Merchant Republics and Goods Produced

[DarkEye5]

Merchant Republics has in general been the target of a lot of criticism and a general lack of love from the developers over some time now. I often defend the mechanics due to the Prevalence of Merchant Republics (there aren't that many of them on the map) as well as a unique tall, trade-focused playstyle. One of the better (albeit more hidden) bonus was a bonus to goods produced equal to half your relative trade power (i.e. if you control 50% of the trade in a node, every province in that node gains a +25% increase in goods produced).

This was great for you as a Merchant Republic due to three reason:

1. You gain a bonus to Goods Produced just by doing what you already wants to be doing (incrasing your trade).
2. You increase the overall Trade Value in places where you already are in a position to benefit from it.
3. It can be used as a bargaining chip with your neighbors.

However by accident I recently discovered that this hidden bonus has been nerfed considerably, insofar as it doesn't affect your production anymore, only the production of your neighbors. This removes the first - and by far the best - of these bonuses. Sure, you still get increased Trade Value but it seems strange to actively decrease the Trade Value by owning more lands each Trade Node. I also highly doubt the AI takes the loss of production income into consideration when planning if they want your land, so the bargaining aspect is only useful in Multiplayer, where it's usefulness in diminished by the opaqueness of the entire mechanic.

It's not mentioned in any changelogs (that I could find) but it seems to be a change in 1.30 according to the forums (mentioned here, here and here) as well as Reddit (mentioned here and here).

Honestly, this is a bit of a problem - or at least a shame. Firstly due to the lack of communication about this. Of course it could just be forgetfulness on the developers behalf, but this mechanic is one of the mechanics brought up in order to justify the viability of Merchant Republics. The fact that it hasn't been mentioned in the DDs or the changelogs means that we had no idea it happened and we have no idea as to why this change was implemented, needed or if anything replaced it nor did we have the opportunity to give inputs to these questions.
And secondly it feels a bit like kicking someone who's already down. Merchant Republics are by no means overpowered, quite the opposite, their viability are continuously questioned, their mechanics (such as Trade Cities) are quite unpolished and lackluster and they haven't gotten much attention for a long time (though going from a hardcoded limit on states to changes in Governing Capacity was good news).

TL;DR: Bring back the old bonus to Goods Produced to Merchant Republics or at least replace it with something similar.
(I considered making this in the "Suggestions"-forum but I'm not sure if this is an actual suggestion or more of a rant. So I'll just post it here)

 

[drawar]

Wouldn't that be related to a change in the Trade Company?
When they changed the restriction from Westerners to countries controlling the company?

However, I think it would be a mistake to go back as before. It is the principle of the Merchant Republics to have few provinces and to live off trade with other countries.
We just need to modernize their system of governance. And give real playability with the Trade Leagues. Maybe a bit like the Stellaris Federations for example.

 

[tobias.mb]

Wasn't it always only neighboring countrys? Did it ever apply to the merchant republic itself?

 

[DarkEye5]

Wasn't it always only neighboring countrys? Did it ever apply to the merchant republic itself?

No, it used to apply to yourself as well. I'm not sure when this was changed, bt as I mentioned I think it's with the 1.30 patch.

However, I think it would be a mistake to go back as before. It is the principle of the Merchant Republics to have few provinces and to live off trade with other countries.
We just need to modernize their system of governance. And give real playability with the Trade Leagues. Maybe a bit like the Stellaris Federations for example.

Some sort of overhaul of the Trade League/Trade City system would be great. I just don't see it being a thing in the foreseeable future. And until they do make these changes it seems like a bad idea to just nerf the eff out of an already weak government type.

Wouldn't that be related to a change in the Trade Company?

Perhaps? I mean, sure you now has the ability to blob as anyone else by now (by using Trade Companies instead of states) but that seems like the wrong way to go to just make MRs sorta like everybody else with a small twist.

It's all for Merchant Republic should be incentivized to going tall - that's why I play them. I'm also not against it shouldn't necessarily be a bad thing to war with your neighbors. I just think this is the wrong way to do it. I'm more in favor of positive incentives rather than negative incentives or, said in another way, because with some playstyles it better to do (or at the least viable to do) not because you have to. I actually think the old bonus sorta did that: You didn't necessarily needed a lot of land because if you focused on your own thing (i.e. trading) you could get additional bonuses and keep up rather that having to always conquer to stay on top.

 

[RobbieAB]

I'm wondering if in 1.30 merchant republics are getting unfairly judged... Ok, they have a -50% GC limit, but they get TC land for only 25% GC instead of 50% GC everyone else pays, which means it's 1% at level 8 with a court-house.

That said, they don't get estates, they get their nothing like as good factions.

 

[redshirt4life]

No estates after the estate overhaul really hurt them. That's a lot of bonuses they don't have access to.

 

[Vohen]

To be honest, I prefer it this way.
I think it's an interesting balance, where there's an actual trade off between conquering and not conquering land.
Normally in this game you're always incentivized to expand, expand and expand, it's usually the optimal decision and has very few downsides to it, but here you have a pretty compelling incentive not to for a change.
I also think it is a positive incentive, as you gain extra stuff if you focus on trade expansion instead of territorial expansion.

Some sort of overhaul of the Trade League/Trade City system would be great. I just don't see it being a thing in the foreseeable future. And until they do make these changes it seems like a bad idea to just nerf the eff out of an already weak government type

It might come sooner than we might expect.
As pointed out already, the estate rework left a huge gap between MRs and the rest, it'd make a lot of sense to rework factions in a short term future.
From there, why not dream of a MR overhaul as a well?

 

[Froonk]

I think the current situation is okay, because it makes it so you actually benefit from trade value of places you didn't conquer yet as well and when you conquer them you have them anyway, this is especially true for merchant republic trade company areas.

Merchant republics have other issues and I have made some suggestions but I don't think EU dev teams will touch them any time soon. They'll probably update South America, Middle-east and Scandinavia before they even come back for Merchant republics, likely nothing for them this year or in 2021.