Trade Theatre Usage Analysis

[Didz]

As you know I've been monitoring the 'Return On Investment (ROI)' on my expliotation of the Trade Ports in the various Trade Theatres during my current British Campaign. The current results can be found here: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=117356

However, I also set myself an arbitary restriction, allowing myself to occupy only one Trade Port per Trade Theatre. In previous campaigns I've always started my game with a trade race to secure as many if not all of the Trade Ports in every Trade Threatre, even placing sloops and brigs on them just to stop the other factions occupying them. This gives you a distinct advantage over the AI factions as they are then denied trade income from the imported goods. I noticed that each AI faction usually limits itself to one Trade Port per Trade Theatre, so I decided to do likewise just to see what difference it made to the way the game plays.

It's now just over 50 turns into the game and I thought it would be interesting to conduct a survey of each Trade Theatre to find out exactly what happens if you leave the AI to option to expliot the Trade Ports in them unopposed.

I have dispatched brigs to conduct the survey and shall report the results below:

Ivory Coast

Trade Port#	Faction explioting	Ships present	Value of goods being shipped
1	Great Britain	7	2352
2	Portugal	3	1104
3	Pirates	4	No trade being generated
4	13 Colonies	7	No trade being generated
5	Russia	7	480

As you can see the AI is wasting two of the Trade Ports completely (3 & 4) and its pretty clear that Russia is not making full use of Trade Port 5 (most of the ships it has there must be warships). Only Portugal is making full use of its trade port, the 1104 revenue its getting from 3 ships is exactly the same as the amount I was getting when I had three ships on mine.

Whats also interesting is that Spain, France and the Italian States all have large fleets parked in the Ivory Coast Trade Theatre, but none of the them are doing anything to secure a Trade Port, even though they are at war with at least one of the current occupants.

Brazil

Trade Port#	Faction explioting	Ships present	Value of goods being shipped
1	Great Britain	4	1054
2	Maratha Confederacy	10	0
3	Portugal	4	578
4	Ottoman Empire	7	91
5	Pirate	4	No trade generated

The Maratha Confederacy has what looks like a battle fleet parked on #2, with quite a high ranking Admiral in charge. Its not generating any revenue, because the Maratha Confederacy has almost been eliminated. It only has Goa left under its control and no trade ports. So, really this fleet would have been more useful trying to keep some sort of trade flowing rather than parked in Brazil doing nothing.
Madagascar

Trade Port#	Faction explioting	Ships present	Value of goods being shipped
1	Pirates	6	No trade being generated
2	United Provinces	1	0
3	Sweden	6	0
4	Ottoman Empire	5	137
5	Great Britain	11	3740

The United Provinces cannot generate any trade as the French Navy have occupied Rotterdam. In fact, the French have occupied Rotterdam for about 24 years now, despite the main Dutch Army being just a few miles up the road and basically a boy scout troop could have kicked them out into the channel, where the main Dutch Fleet is parked ready to blow them out of the water. Likewise Sweden have allowed Denmark to blockade Malmo for a similar period and perhaps would have been better served using the ships wasting their time here to actually drive off the Danish Fleet.
East Indies

Trade Port#	Faction explioting	Ships present	Value of goods being shipped
1	Great Britain	14	4579
2	Mughal Empire	6	703
3	United Provinces	2	0
4	France	9	308
5	United Provinces	7	0

Its pretty clear from these results that CA have done a pretty poor job programming the AI to make best use of its resources. The vast majority of the ships in these trade zones are just wasting their time, and for the most part the AI will be making a loss of the investment made. Bear in mind also that all of these trade theatres have huge fleets just parked and hanging around doing nothing in case by some miracle a trade port becomes available.

If you use the British figures as a guide to what ought to be possible you can see how far short of adequate the AI routine is.

[jsberry]

Does the AI ever attack ships docked at a trade port? I've found that all I need to do is park an Indiaman there and it is safe, even from pirates that are trolling close by.

[Didz]

Does the AI ever attack ships docked at a trade port? I've found that all I need to do is park an Indiaman there and it is safe, even from pirates that are trolling close by.

No, at least not in my experience, and I think thats the gist of the problem. By rights factions should be fighting over these trade resources but they aren't allowed to. That just makes the parking of large fleets in the trade theatres doubly dumb. In many cases they don't even raid their enemies trade out of the zone.

[Fisherking]

Does the AI ever attack ships docked at a trade port? I've found that all I need to do is park an Indiaman there and it is safe, even from pirates that are trolling close by.

It did pre-patch. I don’t know if it was nerfed or what. I had previously had pirates and other factions attack trade spots but it has not happened since the patch.

[anweRU]

I never saw the AI attack ships in trade spots, pre- or post-patch.

[Ordani]

AI navies never attacked anything parked on a trade spot. If you moved out of the spot anyone in intercept range would jump you. The trade spots are probably classified as some non-combat resource like a school or similar, likely related to why splitting fleets on them was so buggy.

[mmk]

Very good research work!

Also very intersting, that you too came across the fact that the French fleet in Rotterdam is never attacked by the Dutch, therefore the Netherlands become pretty useless as a trade partner after around 6 - 8 turns in the game.

[Didz]

The thing that surprises and disappoints me most about these results is that, even when the player deliberately restricts his own expliotation of the trade zones, the AI is completely incapable of making proper use of the opportunity.

In theory, up to five AI controlled factions could and should have been able to match Britains performance in terms of trade revenue, and yet the only one that comes close is Portugal which manages to make 1,682 per turn, compared to my 11,727.

[Monsieur Alphonse]

The very bad management of resources is one of the weaker points of the game. The AI is very good in building large fleets without any use. The reason why the 13 colonies always loose, is because they build a large fleet to protect their shores from naval invasions against the Indian battle fleets, you know all those 100 guns canoes. The enormous upkeep makes it impossible to defend its regions against the natives.

An other reason that weakens the AI is its priority in construction. The AI wants to build as much as possible churches and fisheries. A fishery is absolute worthless for the AI. I have seen Hanover build one instead of a trade port on its only port site. It shouldn't be that difficult to program the AI to build primarily trade ports. Population growth can be given an AI bonus. At the moment the AI is hardly making some money from trade. There are some exceptions.

[Didz]

I agree. To be effective the first goal of the AI should be to act in the best interests of AI faction it is currently controlling. That it clearly doesn't do, instead its sole aim seems to be to act against the players best interests no matter what the cost.

[Skott]

I'm not surprised by this info. I've long thought the AI wasnt doing all it could and this just proves it. Kudos to Didz for taking the time to do this btw. CA needs to work on this but I have a feeling they wont bother too much with it. My guess is if they do work on it it wont appear until their next game/expansion. I just dont think they are willing to spend more time on something when they can make some quick money like they have been doing. I would encourage them to try though.

On the subject of wether a enemy fleet attacks ships on a trade node or not I have seen it happen. Usually its the pirates as they seem the most aggressive in attacking trade zones but I've only seen it happen if I have warships next to the trade node. If you park your India Men ships on the node and move the warships away from the node the trade ships are left completely alone. This is why I dont mix my fleet with warships and trade ships on a node. I will put trade ships in the stack with warships until I get to the zone of choice but upon entering that zone I split my fleet apart. I'll send the traders to whatever node I desire but once there I'll keep my warships far from them. Out in the shipping lanes preferably. Just something I have learned to do since the game came out.

In the beginning I thought if I kept my warships near the traders they would be in a better position to defend them since some of the nodes can be close together. Experience has taught me it seems to attract trouble especially if the stack containing my warships is smaller than the enemy's stack. It doesnt happen a lot but it does happen upon ocassion. Like I said though more often than not its the pirates who do the attacking than other nations. I always figured the pirates are programmed to be more agressive in this manner.

[Didz]

Yes, I've seen that happen a few times. The a faction (player or AI) places a fleet close to a another on a trade post then an enemy will attack the fleet that isn't on the trade post and the trade fleet gets caught up in the action as a reinforcement. Thats why, as you say, its best not to put another fleet anywhere near your trade posts.

[Monsieur Alphonse]

Yes, I've seen that happen a few times. The a faction (player or AI) place a fleet close to a another on a trade post then an enemy will attack the fleet that isn't on the trade post and the trade fleet gets caught up in the action as a reinforcement. Thats why, as you say, its best not to put another fleet anywhere near your trade posts.

Unless you want that node, park a sloop next to it and wait for the pirates to attack. Before the patch it was my favorite tactic to get some extra nodes. I usually managed to get those from the Portuguese on the Ivory coast and the one from the Dutch in the East Indies. After the patch the starting fleets of the pirates are too weak to do that succesfully.

[anweRU]

The thing that surprises and disappoints me most about these results is that, even when the player deliberately restricts his own expliotation of the trade zones, the AI is completely incapable of making proper use of the opportunity.

In theory, up to five AI controlled factions could and should have been able to match Britains performance in terms of trade revenue, and yet the only one that comes close is Portugal which manages to make 1,682 per turn, compared to my 11,727.

That is probably Portugal's starting fleet, which it didn't recruit. Portugal starts out with one trade node in Brazil and the Ivory Coast.

I've seen a 12-ship Swedish stack, with only two indiamen, the rest being 5th and 6th rates. Highly inefficient...

[jsberry]

splitting fleets on them was so buggy.

Not "was" - it still is!

[Fisherking]

I agree. To be effective the first goal of the AI should be to act in the best interests of AI faction it is currently controlling. That it clearly doesn't do, instead its sole aim seems to be to act against the players best interests no matter what the cost.

Yes, indeed, I think that is why trade partners allow their ports to be blockaded and never try to remove them.

There seems to be several AIs in the game. Each faction has a campaign AI and a battle AI. Then we have the overall game with an AI god who tries to sink the player and has the various other AIs behave stupidly. All those factions are starved for money and troops but the only thing that seems to matter is what the AI god directs.

It is just what I think but I feel it spoils the game. What is your strategy to defeat god?

[Monsieur Alphonse]

What is your strategy to defeat god?

Become an atheist.

[Slaists]

The thing that surprises and disappoints me most about these results is that, even when the player deliberately restricts his own expliotation of the trade zones, the AI is completely incapable of making proper use of the opportunity.

In theory, up to five AI controlled factions could and should have been able to match Britains performance in terms of trade revenue, and yet the only one that comes close is Portugal which manages to make 1,682 per turn, compared to my 11,727.

The part of the AI that deals with trade nodes is REALLY crappy... Whenever I fight a stack of AI's ships on the nodes I find out that most of the ships there are war ships not earning any revenue.

AI factions lose trade ships while auto-fighting pirates/other AI factions. On several occasions I've fought AI's 5-10 ship stacks near Europe/in the Mediterranean, which were composed entirely of Indiamen. For some reason, AI fails to send these to the trade theaters and rather uses Indiamen stacks as warships whereas real warships end up sitting on trade nodes. I guess, sloppy
AI logic (lack of it) is behind that absurdity.

Another factor that does not help AI build economy is abundance of fishing and war ports, severely limiting AI's trading capacity and making it's trade very risky since a single boat can destroy/block the entire trade of a faction owning a single trading harbor.

[Prodigal]

The two factions that start with units on trade spots have mixed fleets, the only logical reason the dev's would do that would be to provide fleet protection, which leads to the conclusion that trade spots were/are meant to be being raided. That they are not looks like a pretty obvious issue, bug may be too strong.

There are some other fleet problems that are probably considered more pressing, but trade spots attacks, and a tweaked fleet generation system that considered increasing faction wealth where a trade spot has been captured would be quite a major game improvement.

[jsberry]

The part of the AI that deals with trade nodes is REALLY crappy... Whenever I fight a stack of AI's ships on the nodes I find out that most of the ships there are war ships not earning any revenue.

AI factions lose trade ships while auto-fighting pirates/other AI factions. On several occasions I've fought AI's 5-10 ship stacks near Europe/in the Mediterranean, which were composed entirely of Indiamen. For some reason, AI fails to send these to the trade theaters and rather uses Indiamen stacks as warships whereas real warships end up sitting on trade nodes. I guess, sloppy
AI logic (lack of it) is behind that absurdity.

It's beyond sloppy. Sloppy would be one set of over-generalized rules that does not work well in every case. That's not what we have.

What we have is an AI that specifically decides to make exceptions to the general rules, in the worst possible cases.

For example, trade spots are easy to attack, can be vulnerable, and are valuable things to take. It's the BEST place to attack an enemy, both because his merchant ships there will be weak, and because you cause immediate financial harm, and because you can take it for yourself. However, it is the ONE place the AI will NOT attack the human. (It is understandable why pirates don't attack there - they can't trade but can raid, so they'd rather be a parasite that does not kill the host - but why don't the other factions attack there?)

I had noticed the use of warships in trade spots, but had not noticed the paradox of usinig Indiamen to fight on the high seas. If this is the case, it is another intentional exception to make the game WORSE.

WHY???

[al Roumi]

The two factions that start with units on trade spots have mixed fleets, the only logical reason the dev's would do that would be to provide fleet protection, which leads to the conclusion that trade spots were/are meant to be being raided. That they are not looks like a pretty obvious issue, bug may be too strong.

There are some other fleet problems that are probably considered more pressing, but trade spots attacks, and a tweaked fleet generation system that considered increasing faction wealth where a trade spot has been captured would be quite a major game improvement.

Labelling this a bug or issue is misleading and IMO irrelevant. It's a failure of the AI to perform what, to the Human player, is a basic, if not essential procedure. With the consequence of cippling the AI controlled factions and handing an un-merited advantage to the player.

Personally, I'd rank this as high as the inability to perform naval invasions. AI controled France, GB, UP, Spain and Protugal are all economically crippled by their inability to trade as effectivley as the player.

[Didz]

AI wise those factions that can trade should trade to the best of their ability, and those that can't should be hiring privateers/pirates to prey on those that can.

[AussieGiant]

God, I hope they fix this crap!!

Good work Didz, thanks for the analysis.

[Hosakawa Tito]

I notice in my UP campaign that the commodity price drops even if I just swap an Indiamen Merchant vessel for a Fluyt on a trade spot. I didn't add an extra vessel to the spot just swapped to use the Fluyt's firepower to attack a Pirate fleet in the East Indies trade theater.

[Didz]

I notice in my UP campaign that the commodity price drops even if I just swap an Indiamen Merchant vessel for a Fluyt on a trade spot. I didn't add an extra vessel to the spot just swapped to use the Fluyt's firepower to attack a Pirate fleet in the East Indies trade theater.

I think you've posted this in the wrong thread.

This thread is specifically analysing the usage made of Trade Theatres by the AI, or as it turns out the inability of the AI to make use of Trade Theatres.

I did in fact, do a thorough analysis of the Return On Investment (ROI) possible from each Trade Theatre here:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=117356

What this shows is that the Trade Value of a commodity does vary over time, and is dependant upon the world market for that commodity not just your own level of shipment.

Check out the figures over there and see if they vary significantly from yours.

[Papewaio]

Awesome work Didz!

I would much rather a smart AI rather than artificial bonuses to make up for poor programming.

Although it does seem that some value is inverted if Warships are on trade zones and Trade ships are in war zones. I doubt that it is that simple... but none of us get un-confused with double negatives.