The Trading Post - Tips & Tricks Exchange

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Hey! Can't be the only one doing a spot of trading to get ahead in the game, so might as well try and take some tips, opinions and ideas to brainstorm. I'm not the best trader (arguably I'm not even good), but I love me my caravans.

Tips

- Don't be a dummy like I was and dismiss the low value trade goods. Hardwood, grain, flax and fish can easily be a doubling of your investment, and sometimes you don't need to go as far as you'd need to with more expensive trade goods.
- The number on your Inventory (not trade screen) tells you the average price everything you have in there fetches in the surroundings. Wile the area is still unknown, and hard to test, it serves as a tell if a trade good is in demand around you!
- Don't sell your weapons! Smelt them and sell the resources, most of the time it's much more worth it. (Might be wrong on this one)
- Livestock doesn't count against your capacity and can fetch a pretty penny, keep an eye out for good deals in villages! Do be careful of the "Herd" speed penalty.
- Buy workshops in those cities with villages that produce the raw materials needed for the production of goods. For example, a linen weavery in a city with two flax producing villages. You can check what trade good need what raw materials here. (Not affiliated to that website)
- Keep track of prices your way. I personally have both a "spreadsheet" with minimum buy price, maximum sell price, maximum buy cutoff, and minimum sel cutoff, and a ledger where I track how much I have exactly paid for what. Doing it in a notebook to feel inside the game is optional but highly recommended for extra immersion.
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As you keep trading, you'll start to find that certain areas specialize in certain goods (northern lands produce fur and fish, vlandian lands have cheaper oil, olives, grapes...). Keep track of this, jot it down or something. Eventually, this will lead you to finding out trade routes that are profitable.
- Caravan and village prices don't fluctuate with stock, unlike city prices. If you see a nice price, either buying or selling, milk it to the max!
- Mind your capacity when trading. Don't buy things you plan to sell on the other side of the map. The economy is dynamic and you might not be able to turn a profit there, and you'll have wasted time and capacity.
- Careful when buying manufactured goods (leather, wine, etc.) and luxury goods (velvet, jewelry), since their prices drop off fast, and you might need to go to various cities to sell them for a profit.

Ideas

- I already suggested having a number in the trade screen indicating how much, on average, you've paid for a certain trade good. Might help determine if you could make a profit.
- Being able to hire extra security for your caravans, and improve them in other ways
- Right now, there are way too few money sinks in the game, and money can become quickly redundant. Ideas on money sinks are appreciated, related to trading so we keep on track here!
- Maybe have some differences in how villages, cities and caravans behave in trading (more details below).
- Carts and cart mechanics (like being able to hide some soldiers in them to take enemies by surprise...)
- Bigger bandit groups and other attacks. To spice things up. Mybe a rival wants you hurt to send a message, that sort of thing.

Known bugs

- Trade XP is gained by sellings items on a profit, tracked item per item. This tracking disappears on reloading, so no XP for the items bought in the last session.
- Sturgian towns have poor AI regarding what workshops to build.


So, what else do you think needs to be in the game? How are the roads treating you? Any wizened trader of many years got any tips for us newbies?

Pull up a chair and share with us!

Edit: thanks for the ideas everyone! Check the discussions below for more in depth details for all this
 
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- I already suggested having a number in the trade screen indicating how much, on average, you've paid for a certain trade good. Might help determine if you could make a profit.

Hi DeZako!
I've been keeping track of how much I pay for trade goods in a spreadsheet.
I've noticed that when I look at my inventory outside of any trade screen, the value given for my trade goods are very close to the average price I paid for them, calculated in my spreadsheet.
I'm 80% sure these values are what the game is considering when it calculates profits.
EDIT: maybe not ?

I agree it would be useful to be able to see this in a trade screen but if you're keeping your own record, you can use the numbers in your inventory screen (extra points for writing it on parchment with a quill :wink:)
 
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Hi DeZako!
I've been keeping track of how much I pay for trade goods in a spreadsheet.
I've noticed that when I look at my inventory outside of any trade screen, the value given for my trade goods are very close to the average price I paid for them, calculated in my spreadsheet.
I'm 80% sure these values are what the game is considering when it calculates profits.

I agree it would be useful to be able to see this in a trade screen but if you're keeping your own record, you can use the numbers in your inventory screen (extra points for writing it on parchment with a quill :wink:)
Really? I thought that just meant the price you could sell it for in the surrounding towns...

Im also keeping track of things, in a notebook because I'm a big nerd that likes to feel inmersed, but man oh man is it helping
 
I started my first save as battle-oriented and earned 200k easily by accepting mercenary and joining armies. When the army u in wins a battle, game gives you lords as prisoners which is a bad idea selling them and making money out of them is tooooo easy.
Than I wanted to stay out of fights because I was having toooo low fps on first days /it is gettin better every patch. I started as a trader. First I talked to people in taverns to hear profitable prices, and I bought 500-1000gold value items and sold to neighbour cities only. My first 5-10k gold took several hours. Because I was forgeting prices and new to all items.
When my trading skill increase/I guess, game started to show price rumours itself and I started to move according to them. Still when I move to a new city I was forgeting what to sell. I tried to make money, increase horses and capacity, than I bought a workshop. Started a caravan, bought second workshop and it costed me 5-6 hours gameplay only spend to trading.
The thing I noticed later in the game is Village production. Some cities have 2 villages with same product. These product is mostly cheap. I found a city with 2 salt village, I was buying salt from here and sellin to other cities. Than I found an aserai city with 2 fish, it generally sells around 10-15gold, and I was selling all fish to more inner-land cities for 20g each.
After 10+ hours of sellings I bought a caravan and 2-3 workshop. The things I noticed:
You may use a spreedsheet but after a time I started to recognize what are average prices. 7-9-10 gold for grain is very cheap and 14-15-16 gold is good to sell, 10-15 gold fish, 15gold hardwood, salt under 30, oil wine around 60ties, or other many units.
Animals are a good unit because they dont fill your capacity, there are some villages produce cow and hogs, but sometimes producers may sell expensive.
Choosing a workshop type with villages of the city producing material of that workshop is looking like a better choice.
Some regions are rich of some unit /fish for sea cities, after wandering around world you start to learn these areas.
The problem is this is mount and blade, you have to fight! and I went on leadership-trade orianted. I earned 100k from nothing with only trading, but I couldnt find somewhere to spend it. Later in the game I bought expensive stuff from cities for myself and followers but still having lots of money doesnt give advantage. maybe if you create your own kingdom it might be different.
2nd problem is fighting - killing - selling prisoners is faaaar more profitable. So I think reaching positive income is main purpose I will have on my next saves. Buying several workshops or having caravans, than everything is going smoother. Now I have more than a million but got much of it from fighting + 3k gold income per day.
 
I agree killing enemy armies is way too profitable and money quickly becomes irrelevant after a few months,I always end up with a million gold just fighting and selling all the stuff (when I'm over a certain amount of money I don't even take the loot to sell anymore)
The game needs a lot of balance money-wise.
When you create your own kingdom you start using influence more than money too,and in most cases influence is like money,you get too much too fast (maybe the first 2 weeks influence is hard to get but after that is just pointless,I have over 20k influence and I'm always leading armies of 800-1000 troops and voting 300 influence whenever I get the chance to improve realtions with other clans,it's not like I'm saving any influence)
 
I started my first save as battle-oriented and earned 200k easily by accepting mercenary and joining armies. When the army u in wins a battle, game gives you lords as prisoners which is a bad idea selling them and making money out of them is tooooo easy.
This is interesting, but I can trust the game right now with the balancing issues (low XP gain, cavalry being overwhelming, lord AI being a bit wonky...) you can't really guarantee victory with certain factions (my beloved Sturgians usually get their **** kicked in) so lords are a bit above my paygrade now (I'm playing super slow, still haven't gotten to max clan tier). Maybe it's a late game problem?

Than I wanted to stay out of fights because I was having toooo low fps on first days /it is gettin better every patch. I started as a trader. First I talked to people in taverns to hear profitable prices, and I bought 500-1000gold value items and sold to neighbour cities only. My first 5-10k gold took several hours. Because I was forgeting prices and new to all items.
When my trading skill increase/I guess, game started to show price rumours itself and I started to move according to them. Still when I move to a new city I was forgeting what to sell. I tried to make money, increase horses and capacity, than I bought a workshop. Started a caravan, bought second workshop and it costed me 5-6 hours gameplay only spend to trading.

You guys do equipment trading? I usually just sell them to the first village or town I find (mostly trash gear form bandits, no lord gear), but never considered buying and selling equipment without using it.

Also, a gripe I have with trade rumours is that they sometimes show cities on the other end of the world that can, when you get around there, have dropped the prices, so thats wonky.

You may use a spreedsheet but after a time I started to recognize what are average prices. 7-9-10 gold for grain is very cheap and 14-15-16 gold is good to sell, 10-15 gold fish, 15gold hardwood, salt under 30, oil wine around 60ties, or other many units.
Animals are a good unit because they dont fill your capacity, there are some villages produce cow and hogs, but sometimes producers may sell expensive.
Choosing a workshop type with villages of the city producing material of that workshop is looking like a better choice.
Some regions are rich of some unit /fish for sea cities, after wandering around world you start to learn these areas.

Those are solid tips, mind if I add them to the main post? Also, I think there was someone compiling prices in a spreadsheet to get the minimum maximum prices.

The problem is this is mount and blade, you have to fight! and I went on leadership-trade orianted. I earned 100k from nothing with only trading, but I couldnt find somewhere to spend it. Later in the game I bought expensive stuff from cities for myself and followers but still having lots of money doesnt give advantage. maybe if you create your own kingdom it might be different.
2nd problem is fighting - killing - selling prisoners is faaaar more profitable. So I think reaching positive income is main purpose I will have on my next saves. Buying several workshops or having caravans, than everything is going smoother. Now I have more than a million but got much of it from fighting + 3k gold income per day.

Yeah, the game needs some money sinks. Maybe organise sea routes, more buildings in cities, build hideouts, anything to sink money into that isn't an inmediate return on investment.

I agree killing enemy armies is way too profitable and money quickly becomes irrelevant after a few months,I always end up with a million gold just fighting and selling all the stuff (when I'm over a certain amount of money I don't even take the loot to sell anymore)
The game needs a lot of balance money-wise.
When you create your own kingdom you start using influence more than money too,and in most cases influence is like money,you get too much too fast (maybe the first 2 weeks influence is hard to get but after that is just pointless,I have over 20k influence and I'm always leading armies of 800-1000 troops and voting 300 influence whenever I get the chance to improve realtions with other clans,it's not like I'm saving any influence)

That seriously needs some rebalancing. Money sinks, adjusting income, all those nice things. Equipment prices are bonkers right now though, crossbows for tens of thousands... not very balanced.
 
Really? I thought that just meant the price you could sell it for in the surrounding towns...
Actually, upon further investigation, you might be right. I noticed last night looking in my inventory that the values were way higher than what I paid for the goods.

Another tip: prices when trading with caravans or villages remains static no matter how much you buy/sell in a trade. Caravans often carry >10k denars on them, so if they're offering a good margin (I now consider good margins to be 100-150% ROI) they're the most efficient means massive profit on your trade goods. However, caravans rarely offer cheap goods for sale. Thankfully, villages do!
Im also keeping track of things, in a notebook because I'm a big nerd that likes to feel inmersed, but man oh man is it helping
You may use a spreedsheet but after a time I started to recognize what are average prices. 7-9-10 gold for grain is very cheap and 14-15-16 gold is good to sell, 10-15 gold fish, 15gold hardwood, salt under 30, oil wine around 60ties, or other many units.
Animals are a good unit because they dont fill your capacity, there are some villages produce cow and hogs, but sometimes producers may sell expensive.
For me, keeping a ledger is more about roleplaying as a merchant and like you say, DeZako, it helps with immersion.
I've found it much more difficult to learn the average prices of livestock compared to trade goods (see graph below). The ledger has helped with that a lot!



As you can see, there's potential to make >450% profit on Mules! EDIT: (or an 80% loss :wink:)
 
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lol you dont need bother with rumors... Buy only green price and dont sell when its green... Most profit you get when you get red price when selling. Other good way allways walk to vilage ppl roaming sometimes they offer cheap items..
 
Another tip: prices when trading with caravans or villages remains static no matter how much you buy/sell in a trade. Caravans often carry >10k denars on them, so if they're offering a good margin (I now consider good margins to be 100-150% ROI) they're the most efficient means massive profit on your trade goods. However, caravans rarely offer cheap goods for sale. Thankfully, villages do!

Right I noticed that... Was thinking of reporting it. As beneficial as it may seem, I feel it's waaaaay too exploitable. Like, it's the same thing with villages, but those have a much lower amount of money on hand so it's not as easily gameable.

I'd love it if there was more distinction between the trading entities:

- villages pay more for processed goods, and offer cheap raw materials, BUT they have close to no money, so you'll have to do multiple villages to offload all the stock. Right now I think this is already somewhat in place, but I'd want to see the differences more accentuated. Stock doesnt affect prices much, they'll pay 61 for the first unit of wool, for example, and 58 for the 100th (if they could afford it).

- cities pay more for raw materials and less for processed goods. Stock makes the prices fluctuate way more than in villages, so the same wool as before would be sold at 70 denars the first unit, and 40 the 100th (for example)

-caravans offer a middle term. Medium fluctuation, medium prices. Sometimes cheap sometimes expensive, but never the highes or lowest pricepoints. Prices fluctuate somewhat with stock, but not as much as in cities.

Whaddaya think?

Also, RPing traders rise up!
 
I was able to buy grain for 4-5 each from Askar at some point. I bought the whole giant stack and then proceeded to sell it all over Carradale for double the price.

Good times, good times.
 
I was able to buy grain for 4-5 each from Askar at some point. I bought the whole giant stack and then proceeded to sell it all over Carradale for double the price.

Good times, good times.

Man you better hold on to that grain. Seek the "village needs grain quests" and do them on the spot, last time I earned close to 35 per unit of grain. Also, you might be able to sell it quite regularly for over 13 denars, my selling cutoff being 15
 
I was able to buy grain for 4-5 each from Askar at some point. I bought the whole giant stack and then proceeded to sell it all over Carradale for double the price.

Good times, good times.

Very true. Askar and the surrounding villages are the breadbasket of the continent. I buy by the thousands between 5-7/unit. And sell to war torn, food scarce areas for anywhere between 14-22/unit. Despite profiting from desperate starving people, you have the potential to make a killing off of grain. Fish too, dont rely solely on trade goods!

I wont spoil too much in hopes that people discover some routes themselves, but i will say a trip to the desert has its merits. Not even mentioning how much certain goods and livestock can be sold for in Aserai, stock up on plenty of cheap grain, dates, and Desert/Aserai horses. The northern realms pay top denar for these.
 
Alright, editing the main post with all your contributions, so newcomers have some more context!

Very true. Askar and the surrounding villages are the breadbasket of the continent. I buy by the thousands between 5-7/unit. And sell to war torn, food scarce areas for anywhere between 14-22/unit. Despite profiting from desperate starving people, you have the potential to make a killing off of grain. Fish too, dont rely solely on trade goods!

I wont spoil too much in hopes that people discover some routes themselves, but i will say a trip to the desert has its merits. Not even mentioning how much certain goods and livestock can be sold for in Aserai, stock up on plenty of cheap grain, dates, and Desert/Aserai horses. The northern realms pay top denar for these.

Haven't really gone that far south in my current run, might be worth it to go down south for a spell...
 
There are a few villages in the Khuzait realm that consistently sell extremely cheap sheep, butter and cheese (the price keeps dropping every time I drop by). In the early game, I found trading sheep to be a good foundation (since I didn't have any pack horses).

Regarding training Trade, I've seen a few people wondering if Trade xp is only gained for following the advice of rumours. The tooltip says you should gain xp any time you sell something for a profit (presumably whether it's mentioned in a rumour or not).

Maybe this was the case in an earlier build but I've confirmed in e1.0.5+ that Trade xp is earned for any trade that results in profit, including trades done with caravans.

On the subject, I think xp is calculated on an item-by-item basis. I've noticed sometimes the log has 2 or 3 separate lines telling me I've gained a level in Trade skill, instead of one. Gaining multiple levels is sometimes shown on a single line and sometimes on multiple lines. Whatever the reason, do you guys think this is a bug?
 
There are a few villages in the Khuzait realm that consistently sell extremely cheap sheep, butter and cheese (the price keeps dropping every time I drop by). In the early game, I found trading sheep to be a good foundation (since I didn't have any pack horses).

Regarding training Trade, I've seen a few people wondering if Trade xp is only gained for following the advice of rumours. The tooltip says you should gain xp any time you sell something for a profit (presumably whether it's mentioned in a rumour or not).

Maybe this was the case in an earlier build but I've confirmed in e1.0.5+ that Trade xp is earned for any trade that results in profit, including trades done with caravans.

On the subject, I think xp is calculated on an item-by-item basis. I've noticed sometimes the log has 2 or 3 separate lines telling me I've gained a level in Trade skill, instead of one. Gaining multiple levels is sometimes shown on a single line and sometimes on multiple lines. Whatever the reason, do you guys think this is a bug?
On topic of that it does seem that a reload will reset all tracking of what you bought at what price. Meaning that when you have a large pack of goods and sell it you will not gain any trade XP of the things you bought before the reload.
And yes, trade XP is gained on an per-item basis I would assume for the reason you stated. I once had a profit run that gave me +6 trade portrayed in 4 different lines. It also might be that total profit (i.e selling large amounts of goods with relatively low profit margin per item, like grain) gains less XP than selling one piece of jewelry for a large profit margin, although I have not yet bothered to check that, although it could be done pretty easily. I guess this could be true to make longer runs with few manufactured goods more profitable.
Also I do wonder if the selling price is affected by your trade skill directly, or if it behaves similarily to the combat skills, and you sell better the more perks you have (like 125 giving you 25% better prices, since you are eligible to 5 perks).
.
Some other things to note:
- Don't take capacity too lightly, the amount of time passing when you have large amounts of goods and traversing long distances is immense. You might find yourself in a totally different world than when you started.
- In the same vein: Do not overburden yourself with food items like grain early, because you can sell it for 5 denars more at the end of your trip.
- Do not dismiss selling goods for "green" prices. Some products have freakishly large green price ranges. I bought furs and hides for 22 a piece and sold them for 80 and 40 which was still in the green. Again if you are overburdened it might be totally worth it to sell for a small margin.
- Further, do not simply buy items just because they are green. I bought wine that I wanted to sell for 68+ was stuck with it for weeks until I could sell them. There are the towns where you can make still make a huge profit, but it is just not worth the hassle.
- Accordingly: Do not overbuy, especially manufactured goods as profit drops really fast. Generally for things like Wine, Pottery and Oil 10 is more than enough. And things like jewelry and velvet, two is definitely enough as well and usually nothing more is available either.
- Your pack animals slow you down greatly, so when you have capacity left, and will traverse Khuzait or Aserai territory (or any territory with horse pastures) shortly, just sell your pack animals and gain profit from them.
- If you find yourself in a position where you are too slow, indeed try to fight some bandits or looters, they all have sumpter horses and real horses in their loot table.
 
- Your pack animals slow you down greatly, so when you have capacity left, and will traverse Khuzait or Aserai territory (or any territory with horse pastures) shortly, just sell your pack animals and gain profit from them.
I'll add your tips to the main post later, just wanted to check this, sint the speed penalty only if you have too many? (The "herd" debuff)
 
I'll add your tips to the main post later, just wanted to check this, sint the speed penalty only if you have too many? (The "herd" debuff)

I actually do not know. :grin: I have not seen the herd debuff so far, as I have not delved into what and how things affect your movement speeds. In that case one would have to think about, whether selling of the horses is a good idea.
And to delve more into this: There are three different pack animals so far: The Mule, the sumpter horse and the camel, with the mule having the largest profit margin and the camel being dirt cheap everywhere I went so far (south and east, mostly). I could only sell it once for 40, while I sold horses for 60 and Mules for 120.
And while they do have different stats, they have the same carrying stats and I do not know if one does slow you down more than others.
 
- Do not dismiss selling goods for "green" prices. Some products have freakishly large green price ranges. I bought furs and hides for 22 a piece and sold them for 80 and 40 which was still in the green. Again if you are overburdened it might be totally worth it to sell for a small margin.

This is exactly why I hope they won't make that green/red thing happen on the main trading inventory screen. I find it fairly useless and honestly it hurts my eyes. At least make it optional so that I can get rid of it if I don't want to.
 
This is exactly why I hope they won't make that green/red thing happen on the main trading inventory screen. I find it fairly useless and honestly it hurts my eyes. At least make it optional so that I can get rid of it if I don't want to.
I like it, as it is a way to keep track of things without writing stuff down or making a spreadsheet. I do wonder though if these are global though, or just an average for the town you are in, or in regard of the last visit.
 
I dreamed to play merchant in the game. The dream died in warband due to the inventory mechanism. I spend the first 4 days in bannerlord to play as caravan. Maybe not a very good choice since it breaks away from the main idea of the game and quite boring. So here is so experience I learn from my caravan days, before I say goodbye to it.

Some hint on the trade skill. It gains exp only if you sell trading goods at good prices (red price only I guess). Even if you are making profit, if the selling price is green, you gain no exp. The game remember the buy backs so buying and selling in the same town gives nothing.

I think the game auto collect all the rumors for you when you enter the town, including the staying caravans. So sometimes you will get some rumors real far from you. Ignore those rumors. Keep record of buying and selling price is not bad, just sometimes the price is affected by some odd reason and cannot be relied on. Keep record of good produced by the towns is better. Sometimes you may find rumor of very low price of goods in a town, travel there just to find the town has no stock of that goods.

If you are not war-orientated, keeping more packing animals to increase your capacity can yield good money. Do the overbuying, as long as the price is good. Just don't over sell, cause the price go down real fast. Stock pile low price goods, as long as you can afford the denars, and travel to different towns, selling them in smaller sections.

The large range of low (green) price probably is caused by broken economic. The goods is not consumed and piling up in the town, make the price go so low. But there will be towns that pay high (red) price for that goods. So if you can afford carrying goods in your party for long time, saving the goods for those town can really bring good profit. Maybe not for hides, that the highest price I ever see is 95. The need for hides is just too low everywhere.

Grains should be buy at 7 or lower, but I will accept 9 to 10 if my stock go really low. I usually keep 300 stock when it is cheap, after I have 20k+ weight capacity. It can be sold for 18 or even 20 when the price is high. Usually 15 is a good selling price.

Silver ore has price around 120, so price lower than 100, usually at producing town/villages, is good buying price. The selling price can go to higher than 180, through you can sell 1-2 only before the price drops to 150.

Jewelry is a tricky one, the price can change so much and the stock is so low. It is like gambling. Usually buying price around 200 is good, and selling price around 250. But I see price of 300 in some rare case.

Fish should be buying below 10, and can be sell at around 20, Oliver can be buy below 20, and sells at 35, sometime 40. Food stuff is quite stable, just the profit per weight is not really good.

Flex buy at 8 or below and sell at 13, clay buy below 10 and sell at around 20, hardwood buy at around 15 and sell at around 23-25. I usually don't do these raw materials unless I have nothing else to buy.

Iron ore is a weird one. At some producing town you can buy at below 30, at other producing town, 50. So the price is odd. The consuming towns can sell for as high as 80, well, for the first few ore. Overbuying the iron ore, they may stay in your inventory for real long time.

Pottery is my favor. At the producing towns you can usually buy below 50, and at general town you can sell for 80 (white price). I find it quite stable but more test may need to be done to find out.
 
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