for a good that it demands on its local market? Where does the money to pay for those goods come from, if anywhere?
 
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