Beiträge von Baltic Trader

Is there a new Contest? If so, could someone be so kind as to place the rules in the International Section? Thanks.

The location of the pirates in the tavern vengeance missions are much like the bride selection; save and reload, different locations will appear. For the bride, once her picture appears, save before accepting. You may alter her age, and the dowry and ship condition change as well.

Cargo is indeed the fourth criteria; but interesting to try with a lower number. I could build as may ships as I desire; I am holding to Luebeck only deliberately. In early October, I am second on the Luebeck list for mayor. I have the cash to move, at nearly 600,000 in early October, to Reval if I so wish. I do not think I will need to, however. I have been accumulating the materials for the road building. It is not just the ships, by the way, it is the total value of trading that matters most.

On 1 OCT of 1300 I was promoted to Patrician status in Luebeck. Seven ships, at cargo capacity 93. Company value is just under 1 million; about half of that is in cash.

Interesting contest; an exercise in minimalism. I built nothing but one warehouse in Luebeck, and as few ships as possible. I added only three new offices, so far. No loans made, no bribes.

Very much appreciated. It is most kind of you.

Now one correction: "Pigeons" should be "Doves". In English, a pigeon is someone who has been, or will be, cheated or taken advantage of. A dove is someone peaceful.

And one question: Is it the average total cargo capacity of the ships throughout the game or just at the date of the Alderman election? Lowest number is best, is it not?

I notice a new contest! If someone would be so very kind, could the rules be translated to English, in the International Forum? I am not certain the Google translator is accurate, but it seems rather appealing.

Thanks.

In English, there is a word, "spoiler" which refers to someone who tries to cause big problems or ruin something. I was very tempted last year with the population contest to be a spoiler, and in fact wrote Bizpro about it. The trick was found years back by a player named Kaiser, and we called it Kaiser's Beer Trick. In Patrician 2, if you donated one beer per day, it attracted beggars. A bigger donation, more. By donating every day, he achieved a population of over a million citizens in Luebeck alone, after a couple of game years. He was making over 10,000 a week just as outrigger in the city. I was seriously thinking of trying to make a point by using Patrician 3 donations to do the same. It is quite possible, combinations of fish, beer and grain achieve the same result.

I decided against doing it though. But I was very tempted to come in first by trickery.

In the English language forums, we found many such tricks, and Arbitrage was one. We knew about Hotseat mode - put the game into Multiplayer mode, have the other players buy ships full of expensive goods, send them to our home office and give the ships and goods to us, then switch back to regular mode. But we still found it possible to agree as a group to not use the tricks. How? The honor system.

And we had a lot of fun. My favorite contest of all was The Gauntlet. We began with debts outstanding, stock sold too, no ship at all, and an auction of a cog at 1% health in the town coming up. Some of us managed to get enough cash together to buy it, get it repaired enough to sail and acquire more ships. We learned things, too. Did you know that using the road to trade, that you pay a higher charge for wine or iron goods, but that you can sneak a few into the shipment without paying more? We even ran one game with only snaikkas.

We had a group of friends, and trusted each other. We banned the tricks. We played honestly, and didn't use them. Why? To win by "cheating" wasn't winning to us.

And now the contests here have come to their ultimate end. What goals can you possibly set that do not require the tricks? Population - Kaiser's Beer Trick wins it, or less easily, Turkish building wins it. Happiness? With Rapidfire and Stock manipulation I can dump every needed good into the markets at the least possible cost, since money and production costs don't matter. Percentage rich, wealthy? Starstruck figured out how to rig that one.

Larsson, Builder, Wasa and others, I don't speak German. I wish I did, because I could not even participate in the discussions last year. Google, and the other translators I tried made it hard to even understand what you were talking about. And maybe if I did, I could have communicated my ideas well - the English speakers here do understand the point. The whole German style contest game has become nothing but "bug-using".

So, what would I recommend? Same map, same start game. It was very well thought out. But play it straight. Let the Office Manager buy or sell, but only use automated sailing for captains - no buying or selling. Build your own ships, don't take the AI ships; if you loot them, don't save and reload to avoid penalties. Fight the pirates, but sink them all. Don't use Arbiss. Don't Turkish build. Explore without S/L. Don't use any kind of exploit. Make CV really mean something, make the accomplishments real. Play with honor, dignity and pride. Play the game it was really meant to be played.

Maybe it is my own military background. A man's word should be good. I can give my word not to do anything that would violate the letter or the spirit of the game. We ran our contests that way. Do you say that German language players cannot?

Greetings, Wasa. Yes, you understood well.

I posted before a story about a contest to determine who should be the King of Beasts. The eagle said it should be judged as who was the highest and fastest flier. The dolphin, the best swimmer. The mole, the best digger. And the lion, whoever was the strongest.

What a person feels is the best for a contest says much about what the person really values, about what is in his heart.

Voting? I find myself a minority frequently. Benjamin Franklin said Democracy was two wolves and a sheep deciding upon what to eat for lunch. Liberty was a well armed sheep disputing the vote.

Of course, the vote will always go to the exploit group here, and sheep aren't strong as lions, no matter how baaaaaaaa-d they feel about it. I just took the liberty to express my own opinion, even if it was a vote of one.

You all owe my return in this discussion to Bizpro, who was kind enough to post my picture on a milk carton. I will leave it to him to translate, and to take the heat as well.

In America, Patrician is just about dead. Patricianworld, our first board, http://www.md-gameinfos.de/pat…rd.cgi?s=415afd67348bffff is a ghost town, mostly frequented by a congenital idiot who spams pornography links, online purchases for cialis and viagra, and assorted other crap. The Tavern's Side Room has dwindled, some of the old gang are there but other than a few posters from here who found the site, most don't play the game anymore.

But when we did In America, we had our heyday with trickery, too. Levon's Gold Nugget, Kaiser's Beer Trick (unlimited beggars, with city population of a million in one town), and the Arbitrage that Quis and I put together. I even posted there on Rapidfire, with arbitrage set to buy/buy and selling manually every purchase, generating millions in the first few months of the game.

We gave those up, though, by common consent. Why? It wasn't Patrician. It was just an exercise in gimmicks, program exploits. After all, what was logical about giving a pirate a ship, letting him loot you and pay you for goods, stealing them back, letting him loot again and pay your once more, and repeat/repeat/repeat until the commission he finally paid amounted to millions? Rapidfire, what possible connection to reality was there? Buy below cost, sell it back - the town would be bankrupt in real life, or no one would buy the goods. But the exploit generates huge amounts of cash. Stock market manipulation, even the intended Tavern Mission allowed a player to make 100,000 or more a week taking pirate ships and selling them. How nonsensical, there wouldn't be in life anything like that number of pirates. "Turkish" building, no roads at all.

We "outlawed" them all. We played a straight game, to make it as close to realistic as possible, and we enjoyed it. Skill, not exploits.

I tried before to suggest that here, to play a game honestly, in constest form, with honor, just as it should have been played. No exploits. No gimmicks. No save/reloads to avoid pirates, indictments, or in exploration and treasure hunting, and even building all your own ships yourself rather than taking the easy way out and getting all your ships from the AI and from the pirates.

The suggestion was about as welcomed as an outbreak of herpes on a wedding night.

Yeah, I started a game up this year, ran the Rapidfire. Made millions, without even bothering to steal anything from the AI or take over a single pirate ship. I took the millions, went to the Med, and flooded my Hanse with luxury goods. WIne at 135? Who cares, when money is irrelevant?

And you know what? It wasn't fun. It was boring as hell. Click to buy, manually sell, click to buy, 80+ round trips a day. 3, 4 million a month, right from the first captain. And not fun, no pleasure, just sore fingers from click-click-click-click-click, a hundred times a game day or more. And then on to stock market manipulation. Wow. What joy.

And now there are players who have the unmitigated gall, the sheer chutzpah to try to tell poor Starstruck that his technique wasn't in the spirit of the game? The classic definition for chutzpah in America is the man who kills his parents, and pleads before the judge for mercy because he is an orphan. You dearly love exploits, and hypocritically attack him for finding a new one? He won "fair and square", if such terms can be applied to this mess of a game style you all seem to enjoy.

Someday, there may be some players here who will play Patrician. I have played it, and liked it. The exploits? Interesting enough, but a real poker player doesn't use a marked deck, doesn't bottom deal or double deal, doesn't stack the deck, doesn't use a slick ace, and doesn't put aces and face cards up his sleeve. He just plays poker, plays what is dealt, and will walk from the table if these shennanigans go on.

Patrician is a really nice game. You all should try it sometime, you might actually enjoy it.

Now, where did that milk carton go?

Hier meine Daten:
31.7.1300

• kontore: 12:
• schiffe: 9 mit 6 kapitaenen.
• betriebe: 41
• einwohner: 18,709
• uw: 9,2 Mio, mit 8.100.000

Ich errichte alle meine eigenen Schiffe. "Unbelievable" Patrizier Bruegge. Ich nehme keine von den Piraten oder von den Kaufleuten.

Still plodding along like a tortoise, I have finally finished July, and as of the 31st of the month:

• Offices: All are built, with three complete with administrators.
• Ships: Nine now, none from pirates. Five more are under construction in Edinburgh, London, Bruegge, Bremen and Goteborg, two of which are cogs. Pitch is still my limiting factor for the present. I have six captains, will have two more on the 1st. All running ships so are snaikkas.
• Businesses: Forty one, in varying states of construction and completion. Three vinyards, three sheep farms, a pottery and a brewery were added, as well as assorted smelters, pitchboilers, farms and brickyards.
• Population: 18,709. Mood is improving in a number of cities as supplies improve.
• Company Value: 9,200,000 of which 8,100,000 is cold hard cash. Goods in the warehouses I don't bother to add up; intangible assets include guild memberships in every town. Churches are endowed. Wells are complete in most towns. No loans made.
  
  I think that about covers it for assets.
• Social Rank: Unbelievable Patrician. I moved to Bruegge, skipped a few ranks.
  Still moving along.

I am not that far along yet, moving pretty slowly, only to July so far.

I would recommend Newcastle, personally. Novogorod is way out there, off the beaten path. Helsinki, much the same but has the advantage of deepwater port facilities, and close to the Lagoda brickyards and construction materials. What goods were you offered?

Moving costs. Ouch. Cost me almost a million to move to Bruegge n July. I wonder what they do with the cash?

I jumped to Patrician though. Nice.

What have you all been paying?

Plodding along like a tortoise, I have finally finished June, and as of the 30th of the month:

• Building permissions: Four. Danzig came in on the 26th, and I built my office there, for a total now of four trade offices. Stetin came in before Danzig, awaits Ig to build. Seven to go, sigh ... just waiting permissions.
• Ships: Five now, one came as a dowry. Two more are under construction in Edinburgh, and another in London. Pitch is my limiting factor for the present. I have two captains. All ships so far are snaikkas. I think I will forswear any ship except for what I build, and any that may be auctioned; excepting of course the dowry of my beloved Katerin.
• Businesses: Twenty, in varying states of construction and completion. Four are workshops, one is a vinyard, one fishery, and four smelters. Not fully staffed yet, but the population is ramping up quickly. There could have been more, but I didn't want to exhaust iron goods or bricks I am saving for more elaborate businesses.
• Population: 17,041. They still run satisfied to dissatisfied, depending upon the population group. Luxury goods remain overall in short supply, which of course affects the results. I will remedy that over the next few months.
• Company Value: 6,000,000 of which 5,500,000 is cold hard cash. Goods in the warehouses I didn't bother to add up, there is quite a bit now; I am accumulating anything and everything up to the cost of production. Intangible assets include guild memberships in Bremen, Hamburg, Edinburgh, London, Stetin and Bruegge. Charitible donations were made for four church expansions. No loans made or granted.
  
• Trading offices: Just four, with Stetin only needing Ig.
  

  
  

  I married on the 23rd, to the lovely Katerin of Danzig. The dowry was a snaikka in 63% health, with some train oil and salt on board. Wow. The wife however, was a better catch: high respect from the people, and highest respect from the councillors. She is 16. The party was a gourmet's delight, in part to enhance my reputation in London, which improved enough for promotion to Merchant. Edinburgh and Bruegge see me as Lord Mayor. Motions for the new wall were made in both those towns, and, fast forwarding, pass handily on the 5th of July.

  
  

  Moving along.

Hier meine Daten:
30.6.1300

• baugenehmigung: 3
• kontore: 4: Danzig, Bruegge, London, Edinburgh
• schiffe: 5 mit 2 kapitaenen.
• betriebe: 20 - mit 4 eisenwaren, 4 schmelzer, 1 vinyard, 1 Fischerei
• einwohner: 17,041
• uw: 6 Mio, mit 5.500.000

Frau ist Katerin, 16, höchster Respekt.
Ich errichte alle meine eigenen Schiffe. Ich nehme keine von den Piraten oder von den Kaufleuten.

So, one of the new towns is Ripen. Are the other two choices Novgorod and Memel?

Personally, I am considering trying for bricks as one of the new town's goods. That means a pottery shortage. With all the upcoming construction needs, it might be very useful to have the first new town producing bricks, timber, and perhaps wool or wine.

For convenience's sake, below is the list of goods which when in short supply will generate the following goods:

Beer-IG
Ore-wool
IG-honey
Skins (furs)-fish
Timber – cloth
Honey – grain
Pottery – bricks
Salt – ore
Whale oil – grain + import of furs
Wine – pottery
Wool – wine
Fish – beer
Hemp – whale oil + fish
Pitch – hemp
Grain – meat/leather
Spice – no effect
Cloth – salt
Bricks – pitch
Meat/leather - timber

Thanks.

I play on a laptop, touchscreen. Middle and index finger fatigue.

As you can probably guess, the captain from Edinburgh was the one I used. I bought some Ig and grain in London, and sailed to Edinburgh. I daytraded everything, anything I could make a profit on, like beer at 1 per barrel; stayed until I had enough pitch, cloth, to build a second ship, and sailed to Brugge carrying pig iron, too. Sailing time was more important, had to adjust the cargo until it took only three days.

I told you earlier the trading part is much easier than our contests were at these settings.

Side effects are that everyone in Brugge and Edinburgh see me as Lord Mayor.

Shipping is of course the major problem. I agree, the loans for ships gambit is probably best. The marriage option I will explore too, a fast check shows a 17 year old unknown with a snaikka. But overall in this game, it may be that the white option is best. Bricks are so few I don't see much advantage in a rapid trade office buildup. It may be better to grow in stages.

Just to see if I could count coup on you, my friend, I played as a peaceful trader, and tested out some ideas as well. Herewith are the results:

• Building permissions: Two. Edinburgh came on the 19th, and Brugge on the 23rd.
• Ships: Just one, with a solitary captain. There are three more snaikkas under construction, one each in Edinburgh, London, and Brugge.
• Businesses: Eight, nearly all complete, including a iron goods workshop, two smelters, a sawmill, and four brickyards. All wells are built in London, and twenty six bricks are in reserve (I plan a fishery), another twenty one in Brugge.
• Population: 15,499. London, Edinburgh and Brugge run satisfied to dissatisfied, depending upon the population group.
• Company Value: 1,227,128 of which 1,070,996 is cold hard cash. Goods in the warehouses add up to just over 60,000. Intangible assets include three guild memberships. Charitible donations were made for two church expansions. I took out no loans, nor have I granted any.
• Trading offices: Just two, awaiting iron goods for Edinburgh. I should have the rest by the end of June, as soon as I can go visiting them. I already have the funds and the iron goods.

There is also variability from when you start on a voyage of discovery. As an example, the same ship off to America may return weeks earlier starting one day later.

I don't much like to shoot up the ships; so, for the mission in Bremen, and in Danzig, I did a modified Cascade. I boarded with one snaikka, and lost; on the next screen I had a second snaikka waiting, engaged, boarded, and won.

Took a while to set up properly though, and cutlasses being still scarce had to divide them between the ships. You still get paid off for delivering the escort, even though your ship was boarded and looted.

Excellent guess!

The next captain, after Edinburgh is hired, is in Danzig. He is a decent one, and trades at level 4. When he is hired, there appears one who is a good fighter in Oslo (level 4).

Danzig has an escort mission available, for a crayer.

Now, the escort mission in Hamburg is interesting. I did score a crayer from it. THAT was tricky, indeed!

First permission came from Gotenborg, before promotion to Trader.

Now, the elections will be interesting. Trader on June 1st, Merchant on July 1st, Travelling Merchant on August 1st, and lastly, Councillor on September 1st means that the election on September 30th is achievable only with a bit of clever maneuvering. With the time lag for new office construction, Alderman is unachievable by the July 14th elections.