Quote Originally Posted by ReluctantSamurai View Post
What does baseline-price-per-unit and price-elasticity-of-demand actually mean? Baseline suggests that there can be a modifier applied to the base price? and if so, what determines the value of that modifier? And does the demand column mean that if a potential trading partner already has that trade good, they might be less inclined to trade?

In R1 I remember the trade table listing imports vs. exports with their corresponding values, but I never really understood how those values were calculated except that goods were traded with neutral factions whether you had a trade agreement or not, but those values went up drastically when a formal trade agreement was actually garnered.

Another factor in R1 that affected trade were roads. IIRC, you got only baseline values (land trade) for no roads and simple dirt roads. There was a 100% increase in values for a paved road, and another 50% increase for highways. All values for city of origin.

Land export/import did not have any apparent separator (one lump sum), but sea trade had separate values for import & export (with the import value always being 20% of the exporters income).

Trade buildings also applied a modifier to trade values; as buildings were upgraded, there was a corresponding %increase in trade values.

I also remember distance and population level being a factor. Any indication that it has an effect here? (ie. closer meant higher trade values, more population also meant higher values)
From observation thus far, the base price (from the table) always factors evenly into the total earned per export in any trade deal. I'm wondering if anyone has seen that change over time.

Price elasticity of demand would imply that prices do change (and affect demand), so I'm not certain. Demand does vary, but seems lower primarily where similar goods are produced by both parties. Have to play deeper into a campaign. I'd be grateful if anyone who has could report whether they see export values (per resource) deviating from an even multiple of the original base price. That would shed some light on how the mechanic works this time around.

As far as roads, they upgrade automatically with settlement size. I doubt that there's any direct relationship since upgrading the settlement already increases the quantity of whatever resource the territory produces. The only trade modifiers I've seen so far are those given by character traits. Those apply to tarrifs and don't directly affect commodity prices. No idea about distance, but economic power is a consideration in trade deals and would be indirectly tied to population. Again, I don't think that has any effect on resource prices though.