MOD: Specialized Trading Ports

[RedKetchup]

yeah i did all his toolbars the way i am always doing them, a bit sligtly different

[JamieIdle2.0]

yeah i did all his toolbars the way i am always doing them, a bit sligtly different

My programming teachers would be ashamed of me, but I am so grateful that @RedKetchup could help me!

[slink]

I am glad you got the help that you needed, @JamieIdle2.0.

[Nilla]

I am sorry to be the bad girl but again. 

I am sure, I am not the only one, that don't find everything just great. But it seems I am more or less the only one, who dares to tell. That doesn't mean that I do not appreciate your work. It is quite the opposite. If I didn't like it, I wouldn't care and I wouldn't say one thing. ( I am sure @RedKetchup is really mad with me because I sometimes criticise his work. I do this because I really love what he is doing     )

Please @JamieIdle2.0 don't be mad at me, I think your specialized ports have some problems, if you want to use them for a big trading economy (I think this is what you want, I mean not problem, but a possibility to use them in a big trading economy)

In the following I will talk about a big trading economy. If you only want to use trade as a supplement to the normal way to support the people, I am sure it works well. I am also not talking about the CC-mod. (one thing I really do not want to say anything about  )

The idea that the merchants buy the things they sell to a lower price is interesting, and it seems to be quite real life, too. Why should anyone want to buy something he sells to the same price? On what should he live?

But

This makes ale- and wood to the only main export-goods again, especially if you want to use the automatic trade function.   

What is if you want to use the creamery- and bakery- products? You buy milk from the Fruit and Protein Merchant or grain from the Vegetable and Grain Merchant, but you cannot sell the products you produce to the same merchant, if you want a good price. ( I suppose Cheese=protein, Bread=grain ) You may solve this with a variety of products, (sell the cheese to the grain-guy, bread to the milkman and ale to the general food-guy) but than you must trade fully manual and also have a lot of different goods in each port. So again if you want to build big ; It's ale! And I don't think, this is what you wanted.

Another "problem" you get in a big economy, if you combine farming and trade (@irrelevant did it that way in his 6000-pop town, and so did I in my biggest settlement) You are more or less selfsufficent on grain and vegetables and buy fruit and nuts (or other cheap protein). If you build Food-Ports, 1 of 3 tradesmen will be uninteresting (OK a bit better than 2 of 5 in the vanilla-version) but still annoying. And again; I don't think you wanted this.

Do I have any suggestions how to change this?

Not really. As i said in my other thread; It is quite an impossible task to change the trade in a way that it fits into each different kind of game. But maybe one thing; if the fruit-guy would pay less for ale, it would make it more compareable to cheese and bread. And perhaps think about, if it is really nessesary/interesting to have these 3 different merchants, all bringing food.

[JamieIdle2.0]

@Nilla based on your feedback I made the following changes: Food merchants no longer buy back what they sell at a reduced price. This makes bread and cheese more viable trade items since you can't distinguish raw goods like grain from processed goods like bread. I did the same thing for the merchants that sold textiles.

http://banishedinfo.com/mods/view/613-Specialized-Trading-Posts#description

[Elfecutioner]

You guys are serious masochists! I not only auto-trade after 6 or 8 ports, I'd like to find a way to eliminate that infernal bong, bong, bong every time a merchant lands.

You can manually select which categories you want to trigger event notifications. Unfortunately, merchants falls under the category of all town events, which includes nomads.

[rkelly17]

You can manually select which categories you want to trigger event notifications. Unfortunately, merchants falls under the category of all town events, which includes nomads.

Exactly. What I hope for someday is a more fine-tuned notification system. Early in the game I want to know when traders arrive, later not so much so. And I always want to know when nomads show up. I can dream, eh?

[Nilla]

Now @JamieIdle2.0, I am finally testing your specialized trading ports  (made a couple of weeks Banished brake). And I can say; work well so far.

I try them in my game with no schools, so the conditions are a bit special, but I think it would work similar (or better) in a normal game. This game is normal in another aspect. It is not a trading-game. I use trade as a supplement to my own production. I am in year 34, almost 800 people. I have 7 trading ports. I built them in this order:

General Trading port (vanilla) (why do everybody call the original for vanilla in my world that's a spice for cakes and deserts)
Raw Material
Food
Food
Raw Material
Finished Goods
Food

I noticed one big difference between the old port and this specialized ones at the beginning (until about 200-300 people ?): The vanilla merchant brought a lot more stuff, than the specialized ones. It is not bad, much more balanced than the original.

The most agreeable thing with the Food and especially the Raw Material Ports is, that you know, that there will be another load of goods next year. You don't have to buy much too much, just in case.  I order logs, iron, stone and wool. The merchant brings all of it every year, sometimes more, sometimes less, but at least so far, always enough. I don't buy  very much food yet. Mostly I need cherries. But I also order wheat, milk and honey. Even if I do not buy from every merchant yet, everyone will be useful later.

The one that doesn't please me, is the Finished Goods Port. In this game with the uneducated work force, tool production is a big problem. I want to buy tools! That's the reason I built the Finished Goods Port. I have had it about 8 years so far and except once (as I ordered the tools) there has only been textile merchants! And they bring .......wool !!!!!(finished goods??) I don't know if it is bad luck or if this port is meant to be used more or less only with the CC mod. I would prefere one merchant, that only bring finished goods (if I want wool, I buy it from the rawmaterials guy). One more thing about this port; the merchant only pay 6 for ale. I don't know if it is intentional. I haven't seen it anywhere else. It doesn't bother me, just want to tell you.

I will go on playing this game for a while. If I make more observations, when it grows bigger, I will tell you.

[slink]

Calling something unchanged "vanilla" probably comes from the world of ice cream, where all flavors start with "plain vanilla" ice cream.  I personally have been calling the buildings that came with the game "standard" or "original".

[chillzz]

[off topic]
yes and no on the ice cream, because most flavours don't even contain or start from vanilla..
however plain - vanilla, was the standard / cheapest taste of ice (in the Americas ?) due to artificial vanilla. basically, 'plain vanilla' became a typical American English synonym for normal, bland, common, ordinary, simple etc.

and yes original/standard fits much better.

[Nilla]

Thanks for the explanation @slink and @chillzz . It is probably so. I personally like the Italian kind of icecream better than the American and that is not based on vanilla, so I couldn't find this explanation myself.

Now I must tell. I did complain this afternoon, that I got no tools in the Finished Goods Port. I just start the game again and the first merchant boat I look into on that port...........

brings 1000 very badly needed tools  (70 tool-less persons)

It has happened before. If you have some problems; make some complains in this forum and try to play again.

This game has a soul!   

[slink]

yes and no on the ice cream, because most flavours don't even contain or start from vanilla..

I find either vanilla ice cream listed explicitly in the description, or vanilla/vanillin listed as an ingredient, in every flavor in my freezer (Chocolate Caramel Commotion (brown base), Mint Chip (green base), Butter Pecan (yellowish white base), and Cookies and Cream (white base)).

[rkelly17]

I find either vanilla ice cream listed explicitly in the description, or vanilla/vanillin listed as an ingredient, in every flavor in my freezer (Chocolate Caramel Commotion (brown base), Mint Chip (green base), Butter Pecan (yellowish white base), and Cookies and Cream (white base)).

Now THAT is what I call a freezer! 

I'd accept an invitation to a home with that sort of selection any day--though a bit hard to get out today. We're not in as bad a shape as Buffalo, but the weather seems to think it's February instead of November. I guessed wrong this year and my appointment for winter tires isn't until Friday morning.

By the way, have you thought of adding Pralines and Cream to your selection? Then I'm in for sure. 

[chillzz]

I find either vanilla ice cream listed explicitly in the description, or vanilla/vanillin listed as an ingredient, in every flavor in my freezer (Chocolate Caramel Commotion (brown base), Mint Chip (green base), Butter Pecan (yellowish white base), and Cookies and Cream (white base)).

Wow, nice selection of ice-cream tastes But must be either a manufacturer thing (easier) to have vanilla as base or as ingredient, or must be a 'local/national' taste.  In all the recipes I found (and used while I was a part time cook during school/study), and assortments in my freezer I cannot find any vanilla  in the ice cream, except of course the vanilla ice cream
chocolate ice cream : dark chocolate, full fat milk, cream, sugar, egg yolks.
Lemon ice cream : lemon juice, lemon zest, sugar, milk, cream, egg yolks.

to go back to our favorite game : isn't there a mod with ice cellars/cave, so we can collect ice in winter and keep everything (ale, fruits, meat) in cold storage.. and maybe even an medieval ice cream shoppe (cream, fruit + ice) = icecream..

[rkelly17]

A bit of a report. I'm currently working on a town where I have used the modded TPs. I started with 1, then 2, seed and livestock TPs. The merchants came regularly, but the luck of the draw kept them from going crazy. I started on medium with wheat and beans. The first merchant brought sheep, so I started a herd. Then, wouldn't you know it, for the next several game years merchants brought nothing but wheat, beans and sheep. It took quite a while to get all the seeds and livestock. After I had all the seeds and livestock I tore down the two original TPs and replaced them with one food and one "finished goods" TP in case of emergencies. I've stocked those with ale but haven't bought much.

As this was going on I was able to get apple and ale production going, so I built 1, then a second, then a third "raw materials" TP where I gave orders to buy stone and iron. At one of the TPs I put in an order for stone and iron. After about ten game years I was so inundated with stone and iron I had to suspend buying and end orders. 16,000+ stone! from 3 TPs! These things are super efficient. For a time they were going through ale faster than I could get it produced, so I eventually had 7 breweries making hard cider from 12 3X15 orchards. Now that I've had to reduce purchases, I also limited ale production (don't want the drinking to interfere with work, after all) and I have more apples than I know what to do with.

So, my experience is that I can do with 5 TPs what used to take 15 or more. I'm now at about 400 or so citizens and we'll see when I need to resume active trading to supply the needs. Even after 3 or 4 game years with no purchases I still have 14,000 stone and 5,000 iron. I might start buying some logs, but so far clearing for farms and pastures has supplemented my foresters enough to keep builders and woodcutters both happy.