The Political Dynamics
This is the fun part of food. This section will be divided into three parts:
1. The Patron-Duke- Guidelines on how to use the economic strength of a duke: vast sums of gold
2. The Merchant-Baron- Guidelines on how to use the economic strength of rural lords: abundance of food
3. The Arbitrageur- Guidelines on how to do some more complicated economic maneuvers
The Patron-Duke
Dukes have gold. Moreover, dukes have a special button: the "Trade Settings" button allowing them to see the supply/demand of food in their duchy, as well as next week's supply/demand.
Dukes can leverage their power in three major ways:
1. Competitive pricing
2. Informal trade intermediation
3. Feudal premiums
Competitive Pricing
Competitive pricing is simple. A rich duke can bankrupt a poorer duke by offering high prices for food. While gold/food demand ratios are loosely equivalent, they are not perfectly equivalent. Some cities demand more food per gold produced. Moreover, some lords run higher tax rates than others, or have higher productivity. Thus, a city with a higher gold output per food demanded (through investment, good management, higher tax rates) can outbid another city: sometimes even a larger city.
This is a passive tool. The other city will be forced into either bankruptcy or starvation. If the duke of the other city is a general, marshal, or otherwise militarily involved person, the task is even easier, as they will be financing a unit. If the "rich-city" lord is, say, a priest, his/her costs will be very low (and temples are tax-exempt stores of wealth for such an economically involved lord). Thus, within fairly short order, the "rich-city duke-priest" can reduce the political influence of the "poor-city duke-knight" by offering rural lords better prices and, essentially, subsidizing rural development. Combined with feudal premiums, this tactic can be extremely powerful.
The primary obstacle to this practice is the banker. Most bankers like to standardize prices throughout the realm. Doing so makes this strategy vastly less efficient. However, it can still be informally managed: while a banker may standardize prices, they might not force quantity shipments. As such, the rich-duke can simply ensure he/she always sets buy orders early, and in huge quantities, and then personally, individually contact rural lords, arranging transactions.
Another strategy in a fixed-price economy is to befriend a rural or townsland lord that has lots of warehouse space, ship food to him, and constantly ship it back-and-forth, meaning it will not show up in surplus/deficit calculations. This tactic will make the rich city starve, and provide an excuse to break food price caps or demand more quantity, but it is risky, time-consuming, and harms the city, perhaps removing the comparative advantage in wealth.
It is worth noting that foreign lords can be included in this. There is no reason to neglect that juicy rural nearby ruled by a friendly neighbor. Contact its lord. If properly managed, this strategy can serve to undermine a "frenemy" realm.
Informal trade intermediation
Dukes are often well-connected, better so than many rural lords. If a duke positions himself as a "business partner" or a "food broker," he can arrange to purchase food from rurals, and hold it for foreign traders to acquire. This can be extremely profitable for the duke, and is made possible by possessing markets and foreign ties: so guilds are useful for a duke attempting this strategy. This strategy primarily serves to build trust and political capital on the home front if a realm has a food surplus.
If a realm has a food deficit, the duke can arrange to make food purchases in his city, and then control the distribution of it. Frequent high-profile deals with foreign countries can serve as a good platform for a duke hoping to become a ruler.
Feudal Premiums
For a duke hoping to secede, or simply wanting lots of political power, or who wants a larger tax base, a large duchy is useful. But why would lords change their duchy? Maybe personal reasons, which we can't always control. Maybe favorable tax treatment (though this is usually a small reason).
A difficult but effective tool to increase a duchy, however, is price discrimination. Offer better prices to lords within your duchy. This requires that the duke do two things:
1. Set buy offers at price X in his city
2. Send caravans to his lords' regions to buy food at price X + P (premium on oath)
Thus, he/she buys food from anyone in the city, but personally purchases at a preferential price (alliteration FTW!) from his feudally obligated lords. This solidifies feudal oaths and personal loyalties, and incentivizes other lords to change their allegiance. When combined with price competition, price discrimination can be a potent tool for undermining another duke.
The Merchant-Baron
Rural lords have obvious power. They control the supply. The power of lords is exercised in the same way the power of dukes is exercised, but inversely:
Price Competition- Lords can choose to sell to the highest bidder, even if that person is a foreigner
Outsourcing- While lords can find their own intermediaries, lords have numerous "helpers," be they dukes or bankers, who are available to help them arrange and get infrastructure for such transactions
Price Discrimination- Lords can control who they offer allegiance to
However, some unique powers also exist in the form of:
1. Withholding- Simply put: starve the cities.
2. Undercutting- Lords can undermine each other within a certain range
3. Inverse Bribes- Operationally identical to undercutting, but with a different objective: political favoritism
Withholding
A high-risk strategy certain to infuriate dukes who starve and bankers who get complained to. Withholding food is a last resort of lords desperate to accomplish some political objective. It is frequently counter-productive and gets the lord banned, but in some circumstances can be valuable. It is the equivalent of an economic declaration of war, so be careful about doing it.
If withholding is implemented, there are two basic types: vocal and silent. Vocal withholding has an agenda it wants accomplished, and declares that the withholding has a certain objective. It holds the realm ransom, essentially. Silent withholding is often unnoticed and can go on for longer for two reasons:
1. People just don't realize it's happening
2. People assume you're inactive for at least a little while
3. People will try to convince you to cooperate for a long time before they whip out the big guns like bans and fines
A note for judges: It is often intuitive to ban a withholding lord. A suggest a better solution is to fine the lord a sum sufficient to purchase his food on the black market, or to purchase an equivalent sum from another realm. That way, the lord's estate is not lost and the region is still managed, courts may be held, and the fiasco of banishing a potentially influential lord is avoided, but the realm will suffer significantly less (and trade can serve as a segue to larger diplomacy)
Undercutting
Just as some cities have a greater gold/food demanded ratio, so many rurals, due to similar factors, have a higher food supplied/gold ratio. As such, some lords can afford to charge less for food and yet enjoy an equivalent income (again, this is easier for priests, who can keep a region in line and have little need for their income). Undercutting food prices undermines other rural lords. This may not be desirable for a lord but, in some cases, might be.
Example:
City A gets food from two regions, Region B and Region C
Lord B hates Lord C
Lord B becomes a priest, invests in region, manages it well, and drastically reduces food price, and otherwise influences Duke A, gaining his/her favor
Duke A asks Lord C to drop price
Lord C either accepts, and faces an income decline (perhaps mandating higher taxes), or refuses, and loses face with Duke A
Again, not universally useful: but sometimes very useful. Limited in effect, however, because any individual region is tightly restricted in how much food it can ever supply, while cities managed by priests have practically infinite capacity to purchase food, provided they have sufficient warehouse space.
Inverse Bribes
A lord can set a sale price that is very low in his region, and ask dukes to send caravans there to purchase it. This earns favor with those dukes, and can be a stepping stone to greater power.
Arbitrageurs
I have actually decided not to discuss the intricacies of effective BM arbitrage because of Tim's notice that significant changes to the trade system are coming, and those changes will undoubtedly alter the availability of arbitrage.
