I have a question regarding the regency collection of thieves/guilders
and their trade routes.

The book says: Trade Route Thief/Guilder (1 RP per GB produced)

Now does this mean the that the character gets a regency point for every
gold bar that he makes on the trade route, or does he get a regency
point for every gold bar the trade route is worth. I'll explain this
with an example.

Trader Alex establishes a trade route between province Wesbralen (7/0)
and Aerele (4/1)
This route potentially delivers (7+4)/2=5,5 is 5 Gold bar. (Always round
down they get enough money as it is)
However Alex has to pay 2 Gold bars in taxes and 1 Gold bar for caravan
guards.
Thus the route nets him only 2 Gold bars per turn.

The question is how much regency does he collect.
A The potential of the trade route:
This means he collects 5 RP for this route, the rationale being that
he collects the
regency because of the amount trade that is flowing through his
hands. The regency
can't be effected by an arbitrary overhead.
B The net of the trade route:
This would mean that Alex only collects 2 RP since that is the net
profit he gets out of
this trade route, the rationale here is that somehow the guilder
gets the extra regency
only from the money that he makes.

System A is the most simple and seems the most attractive since it
doesn't depend on arbitrary taxes and other expenditures to determine
the regency collected.
System B is more work since guard costs have to be allocated and taxes
deducted. It does help however in keeping the Traders in check since
they can't jump ahead as they would otherwise do.
(compare the starting fighter/mage/priest :
Turn 1 create/create/realmrule >collection max 2rp
with the thief/guilder
Turn 1 create/rule/traderoute >collection 6rp)

Another question related to this matter is the question of the trade
chain.
In a trade chain a trader expands on an existing trade route forging
extra stops onto it.
For this expansion he collects extra Gold bars and consequently extra
Regency. This would seem obvious.
The interesting point however is something else mentioned in the
description of the trade chain action: "In addition, the guilders who
agreed to the trade routes collect 1 GB per province beyond the second
each domain turn."
This means that the guild holders at the different stops of the chain
also collect money from this chain. How is this money divided and do
they get regency (if eligible)
i.e. If Alex of the previous example expands his trade route between
Wesbralen and Aerele with a stop in Ilien (7/0). He would collect
((7+7+5)/3)+1=7 Goldbar
Bertram the only guild holder in Aerele would get 1 Goldbar.
In Ilien however there are to guild holders Cecil(3) and Dirk(4) who
gets the goldbar ??
One would say the that either the extra gold goes to the main trader or
it is divided equally.
No regency should be collected for these extra goldbars however,
otherwise all guilders would cooperate and create a tradechain of 50
provinces, netting each trader 48 goldbars and 48 regency (except for
the owner who would collect a little more)

One other question concerning the trade chain is this one:
Does each link in the chain constitute a traderoute ??
A Each link is a trade route:
consequence begin and end province one traderoute slot, stops two
traderoute slots
taken. This is very expensive for the other traders since they are
hardly able to create
their own routes.
B Each province visited takes a traderoute slot
consequence begin, stop, and end province one traderoute slot taken.
This leaves
some room for the other traders to create their own trade routes.
C Only begin and end need traderoute slots
consequence only in begin and end province is a traderoute slot
taken. This will lead to
unbridled extension of traderoutes

Option B would seem the most reasonable.

Remember that tradechains are very vulnerable to disruption however so
don't hesitate to break them up if you think guilders are abusing them
in your game.


Okay that's it. I'ld like to hear what you all think on this matter.

Jan Arnoldus