Can someon explain how trade works?

[Semper_Ducimus]

Ive read post after post. "OMG, trading is so OP!".  But for the life of me, i can't get it to work at all.


I go to whatever town.
Assess the prices.

I get my feedback.
Buying Soandso here, and selling it at SuchinSuch place will yield X Amount of cash.

Ok, so i go talk to the mayor.
I want to send a caravan, to SuchInSuch place.

And then.. drumroll, the option to buy SoandSo isn't there!

Well if its not there, then why the hell tell me, "If you buy it here".

I even check to see if the goods merchant has the item.  Regardless if he has the item or not, i do not have the option to send a caravan with that particular good to the city listed in the original assesment. 

Seems to me, trading isn't over powered, it doesnt seem to work at all!!!!

I'm very frustrated. I stayed up to 4AM trying to figure this out, and NOTHING i do works.  I need a step by step guide, because the minute detail of  this game.. hell this entire series, makes it extremley hard to get into.

 

[Mavkiel]

Look for cheap goods.  $100ish velvets, $20ish tools and finally $90ish spices. At those prices you would have a hard time losing cash. Exporting spices/velvets to swadian(err Swedish) cities is usually an easy profit.

You can pretty much never make a profit off of food items. Or shag.

edit: Forgot to mention close by cities tend to not be listed. At least in my experience. Also not sure what the rhyme or reason is for the city sorting. Its not alphabetical and doesn't appear to be listed by faction. So you gotta go through it carefully

 

[Trithemius]

The key (exploitable?) mechanic is that mayors offer caravans for whichever commodities are in the goods market in that town. If a commodity is not in the market inventory then it is not available. You can get around this by selling a commodity to the goods market, then setting up a trade route.


The way I do it is basically as follows:
0. Carry a single item of a couple of good trade goods (fur, linen, salt, spice, velvet, and dyes... although dyes are not that impressive it seems).

1. Check the price in the marketplace everywhere I go and locate: (a) a town/fort that buys the commodity high, and, (b) a town/fort that sells the commodity low.
2. Travel to the town/fort that sells low and visit the marketplace.
3. Check the goods market to see if the commodity you want to ship is in stock. If it is, return to the town screen. If if isn't sell your one unit of the commodity and then return to the town screen.
4. Visit the mayor, talk about trade, and set up a caravan to the town/fort that buys high. Pick the commodity and the amount, then return to the town screen.
[4.b.] CONDITIONAL: If you sold a good to the goods market now go and buy it back.
5. Escort your caravan to its destination.
6. Profit!

I have a good time taking Spice and Velvet from Crimea and the Ukraine (Kiev, Cherkassy, Kafa sometimes, the various forts in the area) to Narva or Dzhinsk [sp?] Castle.
In this case a Good Time = 89,000 from one large caravan! I do the longer run because then it feels less like cheating and I need to fight along the way. It also gives me a chance to camp for the night and read all the books I buy with my large sacks of money!

 

[Semper_Ducimus]

Thanks for the explanation, but at this point, i think im ready to retire this game, or just cheat myself infinate cash. Trade, IS NOT WORKING in my game.  Allow me to illustrate:

I asses the prices:

隐藏

Ok, selling velvet to Ryazan sounds profitable.  Lets see if the goods merchant has any in stock.

隐藏

Well, looky here, he happens to have quite a few of them in stock. Must be my lucky day! I should be rolling in the dough in no time!  Let's go talk to the mayor....

隐藏

What?  Just hides and honey? What about velet?  The merchant has it in stock, why can't i run a caravan?!

I give up.

 

[Finch]

The trade system is very powerful, but if you just want the money without the tedium use a cheat. To trade you do not need to assess prices. What you want to do is to keep a look out for items going for bargain prices such as your 100-ish velvet, cheap tools, etc. Run to a few cities, get an idea of what is the price range of items, to give you an idea of what is a cheap price. Once you know what is considered cheap, you will not need to assess prices. You buy based on the price you know to be cheap. Eventually you will have around 100K to 150K. That is when you start thinking to send out Caravans. And that is where the real profit is - Caravans.

You could not start a Caravan because you do not enough Capital to afford sending out a Caravan. You will probably need around 100K in Capital for expensive items like Velvet.

 

[Senior Jarl Raven]

Thanks for the explanation, but at this point, i think im ready to retire this game, or just cheat myself infinate cash. Trade, IS NOT WORKING in my game.  Allow me to illustrate:

I asses the prices:

隐藏

Ok, selling velvet to Ryazan sounds profitable.  Lets see if the goods merchant has any in stock.

隐藏

Well, looky here, he happens to have quite a few of them in stock. Must be my lucky day! I should be rolling in the dough in no time!  Let's go talk to the mayor....

隐藏

What?  Just hides and honey? What about velet?  The merchant has it in stock, why can't i run a caravan?!

I give up.

lol happens to me too, just sell it by hand, will also make loads of proffit

 

[Sir David of Derby]

As Finch says, the option to send a velvet caravan isn't there because you can't afford it. The game doesn't display options you can't afford in this screen. When you look at the market, see how expensive velvet is? That's a crazy high price for that stuff. Find a town where it's about 100 thaler and then send a caravan to Moscow. Moscow loves velvet and you'll get a good profit from it. For a large caravan at around 100 thaler a unit you need about 8,000 thaler to start the caravan.

 

[Manu]

Also keep in mind that assessing the market takes some times and it can happen that the refreshing of the merchant's store happens just during the assessing, screwing the deal when you're trying to start the caravan.

A slightly cheaty way around the issue is to keep one unit of velvet or spice in your invenory. If the trade is good, sell it in town, start the caravan (there's ome in sotre so you cna do it if you've got the money), then buy it back.

That way you'll never have problems with out of stock goods.

 

[Trithemius]

Thanks for the explanation, but at this point, i think im ready to retire this game, or just cheat myself infinate cash. Trade, IS NOT WORKING in my game.  Allow me to illustrate:

I asses the prices:

隐藏

Ok, selling velvet to Ryazan sounds profitable.  Lets see if the goods merchant has any in stock.

隐藏

Well, looky here, he happens to have quite a few of them in stock. Must be my lucky day! I should be rolling in the dough in no time!  Let's go talk to the mayor....

隐藏

What?  Just hides and honey? What about velet?  The merchant has it in stock, why can't i run a caravan?!

I give up.

Don't use assess the prices, eyeball the value of things in the goods market. Assess prices is always weird for me!

Just for example I normally buy Velvet in Cherkassy or Bryansk Fortress for about ~125 per unit. Then sell it in Narva (or Tula if I am feeling lazy...) for ~1200-~1800.

If the fancy goods (velvet, silk?, spices, etc.) are not showing up it might be because you haven't got a "rep" as a trader yet. Do one profitable trade route (salt from Kiev to Smolensk was okay for me) and then you seem to get the Trade Permit quest and can make trade routes for the fancier, more costly, goods. If you make enough and get the permit it seems to increase profitability somehow.

Also keep in mind that assessing the market takes some times and it can happen that the refreshing of the merchant's store happens just during the assessing, screwing the deal when you're trying to start the caravan.

A slightly cheaty way around the issue is to keep one unit of velvet or spice in your invenory. If the trade is good, sell it in town, start the caravan (there's ome in sotre so you cna do it if you've got the money), then buy it back.

That way you'll never have problems with out of stock goods.

This is the exploitable mechanic I mentioned (just in case the OP missed it!)

 

[Trithemius]

Thanks for the explanation, but at this point, i think im ready to retire this game, or just cheat myself infinate cash. Trade, IS NOT WORKING in my game.  Allow me to illustrate:

I asses the prices:

隐藏

Ok, selling velvet to Ryazan sounds profitable.  Lets see if the goods merchant has any in stock.

隐藏

Well, looky here, he happens to have quite a few of them in stock. Must be my lucky day! I should be rolling in the dough in no time!  Let's go talk to the mayor....

隐藏

What?  Just hides and honey? What about velet?  The merchant has it in stock, why can't i run a caravan?!

I give up.

lol happens to me too, just sell it by hand, will also make loads of proffit

A large caravan of Velvet from Bryansk Fortress to Tula normally makes me about 100,000 thalers a trip... that's a lot of profit! Sometimes you get spice or velvet "naturally occurring" in Bryansk as well - and that is when I fill up my personal inventory as well!

 

[Capt_Smith77]

I've found that starting a campaign where you use one or even two of your skill points for additional inventory helps early on. 

Caravans are good, but having additional inventory slots is great for storing more food, weapons, and of course trading goods. 

Velvet and Spice you can pick up in the south and south east, and sell it in Vyborg or other Swedish cities for maximum profit.  I believe Rzev Fortress also buys them high.  Never underestimate the profit you can make from oil either.  Spice and velvet isn't always available, but many of the cities offer very low prices on oil, say 45 thaler, and sold for 500+ up north in Tula or Ryazen.  I've even seen prices higher than 800+ for oil, which is fantastic for inventory sales. 

One thing I will recommend, if you use the fast track ctrl+space to make time fly when you're running your caravan.  Be sure you stock up on enough food for your party, and stay far away from meat that goes bad.  You'll also want to check on your food supply every few days or so.  You can pick up 50 or so cheap mercs at any of the local mercenary camps, but remember you must keep them fed at all times with a variance of food.  Dried meat and smoked fish seem to be the only two that don't spoil.

 

[khornebread]

Thanks for the explanation, but at this point, i think im ready to retire this game, or just cheat myself infinate cash. Trade, IS NOT WORKING in my game.  Allow me to illustrate:

I asses the prices:

隐藏

Ok, selling velvet to Ryazan sounds profitable.  Lets see if the goods merchant has any in stock.

隐藏

Well, looky here, he happens to have quite a few of them in stock. Must be my lucky day! I should be rolling in the dough in no time!  Let's go talk to the mayor....

隐藏

What?  Just hides and honey? What about velet?  The merchant has it in stock, why can't i run a caravan?!

I give up.

dude look at your money, you only have about 11k.  You don't have enough money to buy a small caravan. 

 

[khornebread]

BTW, you don't have to do a trade caravan or assess prices.

1.  Find a city that has velvet for less than $200  (Sich, Korson, Kiev, Chekassy?)
2.  Buy all you can (in the marketplace)
3.  Travel to Vyborg, Novogorod, Tula, Tver', Ryazan or Moscow (most money is Vyborg, least is Moscow)
4.  Sell the velvet in the marketplace
5.  Once you have enough money you can start caravans.

I am not sure what the best cities are to sell or buy Spice.  If the cites run out of velvet then hunt down some looters or do other misions until the market regenerates. 

 

[Pat007]

Someone stated it will not show you options that you cannot afford, this is not true.. plenty of times i have clicked and was told i didnt have the cash.

Reason they dont appear is you need a 45,000 trade permit to trade in luxury goods (salt, silk, velvet, spices) 

 

[Hellman109]

^^ Ive done my first caravans with silk before without a problem, and bought a trade permit 10 trades later

 

[ragingbull78]

You dont need 100k to start up caravans and you dont need a trade permit for velvet and spice.  i try to keep 30k on me when im making trade runs.  If you price around (normally in S - SW) of the map around Kiev you can get velvet for around 100 starting out and spice around 80.  When you find a city or fortress that has alot of those items cheap dont buy them right away.  go to mayer first and then set up a caravan.  if you buy all but one of the items it raises the price therefore you pay more for the caravan.  once the caravan is purchased then buy up everything in the market that you want to sell.    moscow area is good to sell these items but the sweeds pay better for spice and velvet.  unload your caravan at the city that you choose then ride around to see what the best price is for the items you have in inventory.  if you find some place that is better profit remember that for your next caravan.  ive paid 100 for velvet and sold for 1400 and 80 for spice and sold for 1500 on my best runs.  generally an average velvet run (depending on how many points you have in trade)  will net you 40-50k per run up to 70-90k just on the caravan.  figure another 10-20 on your inventory goods if you stocked up.  Once your done go back to the S SW corner and start over again.  once you paid for another caravan place all but a couple grand in the bank (merchant guild at town center) to collect interest on your money while you are traveling.  If you have 100k in the bank at 14% interest you will gain 466 per day.  that adds up when you figure at least 4-5 days for a round trip caravan quest.  When i start out a new game i try to get up around 60-70 calvery units to travel with me.  this deters most of the bandits around.  Also a good thing to remember is CTRL + SPACE  will let you travel alot faster without enableing cheats.  makes trade runs go alot faster.

 

[ragingbull78]

Oh and i forgot when your making the trade runs from the cossaks to sweeds load up on salt, tools and iron as well.  those 3 items along with velvet and spice makes for very profitable trade runs.  you can buy salt for around 25 sells for 300-500.  tools for around 100-200 sells for 300-700 and iron for around 25 and sells for around 250-400.

 

[Aeon221]

Honestly, they _should_ require a trade permit specific to a luxury good, and make that permit only valid for 7 days. So you'd pay 45k to 60k for the right to trade in velvet for 7 days, and it's on you to make a profit on it in that time. See it as a mandatory tax. And if you don't like it? Trade in the commodities, which'd be bumped up by 10x at every level (so 100, 200, 400) with a slightly higher discount.

And to get rid of the BS where people sell a unit of velvet and can then send a 40 unit caravan from a non-producing town, tell the game to check what production facilities in the town are non-zero rather than checking the merch inventory. Pick a random subset of them, and those are your allowed trade options for this visit.

That'd make people whine less about how OP trade is. You'd have a choice between **** margins or really ****ing expensive routes. And if you want to use it more than the likely one time, you'd have to have a minuscule party to move fast enough. I figure you'd make a net of up to 60k on a velvet run with that system if you were able to find a good route AND able to move really really quick so that you could use it twice (since travel between a Crimean city and a profitable central Russian or Swedish city takes 3-4 days round trip). And if you're moving that quick, your party is small. Which makes you vulnerable to bandits.

RUH ROH.

I'll mod it in when they put out the mod system. We'll see who actually cares about balance, and who just wants to whine.

 

[khornebread]

Check out the castles and fortresses too (especially Swedish ones).  I sold a spice caravan @ 2100 per, for 115k NET. 
Keep a spice and velvet in your inventory so you can check prices.

I am doing this with a trade skill of 3, that is pretty silly, there is even less incentive to put points into Charisma (persuasion = sucky, leadership is only skill worth anything)