Some disccusion about new trade remake

[BaicaiTomato]

Idk if there will be devs see this post...but I just wanna discuss about some question I find about this trade remake.
I guess the devs do want to find a better way to make players set their trading based on geography --- since they force players to find a port to connect to the world market. I totally agree with that, since almost everything in the victoria era is about the geography. Geography tell us why London, NYC and Constantinople ( or Istanbul lul ) become the most important cities in that era.
However, it seems like a key featrue is still missing in the new trading system, at least I didnt find that in the dev diary, RIVER. The new system still doesnt seem to have anything intergration with rivers rather than some simple traits. Rivers are very important for the trading system of a country. Without rivers, Chigago and Lyon and Wuhan will not have any distinctive qualities, and in fact those cities do exactly not hold any significant role in the game. The lack of river features in the system really affects player experience, at least for me.
Actually, there are some mods trying to solve this problem by adding a trait for those states and adding state_market_access_price_impact modifier, however I really hope Paradox can implement something foundational by this chance -- at least something more than a simple icon on the page of the state.
I dont expect the dev team can create the whole distribution system for a country, which might fk up the cpu, but I do expect the dev team can create something new, for example, something about the storage system, to imporve the importance of those famous rivers.
Anyways, idk devs might or might not see this post, but this is what I wanna discuss about this trade rework.

 

[Helmut von Dandy]

Actually, there are some mods trying to solve this problem by adding a trait for those states and adding state_market_access_price_impact modifier

The base game already gives bonuses to rivers. Chicago gets +5% MAPI and +20 Infrastructure from the Mississippi, Lyon gets +15 Infrastructure from the Rhone, Wuhan gets +5% MAPI and +20 Infrastructure from the Yangtze.

As far as World Market access goes, rivers still flow through territory, so if you don't control the territory where the river meets the sea it makes sense that the river alone wouldn't give you access.

 

[chrism2012]

The base game already gives bonuses to rivers. Chicago gets +5% MAPI and +20 Infrastructure from the Mississippi, Lyon gets +15 Infrastructure from the Rhone, Wuhan gets +5% MAPI and +20 Infrastructure from the Yangtze.

Thanks, just a question: Is the construction of the Illinois and Michigan (I&M) Canal and the latest Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal in the current game (as they were basically constructed within the Vic3 timeframe)?

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

Thanks, just a question: Is the construction of the Illinois and Michigan (I&M) Canal and the latest Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal in the current game (as they were basically constructed within the Vic3 timeframe)?

Canals in general are not in the game yet other than Suez and Panama, but would be fairly easy to put in there as a seperate building of which you would only be able to build 1 in a province for example and which then gives +5% Mapi, that has been part of a past mod of mine in fact, coupled with bridges and tunnels.

We dont have other modifiers currently to work with other than either MAPI or blasting the whole map into negative infrastructure by default, and with Mapi in mind modders would always have to ensure that you cant get something like 110% Mapi.

Yes the why is obvious, canals improved trade a lot and transport over water was preferred over many other forms of transport usually. One can make a similar argument regarding a number of large bridges that had to cross wide rivers and long tunnels, they tend to represent a significant investment made for the easier flow of trade and movement. There is relatively few reason to point to any specific canal and its importance, as a person from the lowlands i'm well aware just how many canals we have in Belgium and the Netherlands and why we had them so rest assured the US isnt the only country who has been taken its canals away from. That Flanders with all it's rivers and ports and canals does not get +5% Mapi well that saddens my Belgian heart a bit too.

 

[BaicaiTomato]

As far as World Market access goes, rivers still flow through territory, so if you don't control the territory where the river meets the sea it makes sense that the river alone wouldn't give you access.

Oh I forget the orginal game has those traits lol. But this also prove that the existing river system is too simple.
As I said, the traits is just icons and MAPI modifiers on the panel of states, so players do not feel the reality of rivers.
Second, for ur viewpoints, image America in the civil war. If CSA successfully let GB ( or Canada if AI is fast somehow ) put an emborgo against USA, Chicago should lose all its adventage for lakes and rivers. However, since Mississippi is just a trait for Chicago, losing Louisiana and Montreal seems has no affect on this. The products from Chicago can just TELEPORT to NYC and get sold and still enjoy those MAPI traits from Mississippi and lakes. At least I think this is not a good design lul.

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

Oh I forget the orginal game has those traits lol. But this also prove that the existing river system is too simple.
As I said, the traits is just icons and MAPI modifiers on the panel of states, so players do not feel the reality of rivers.
Second, for ur viewpoints, image America in the civil war. If CSA successfully let GB ( or Canada if AI is fast somehow ) put an emborgo against USA, Chicago should lose all its adventage for lakes and rivers. However, since Mississippi is just a trait for Chicago, losing Louisiana and Montreal seems has no affect on this. The products from Chicago can just TELEPORT to NYC and get sold and still enjoy those MAPI traits from Mississippi and lakes. At least I think this is not a good design lul.

The case you point to also highlights the challenge though especially when things like canals and rivers and lakes are concerned vs rail connections.

By itself the game has a "node map" for convoy costs that will increase the cost depending on distance, for the purpose of logistics this seems like the obvious sort of abstracted system to use and perhaps even extend to land and rivers. But then you would have this "river/canal node network"running through or alongside the potential rail network, now you have to wonder if certain goods will be either send to Europe by Ship from Chicago via rivers/canals/lakes or if its going to go by rail first to NYC to be shipped from there. Kinda makes a fair difference if the cargo is going to be transported by sailing ships or steamers, or the kind of cargo it entails.

If you have layers of local prices to market prices and market prices to global prices, logistics wise as with how nodes work it could be more or less something like where local provinces have to sell to the national market from which they can be sold to the international market., or when local prices can sell directly to the world market via the closest route that this would entail. I think Paradox is going for number 2 with the trade rework. Eitherway i think that if you then add canals and rivers so as to be part of a transport network that it becomes somewhat different to differentiate its use so as to facilitate trade between 2 provinces and facilitate trade from the river port directly to the world market.

Mapi imho isnt a bad tool if you use it so to represent "inabillety to transport to a larger market". ive given my feedback on that matter with "mapi circumvention", and for me river ports and canals would have to do a similar thing and then things would be fine. Although, then the player has to choose wether he uses rail to transport or river, and there would be a point where the player would think "well cant i have it going by rail half the trip, and by river barge the other half?"which again just make things complicated. Eitherway imho the ability for a province to sell goods to the larger or world market efficiently should to a large degree be determined by the local presence of transport infrastructure which albeit hopefully also further "connects" into some sort of wider system. In that sense, having fairly high MAPI penalty's at start that can be alleviated by rails and ports would be fine imho if we can designate what kind of industry can make use of the limited capacity that might exist, by which they would be able to circumvent MAPI within the national market to either sell at market price or sell to the global market withought the impediment of MAPI.

My proposal was always "Implement Mapi circumvention as a sort of production method similar to automation", so that when a factory uses it he sells directly to the national market withough Mapi penalty albeit having to pay the transport cost for it. In such a case your Chicago might start with a dock or port from which it can move its goods to the national market or similarly effeciently sell to the world market its just that the size of the dock/port and the kind of ships used would determine how much transport it sells and how many factory's it can provide transport for at reasonable price. Such a system will never consider distances, Chicago would perhaps have a port and a railway station and some stuff might be send by river and some by rail but the cost of each would be similar and distance would not really play into it, only the distance from the port where it exists the country to the port where it enters another country with the sea node map in mind.

 

[Aloraand]

Rivers are more domestic market infrastructure right?

They've explicitly focused on intra-market trade. There are still valid criticisms based on geography. E.g. It seems like Switzerland to Austria trade will require ships? They've uncapped ports (good change), but there is still geographic impacts on harbouring. Rivers do play a role in this e.g. if your river is navigable to the ocean you should maybe get access to ports and hence the world market without needing treaties (oil river trade comes to mind), but it's similar to railways which also don't play much role in the current trade re- design. But I think it's because those are important for internal infrastructure, which hasn't been addressed yet.

 

[AlexNereča]

But then you would have this "river/canal node network"running through or alongside the potential rail network, now you have to wonder if certain goods will be either send to Europe by Ship from Chicago via rivers/canals/lakes or if its going to go by rail first to NYC to be shipped from there. Kinda makes a fair difference if the cargo is going to be transported by sailing ships or steamers, or the kind of cargo it entails.

I don't envy the devs' for the position they'll be in with the inevitable logstics rework due to this very reason - having to put systems into place to handle both waterways and railroads for even just resupplying armies (let alone goods transportation) will be a lot of work even if it makes sense to do both at the same time.

 

[BaicaiTomato]

Mapi imho isnt a bad tool if you use it so to represent "inabillety to transport to a larger market". ive given my feedback on that matter with "mapi circumvention", and for me river ports and canals would have to do a similar thing and then things would be fine. Although, then the player has to choose wether he uses rail to transport or river, and there would be a point where the player would think "well cant i have it going by rail half the trip, and by river barge the other half?"which again just make things complicated. Eitherway imho the ability for a province to sell goods to the larger or world market efficiently should to a large degree be determined by the local presence of transport infrastructure which albeit hopefully also further "connects" into some sort of wider system. In that sense, having fairly high MAPI penalty's at start that can be alleviated by rails and ports would be fine imho if we can designate what kind of industry can make use of the limited capacity that might exist, by which they would be able to circumvent MAPI within the national market to either sell at market price or sell to the global market withought the impediment of MAPI.

Yea, I also agree with that MAPI is not bad system to show this. I tried to make a mod to add a trait modifying MAPI for cities along Danube, and add a yearly pulse event to check if Danube is still accessable for those cities. But I didnt continue because this is too tedious -- I cannot make events for all cities all rivers around the world. But this mod can somehow use MAPI to simulate rivers.
Imo, infrastructure shows how convenience a product can connect to the market. There should be some purnishment for Chicago if USA loses Louisiana, like the player have to bulid more railway, but there is not. If the player decide to use railway to transport products from Chicago, at least those products shouldnt benefit from the MAPI buff from Mississippi.
Another extreme example is that if another country grabs Suzhou from Qing, this country should easily destroy the market of Qing. However, since the trait of Yangtze River gives enough MAPI to cities, products from ChongQing and WuHan can still go other ports without railways, which is really unreasonable imo.
Moreover, I hope there could be a new systems to show supply chains in the trading market. For example, Flanders should enjoy the lower price of fabric and have adventage to build textile mills since it can receive fabric from cotton plantations in Cambrai along Schelde. But in fact there is no differnece for Belgium to build textile mills anywhere since fabric is from an abstract market from France. Maybe the only benefit is that Belgium can use less ships, or socalled Merchant Marine in the new system, but Flanders itself does not have any advantage anyways.

 

[Jamey]

I do hope that there is tangible benefits to being on rivers.

I grew up in St. Louis, which exists as a city because it is at the confluence of 3 major rivers. It would be nice if a location like that had trade benefits in the new system, rather than being treated as landlocked.

 

[Desseabar]

Rivers are more domestic market infrastructure right?

They've explicitly focused on intra-market trade. There are still valid criticisms based on geography. E.g. It seems like Switzerland to Austria trade will require ships? They've uncapped ports (good change), but there is still geographic impacts on harbouring. Rivers do play a role in this e.g. if your river is navigable to the ocean you should maybe get access to ports and hence the world market without needing treaties (oil river trade comes to mind), but it's similar to railways which also don't play much role in the current trade re- design. But I think it's because those are important for internal infrastructure, which hasn't been addressed yet.

The Rhine and Danube in Europe cut through several different countries – and control of the mouth of the Danube was something that Russia fought over pretty extensively.

Maybe an answer is playing around with MAPI and their sub-market views. So eg for the US, states along the Mississippi/Missouri rivers get a MAPI bonus specifically for access to a market hub in New Orleans, or states along the Rhine get a MAPI bonus for a market hub in Rotterdam. This would require some hard-coding, though.

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

Imo, infrastructure shows how convenience a product can connect to the market. There should be some purnishment for Chicago if USA loses Louisiana, like the player have to bulid more railway, but there is not. If the player decide to use railway to transport products from Chicago, at least those products shouldnt benefit from the MAPI buff from Mississippi.

As the trade rework is being proposed, afaik it will be possible to take ports and have country's pay tariffs to trade trough your ports. Provinces in the hinterland will trade trough ports to the global market afaik, and possibly to those that are nearest or to which they are best connected. So it might be a case where the Ai chooses either river or rail or both, taking the tariffs with it. When it would concern Mapi circumvention, both the river and the railway would give as much of a MAPi bonus, kinda a "full bonus" so to speak because it would entail a full circumvention of the MAPI penalty, but where it goes through other country's it (potentially) incurs a tariff. Rather from that circumvention perspective the more important matter is not the quality of the transportation way, but the capacity it can provide. In some way, that river connection actually benifits railway transport if it takes a volume of traffic away that would otherwise make railway transport expensive, the circumvention story is really a matter of matching your usage to your needs and how much you can afford to invest in infrastructure at any given point.