Contest Strategies

  • Please post your comments and questions regarding contest-specific strategies here. If you are looking for a beginning strategy for a peaceful trader you will find a link in the sticky thread "Contest2006 details"

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Do the AI traders send expeditions to America as well or only into the Med? I have only two shipss for expeditions and want to prioritize to stay ahead of the AI.

  • I have to date not observed an AI discovering America nor find trading spaces there. I also appears they they shun the Iberian Peninsula and start off far in the Med.

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Is ther any way to auction a business?
    I need clean way :look: :business and trade.not right click and left click trick.:oldman:

  • @ bizpro


    Well, I have in my actual contestgame an AI that has discovered america, but found nothing! He droves after me, I was the first one to find america. But there is one white mark, that is definetly not from me, because I don´t drive to this place! I discovered this case the first time. Maybe it was earlier too, but I didn´t watch on it, esspecially not in the mediteranian sea ... ;)


    @ hulk


    Yes, it is. You know, if you cklick on one of your things, you have the 2 options auction or destroying. If you click first on one of your businesses and then with a fast double click to one of the AI you have the same option know with this AI businesses. Destroying goes with this trick everytime. Auction goes only, if you are in the guild of the town.
    It ist also important, that this trick does function only business to business and house to house.


    The AI could be very helpfull on the start, because you can´t supply everything. Later that status decreased, because you havemore and more own. However, it is a cind of individual playing and there is no strictly good or bad. ;)

    Nur der Pirat ist der wahre Händler, denn nur er hat alle Möglichkeiten (business is war !!! ;) :P

  • [quote0
    I need clean way :look: :business and trade.not right click and left click trick.:oldman:[/quote]


    There is no clean direct way , only an indirect one. Let's say you want to buy a workshop. Don't sell any pigiron. Eventually the workshop will be closed down and a few months/years later it will be up for auction.


    BTW, sorry, :O I wanted to quote and actually ended up in edit. I'm still getting used to the buttons that are new for me.

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Hulk:


    some raw materials are only produced by towns in very limitted amount. In the contest2006 there is quite a bit pigiron available in the beginning but, If you let your administrator buy it than none is avaialble for the AI :D.
    Now I have arbitrage ships who buy at up to 1605, so there is definitely none avaialbe. If there is no profit for the AI he never buys.

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

    Dieser Beitrag wurde bereits 1 Mal editiert, zuletzt von bizpro ()

  • bizpro ;
    But if you buy scared goods you will loose your reputation?is it right? ?(
    can you explain to me "Arbitrage"term?

  • Generally, if you buy scarce goods you will loose reputation. But, if you buy a raw meterial that is of no use to the producing city, such as prigiron produced in Koln, you will not loose reputation. The town should actually be glad that they make the extra money by selling it to you.


    Arbitrage is a way to "print" money. To explain the math behind it would take a while. The figures below have been researched by Ugh! and I can vouch that they work. You need a crayer with a captain of trade skills 4 or 5. Then you set an autoroute where you let him buy goods for a higher maximum price than what he will sell in the next cycle as a minimum. Don't worry, it work. Just try it in a saved game and see how money comes in.


    If you want to buy IG, for example, set the autoroute to buy maximum quantity for a maximum price of 400. The next cycle is the same town but you sell maximum IG for minimum of 220. It only works in a town where the good is either imported or produced efficiently.


    The following excerpt is translated from Ugh!'s post. You can use bale goods too but the margin is not very high. The best goods for arbitrage are IG, skins (furs), leather, cloth and wine:


    The first price is buying, the second one selling

    • beer 53 / 26
    • cloth 320 / 176
    • leather 339 / 170
    • iron goods 400 / 220
    • wine 339 / 184

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Here the original Table
    Beer. . . . . . . 52 . . . . . . 26
    Iron ore/Pig iron. . . . 1605 . . . . .. 670
    Iron goods . . . 400 . . . . .. 220
    Skins . . . . . 1048 . . . . .. 510
    Fish. . . . . . 660 . . . . .. 344
    Meat . . . . ....1425 . . . . .. 724
    Grain . . . . ...164. . . . . . . 91
    Spices. . . . . 420 .. . . . .. 245
    Hemp . . . . . . .450 .. . . . .. 370
    Timber. . . . . . . 82 . .. . . . . 47
    Honey . . . . . .172 . . . . . . 84
    Pottery. . . . . 261 . . . . .. 150
    Leather. . . . . 339 . . . . .. 170
    Pitch. . . . . . . 82 . . ... . . . 53
    Salt. . . . . . . ..42 ... . . . . . 22
    Whale oil . . . . . 127 . . . . . . 72
    Cloth . . . . . . 320 . . . . .. 176
    Wine . . . . . 339 . . . . .. 184
    Wool . . . . . 1338 . . . . .. 671
    Bricks . . . . . 122 . . . . . . 63


    I Use only the easy version. One ship in Reval is trading skins and iron goods. The captain has 5 Points for trading. This gives about 3.000 GS cash per day.


    Taking up to seven ships in the same Habor the Amout wil multiplicate.


    1. Sell skins , 2. Buy Skins , 3. Sell skins , 4.......


    But to install a cascade like this is out of my actual possibilites.

    Niemand braucht ein einfaches Spiel! Ein gutes Spiel reicht!


    Für die Dunkle Seite! Auch Piraten wollen Handeln!

    Dieser Beitrag wurde bereits 1 Mal editiert, zuletzt von Baltic Trader ()

  • There has been a lengthy discussion on the value of restarts. First off, it is true that a player with limited time would be better off to continue and, more or less, complete the game by using up all available building spaces; of course with largely different success. In my case, I do have quite a bit of time from the late summer onward and was musing what kind of differences would justify the time and effort. I came to the conclusion that an increase of population of over 13,000 to the end of 1301, combined with an increase in CV of over 5 M did justify the exercise. Furthermore, the aim was to waste a little bit less building space than previously. Unfortunately, my hometown was not at all cooperating and, where I had envisioned nice blocks of 6, or more, I was restricted to blocks of 4, or less, due to disappearing green. :(

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

    Dieser Beitrag wurde bereits 1 Mal editiert, zuletzt von bizpro ()

  • I noticed this statement by Patrician Jr. in the "progress report 1300" thread:

    Zitat

    Why do so many players disregard the importance of CV in this contest? It appears that the majority is mesmerized by population and forgets the real point maker, the CV.


    Please let me make a comment on this.
    The company value is definately not the real point maker in this contest!
    The most important factor are the inhabitants in your Hanseatic League.
    Today's formula has a special - let's say - "trick" to avoid having a too important CV. Please notice:
    The points you gained with your CV cannot be higher than 1,5 times the points you gained from your population.
    You see, the CV points are strictly limited.


    If you do not have enough inhabitants, you cannot make a lot of points with money!



    I do know that "contest strategies" do not seem to be a very good place for this, but the "progress report" threads should be kept clean, I think.
    I didn't choose making the comment via PM, because it may be useful for other English players for whom it could be difficult to find out about the restriction of CV points in the formula.

  • While CV is limitted by population, the amount of points allocated to CV is still higher. Just look what gave you more points, population or CV.
    In order to obtain maximum points for CV in later years you need a printer to generate the necessary funds. :(


    Let's take a player who has 160,000 ppl living in his Hanse at the end of 1302 and 240,000 at the end of 1303. he gets 800 points for the increase in population. If, over the same period, he increases his CV by only 2 M per month he will end up with merely 510 points for CV, a far cry from the maximum avaialble of 1,200. So, how can CV not be of utmost importance?

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Zitat

    While CV is limitted by population, the amount of points allocated to CV is still higher.


    That's completely true and I don't want to say anything against that.


    My general opinion is:
    It is easy for a player to increase his CV value to a very high level without doing anything for growing population.
    But if you succeed in establishing a permanent and high immigration to your Hanseatic League, your CV will increase nearly automatically.


    What I wanted to express with my statement was just:
    You need a successfull game to "unlock" high CV points.


    I don't have the experience to be able to talk about games and calculations for 1304 - I'm not that far in the game.
    So take my own savegame of 1300 as an example:
    Amselfass 1300
    PPL: 58.000
    CV: 12.000.000
    Points for PPL: 250
    Points for CV: 375 --> this is the limited maximum for my PPL


    We all see that I got more points for my CV than for my population.
    But it could have been better if I - in theory - had been as good as e. g. Arno.
    Arno 1300
    PPL: 78.000
    CV: 11.000.000
    Points for PPL: 450
    Points for CV: 675 --> this is the limited maximum for Arno's PPL


    The consequence is: the better you play concerning the population, the higher your points for CV will be.
    Only concentrating on the CV (at least in the first years) is dangerous.
    If I player can reach a CV of 30.000.000 at the end of 1300, but only a PPL of 51.000, he will get less CV points than me and Arno for a much higher CV than the others have.

  • Any player who can not obtain maximum population in a few years will never get max CV points unless (s)he has a licence to print GS.


    Zitat

    I don't have the experience to be able to talk about games and calculations for 1304 - I'm not that far in the game.


    I am not there myself, but I used the XL spreadsheet to get enlightened.

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • Ugh! reported the following: :170:
    In the current contest he observed that escort missions came only from 5 cities for the period during which he had 25 cities. He is not quite sure if it was before or after the tavern in his first production town was completed. Instead of finding theses missions in any of the towns they came from just five, namely:
    Edinburgh, Harlingen, Toensberg, Rugenwald and Pernau.
    This should be a tremendous help for anyone who has not yet accepted the mission to build the 2nd production town. As soon as the 2nd mission has been accepted the missions revert back to any of the existing 25 towns.

    Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new
    Wer niemals einen Fehler gemacht hat, hat noch nie etwas neues probiert Albert Einstein

  • @ Amselfass:


    I think bizpro, the one who enlightened me too, said it. If you dont hoard mountains of CV early on you'll be left stranded in the foothills:wave2: - pun intended.

  • Patrican Jr.


    Dont worry about not geting the LM in 1300 You miss only additional points witch are not included in the Normal contest result.


    It's the first contest I play. But I'm Playing Patrician since first version. Before I played the older versions. My Avatar is from "Hanse" the first Patican game ever programmed by Asc(ar)on. I played it in 1990. ;)

    Niemand braucht ein einfaches Spiel! Ein gutes Spiel reicht!


    Für die Dunkle Seite! Auch Piraten wollen Handeln!