What kind of trading system would you prefer?

[Brickfix]

~ SNIP~

I really like the idea of trade routes providing certain buffs to planets, or even Systems. I could imagine that a multi-habitable planet system would have a much higher attraction for trade routes than that lonely one planet system, so the likelyhood of a trade route generating/spawning should depend on the total amount of pops in a system.
Not sure about corporations being so powerful to rival political factions, but I could think of factions supporting corporations in general.
Trade routes should be visible on the map, and it might add some flavour if they would follow hyperlanes. Inside one empire, these trade routes could establish themselve once the empire has reached a certain size, but I would not really give it to the player to control where that is, but rather have the player come up with a good solution on how to max out the buffs the trade route provides.
Additionally, a trade route should lower the cost of consumer goods for a planet. I could also think of trade routes slowly expanding, like a snake through the Galaxy. First, it only connects a sector capital with another, than it continues to the main empire capital, on over the boarders to another empire, and so on. It would add some flavor to the Galactic history, of how one Trade Route began to encompass the entire Galaxy, and would also add a political dimension, as all those empires profiting from this trade route would not want one provider to fall prey to some fanatic purifiers!
Buffs could skale with the length and amount of planets effected by the trade route.
It might be cool if there would be different kinds of trade routes, having different effects. Here are some examples I came up with:

Earth - Cadia - Trondor Mineral Trade Route (goes from Earth over Cadia to Trondor)
Planets : 3 (buffs skaling with amount of effected planets)
Effect: Mineral Production +8% (+2% per planet buff)

Trondor - Unity Slave Trade Route
Planets: 2
Effect: Slave production +4%

Cadia - Unity - Phoenix - Trondor Gemstone Route
Planets: 4
Effect: Energy output + 10%

There could be more types of trade routes for science, food, effecting Robots etc.

 

[Hype Train]

I think the current one with maybe a few additions is fine, we just need to make the strategic resources actually able to contribute something more than a passive buff

 

[Tekadiel]

What I really like about Vic 2 are production chains and I think they would add a lot of depth and immersion to Stellaris.
Of course it should be simpler than in Vic 2. All we need are factories which turn minerals and energy in building materials (to be used as minerals are used right now), consumer goods and maybe supplies.
Especially inter-empire trade would be very interesting if one empire sells you raw materials for finished products you can produce more efficiently and making a profit in the process.
In regard to immersion it always bugged me to see production based on mining. I would like to see my core worlds to be huge forge worlds supplied by mining worlds.
If the aim is to make a Stellaris unique economic system I really like the idea about corporations, especially with the funding of factions.
This might offer great potential for a new ethos pair: free market vs. state economy ethos.

 

[Vanhal]

Trade system? Perhaps some simpler mechanic...

 

[terrycloth]

EU4 system would suck big time. It can't have dynamic routes or you could create infinite loops (bad) which is fine in a preset world map that is meant to reflect European Imperialism by having trade flow in one direction (towards Europe). For a game like Stellaris you would need the trade to be much more organically based on how the map develops over time.

I do like the idea of trade but I have no idea how you would best implement it. Maybe expand on the strategic resources already in the game somehow?

EU4 style in Stellaris would probably need to have multiple trade route networks, because like you said the trade has to be eventually all flowing to the same place for them to work.

So, by default your capital is the end-node for your trade network, with other planets forwarding their trade towards it (or towards the sector capital which forwards it towards it). Then let adjacent foreign nodes attempt to siphon off some of your trade and vice versa, although ideally it'd add some value to both parties (just more to whoever was doing the most trade-focused stuff whatever that is, eg assigning ships to 'protect trade' or having valuable resources on their planets).

Then an empire which had a few valuable worlds scattered around the map might be able to be a 'trade empire' because each world would be pulling in resources from all the neighboring aliens and then sending it all to their capital. So long as they could stay at peace with everyone in position to block the trade flows.

 

[General Retreat]

I don't really want any of the ones listed tbh.
All of them are set up in such a way that they are really designed around the setting; trade, production and consumption in V2 was intimately linked to the era of industrialization and social upheaval, trade in EU4 was designed to imitate the importance of that era's naval trading routes, and trade in HOI was specifically oriented towards a world at war. Stellaris is something different entirely and a trade system should reflect that, if one is to be implemented at all - and I've yet to see a real compelling pitch for it.

This touches on an interesting point. Effectively, Stellaris simulates the mercantilist economic model. Trade is extremely limited, in that it is seen as a zero sum game. Anything that benefits another empire by default harms your own prospects. See: early game colony rush and the vying for space resources through border pressure.

In this economic model, only basic resources should be purchased, with manufacturing done domestically and refined goods exported when necessary to remove trade deficits. It puts a strong focus on military production, colonial expansion and protectionism pretty much rules the day. This can pretty much be simulated by the current system of limited diplomatic integration with trade, where only raw materials can be exchanged between states.

It'd be interesting if trade options evolved through the game from those basic initial settings through trade philosophy options (society tech research). The options for more sophisticated trade could even be there from the start, but cause backlash from the public / factions until the relevant philosophies are unlocked. It'd be really neat if over the course of centuries, your empire could range from mercantilist to classical economics, free market globalism (galaxyism?) into whatever post-globalism might look like.

 

[Strager]

It'd be really neat if over the course of centuries, your empire could range from mercantilist to classical economics, free market globalism (galaxyism?) into whatever post-globalism might look like.

Post-Globalisim is Apocalyptic. That would be a good end-game crisis. A major market crash happens when the whole galaxy spends more than it has and suddenly everything costs 10x as much. Capitalists get hit harder.

 

[harvesarmy]

- Once a corporation gains enough strenght level, it will grant a trade route to your empire. State-controlled economies will allow you to pick and choose the trade route's destination, while free market economies will present significantly stronger trade routes, at the expense of their control. Trade routes will be visible on the map to every empire that has charted at least one of the systems where it has been stablished

- Some really powerful corporations (and their trade routes) could survive external conquest, even if war will of course weak them out. Conquering empires will decide then whetever to mantain their old foe's corporations or to disband them so they don't become subversive trojan horses

Really like these ideas - this level of abstraction is just about right.

I would add a few things:
1) trade routes should probably be dynamic, or able to be influenced in some way by the player, either spending influence or with buildings. Perhaps buildings to increase the rate at which the trade level increases, or increase the chance of spread of the trade route to another system.

2) they should probably be non-empire specific entities after a certain scale. You could then have options to kick a corporation out of your empire and they might flee to a neighbour.

3) trade routes imply groups of systems to me - networks, not just individual links between individual systems as you imply.

All in all though, I think you could make a pretty deep and entertaining system from an idea like this, with minimal "spreadsheeting". If you have overlapping trade routes, corporations, strengths etc. then you could have a fun time trying to influence and grow the routes and hubs you want, and get rid of the ones you don't.

 

[Person012345]

I like the Aurora 4x system. When a planet is first colonized it produces a enough of several trade goods to support its own demand, with one or two goods producing a surplus. Once the planet reaches an appropriate population it begins to produce a surplus in another couple trade goods.

Each planet will therefore end up "specialized" in producing a few goods, while driving up demand for those goods it doesnt produce. The better you are able to fill this demand, the better your pops on that planet would do their jobs.

The game built its own civilian trade c
ompanies that would run this trade in the background, but relying on the private sector to build this trade on its own is slow. Therefore, the player is encouraged to subsidize the private sector to help it along, until the size of your empire is large enough it can sustain itself.

Yeah, Aurora popped into my head too, although it would need to be heavily modified to fit the different way each game represents population.