I don't see anything wrong with letting realms die that can't motivate their members to put in a tiny bit of effort. I'm all for making it a very small effort, but I'm against making it zero and fully-automatic.
Thing is, I do not see permanent auto offers bringing effort to zero. Simple fact is that those offers have to be set up and there will be times where they need to be changed. Beyond that, what I suggested only creates offers automatically. Someone still need to go in and click the BUY or SELL button. The only automation is getting it to market reliably. Additionally, in my proposal, any food buyers still need to keep their Food Fund stocked. Yet another piece of engagement. Depending on how the realm is set up buyers still need to click the buy button to fill the auto sell offers, or sellers need to click sell button to fill auto buy offers. The only way to offload the work from the lords is to have a trader or two do the buying or selling. Plus, should the economic situation change, the auto sell or auto buy orders will need to be updated or the region/realm will suffer negatively. The orders will require some maintenance.
So I am not really sure how auto buy and auto sell orders as I presented earlier, really take away all effort. It simply reduces the effort needed to get food on the market. If combined with capable traders, it has the potential to reduce the effort of lords to a healthy minimum but it dose not reduce the effort to nothing in my opinion!
With Traders (Lowest Effort Option):
Food producing lords set an auto-sell order that brings excess food to market and is done until that order needs updating.
Food buying lords set an auto buy order that brings food to market, continually stocks the Food Fund and is done until the order of Fund needs updating.
Traders of the realm do all the Buying and Selling on the lords behalf while they go off and kill things. (Go partial Buy and Sells!)
No Traders (Heavy Buyer Effort):
Food producing lords set an auto-sell order that brings excess food to market and is done until that order needs updating.
Food buying lords regularly check market and click the buy button as needed. (Go partial Buy and Sells!)
Food producing lords go off and kill things with food buying lords joining in as possible.
No Traders (Heavy Seller Effort):
Food buying lords set an auto buy order that brings food to market, continually stocks the Food Fund and is done until the order of Fund needs updating.
Food selling lords regularly check the market and click the sell button as needed. (Go partial Buy and Sells!)
Food buying lords go off and kill things with food selling lords joining in as possible.
Traders of the realm do all the Buying and Selling on the lords behalf while they go off and kill things. (Go partial Buy and Sells!)
The option I presented does NOT remove effort completely. It reduces effort and frees up some or all region lords to fight. It gives HUGE value to traders within a realm. I am sure there are downsides too but I am in the business of selling my idea right now so I will not go there!