i'd say EU4- though as seen by one of the dev MPs, you need to be in a multiplayer game and have coordination to truly turn trade into a behemoth.
other than that... vicky 3?
other than that... vicky 3?
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EU4's trade system is just a fixed set of arrows pointing towards western Europe that money can be skimmed off of. It's an improvement over EU3's system of a fixed set of pots that you spam merchants at, but it still doesn't resemble the buying and selling of goods.
well that's because EU4 doesn't model the impact of goods outside of a macroeconomic context.
Imperialism 2 
simple and elegant
oh, wait, we talk Paradox games, that would be Vicky 1 or maybe 2? it's the most advanced trade system, and certainly most ambitious, but had to be simplified for games sake and computing power, and of course had some beforementioned flaws
HoI2 has OKish trade system iirc
simple and elegantoh, wait, we talk Paradox games, that would be Vicky 1 or maybe 2? it's the most advanced trade system, and certainly most ambitious, but had to be simplified for games sake and computing power, and of course had some beforementioned flaws
HoI2 has OKish trade system iirc
Vicky 1 gave me headache, could never wrap my brain around it.Imperialism 2
oh, wait, we talk Paradox games, that would be Vicky 1 or maybe 2? it's the most advanced trade system, and certainly most ambitious, but had to be simplified for games sake and computing power, and of course had some beforementioned flaws
HoI2 has OKish trade system iirc
I liked Victoria 1's trade, haven't played Vic 2 enough to comment. Personally don't like EU4 trade much which is indeed an abstract gameplay device and additionally isn't very intuitive.
The trade is relatively intuitive. Each trade zone produces trade, which is added to the pool moving down the line. Locals try to skim off the top, and for some reason it all ends at Genoa, England, and Venice, so they get everything nobody else scooped up along the way.
But that’s hardly a “trade system”. As @wingren013 put it, it’s a magic money machine that flows in one direction. If France and Spain become super prosperous and England and NED become destitute, money still flows to The Channel...wut
It's not a trade system, not really. Is it "intuitive"? A little bit.
Victoria's problem is that the trading system abstracts away location (goods just teleport around) in a time period where investing massively in improving the transportation network was a big deal, thus railroads are demoted to providing production bonuses. Some kind of trade network is needed to simulate shipping prices at the very least.
Nothing in your description evokes the word "Trade" to me. There are no transaction taking place. No goods on the market. No desire or lack of desire for the goods that are produced. Everything is bought and yet nothing is sold.
The part thats good about is that it accounts for location. Like @Haltin said a large flaw in Victoria's trade system is how it completely ignores geography and transportation.
This could be fixed easily by regularly reordering the trade nodes based on some criteria (like total development in the node + twice trade development) and having every road always go from weaker to stronger. There could even be a mechanic where a route transfers money one way and strength the other, so strong nodes pull weak ones up by virtue of being midway points to them.
Then you could have the world's trade system tunnel everything into Australia if you somehow manage to pull that off.
Victoria II is by far the best trading system, followed by EUIV
After a long time playing Victoria II I've eventually come to understand how the economy in that game works. It works pretty logically as a world market generally works (maybe even by accident due to the AI behind it) but it just lacks tooltips and explanations. I've had several years of economic education on high school so I might have a bit of an unfair advantage over people who never had to deal with boring lectures about supply and demand...
About EUIV's system:
The end nodes are based upon how the European market worked back then. Genoa(/Southern France), Venice and Amsterdam/London/Bruges/Antwerp (together the English Strait trading node) were places which in Dutch were known as stapelmarkten, or 'staple markets'. Staple markets are generally very large central trading hubs that serve as storage and distribution centres for the entirety of Central, Northern, Western and Southern (excluding the Ottoman Empire) Europe. Since practically the majority of world trade was generally directed at getting goods from the 'far east' and 'far west' of the world to Europe the trade node system actually fits, Funnily enough this system started around probably 1450 and ended after Napoleon was defeated, so (maybe by accident once again?) EUIV actually contains the entire era this system was used while Victoria II starts at the very start of the existance of proper world markets.
Lissabon should actually also be a 'staple market' since Portugal used to control nearly all trade from Asia to Europe and used Lissabon as a distribution centre for the European market for some time untill the British and Dutch were able to establish trading ports and the latter kicked Portugal's arse nearly out of Asia. It would probably be really difficult to implement that however so I guess we won't see that anytime soon.
After a long time playing Victoria II I've eventually come to understand how the economy in that game works. It works pretty logically as a world market generally works (maybe even by accident due to the AI behind it) but it just lacks tooltips and explanations. I've had several years of economic education on high school so I might have a bit of an unfair advantage over people who never had to deal with boring lectures about supply and demand...
About EUIV's system:
The end nodes are based upon how the European market worked back then. Genoa(/Southern France), Venice and Amsterdam/London/Bruges/Antwerp (together the English Strait trading node) were places which in Dutch were known as stapelmarkten, or 'staple markets'. Staple markets are generally very large central trading hubs that serve as storage and distribution centres for the entirety of Central, Northern, Western and Southern (excluding the Ottoman Empire) Europe. Since practically the majority of world trade was generally directed at getting goods from the 'far east' and 'far west' of the world to Europe the trade node system actually fits, Funnily enough this system started around probably 1450 and ended after Napoleon was defeated, so (maybe by accident once again?) EUIV actually contains the entire era this system was used while Victoria II starts at the very start of the existance of proper world markets.
Lissabon should actually also be a 'staple market' since Portugal used to control nearly all trade from Asia to Europe and used Lissabon as a distribution centre for the European market for some time untill the British and Dutch were able to establish trading ports and the latter kicked Portugal's arse nearly out of Asia. It would probably be really difficult to implement that however so I guess we won't see that anytime soon.
Sorry, but no. True world markets don't magically transport resources through unfriendly territory to arrive, free of charge, at the manufacturing/distribution centers of a nation just because that nation happens to have political influence. If you want to see trade markets done right a much better example is Pride of Nations (which covers a similar time period) where you are restricted on buying/selling goods to areas you can reach either by land or with your active merchant fleets.
Well here we see the contradictions at the bottom of the EU4 trade system- the relationship between Europe and the Americas at this point was largely American cash (later, raw materials and crops) in exchange for European finished goods. In game, Europe makes money off of this. At the same time it was largely European cash buying Asian finished goods- Europe makes money off this too! So does the direction of trade represent the overall flow of goods, or of cash, or neither?
The staple markets were the main entrepots for global and inter-European trade- so why are they end points in-game, from which no trade value can escape? At least part of their function was sending goods into the interior of Europe, so why does Champaign pay into North Sea and not vice-versa?
Then there's also the problem with unidirectional trade not reflecting any networks of exchange other than the ones pointed at Europe. So the dense webs of trade in, say, the Indian Ocean or the South China Sea get flattened. The arrangement of trade nodes in China, for example, are completely arbitrary, but they can be because all that really matters is that the trade value all goes West one way or another.
Does Pride of Nations also have detailed demographics, with your population buying goods according to their needs and prices fluctuating due to changes in supply and demand? Because if the lack of logistics was the price to pay for having the POP system then I'd call it a fair trade.
It's even better if you're coming from further afield. Why should the trade be flowing to Europe if most of the trade is dominated by Qing, or a resurgent Golden Horde?
Sounds like something between the system in Victoria II and HOI4 would be ideal.
Goods are produced in provinces and are sent along trade routes to their destination port, where they are transported to the pops that need the resource. Every route/province has a certain throughput limit, which is improved via tech and improving infrastructure and building a largest merchant marine. If a good isn't able to move to the next link in the chain, it piles up and could bring the trade route to a halt. War would disrupt it, armies would disrupt it, privateering could stop it for a the nation that is being targeted. Combine this with the influence system from Vic 2 / HOI4 and you have a somewhat realistic system which slowly improves over the game.
Well...yeh...we've already discussed that ad nauseum. I guess Pride of nations is published by PDX, but it's an AGEOD Game... I don't really consider it a "Paradox Game" as is the topic of this thread.
Yes and no. It doesn't break the population down into as many sub-types as Vic (6 different population strata from servile to aristocrat with differing requirements) but it does have good needs for the population that need to be filled (food goods, life needs, and luxury groups with multiple options within each group and limits on how much of any particular good-no feeding everyone fish and nothing else) or you see lowering happiness, increased militancy, and increased revolt risk. Supply/demand affecting prices is obviously included and instead of the silly sphere mechanic reserving goods for particular countries it has a much more realistic system with an option to pay extra to help ensure being the buyer of a particular good along with mutual relations and trade agreements having an impact on your place in line to buy goods from a country. It also doesn't limit production in a province to a single resource (most have 2-4 different mineral/agricultural goods available).
The game has other issues holding it back but the resource generation, transit, and trade stuff is extremely well done IMO.