Merchants ?

[anaztazioch]

I dont like them, best it be to have em removed.

Besides do you think its logical ? 1 merchant pre city even big as Paris ? Aquisitions ? AI seeing through fog of war your merchants and their finance, to just pop out of nowhere and dump you 550 florins spend, 6 turns to get to resource that give you barelly 80/turn.

And GOLD known as most valuable resource. What happens if you have a capitol in same provice as gold ? You can have mines yes, but you can have mines in all cities not only in capitol. But you emrchants "dig" 50 florins/turn from gold in your capital province, while some foreign merchant can harvest up to 1200 with 5 or 6 finance !!! And whats worse, all gold resources are so cheap for you. I can get even 70/turn from WHEAT. I REALLY hate this.
When playing as Poland i can harvest 150/turn from gold in Prague with lvl 2 mechant, while Dannish and HRE merchants with same lvls harvests 400+

If the value of resources is dependant on distance to your capitol city, why there is differance in "base" value of resources ? Poland known for red dies, cannot get rich on them becouse they are in "neighbour" province to capitol. Same will be with salt mine in Wieliczka, Poalnd will not be able to get rich on it. Amber is also what Poland was rich from, but not exacly now. Venice gets more richer on it than Poland :/

And i havent find out that having forign merchants trading in your borders makes you richer. :/

I say that merchants should be removed and instead for them, severall buildings should be allowed, that will harvest resources. Mines allready are for gold, coal, silver, tin, sulfur and salt (if added). Ports should harvest from fishes, and fishermans hut for inland cities with fish resources. Leather tanner to gather furs, jeweler to increase silver, gold and harvest amber and gems (if added). Quarry to harvest marble. Clothier to harvest dyes, textiles, cotton and silk. Merket to harvest spices, sugar and ivory. Slave market to harvest slaves. Pasture to harvest wool. Farms to harvest Wheat. Winery to harvest wine.

[Averroës]

Download the two files in my thread on TLR resources here:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showp...9&postcount=25

They change the locations of everything. Gold is reduced to just 3 far away locations. Every capital, plus some of the rebel provinces, have 2 of a resource which allows your merchants to gain the Capitalist/Market Controller/Monopolist trait line. This trait line was unobtainable in the old version of TLR resources because no province had 2 of any resource. The thread with those files explains it all.

Your merchant will only earn 30-70 or so per turn at first on the local double resource, but he will also acquire that Monopolist trait line in a few turns, quickly getting him to 3-4 skill. Then you can send him off to the more lucrative double resource at a foreign capital a greater distance from your own capital. A 3 skill merchant will earn 360/turn on one of those distant double resources, then 450 with 4 skill and so on. It is common to have a merchant earning more than 1000-1200/turn when get gets old.

And if an AI merchant comes to your capital's double resouce, you can always send your own merchants to another close double resource which will probably be worth less to the AI merchant, so he'll leave you alone.

[acegogo]

I must say that it is quite good and made merchants more intersting.

+rep!!!!!

[anaztazioch]

I you allready assumed my merchant wont get aquisited in less than 3 turns... only If i put Polish merchants on Uranj silks, they are quite safe there... but Khwarzem likes to train their merchants on mine

I think that mrchants are interesting, but poorly made and makes me rage

[Averroës]

Try putting them on something unwanted, like the double grain at Câmpulung or the double fur at Pinsk or the double timber at Metz. The AI will generally leave your merchant alone if you're on these less valuable spots. Send your merchant to the closest of these immediately after creating him. Then check every turn to see when he gains the Capitalist trait. It should only take 3 turns at most.

The AI is going after your dye because it's more valuable to them than something closer. So choose something at first like the above which won't attract the AI.

After you gain Capitalist, which only comes by sitting on a resource which has two of the same type in the same province, you can then more safely send your merchant to more valuable resources. Try the ivory at Oslo, there are two ivory there so your merchant can continue gaining the Monopolist traits after Capitalist. That ivory simulates the Norse trade in walrus ivory and whale bone which competed with the African ivory trade. Another good resource for the Polish merchants instead of silk is the double spices at Baghdad or the double sugar at Cairo or the other double ivory at Dongola.

[Thorn]

I you allready assumed my merchant wont get aquisited in less than 3 turns... only If i put Polish merchants on Uranj silks, they are quite safe there... but Khwarzem likes to train their merchants on mine

I think that mrchants are interesting, but poorly made and makes me rage

There is a way to avoid that.. lowering the chances of a succesfull aquisition..

but in kingdoms merchants arent too agressive..

[anaztazioch]

There is a way to avoid that.. lowering the chances of a succesfull aquisition..

but in kingdoms merchants arent too agressive..

TLR is for 1.2 not kingdoms.

[Thorn]

TLR is for 1.2 not kingdoms.

I know.. that is why i said "but"

You can lower the chances of a succeful aquisition (i did it before i found the new features with kingdoms)

If you play Med2 You cant make the merchants less agressive, but you could make them less "lethal"

[acegogo]

but with Darth Ages it will be.

[anaztazioch]

Links dont work :/

[anaztazioch]

3 merchants under escort of 1 peasants on silk, all of them harvesting money and AI dont know how to aquisite any of them...

[Banjeeboy]

If you're into exploiting and cheating, why not use a console command to get money right away instead?
Seriously... don´t blame this mod, or merchants for such a silly exploit...

[Irishmafia2020]

wow - so you can have merchants in an army as a group go to a location en masse... I did not know that. I do use the exploit wherin I place a fort over a resource sometimes, but only if I own the province.... I didn't know that I could do the same with thing an army.

[anaztazioch]

i think you cant build on top of every resource.
I dont blame mod, its rather MTW that didnt think of that (poor beta testers)

[Averroës]

That never would have occured to me. I just assumed that CA would make something like that impossible! Heh. Ah, well. There is no way to keep that kind of exploit from happening, if CA allows merchants to work a resource on top of each other as part of an army.


I still haven't found a way to make the AI pay attention to merchants after the first few hundred turns. Eventually the AI stops spending money on merchants altogether and only builds armies when wars start heating up. At some point the AI lets all of its merchants die of old age and doesn't replace them. The map gets kind of lonely then. It gives a huge advantage to the human player later in the game. One can easily maintain a bunch of high skill merchants pumping out 20K florins per turn, with just 10-15 towns.

[Edward the Bear]

If increase priority of merchants, possible to make AI replace dead/dying merchants?

[Averroës]

That's a possibility. Not sure how to do it, however. And I worry that the AI will concentrate too much on merchants early in the game. I suppose it might be a question of balance. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Tiglat]

Hi,
i play TLR now at 30 turns and i' ve 12 regions but i can only have 1 merchant? is it o.k.? I can' t recriut more merchants in my cities! In MTW II i've to build an market before i get merchants but in TLR i can' t build a market. How can i get more merchants?

Tiglat

[anaztazioch]

Build base farming, than grain exchange.
This allows you to have 1 more merchant.

You can build those only in cities. Castles are gain exchange proof.

[Pelican Man]

Hi,
i play TLR now at 30 turns and i' ve 12 regions but i can only have 1 merchant? is it o.k.? I can' t recriut more merchants in my cities! In MTW II i've to build an market before i get merchants but in TLR i can' t build a market. How can i get more merchants?

Tiglat

Hello Tiglat,

the main reason being maybe you have not build basic farming, then grain exchange for a city. Basic farming needs to be built first before you start building grain exchanges. Then, you can build merchants. Now remember, 1 merchant per city. I think you can get two at Great market, but I am not sure, can't remember. lol anyways, give that a try.

THE P-MAN