trade has been nerfed

[Mef]

"trade income" should not be an income source. Tarrifs, taxes on burghers, port fees etc should represent that income. It is stupid to have "trade income" going straight to the state and not burghers and it is as stupid to now nerf it based on "crown power" that has nothing to do with how much state can get out of local and foreign burghers with taxes, tarrifs and fees.

So how are you going to represent government trade monopolies and mercantilist policies then, if all trade income went to the estates?

I also don't think that there are currently any provisions made for tariffs in the trade logic, but tolls are theoretically possible to expand (like the sound toll).

 

[margustoo]

So how are you going to represent government trade monopolies and mercantilist policies then, if all trade income went to the estates?

I also don't think that there are currently any provisions made for tariffs in the trade logic, but tolls are theoretically possible to expand (like the sound toll).

In those cases some of it should go to the state. But that is in most part not relevant at the start of the game and usually it is specific for a specific good. Even in those cases having "trade income" as a line in the budget would be silly.

 

[NoobishHeadache]

"trade income" should not be an income source. Tarrifs, taxes on burghers, port fees etc should represent that income. It is stupid to have "trade income" going straight to the state and not burghers and it is as stupid to now nerf it based on "crown power" that has nothing to do with how much state can get out of local and foreign burghers with taxes, tarrifs and fees.

Crown Power should absolutely have an effect on how much you're able to effectively tax your Estates, enforce tariffs, and such. But I agree that the state collecting a direct profit from trade income, at least in the first couple centuries or so, is pretty silly and should probably be reworked entirely.

 

[GDQuirm]

port fees for passing trade and tarrifs

I'm pretty sure that's what 'trade income' is representing ingame. You collect income on both imports and exports relative to the cost difference between the markets, so it's pretty easy to abstract that as representing a tax on the % of the sale value, which is how trade tolls operated in the early modern period.

Edit: So, to be clear, there generally weren't taxes on the 'sale value', but on the 'market value' of the entering good. But that's mostly semantics for the purpose of a game mechanic.

 

[margustoo]

I'm pretty sure that's what 'trade income' is representing ingame. You collect income on both imports and exports relative to the cost difference between the markets, so it's pretty easy to abstract that as representing a tax on the % of the sale value, which is how trade tolls operated in the early modern period.

Edit: So, to be clear, there generally weren't taxes on the 'sale value', but on the 'market value' of the entering good. But that's mostly semantics for the purpose of a game mechanic.

No. You are miles off. Trade income in the game is difference between the price of the good and the base cost of the good. That is closer to the profit that merchants made.. not state. It also is missing any costs that trading may have (tolls, port fees, sailor salaries, ship repairs, food for the crew etc)

/edit My bad. It's price difference between 2 markets. Nevertheless, my point stands. It doesn't depict cost of trading nor taxes, tarrifs or fees that state would get from that trade. Not to mention that it completely ignores influence of such state taxes and tarrifs on the trade itself.

 

[Mef]

No. You are miles off. Trade income in the game is difference between the price of the good and the base cost of the good. That is closer to the profit that merchants made.. not state. It also is missing any costs that trading may have (tolls, port fees, sailor salaries, ship repairs, food for the crew etc)

No, trade profit is the difference in price between the two markets, and price in markets specifically depends on local demand and supply (it doesn't take trade routes into account or only to a small degree).

 

[Álvaro Núñez de Lara]

No. You are miles off. Trade income in the game is difference between the price of the good and the base cost of the good. That is closer to the profit that merchants made.. not state. It also is missing any costs that trading may have (tolls, port fees, sailor salaries, ship repairs, food for the crew etc)

Well yes before, but now that it is based on crown power you can easily say it represents, in an abstraction, the capacity of the crown to tax and tariff that trade?

 

[margustoo]

Well yes before, but now that it is based on crown power you can easily say it represents, in an abstraction, the capacity of the crown to tax and tariff that trade?

Having a potential and actually doing it are 2 separate things. Having tarrifs and taxes instead of random a** trade income could help to better depict it's impact on trade quantity, estates opinion of the state, price of goods to the end user (state or estates). Current approach is more sensible than before but still stupid.

 

[Regaccio]

Well yes before, but now that it is based on crown power you can easily say it represents, in an abstraction, the capacity of the crown to tax and tariff that trade?

imo they used crown power because treating it like taxes wouldn't work. Trades happen per-market, while taxes are per-location. Locations each have their own Control, so you can multiply local tax income by Control, simple. Markets don't have Control, and calculating average Control for every tag in every market every month would destroy performance. So they multiply it by Crown Power instead, which is like an approximation of Control, just on a higher level applied to the whole merchant class, instead of the merchants in each little location. I think it's an acceptable band-aid to represent the state taxing trade, instead of actually doing the trade itself.

 

[Álvaro Núñez de Lara]

imo they used crown power because treating it like taxes wouldn't work. Trades happen per-market, while taxes are per-location. Locations each have their own Control, so you can multiply local tax income by Control, simple. Markets don't have Control, and calculating average Control for every tag in every market every month would destroy performance. So they multiply it by Crown Power instead, which is like an approximation of Control, just on a higher level applied to the whole merchant class, instead of the merchants in each little location. I think it's an acceptable band-aid to represent the state taxing trade, instead of actually doing the trade itself.

True. They would need to add a new tax slider just for tariffs, independent of the estates which effectively would only target trade income. It is a good solution imho but might be out of the scope of a rework before release. We will need to see how their solution plays out.

 

[TMMartins]

This change is good and probably better than reducing the capacity for player trades, from a gameplay perspective.

However, it does not address the problem that trade is too profitable (at least in the beginning, which is what we've seen).
The meta should not be to spam markets everywhere to get trade capacity and abuse overinflated trade income. Increasing production and control should be what is most important for most countries, at the beginning, for player and AI.

My two proposals:
1. Make trade affect the price of goods (by increasing effective demand and supply). The stickiness of prices can be maintained by including the % of market stockpiles (MS) for each good in the current calculation for the monthly change in price of that good. The logic:
- If demand>supply, decreases in monthly price are multiplied by %MS, so that when %MS=0% prices never decrease. Increases are unnafected.
- If demand<supply, increases in monthly price are multiplied by (1-%MS), so that when %MS=100% prices never increase. Decreases are unnafected.
- Absolute amount of MS needs to be balanced around this mechanic and should not be too high compared to the flow. It could also be differentiated by good (depending on the perishableness of each good).

2. Trade costs should be much higher. The simple fix is to increase trade maintenance costs. However, I also have other suggestions:
- Get rid of current "trade efficiency". Trade efficiency should be simulated by reduced trade costs, not an unrealistic add-on to profit. Or instead, "trade efficiency" could be a modifier that reduces the "trade capacity" needed for each trade, replacing "trade maintenance".
- Trade maintenance should be proportional to the "trade capacity" needed for each trade (if not already, to simplify, so that maintaining 1 "trade capacity" costs 0.1/0.5/1 gold).
- The cost in "trade capacity" of going from location to location in coastal sea zones should be much lower than in no road grassland flat zones (like 1:10~20?, then rough terrain increases the cost, roads decrease). There should be significant "trade capacity" costs from embarking/disembarking (that are reduced on locations with port infrastructure?). This should be tuned so that most trade routes are done by sea (when possible) and only have one emarking and one disembarking location.
- There could be a distinction between "trade maintenance" costs (or my proposal for "trade efficiency") for land vs sea. This would create the choice between pursuing innovations/policies/infraestructure that increases efficiency in trade by land or sea, depending on each nation. Societal values like Land vs Naval are an obvious candidate to impact it differently leading a Land focus society to be more efficient in trading by land and vice-versa (be it by reducing "trade maintenance" in land or "trade capacity" needed to traverse from location to location).

 

[giorgosth128]

I think the new trade nerf is a marvelous idea. for me it represends both the nobles and the other glasses organizing trade and the crown as well. and as the crown's power grows so does its trading.

 

[The GOAT 1988]

True. They would need to add a new tax slider just for tariffs, independent of the estates which effectively would only target trade income. It is a good solution imho but might be out of the scope of a rework before release. We will need to see how their solution plays out.

im general in favor of using Import Duties and Export Duties as mechanisms for the state to collect wealth from trade, that way it could be limited by the "Mercantilism vs Free Trade" societal values and other modifiers. But what would you calculate that tax on specifically? Because it appears as tho the current trade is the profit on trade transactions and if you only are now going to place a duty tax on that, where does the rest of the profit go to?

 

[Álvaro Núñez de Lara]

But what would you calculate that tax on specifically? Because it appears as tho the current trade is the profit on trade transactions and if you only are now going to place a duty tax on that, where does the rest of the profit go to?

So each trade gives a profit based on the difference of purchase and sell price. You set a tax on that profit. The rest goes to the estates (the burghers mostly). Basically the same as now but instead of being based on crown power, it is a tariff slider. What i dont know is what would limit the slider so you just dont crank it up to 100% and keep it all. I guess estate satisfaction? And you might have a max tariff cap as well base on your trade efficiency and mercantilism vs free trade?

 

[VoodooDog]

As Quill said, trade literally was/is op in real life.
So if trade is OP in the game, it feels like a accurate representation of reality, no?

 

[NoobishHeadache]

As Quill said, trade literally was/is op in real life.
So if trade is OP in the game, it feels like a accurate representation of reality, no?

Not when it's so OP that it allows the state to keep building more and more trade and manpower buildings everywhere, constantly, and afford to field a 100% professional army by 1400.

 

[VoodooDog]

Not when it's so OP that it allows the state to keep building more and more trade and manpower buildings everywhere, constantly, and afford to field a 100% professional army by 1400.

In principal, should not everyone do this if its possible and with everyone doing it a nice competition about markets should arise and therefore it should not happen?
The AI is currently probably to stupid, i guess?

 

[Ignatius Balthazar]

Its a nice change, i wonder what affects this has on other systems. If the creators would do their run on this new patch, i would expect to see a difference.

Less direct trade money, so if you want more you have to increase your crown power or estate tax. Wich should force you to engage more with your estates. Instead of ignoring them and giving them all the privileges because of "infinite" trade money.
Less buildings, so a slower scaling of your country.
Raising levies is more expensive? I think. And its harder to field a professional army.

But this is all speculation untill we see gameplay.
I wonder if this change is a buff for AI, because they dont trade as efficiently as the player. Or a nerf because they lose income now.

 

[Mike282]

The exception being the banking countries, who aren't actually states and the "government" is just the people that run the bank. If you're playing as a company like that then "trade income" makes sense. But yeah, for any state in the game, which is 99% of the tags, you shouldn't really be making "business income" unless you've created some sort of state-owned enterprise, or a national bank collecting interest on loans. Feels like a late-game thing.

Just to add a thing you may or may not be interested in: banking nations will have little to no trade capacity. Their income will come from loans and banks buildings. Instead Trading Companies and the Hansa will be the country that focus on trade a lot

 

[Álvaro Núñez de Lara]

As Quill said, trade literally was/is op in real life.
So if trade is OP in the game, it feels like a accurate representation of reality, no?

For all its faults, the deterministic nature of trade in EU4 made it so it was paced historically. Yes, trade was OP but: 1. Not for the state exclusively. 2. Not since the first decade of the game 3. Not for every single country of earth (hurts replayability if the meta is the same for all countries).

Trade boom has a time and a place. Before the age of descovery it was for the Hansa and Italian republics for a reason. Then it became available for certain countries to profit as they explored and colonized, for that reason as well. That is like 150-200 years into the game just to start it, not 20 years into the game like currently.

I fear that trade republics with the current design won't have anything special for them other than a few modifers, and therefore, any nation and all nations can outtrade trade republics. Now, this may be fixed if the AI gets better and trade so you get less share of the trade, giving the trade republics the advantage that they can build better buildings in foreign countries which gives them better capacity and access than non trading countries. But we will have to see how the game plays after the trade changes and changes to the AI.

Also of course the (hopefully) bug that makes trades not affect supply also overpowers trade, since lots of people bringing the same trade into a market does not lower its profitability, when it actually should, forcing the player to look for new markets like, you now, Asia and the New world. But if anyone can import gold from Prague and Cloth from Netherland unlimited amounts without the price tanking, well, you have broken the trade system effectively.

Its a nice change, i wonder what affects this has on other systems. If the creators would do their run on this new patch, i would expect to see a difference.

Less direct trade money, so if you want more you have to increase your crown power or estate tax. Wich should force you to engage more with your estates. Instead of ignoring them and giving them all the privileges because of "infinite" trade money.
Less buildings, so a slower scaling of your country.
Raising levies is more expensive? I think. And its harder to field a professional army.

But this is all speculation untill we see gameplay.
I wonder if this change is a buff for AI, because they dont trade as efficiently as the player. Or a nerf because they lose income now.

Yeah a massive knock on effect. Less money means less production which in effect means also less trade and less profitable, means less control from buldings roads etc, means less buildings that speed up literacy, culture conversion etc, which means less blobbing as well. In effect like with any PDX game, slashing the economy by 50-80% means slowing the game right down, fixing a bunch of other issues. I am VERY curious to see a gameplay after this change and see if it works as intended or they can find a new exploit to get the trade income out of control again (such as revoking all privileges with no consequences and still roll in money by 1400 for instance?)