Trade Routes and Castles

[craig@finance.econ.usyd.]

How many people on this chat line enforce the terrain requirement of the
trade route rule, ie only differnet terrain types in different cultures can
support a trade route. To me this makes no sense. What ever happened to
Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations theory of national competative advantage
that says that each nation should produce what it is best at and trade for
the rest. So why cannot Roesone farm barley for example and trade with
Ilien for cattle. The are no logical reasons that I can see that countries
in the same region (ie Anuire) with the same terrain (ie Plains) cannot
trade with one another. I can see a potential game balance problem with the
excessive wealth that some people here seem to worry about but personally I
would rather every regent be able to raise larger armies (I think currently
they are all to small), live in more luxurious palaces etc.
Opinions?
Another question does anybody else think that it takes to little time to
build a castle in Birthright. I cannot think of too many examples
historically of castles that were built in less than say 10 years. I couls
understand it taking less time if magic was commonly available but in
Birthright it isn't.

Craig

[Clayton F. Hinton]

At 02:44 PM 6/1/98 +1000, you wrote:
>How many people on this chat line enforce the terrain requirement of the
>trade route rule, ie only differnet terrain types in different cultures can
>support a trade route.

Me. It's part of the rules, and is intended for two things: 1) game
balance, and 2) needs of each province allow for mutually benificial trade
(plains province gives grain for stone from the mountains, which can be
sold at profit because of its relative scarcity and produce more revenues
for the trading organizations).

>To me this makes no sense. What ever happened to
>Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations theory of national competative advantage
>that says that each nation should produce what it is best at and trade for
>the rest. So why cannot Roesone farm barley for example and trade with
>Ilien for cattle.

Because this type of specialized economy is not possible without becoming
dependent for your very survival on something that is not dependable in a
feudal society: mass transportation. Besides, what you are talking about
is already considered in something called "Guilds."

>The are no logical reasons that I can see that countries
>in the same region (ie Anuire) with the same terrain (ie Plains) cannot
>trade with one another.

Sure they can. The problem is, that they do not have anything in large
enough quantities to trade to each other, that the other does not also have
in large quantities.

>I can see a potential game balance problem with the
>excessive wealth that some people here seem to worry about but personally I
>would rather every regent be able to raise larger armies (I think currently
>they are all to small), live in more luxurious palaces etc.
>Opinions?

You already have mine. The system works if you make it work, just like any
system.

- -Clay Hinton
chinton@mail.utexas.edu