Difference between revisions of "Trade"

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(→‎Optimal trading strategy: maths correction)
(Updated for Alpha 7, removed outdated info, still needs screenshot of trade interface.)
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In RimWorld, colonists can trade with passing trade vessels to buy and sell [[resources]], [[gear]], and [[colonists|slaves]]/[[prisoners]].
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Reason for Rewrite:
 
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* 1: Silver has been added to the game as money
 
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In RimWorld, colonists can trade with passing trade vessels to sell extra [[resources]] and [[prisoners]], and/or buy supplies and slaves.
 
  
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During the light season, trading vessels will often pass in comms range during a limited time. A message will show up to announce what kind of vessel is in comms range, and a simple notice will tell when the trading vessel is out of comms range (unavailable to trade anymore).
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Trading vessels will often pass within comms range during a limited time. A blue notification will appear right of screen to announce the trader vessel and its type (which determines its range of available goods), and a simple notice at the top of the screen will declare when the trading vessel has left comms range and can no longer be traded with.
  
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To enable trading, a colony must have at least a [[power]]ed [[Comms console]]. Any [[colonist]] can be selected and ordered to engage trading with available vessels by right-clicking on the Comms console. After selecting the trading vessel, the trade screen opens.
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To enable trading, a colony must have a [[power|powered]] [[Comms console]] and an [[Orbital trade beacon]]. Any goods the player wishes to trade (excluding prisoners) must be within the orbital trade beacon's area of influence, which can be displayed by selecting the beacon. Any [[colonist]] can be selected and ordered to trade with available vessels by right-clicking on the Comms console, however the higher the social [[skills]] of the selected colonist, the better the trade prices will be. After selecting the trading vessel, the trade interface opens.
  
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This screen is divided between three tabs: Commodities, People and Weapons. Commodities allows the trading of [[resources]], People allows to sell prisoners and buy slaves, and Weapons allows to trade carried weapons. Any weapons or resources to be sold must be placed on a [[Launch pad]] stockpile.
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The trade interface shows what commodities are available to trade, the colony's stocks, trader's stocks, and the prices to buy/sell. To trade, simply click and hold the number listed under "Drag to trade" next to the appropriate item, and drag it either to the left to buy, or to the right to sell.
  
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A Comms console allows to contact a trade vessel and sell resources, people and weapon. In order to buy from a trader, a colony needs a [[Drop beacon]]. Bought items and people will arrive by landing pod inside this area.
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Note that prices listed in green are cheap, and prices listed in red are expensive.
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In RimWorld, silver is used as currency, so 1 silver = $1.00 on the trade interface.
  
 
==Trade tips==
 
==Trade tips==
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*Each trade vessel type has a different range of available commodities, people and weapons. Use the table below to spot the good bargains.
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*Each trade vessel type has a different range of available commodities, people and/or weapons.
 
*Colonists with a higher Social skill using the Comms console will negotiate lower buying prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
 
*Colonists with a higher Social skill using the Comms console will negotiate lower buying prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
 
*Likewise, colonists with a higher Social skill will negotiate for higher selling prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
 
*Likewise, colonists with a higher Social skill will negotiate for higher selling prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
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*Selling a prisoner is profitable, but has a negative impact on the happiness of all the other colonists.
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*Selling a prisoner is profitable, but has a negative impact on the happiness of all colonists (excludes psychopaths).
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*As of build 213, food can be very quickly grown on [[Hydroponics table]]s, which makes it a profitable cash cow provided there's enough manpower to tend to the ever-growing crops.
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*Food and textiles can be quickly grown on [[Hydroponics table|Hydroponics tables]], which makes farming a viable income source, provided there's enough manpower to tend to the ever-growing crops.
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{| border="0" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" class="article-table" style="width: 100%;"
 
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|+Trade vessels summary
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Food
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Metal
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Medikit
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Uranium
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Shells
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Missiles
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|People
 
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! colspan="2" scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Weapons
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
−
! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Buy
 
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! scope="col" style="text-align:center;"|Sell
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|Farming vessel
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$1
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$5
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$20
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$5
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|Industrial trader
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$1
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$8
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$4
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
−
| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
−
| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|Slave trader
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$20
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$8
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$80
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$40
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$8
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$5
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$75
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$50
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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|-
 
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! scope="row" style="text-align:center;"|Combat supplier
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$5
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$20
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$10
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$5
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$4
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$4
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$2
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$19
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|$12
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✗
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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| style="text-align:center;"|✓
 
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|}
 
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Buy = Buy from the trader
 
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Sell = Sell to the trader
 
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===Optimal trading strategy===
 
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You can obtain an essentially unlimited amount of silver by engaging in arbitrage between different vessels (basically: buy low, sell high).
 
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Below are the best buy/sell strategies for each good:
 
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{| class="wikitable" {{table}}
 
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| align="center" |'''Commodity'''
 
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| align="center" |'''Buy from'''
 
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| align="center" |'''Sell to'''
 
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| align="center" |'''Profit per item'''
 
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| align="center" |'''Profit per $1 invested'''
 
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|-
 
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| Food||Farming vessel||Slave trader||8||4
 
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|-
 
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| Metal|| Industrial trader, <br/> Combat supplier||Slave trader||6||3
 
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|-
 
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| Medikit||Industrial trader||Slave trader||30||3
 
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|-
 
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| Uranium||Industrial trader||Farming vessel||1||0.25
 
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|-
 
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| Shells||Combat supplier||Slave trader||1||0.25
 
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|-
 
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| Missiles||Combat supplier||Slave trader||31||1.63
 
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|}
 
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* Food is the most efficient relative to the capital: The return on investment is 400%. The only drawback is low unit price of potatoes: To make larger profits, you will need massive food stockpiles (which must be protected from pests) as well as manpower to haul it around. In addition to the silver profit, your large quantity of export food doubles up nicely as an emergency reserve - but on the other hand you may experience supply shocks if you sell too aggressively.
 
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* Metal is also very efficient, with a 300% ROI. As an added bonus, you can skim some of the metal flowing through your trading post for construction projects, to supplement mining and pod drops.
 
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* Medikits are the value-dense alternative to metal and food: You get a lot more profit per item (hence per hauling job and per storage space). These are currently completely orthogonal to your domestic economy, so you don't need to worry about balancing your own economy with trade.
 
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* Uranium isn't very profitable, but it has a very important advantage: All other items must be sold to the slaver, but with with uranium, you can sell to the more frequent farming vessel.
 
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* Shells - same as uranium, except bought from different ship and must be sold to slaver.
 
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* Missiles are similar to shells, but again there is the advantage of being value-dense. At $31 per missile, you need a much smaller quantity of missiles to make the same profit compared to other, more efficient goods like food or metal.
 
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While you are starting out, it makes sense to trade in food since that gives the most ROI. Unfortunately you have to wait for the rare slave ship, so you can also invest in uranium to even out your income flow, at the cost of sacrificing some income in the long run. After trading a couple of times, you will likely amass so much capital that the choice of commodity will become irrelevant - you will have to buy everything the ship has because the limiting factor is now quantity available for sale, not price.
 
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Another very profitable activity is to sell weapons: After defeating a few waves of raiders, you will have enough advanced weapons for all of your militia, and you will begin to amass a very large pile of common weapons like pistols. At $40 a pop, selling a bunch of pistols provides a tidy profit as well, the only drawback is that they will occupy a lot of space on your landing pad (until you sell them).
 
  
 
[[Category:Trade]]
 
[[Category:Trade]]

Revision as of 10:03, 9 October 2014

In RimWorld, colonists can trade with passing trade vessels to buy and sell resources, gear, and slaves/prisoners.

Trading vessels will often pass within comms range during a limited time. A blue notification will appear right of screen to announce the trader vessel and its type (which determines its range of available goods), and a simple notice at the top of the screen will declare when the trading vessel has left comms range and can no longer be traded with.

To enable trading, a colony must have a powered Comms console and an Orbital trade beacon. Any goods the player wishes to trade (excluding prisoners) must be within the orbital trade beacon's area of influence, which can be displayed by selecting the beacon. Any colonist can be selected and ordered to trade with available vessels by right-clicking on the Comms console, however the higher the social skills of the selected colonist, the better the trade prices will be. After selecting the trading vessel, the trade interface opens.

The trade interface shows what commodities are available to trade, the colony's stocks, trader's stocks, and the prices to buy/sell. To trade, simply click and hold the number listed under "Drag to trade" next to the appropriate item, and drag it either to the left to buy, or to the right to sell.

Note that prices listed in green are cheap, and prices listed in red are expensive.

In RimWorld, silver is used as currency, so 1 silver = $1.00 on the trade interface.

Trade tips

  • Each trade vessel type has a different range of available commodities, people and/or weapons.
  • Colonists with a higher Social skill using the Comms console will negotiate lower buying prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
  • Likewise, colonists with a higher Social skill will negotiate for higher selling prices for everything but the Commodities (0.5% per Social skill point).
  • Selling a prisoner is profitable, but has a negative impact on the happiness of all colonists (excludes psychopaths).
  • Food and textiles can be quickly grown on Hydroponics tables, which makes farming a viable income source, provided there's enough manpower to tend to the ever-growing crops.
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