How to optimize the trade income for my unusual Empire

[Mightypeon]

Hi,

I am currently playing a game as Dai Viet (Dai Nam), given that Dai Nam means "Great South", I am trying to conquer/control the entire Southern Hemisphere. As a tangent, I am currently unable to grasp on how to best organize my trading. Castile/Portugal is constantly declaring holy wars on me (as will propably declare colonial wars later), and I really need to maximize my income if I am to keep a competetive fleet.

As it stands:
General:
-Fully Westernized, nearly no overestension, in the process of setting up Chinese buffer states
South East Asia:
-I directly own the South East Asian Mainland other than 3 remaining provinces of Ayuthaya, and 4 provinces of Aceh. I have colonized the majority of the Philipine Trade Node, and make progress into the Australia trade node. There is however a pretty huge coalition involving Ming, Manchu, the remaining south east Asian minors and Japan against me. I border Bengal which is in a PU under me so that flank is safe. Vijanagara doesnt like me too much, but hates the Muslims much more.

Africa:
-I managed to monopolize Africa from the Gold Coast to Inhambane, this should mean zero competition for colonies farther east.

South America
-I have colonized Argentinia, but basically Spain is taking my lunchmoney there.

North Asia:
-I colony as a staging point to North America, will propably loose it soon because Russia Stronk!. If I manage to core something in North America before that happens than that is no proplem. I can also use Hokaido as an alternative.

Having selected Expansion is a 4th NI, I have 3 Merchants. The question is, where do I place them?
A) in the places where I got natural monopolies (Philipines, Cape), Where my Cap is (Siam), where most of the trade has to pass (Mallacca, Bengal)? Would moving my capital to the Mallacan/Bengal Trade node improve things?

Also, Spain/Portugal have clear naval dominace against me. They can propably wipe out fleets in Gold Cost, Argentian or Congo trade nodes. Last but not least, I would really like to keep certain boni for trading in X I get from being in Canton (-25% for advisor costs from tea trading is pretty cool).

 

[might]

A screenshot would help

 

[Schmoekoeksklok]

It's not really possible to tell you the optimal trade situation without actually being in the game, but I would probably let all African trade move forward on it's own until it reaches your last dominant node and collect there.
Then I'd move my capital to Malacca and let Siam and Canton forward trade on their own as well, while sending a bunch of ships and a merchant to Hangzhou steer trade towards Malacca. That leaves one merchant which you could set to collect in Malacca, steer in Canton or steer in Gulf of Aden if that's part of your African holdings.

Not having a merchant in Canton doesn't really effect the trading in bonus at all, since that's based on your trade power in the node, and merchants don't give much of that (I assume you do have some land in Canton at least).

 

[grisamentum]

Steer in Gulf of Aden? Where's he going to send it? Basra, Zanzibar, Alexandria? All those nodes just go farther on to Europe. Very late-game I suppose he could conquer all the Arabian Peninsula and collect in Basra. Alexandria is not an option for obvious reasons (European ship access) and Zanzibar isn't an option because he can't move capital to Africa for collection.

The problem with collecting in Malacca later on is that he loses all the trade value of any downstream provinces. Ultimately he needs to pick the farthest downstream node plausible and send everything there and then collect. Or move capital as he conquers.

Early on that's probably collecting in Malacaa and conquering all of it, then conquering Bengal and collecting there, then Ceylon. Malacca is definitely the ideal choice for any ultimate conquest of China and Asia, and the Philippines is basically wide-open for colonization and free money.

After that it's a choice between Indus and Aden, although Indus is also fed by a new source in Kashmir.

 

[unmerged(804580)]

Yes, a screenshot would help. Well, one thing. If you care about the trade, you need to leave the Siam node. Malacca is way better.

Focus on Malacca and place a lot of light ships so you can minimize the outflow, and try to secure monopoly in Malacca, Siam and Canton by killing Ayutthaya, Aceh and whoever else remains there. Just these three nodes by themselves can make you quite rich, since the trade goods are usually pretty good. If I were in your situation, I'd try to claim the rest of the Chinese coast to direct everything from Hangzhou as well, since these provinces usually have really nice trade goods.

The African and American holdings are good, but don't expect to make much trade money out of there. You can't steer trade from Zanzibar and Cape to your home in Southeast Asia. It's silly, but All African trade just flows to Europe. Likewise, there is no way to bring trade from Peru to home. As far as I know, the only New World trade that flows back to Asia is Mexico -> Nippon route, but California is the only node going to Mexico. Everything else flows into Carribean and/or Chesapeake Bay and to Europe. The New World and African trade is meant for the Europeans to exploit, not you. (I'm ignoring Hudson Bay node for its insignificance in most games) Also, don't bother with Yumen and Beijing. They are there for Russia to enjoy.

The best trade route for SEA is securing everything in these routes:
* Nippon -> Hangzhou -> Malacca
* Siam -> Malacca
* Canton -> Malacca
* Australia -> Philippines -> Malacca
...and preventing anything from leaving by just spamming a lot of light ships and trade buildings until you have a virtual monopoly. (You'll never have total monopoly if other countries start sending merchants and ships, but you can deny them most of the value.)

And in case someone mentions.. yes, it's possible to send a merchant to collect in Cape, so you could also benefit from Bengal -> Ceylon -> Gulf of Aden -> Zanzibar -> Cape. But the muslim nations in the region will try to divert that trade to Kashmir, Basra and Alexandria, which is probably less than manageable amount of competition.

 

[Mightypeon]

Thanks a lot! I actually make abou 25 extra ducats per month now! (even without a Cap move, inherited Bengal and basically monopolized that).

 

[Ungerargh]

In my Qing game, I ultimately collected in Ceylon, yumen, and panama (I owned all of Cali, mexico, Peru, panama, Nippon, yumen, Beijing, Hangzhou, canton, siam, Australia, Philippines, Malacca, and bengal). Generally, Ceylon is the last collection point you can use without having upstream merchants direct trade; IMO there's little point collecting further west as an Asian country unless you can get to the point of collecting at Alexandria, Basra, AND somewhere along the African coast - Indus, Aden, and Ceylon are extremely leaky and make crappy mid-points in a trade network.

Central Europe is about as bad unless you can control Antwerp, Lübeck, north sea, and the Baltic (and pref white sea, although not much gets there usually). Anyway, Ceylon, Bengal, and Malacca are all equally good as final nodes if you don't have much to the west of them.