Trade Connection

Trade is the fuel of economy. It transfers wealth, creating new jobs, producing taxes… Trade, along with resource extraction, manufacturing and research, is an essential part of every Empire that is not centered on pillaging.

Trade present itself in many forms. Players buy items they need, and sell what they have no use for, harvester and cargo ships deliver resources to the colonies, but this visible and obvious activity is hardly a tip of the iceberg that is going under the hood. I'm talking about the trades that happen between cities in the same solarsystem. While these so-called "wholesale" trades are not taxed by the government, they serve essential role of resource exchange between cities in the same system.

And to build and maintain a successful and prosperous colony, you need to understand, how this trade is conducted, what is affecting it, and how you can exploit its rules to your advantage.

There is no export

First rule you must take to heart is that colonies do not export anything. All intrasystem trading between cities is based on import and import alone.

Not obvious? Confusing? Let me make an example.

• You have two apples. I ask you nicely to sell me one for a credit. You comply. We exchange. You now have an apple and a credit. I have an apple and no money.

That's what you call export. You willingly share an apple with me. Now, a different example.

• You have two apples. I take an apple from you and give you a credit. I now have an apple and no money. You have an apple, a credit and a grudge against me.

That's how city trades work in Hazeron. You may call it "civilized robbery". We call it import.

Trade links

Trading between cities does not happen out of the blue. In order to participate in the trade, two cities must have a connection. There's four different types of trade links in the game, each have different throughput:

1. Roads. The road built from one city close enough to another one will serve as a trade link between these two cities. The throughput of the road is considered a base for all other trade links. I.e. 100%.
2. Wharfs. Wharf, beside being a manufacturing building, supplying the city with delicious seafood, also serves as a trade link overseas. Throughput of the Wharf is half of the road's. (50%)
3. Airport Terminal (same planet). Airport Terminals serve as two distinctive cases of trade links. When both cities are located on the same planet, the throughput of the terminal is a third of the road. (~33%)
4. Airport Terminal (interplanetary). In case of interplanetary exchange, the terminal's throughput is a quarter of the road throughput. (25%)

What this means in practice, is that you can build a city, that is connected to one city on the same planet, but not to any other.

For the purposes of import calculation, the best available link is always selected.

Importers

Trade links are good, but they only provide avenue for trading. Import itself is performed by special buildings - importers:

• Cantina. Good old crash place import what the citizens eat, water and alcohol. Import rate is

0.5%(base) + 0.5% per floor, up to 20% total.

• Grocery. Your go-to shop for all things edible will import food, water, alcohol and medicine. Import rate is

1% per floor, up to 40% total.

• Retail Store. As a complement to Grocery, Retail Shop will provide city with essential tools and materials for maintenance, as well as Air, armors, weapon and other necessary goods. Import rate is similar to Grocery:

1% per floor, up to 40% total.

• Broker. The ultimate end of every trade route in the city, Broker will import anything and everything. Miraculous in gathering raw resources from remote cities in one place, it wrecking havok when used carelessly. Importing potential of a Broker is huge.

2% per floor, up to 80% total.

Now, as you can see, the import is defined in relative units. The actual quantity is calculated from the available stock of the city the importer grabbing from, and is further modified by the link throughput. Check the Equations page for further information on the math involved.

This is an important moment to keep in mind: Current stock matters as much as your ability to import it. If you ever thought that "oh, I'm overproducting this item, let's turn the production off" - you've made very big mistake. There's no such thing as overproduction. Only too slow or not fast enough production. All your cities should always have everything they are using or producing in full stock. Exceptions exist, but principle remains.

How all of it works

It works quite simple. Every six minutes a city call its importers to grab goods from cities around it. Rules are applied and goods are delivered. Those familiar with games like NIM can easily approximate the rules to the situation.

For those unfamiliar, let me show you an example. Assume we have three heaps of sticks: heap A with 50 items, heap B with 100 items and heap C with 200 items. For the sake of our example, we pretend, that each heap represent a city connected inland by a road, and have one floor of a broker each and is not limited on storage. This means, each turn each heap… err, city can import no more than 2% of other city's stock.

Let's give our cities turns in the order of their names (i.e. A goes first, then B, then C, then turn is passed back to A), and take a look at the stock changes:

• A(50 + 0.02 * B + 0.02 * C) = A(50 + 2(B) + 4(C)) = A(56), B(98), C(196)
• B(98 + 0.02 * A + 0.02 * C) = B(98 + 1(A) + 3(C)) = B(102), A(55), C(193)
• C(193 + 1(A) + 2(B)) = C(196), A(55), B(100)

Even in this short example, the tendency is visible, but the picture will tell it outright:

Low-stock cities tend to accumulate stock, high-stock cities tend to supply other, but at the same time, each party make sure to not overdraw the others, with the shared stock of the system eventually reaching certain equilibrium. The system is self-balancing and is very powerful at that.

Reservation

However, due to constant whining from people mismanaging their systems, the reservation mechanics was implemented. Cities in certain environments reserve a minimum stock of some commodities:

• Air, Water - On a world that does not support animal life, a city reserves 13 units per citizen.
• Food - On a world that does not support plant life, a city reserves 10 units of each kind of food per citizen, divided by its food value.

How can you use it

Now, that's a very good question!… What? No, really, it is a very good question. But to answer it you should read the previous parts of this article. Do it now, please, while I'm finishing this write-up.