The Trade Network

Lazy Knight · Apr 7, 2013

Hi,

I had some fun watching the twitch-stream again, and figured one could probably extract the trade network from the sequences shown in Trade mode ( around 3:43 of this video: http://sv.twitch.tv/paradoxinteractive/b/382958953 ), so that is what I spent the last few hours on

You find the result below, as a map and a list. The map is obviously a bit tight around Europe, but I hope you still find it useful! Everything in black I am 90% sure I have seen it or concluded it was there, everything that is grey (or marked ? in the list) I am more or less guessing its existence, mostly routes in Central Asia, nothing has been shown there so I made them up.

And here goes the list:

Code:

Trade Node	Value at Gamestart	Number of Connections	Connected To								
Carribean	0	7	Chesapeake Bay	Mississippi River	Mexico	Panama	Brazil	Sevilla	Bordeaux		 
Sevilla	7,3	6	Genoa	Tunis	Bordeaux	Carribean	Safi	Mauretanian Coast			
Antwerpen	10	5	London	Bordeaux	Genoa	Lübeck	Frankfurt				
North Sea	0,9	5	Hudson Bay	Chesapeake Bay	White Sea	Lübeck	London				
Constantinople	6,8	5	Alexandria	Crimea	Ragusa	Basra	Persia				
Lübeck	10,9	5	Baltic Sea	North Sea	Wien	Frankfurt	Antwerpen				
Genoa	8,7	5	Sevilla	Antwerpen	Ragusa	Tunis	Alexandria				
Chesapeake Bay	10,3	5	Carribean	Mississippi River	North Sea	London	Bordeaux				
Gulf of Aden	5,9	5	Zanzibar	Alexandria	Basra	Indus	Ceylon				
Kazan	4,5	4	Astrakhan	Novgorod	White Sea?	Kiev?					
Ivory Coast	2,5	4	Congo	Mauretanian Coast	Brazil	Timbuktu					
Novgorod	9,5	4	Kiev	Baltic Sea	Kazan	White Sea					
Kiev	2,8	4	Novgorod	Krakow	Crimea	Kazan?					
Krakow	5,5	4	Kiev	Wien	Baltic Sea	 					
Samarkand	7,6	4	Astrakhan	Perisa	Yumen?	Kashmir?					
Alexandria	6	4	Genoa	Venice	Constantinople	Gulf of Aden					
Bordeaux	6,2	4	Antwerpen	London	Chesapeake Bay	Carribean					
Wien	3,8	4	Krakow	Venice	Lübeck	Frankfurt					
Mexico	4,9	4	California	Carribean	Panama	Nippon					
Panama	3,1	4	Carribean	Mexico	Ivory Coast	Peru					
Philippines	0,2	4	Panama	Australia	Malaxxa	Canto					
Bengal	6,9	4	Siam	Ceylon	Kashmir?	Indus?					
London	6,5	3	Antwerpen	North Sea	Chesapeake Bay						
Baltc Sea	8	3	Novgorod	Krakow	Lübeck						
Frankfurt	7,6	3	Lübeck	Antwerpen	Wien						
Crimea	6	3	Kiev	Constantinople	Astrakhan						
Persia	4,1	3	Constantinople	Basra	Indus?						
Ragusa	4,8	3	Genoa	Venice	Constantinople						
Basra	5,6	3	Persia	Constantinople	Gulf of Aden						
Timbuktu	0	3	Ivory Coast	Safi	Tunis						
Hangzhou	4,7	3	Beijing	Nippon	Canto						
Malacca	9,1	3	Siam	Philippines	Canto						
Kashmir	1,8	3	Indus	Bengal?	Samarkand?						
Siam	3	3	Malacca	Bengal	Canto						
Ceylon	8	3	Indus	Guld of Aden	Bengal						
Indus	7,3	3	Ceylon	Gulf of Aden	Kashmir						
Brazil	0?	3	Panama	Ivory Coast	Cape Hoorn?						
Astrakhan	2,3	3	Crimea	Samarkand	Kazan						
Venice	8	3	Ragusa	Alexandria	Wien						
Hudson Bay	0	1	North Sea								
White Sea	1,9	2	Novgorod	North Sea							
Tunis	5,9	2	Sevilla	Genoa							
Safi	0,7	2	Sevilla	Timbuktu							
Mississippi River	0,3	2	Carribean	Chesapeake Bay							
Nippon	4,8	2	Hangzhou	Mexico							
Yumen	4,4	2	Samarkand	Hangzhou?							
Canto	2,5	2	Siam	Hangzhou							
Peru	0,8	2	Panama	Cape Hoorn?							
Zanzibar	3	2	Cape of Good Hope	Gulf of Aden							
Congo	0,9	2	Ivory Coast	Cape of Good Hope							
Cape of Good Hope	0?	2	Congo	Zanzibar							
Mauretanian Coast	0	2	Ivory Coast	Sevilla							
California	0	1	Mexico								
Beijing	3,2	1	Hangzhou								
Australia	0	1	Philippines

Please let me know If I missed something, but please keep in mind that old dev-diaries showing cote-d'azur and stuff are apparently outdated...

Edit:
- Added Number of Connections and Value at Gamestart
- Removed some misstakes from the list

GoWithTheFlo · Apr 7, 2013

Nice work! Did you analyse the graph? Which trade nodes have the best degree centrality?

How about the best betweenness centrality? (Will that even be important with the game mechanics?)

enf91 · Apr 7, 2013

One thing to note, though, is that connections seem to be one-way. So it might help to include which way the arrows go; that is, say which nodes transfer money to which other nodes.

unmerged(1823) · Apr 7, 2013

There is a few errors there though.. Siam, brazil, North sea, Indus has connections wrong.

There is no cape horn or siberia

Endnodes are antwerpen & venice.

Avernite · Apr 7, 2013

A bit odd to see Antwerp unconnected to the North Sea, but well

Lazy Knight · Apr 7, 2013

GoWithTheFlo said:
Nice work! Did you analyse the graph? Which trade nodes have the best degree centrality?

How about the best betweenness centrality? (Will that even be important with the game mechanics?)

I don't know what you mean with this, but I have updated the list to include both number of connections (sorted by that number now) and value at gamestart.
Sevilla and Carribean lead Number of Connections, with value at gamestart Lübeck leads, next in line are Chesapeake Bay and Antwerpen.

Balor said:
There is a few errors there though.. Siam, brazil, North sea, Indus has connections wrong.

There is no cape horn or siberia

Endnodes are antwerpen & venice.

Removed the two, took into account what I could, the hints are a bit vague though. At least something to find out

Suggestions:
Siam: Route to Canto seems to not be there, maybe not route to Bengal either
Brazil: No Idea, as it is never really in the Dev Diary, but you can see the routes leaving from Ivory Coast and Carribean, maybe there are routes to Peru or Cape of Good Hope?
North Sea: really no Idea what is wrong, looks pretty clear to me at 3:43:24
Indus: hard to spot, I think Bengal, Basra and Persia are not there...

Gonna Fix the map tomorrow...

enf91 said:
One thing to note, though, is that connections seem to be one-way. So it might help to include which way the arrows go; that is, say which nodes transfer money to which other nodes.

Are you sure this is set in stone? So, if say GB was to build up lots of trade power and Burgundy would go down the drain, trade would still flow from London to Antwerpen and not vice versa? If the US would rise to power, never would trade flow to America? Aslo, this means Antwerpen and Venice are end-nodes for ever?

GoWithTheFlo · Apr 7, 2013

Lazy Knight said:
I don't know what you mean with this, but I have updated the list to include both number of connections (sorted by that number now) and value at gamestart.
Sevilla and Carribean lead Number of Connections, with value at gamestart Lübeck leads, next in line are Chesapeake Bay and Antwerpen.

It's graph theory: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrality; basically, it's a bunch of equations that can measure graphs or networks. You could find for example the most influential people in a social network, or find the most used connexions in a transport network.

"Degree centrality", from wiki: "Historically first and conceptually simplest is degree centrality, which is defined as the number of links incident upon a node (i.e., the number of ties that a node has)". So that would be Sevilla and Carribean.

"Betweenness centrality" from wiki: "Betweenness centrality quantifies the number of times a node acts as a bridge along the shortest path between two other nodes." But in retrospect I don't think it's that important since the trade network is directional, as enf91 mentioned.

Spricar · Apr 7, 2013

Avernite said:
A bit odd to see Antwerp unconnected to the North Sea, but well

I thought about that one too

Alerias · Apr 7, 2013

Balor said:
There is a few errors there though.. Siam, brazil, North sea, Indus has connections wrong.

There is no cape horn or siberia

Endnodes are antwerpen & venice.

After all the work this poor guy has done, you might as well cut and paste the relevant text file

Evie HJ · Apr 7, 2013

There really need to be an extra trade node in North America for the Saint Lawrence-Great Lakes area.

First because it's just ugly as sin to split that region between three separate trade zone

Second, because, FAR more than the Mississippi, the Saint Lawrence was the highway into the heart of the continent, through which the fur trade from the Great Lakes and beyond flowed for centuries

Third, because historically, the two should be distinct regions, which would encourage two different powers to focus on developing the two as their colonies. As is, the current setup seem means that someone who controls Quebec city benefits more (in term of trade control) from grabbing Charleston than from expanding toward the Great Lakes, since much of the Great Lakes is either in Mississippi or Hudson Bay.

If it's a matter of too many trade centers in North America, then it makes FAR more sense to group Hudson Bay, Great Lakes and Saint Lawrence together than to lob the Saint Lawrence in with the English colonies.

It doesn't appear balanced in game terms (Chesapeake get far, far, far more provinces than the other two, unless some drastic and unseen changes to the North America map have occured - and everything we've seen shows NA remaining the same). It doesn't appear realistic in historical terms (see above). And it doesn't appear, from what we've been told of how these trade nodes work, to lead to realistic gameplay, since as I noted it encourage whoever settles Quebec to grab Charleston before they try to grab Lake Superior.

Zenith Darksea · Apr 8, 2013

Agreed.

Paro · Apr 8, 2013

I agree there should definitely be a Saint Lawrence trade node, I think a node here would be much more important then the Hudson Bay node they included.

Alerias · Apr 8, 2013

Nick9911 said:
I agree there should definitely be a Saint Lawrence trade node, I think a node here would be much more important then the Hudson Bay node they included.

I agree, and I hadn't noticed it wasn't there. French trade with Québec and Montreal in the era of the Sun King and afterwards far dwarfed by an order of magnitude the meager trade there was to be had in the Martimes. Until the fall of New France, the fur of the entire continent flew through these ports, making them one of the three nodes of the french triangular commerce.

Alley · Apr 8, 2013

Could you use curved direction lines, rather than just adding the directions to the next version? I ask, because like this it's almost impossible to tell which are land and which are see trade lines. When the dot is on the coast to another dot on the coast I expect it to be naval. but there are a few cases where the overland route is shorter. So I really can't tell.

We might get a full 360 degree world map at some point from paradox I guess but otherwise something like this is really nice.

Evie HJ · Apr 8, 2013

I think on looking again the problem is that any trade node in the Saint Lawrence region would almost have to interrupt the lines between Chesapeake Bay and London or North Sea (that is, the two lines would have to interesect somewhere).

The easiest fix would be to have the Saint Lawrence trade node flow toward Chesapeake Bay (which really should be renamed), especially if Chesapeake includes the Maritimes region. Then you effectively simulate the vital strategic importance to France of Louisbourg, as the key to their being able to get the trade from the Saint Lawrence. If ALL of the Saint Lawrence region is in Chesapeake, that doesn't work, because Quebec City and the rest are having the same effect Louisbourg would have. But if they're in their own zone, and Louisbourg and Acadia are the only French possessions in an other English Chesapeake Bay trade node, then they are vital to the survival of New France, because they allow France to redirect some of the Chesapeake Bay trade (which include their own Saint Lawrence trade) toward New France.

In relation to all that, California could have an alternate path toward Hudson Bay, the Saint Lawrence or both - while they formed only in the last decade of the EU3 timeline, they were a very significant trade route that saw some heavy competition. And it would give California a much-needed alternate path for their trade to flow, besides Mexico. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/York_Factory_Express )

enf91 · Apr 8, 2013

Lazy Knight said:
Are you sure this is set in stone? So, if say GB was to build up lots of trade power and Burgundy would go down the drain, trade would still flow from London to Antwerpen and not vice versa? If the US would rise to power, never would trade flow to America? Aslo, this means Antwerpen and Venice are end-nodes for ever?

I'm pretty sure. Hence all the talk about Antwerp and Venice being end nodes. (For those of us who know graph theory, that means the network cannot be Hamiltonian, though a Hamiltonian path could exist.)

Ruwaard · Apr 8, 2013

Avernite said:
A bit odd to see Antwerp unconnected to the North Sea, but well

Spricar said:
I thought about that one too

That makes at least three of us.

Another thing regarding trade nodes, at later starts will Amsterdam have a trade node? Historically after (started during) the 80 years' war Amsterdam replaced Antwerpen as the trade node of the Low Countries. Still without a Dutch revolt and the fall of Antwerpen, that doesn't have to happen.

The Boss · Apr 8, 2013

Trade Nodes are hardcoded on the map so it won’t happen dynamically while you play, but maybe if you start at a time Amsterdam should have it as we know it can be changed before game starts, at least with modding. I surely wish Trade Nodes or at least some was made dynamic or partially set to spawn in a specific area rather than being fixed on a set province.

Darsara · Apr 8, 2013

I do feel inclined to agree with the creation of a St. Lawrence trade zone, and with possibly merging with Hudson Bay; after all, the reason why the British established trade factories along Hudson bay was because the French kept them form getting in the St. Lawrence. The eastern Rupert's Land trade was largely an attempt to poach furs from New France.

Lazy Knight · Apr 8, 2013

Alley said:
Could you use curved direction lines, rather than just adding the directions to the next version? I ask, because like this it's almost impossible to tell which are land and which are see trade lines. When the dot is on the coast to another dot on the coast I expect it to be naval. but there are a few cases where the overland route is shorter. So I really can't tell.

We might get a full 360 degree world map at some point from paradox I guess but otherwise something like this is really nice.

I don't think a distinction between Land and Sea routes exists. For Example, the route from Constantinople to Basra and Persia will go through the mediterranean rather than Anatolia until Antioch, then continue by land.

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