I figured out what is wrong with Trade...and how to fix it

[Penchant]

What are the odds that the price cap could be raised to 100/100? In many cases, it seems like 50/100 is underselling. I don't see any reason as to why it's so low.

If you think 100/100 is remotely viable, there is something wrong. 50/100 already uses a lot of gold. For example, with Golden Farrow (rough estimate) half of the city's tax income would go purely to food. That is a ridiculous amount and should never be that high. The Morekian duke who did that had lots of gold stored up but long term that would bankrupt him. As Indirik said, he should have been banned for that especially when compared with that realms demand 10/100. The solution to this problem is not just make lazy rural lords willing to sell because they get ridiculous amounts of gold. In what way is 50/100 underselling?

[Gustav Kuriga]

I actually spend nearly my entire income on food, and that's at 40 gold/100 bushels

[Chenier]

As IRL, food cannot simply be totally put up on the free market without any restriction or control. The market helps get a maximum price for what people are willing to pay for for any given resource, but in the case of food, everyone needs it, and so everyone will pay whatever it takes to get it. In consequence, those who need more, or aren't as rich, will be unable to pay for market price, and will starve. Food isn't a consumer good, nor a luxury, it's a necessity for all. Hiking the food price limit, combined with the new food scarcity, will not do anything to help Dwi or any other continent, starving realms. Traders from needy realms, instead of facing the lack of sell offers, will only find sell offers they cannot afford. It wouldn't make anything better.

I wouldn't really mind if food became a lot less scarce, as it is IRL.

I actually spend nearly my entire income on food, and that's at 40 gold/100 bushels

I remember I put Paisly bankrupt by buying too much food, at 35 gold per 100 average I believe, one week. I was cutting it close for a few weeks, but that week was too much, and I lost over 6000 gold's worth of infrastructure and militia. Wouldn't be as bad today, but still. The point of the trade game is not to make food so rare and expensive that cities no longer produce any profits at all.

I've always argued that the trading game should be the least onerous possible to non-traders. Tom seems to oppose "set and forget", but I really think that if we want resources in this game, they all need to be "set and forget" for the lords. Not for the traders, but for the lords. Or bankers, or whoever is in charge. "sell all food in excess of X threshold for Y price" and "buy all food to reach X threshold for Y price". The new system, by making use of bonds instead of region income, makes this more complicated (while preventing bankruptcy as well), but forcing every deal to be made manually by at least 2 people (if not 3) and putting an expiry date of a meager 2 weeks was not a good change, imo.

[Kwanstein]

If you think 100/100 is remotely viable, there is something wrong. 50/100 already uses a lot of gold. For example, with Golden Farrow (rough estimate) half of the city's tax income would go purely to food. That is a ridiculous amount and should never be that high. The Morekian duke who did that had lots of gold stored up but long term that would bankrupt him. As Indirik said, he should have been banned for that especially when compared with that realms demand 10/100. The solution to this problem is not just make lazy rural lords willing to sell because they get ridiculous amounts of gold. In what way is 50/100 underselling?

I could see 100/100 being viable in extreme cases, such as that of a drought or other shortfall. If a duke is bankrupted in such a scenario, that is no problem. After all, the game isn't meant to be easy and predictable; the possibility of something going seriously wrong serves as an incentive for players to play better. Smart dukes could seek out ways to acquire additional food-producing regions, or levy more control over the market, in order to keep the cost of their food down. Incompetent dukes wouldn't do anything, and so they'd be forced into bankruptcy and possibly even starvation. Higher prices, better rewards and larger potential losses would lend more weight to trading and encourage a more meritocratic system than what we have now, which basically neither rewards merit nor punishes lack of it, leading to very apathetic gameplay, which a lot of people don't even bother with.

[Penchant]

I could see 100/100 being viable in extreme cases, such as that of a drought or other shortfall. If a duke is bankrupted in such a scenario, that is no problem. After all, the game isn't meant to be easy and predictable; the possibility of something going seriously wrong serves as an incentive for players to play better. Smart dukes could seek out ways to acquire additional food-producing regions, or levy more control over the market, in order to keep the cost of their food down. Incompetent dukes wouldn't do anything, and so they'd be forced into bankruptcy and possibly even starvation. Higher prices, better rewards and larger potential losses would lend more weight to trading and encourage a more meritocratic system than what we have now, which basically neither rewards merit nor punishes lack of it, leading to very apathetic gameplay, which a lot of people don't even bother with.

Bull!@#$. Gustav is already spending his entire income on food and you want him to pay more. Cities didn't waste all their gold on food like you expect them to. A lord spending all of his tax income on food is an extreme case. You ignore that I didn't say it bankrupted a duke short term, but long term because they never make any money in your scenario. Also, bull!@#$ on the no loss part considering with the current prices I have heard of lords letting their city starve because it wasn't worth it. 500 gold is plenty and any who want that much need only not be lazy as I can sell my food for that much anytime since I am not lazy. With your plan, your making margrave of a city a position no one would ever want.

[Chenier]

I could see 100/100 being viable in extreme cases, such as that of a drought or other shortfall. If a duke is bankrupted in such a scenario, that is no problem. After all, the game isn't meant to be easy and predictable; the possibility of something going seriously wrong serves as an incentive for players to play better. Smart dukes could seek out ways to acquire additional food-producing regions, or levy more control over the market, in order to keep the cost of their food down. Incompetent dukes wouldn't do anything, and so they'd be forced into bankruptcy and possibly even starvation. Higher prices, better rewards and larger potential losses would lend more weight to trading and encourage a more meritocratic system than what we have now, which basically neither rewards merit nor punishes lack of it, leading to very apathetic gameplay, which a lot of people don't even bother with.

You are confusing competence with opportunity. Dukes don't decide who go to war, rulers do. Rulers don't decide how large they can expand, noble count do.  There aren't always the nobles to acquire more food-producing regions, and often, there are no additional food-producing regions to be acquired. High gold prices are only fair if the need to pay them is rare. If you must buy food all the time, then it's another story. And if every city had to buy food at 50 gold per 100 bushels, I'm sure all of them would go bankrupt. I doubt any single city can, at full population, afford to buy all of their food at 50 gold per 100 bushels. Much less at 1 gold per bushel. In reality, though, you'd have a few realms with insane surpluses that'd have their lords sell to their cities for cheap, and every other realm on the continent would go rogue due to starvation. That's the scenario you propose.

Your magical thinking that dukes can simply work everything out if they work hard enough is utter bull!@#$. Incompetent dukes will starve more often no matter what, but no amount of competence with compensate for circumstance.

[Kwanstein]

You are confusing competence with opportunity. Dukes don't decide who go to war, rulers do. Rulers don't decide how large they can expand, noble count do.  There aren't always the nobles to acquire more food-producing regions, and often, there are no additional food-producing regions to be acquired. High gold prices are only fair if the need to pay them is rare. If you must buy food all the time, then it's another story. And if every city had to buy food at 50 gold per 100 bushels, I'm sure all of them would go bankrupt. I doubt any single city can, at full population, afford to buy all of their food at 50 gold per 100 bushels. Much less at 1 gold per bushel. In reality, though, you'd have a few realms with insane surpluses that'd have their lords sell to their cities for cheap, and every other realm on the continent would go rogue due to starvation. That's the scenario you propose.

Your magical thinking that dukes can simply work everything out if they work hard enough is utter bull!@#$. Incompetent dukes will starve more often no matter what, but no amount of competence with compensate for circumstance.

Dukes can pressure rulers into going to war. Realms that go to war often tend to have surplus nobles. There are always regions to be acquired. I didn't say that cities would have to pay 50/100 for food. Why would every realm go rogue?

[Lefanis]

Didn't read the entire thread... tl... However, I made several sales for more than 50 gold per 100, before the cost cap, when the buyer could decide how much the food was worth to him/her.

[Chenier]

Dukes can pressure rulers into going to war. Realms that go to war often tend to have surplus nobles. There are always regions to be acquired. I didn't say that cities would have to pay 50/100 for food. Why would every realm go rogue?

"Realms that go to war often tend to have surplus nobles"? Seriously? Where on earth do you get that from? Because that's not my experience at all. What, you simply declare war and, poof, 20 nobles appear? It doesn't work that way. When you have almost as many nobles as you have regions, no, there are not "always regions to be acquired". When the regions at your borders already suffer from anarchists due to distance from the capital, no, there are not "always regions to be acquired".

I don't know where you play, but you must always consider that food affects the different continents very differently. Some continents have only realms with surpluses, or just about, while in others, very few realms have steady (although significant) surpluses. On Dwi, basically you have a few realms which really need food (D'Hara, mostly), a bunch of realms that pretty much break even (surplus is so small they don't like the risk associated with sales), and a few realms with have so much surpluses that nobody really needs to bother with the trading game at all and that very little can convince them to actually care.

[Kwanstein]

"Realms that go to war often tend to have surplus nobles"? Seriously? Where on earth do you get that from? Because that's not my experience at all. What, you simply declare war and, poof, 20 nobles appear? It doesn't work that way. When you have almost as many nobles as you have regions, no, there are not "always regions to be acquired".

When the regions at your borders already suffer from anarchists due to distance from the capital, no, there are not "always regions to be acquired".

Realms that go to war tend to be exciting. Exciting realms tend to attract players. On Dwilight, the realms with player shortages are all very peaceful, while those with large surpluses are all very warlike.

If a realm is so big that it cannot expand, then it can consider dividing it's lands so that it can.

I don't know where you play, but you must always consider that food affects the different continents very differently. Some continents have only realms with surpluses, or just about, while in others, very few realms have steady (although significant) surpluses. On Dwi, basically you have a few realms which really need food (D'Hara, mostly), a bunch of realms that pretty much break even (surplus is so small they don't like the risk associated with sales), and a few realms with have so much surpluses that nobody really needs to bother with the trading game at all and that very little can convince them to actually care.

If the realms on Dwilight are unwilling to sell their surplus food, then increasing the price cap on trade would be a good way of encouraging them.

[egamma]

I've always argued that the trading game should be the least onerous possible to non-traders. Tom seems to oppose "set and forget", but I really think that if we want resources in this game, they all need to be "set and forget" for the lords. Not for the traders, but for the lords. Or bankers, or whoever is in charge. "sell all food in excess of X threshold for Y price" and "buy all food chto reach X threshold for Y price". The new system, by making use of bonds instead of region income, makes this more complicated (while preventing bankruptcy as well), but forcing every deal to be made manually by at least 2 people (if not 3) and putting an expiry date of a meager 2 weeks was not a good change, imo.

Excellent ideas:
1. Automatic sell offers
2. change from 2 weeks to 4 weeks

Here's one more:
Change all offers over 100 into sell lots of 50 bushels. When a lord puts up a sell offer of 200 bushels, have the game automatically make that into 4 separate offers. That way, it's easy to buy a little and it's easy to sell a lot.

[Penchant]

Excellent ideas:
1. Automatic sell offers
2. change from 2 weeks to 4 weeks

Here's one more:
Change all offers over 100 into sell lots of 50 bushels. When a lord puts up a sell offer of 200 bushels, have the game automatically make that into 4 separate offers. That way, it's easy to buy a little and it's easy to sell a lot.

I like it.

[Anaris]

Excellent ideas:
1. Automatic sell offers
2. change from 2 weeks to 4 weeks

Here's one more:
Change all offers over 100 into sell lots of 50 bushels. When a lord puts up a sell offer of 200 bushels, have the game automatically make that into 4 separate offers. That way, it's easy to buy a little and it's easy to sell a lot.

Without major changes to the interface, that would make accepting any offers (buy or sell) much more of a hassle. Instead of accepting one buy offer for 300 bushels, I'd have to accept six separate offers for 50 each. And each of those offer acceptances would be a click on a "trade" button that would then reload the page. (It would also thereby increase the load on the server.)

[Indirik]

It would also flood the interface with zillions of orders. It's already bad enough when someone floods it with ridiculous offers. Like 20 public buy offers of 10/100, for 100 bushels each.

The trader game on EC simply doesn't exist right now. The only way to go is lord/steward, and just buy whatever you can, and then resell to know buyers later. The free market will only work with large numbers of both buy and sell, and traders that have significantly longer range than lords.

[Anaris]

The trader game on EC simply doesn't exist right now. The only way to go is lord/steward, and just buy whatever you can, and then resell to know buyers later. The free market will only work with large numbers of both buy and sell, and traders that have significantly longer range than lords.

...and I believe the only way that is likely to happen naturally is if there is a large area of the map that is chronically short on food, but rich, and another area of the map, of comparable size, that is chronically short on gold, but has plenty of food surplus.

Not only does that not happen given our current maps, any realm in the former area would fall apart due to starvation before the food would be likely to be brokered to them, and any realm in the latter area would not have enough money or nobles to withstand assault by a richer realm that wants the breadbasket for itself.