DE trade units don't always pick the longest route

Trade unit choice of markets is more complicated than I thought!
Patreon: / spiritofthelaw
Full intro song: • Spirit of the Law Chan...
Background music from Epidemic Sound: www.epidemicsou...
Game: Age of Empires 2 Definitive Edition, with Forgotten Empires, African Kingdoms, Rise the Rajas, and Last Khans expansions

[@ExcelonTheFourthAvalonHeirs]

SoTL fans: So, what the answer? SoTL: Well, it's complicated... SoTL fans: Make sense.

[@winnieelegante6901]

Like my chemistry teachers lol

[@HolyKhaaaaan]

He is like the Tim Pool of Age of Empires.

[@reubendias18]

SOTL: Which market would you choose? Trade cart: *this one* SOTL: *So I'll delete it*

[@fantasyfootballhq9842]

"Hi guys, Spirit of the daily Trade info uploads here"

[@BanDaniel23]

Hahahahaha this comment really made me laugh 😂

[@UberMenschNowFilms]

"The wood market is down after the Teutons sold off their excess timber, but food is still offering a good price. At nine, we'll discuss the ramifications of the defeat of the Koreans on stone trading."

[@Sids1192]

Spirit of the Deal

[@sushantsardeshpande9484]

@@UberMenschNowFilms And the Spanish market crash and bonus being decreased to a mere 2% as a result.

[@MrDibara]

"Hey guys, Spirit of the Ferengi here."

[@Keviamaya]

Bless the DE for the daily uploads It has blessed us with.

[@artham94]

They keep remaking it and adding content just to see SOTL-senpai's hot takes on all of it.

[@masternobody1896]

Nice

[@artham94]

1:38 you monster!

[@izaktaylor4246]

@Artus Hammell I’m saying! 😂 #StopTradecartAbuse

[@frankybee9]

One of the few ppl willing to make a video correcting past mistakes. You truly are a man about numbers.

[@idndyzgaming]

They should have inserted "this is my preferred market for trade" option ... Y'know, like stock market in which nations can choose where they want their center be.

[@josephprince3917]

"Hi guys, Spirit of the daily uploads here"

[@ThomasBreaker]

The guy has new material to look at after many years, give him a break lol.

[@ragmority]

And that's a good thing!

[@ChauNyan]

Thomas Nazar I’m so glad age of empires 2 is returning into popularity. Another booming channel, the spiffing Brit actually gave Spirit a shoutout too.

[@estebancastilloa300]

Hey Spirit, could you do a video on the secret units of DE? Apparently meso civs can now train Xolotl warriors (heavy cavalry) by converting stables, but there's also Ninja s, Iroquois Warriors and Mounted Samurais.

[@pronoob2439]

By Meso civs you mean Aztec and Incas

[@TheIanOakley]

@@pronoob2439 So can Mayans, but as they don't get Redemption, they can't convert Stables - but in the scenario editor if they start with a stable they can.

[@lud4079]

How do you get the mounted samurai?

[@KapitanWalnut]

Markets and docks should just have a button that either allows or prevents trade with that building. That way the players can easily control their trade routes without the devs having to balance around an ideal distance.

[@Morgowitch]

You can trade with your opponents though, which would be made impossible then.

[@kesiazezebajki1982]

"What if I delete their favourite market" How dare you! Trade Carts have feelings too.

[@pendantblade6361]

I've been watching your videos for nearly two years despite the fact I don't play the games at all.

[@MasterSonicKnight]

*visibly glad but confused*

[@legoman2m98]

Same xD

[@namensklauer]

i feel like this doesnt change too much. trade cog: *just minding its own business at its 60 long route to my rear end dock* me:*builds forward dock at a distance of 110* trade cog: YEET!

[@malox1696]

Why not make button on markets to chose the preferred one ?

[@marosam236]

malox1696 i dont even know why this was not common sense to the developers, its the simplest and most logical option, i would add the best approach is if i could make a waypoint between two markets to manually force a group of trade carts to trade between them Edit: i think this was how it was in empire earth 2 if i am correct, so it is not like a new idea in the first place

[@hellodean4]

like in the command and conquer games , "primary building selected"

[@idndyzgaming]

Yes. This is what I wanted to say.

[@juggernaut93]

@@marosam236 They would still need a solution for when markets are destroyed anyway

[@ifoundmypasta]

@@juggernaut93 There could be a priority list of markets but yeah, the tile preference makes sense for default

[@rin-senpai7115]

Now that the new tech Supplies exists, we could also revisit "Champion vs Samurai". Champions being even cheaper now makes it a really more attractive choice overall (outside of countering unique units specifically).

[@Papersheepp]

quit confusing the poor horses dammit

[@thetntsheep4075]

The market should have a button which can change the carts' preferred distance

[@sghost128]

A distractor market, North Korea's unique tech.

[@bbeat12]

spirit of the law(of trade). thanks for your uploads man! pure gold

[@andrewk.5575]

Obviously, I don't know of any civ bonuses that give wood, stone, or food with trade.

[@nathangamble125]

WOW! I got into a SOTL video! It's really cool that there was some extra mechanic behind it which neither of us had realised before you did some extra research to prove it. Massive respect to you for investigating further, @Spirit Of The Law

[@DTMugetsu]

can u make a triangle of markets!??, that way it's more efficient rigth🤔🤔

[@voidgods]

Wow, nice catch, worth a test. But I'd say that chances are the angled tiles/building shape will make it hard to have they be the same distance away from each other at all points

[@-Kerstin]

That's clever

[@wolfgangbr1576]

this sounds logical and smart, but is it really? How would it work? My market --> ally market --> my market = triangular. Maybe do a square of markets, but then again, how would you control all 4 corners in a map?

[@ahbraveconscript997]

those collabs with t90 were really cool

The original market video was already long with 42 minutes but now we have even more data about the building that everyone underestimate

[@saccaron]

Hi, thanks for the update. I think there should be an option in the docks and markets "favourite trading market/dock", which could be enabled/disabled in no/one/several/all buildings. If all were enabled or disbled for instance, then the present day default mechanism would apply. But if two markets were enabled for instance, then the trade carts would choose the closest to default (in this case 100 tiles). And if one only was enabled, then it would be the favourite of all units able to reach it.

[@alex_zetsu]

Ideal trade cart behavior: If you are trading between 2 markets, keep doing it as long as there is a path (neither market is destroyed or walled off). If your home market is destroyed, at the time of destruction, chose one closest to you to replace it. If you were just created, your home market is that that one. This gives all the flexibility a player should need for his trade carts.

[@c182SkylaneRG]

Interesting observation from your videos: it appears as though Trade Carts will continue dropping gold at a market, even AFTER the market has been deleted, up until the building collapse animation finishes. I saw several instances of trade carts dropping gold at deleted markets that were in the process of collapsing.

[@andriykostiv5068]

Wishful thinking:when chinese civ receives: 1.dragon fireship from Langshan Jiang battle 2.chukonu get +1 attack for each Relic garrisoned in the Monastery, up to +5 3.Can build Krepost 4.Archers do +50% damage when attacking from higher elevations (instead of +25%) 5.Can build an additional Town Center in the Feudal Age. Siege Workshop and Battering Ram available in the Feudal Age

[@qwerty222999]

I think DE should add a trade route feature, where you link two markets to create your desired trade route, and then order caravans to use a trade route, by issuing a move command, to either market that has a linked trade route. That would improve caravan handling.

[@blessedbethelord4835]

"Hey guys, Spirit of a Lot of Free Time here..." I thought of this before i saw the comments; good to see were all on the same vibe lol.

[@Nico-kd7uz]

For this type of videos is for what i became a subscriber. Love this type of content

[@bouteilledeau1463]

"Hey guys, Spirit of the Flaw here"

[@lexecutoomber]

God bless AoE 2 DE because of it Spirit of the law is uploading almost daily videos

[@aliyass391]

bless the de for this daily upload gift

[@Elmias]

"Hey guys, Spirit of the La Hire"

[@TheManofthecross]

100 title distance from one market to the next is preferred and all maps have it over that distance so anything closest to that number will do.

[@SciFi2285]

As with so much else when discussing HD vs DE: one step forward, one step back. Having them go for the closest market makes trade much easier to control. Are you going to remember the complicated 100 tiles rule in the middle of a sprawling post-imperial age battle? Are you going to waste time counting tiles during all that? Probably not.

[@Johnnywilsonforever]

I love the Hey Arnold reference at 2:57

[@mussagan]

Dear Spirit of The law: You are a Post doctoral reseracher in AOE 2 Mathematics :) Bravo

[@icjet1ks]

next Spirit of the law video: Taxi units don't always take the closest route

[@ZKP314]

So, Spirit, I know this sounds weird, but is it possible to do Civ overviews for Galactic Battlegrounds? I'd like to see what you could find.

[@DaftSpunky]

SOTL you should make a video about the % increase of your upload rate after AOE2 DE came out

[@Daplin1]

I'm not making an account for this. Someone tell de team that the cuman campaign is broken.... In the 4th or 3rd mission theres a merchant you need to protect. If you dont find enemy humans first then when you get that prompt the merchant will stop walking. Meaning you cant finish the mission. Fix plox 3 resets ffs

[@SentaDuck]

aww Spirit reads my comments. ♡♡♡

[@bladactania]

Why would they just not remove the "auto" feature and just have the trade units trade with the target market/dock?

[@lukefreeman828]

Lee Blake what happens when it’s destroyed? Also, players can’t be trusted to pick the best market lol.

[@Morgowitch]

Where do they drop off?

[@willyjeff85]

collapse animation of buildings in DE is amazing.

[@TheRealGovika]

The trade carts look like scared, confused ants when you start deleting markets

[@fatjuicymeatball2266]

Nobody expects the Spanish inquisition!

[@poutykeiki2574]

*YEET*

[@kostariusevmenid7289]

I did not expect them here oh wow.

[@aliencatcrew3336]

Maybe the 100 tiles thing is for someone who builds multiple markets, far apart from one another, and then forget about 1. The trade cart or cog will choose one with a 100 tile distance as a reminder i guess lol. Its almost as if the trade units are tired and just want the shortest trip lol

[@ducktape-3470]

Mind = BLOWN I clicked thinking this might be an oopsie, instead a simple thing like trade turns out to have such exquisite mechanics. Spirit, make a video about gather points and unit spawns ? Might be interesting.

[@RustyBrakes]

It looks like the Devs have basically added in a small adjustment to prevent your accidental close market from being used

[@huberteichson8304]

Why not make it so that they always go where you have placed that summoning/spawn flag? That would make you have full control of where your trade dudes goes. The only downside would be that all trade carts from that one market would go to the same market and you'd would have to build another market for a new trade route with another player/market. I feel like me as the player having full control over my units is better than any random hidden 100 tiles magic number.

[@krankarvolund7771]

Yeah, I was windering too ^^'

[@TheCoastalAVENGER]

could be cool if the devs add a slider in the options menu to choose your own trade units route length preference from 0 to max

[@blitzknight5x744]

I'm loving the content that DE is putting on the table. Delicious and fresh! :D

[@NewEnglandOtaku]

I'm still on HD, my lumberjacks been going around longer way than going to the one closest to where they're working.. They go to the other side of the wall instead... I built one closest to the forest and they go to the one furthest away.

[@TheCrimsonGears]

Spirit of the Law for President 2020 "Hello fellow citizens, SofL here" *Crowd goes wild* "Hey guys.." *Crowd screams in deathly volumes*

[@Skaitania]

No worries, everyone knows TCC, Trade Cart Calculations, are the toughest dicipline both in Business Management and Political Economics. We all get our assumptions mixed up at least by semester three. If only there was a video game to make it easier to remember.

[@OytheGreat]

Spirit is basically a dll decompiler by trial and error

[@Clerkius]

Excellent Choice!

[@Progeusz]

Wow. Well done with the research, good stuff and though initially unintuitive, it actually makes sense why devs went for this.

[@alexanderdavies1891]

Wouldn't a better compromise be controlling trade units similarly to the patrol command? For example, if you are training carts if you set a spawn point at a specific market, the cart should go back and forth between its spawn market and the selected ally one. Then, if you want to change it, you should be able to select a unit and choose two points for it to go back and forth between regardless of distance.

[@DJFlosse87]

Ohhhhh Boy, only FEW left to 200k subs! Hope u have a good special for it! Keep up ur work and get better to Play against T90 more offen ;)

[@egopooky9190]

With DE you got like tons of new content. Videos are acutally frequently.

[@rasput1n6]

Nice research

[@GolanL]

May the KZbin algorithm be with you

[@offsdexter2]

honestly... an old RTS called KKnD had a mechanic where you would select your truck, click on a refinery and on an oil outpost, the truck would run between these. Why can't you click on a market and the unit starts using that market? if its urs, then its where he will leave the gold. If its an enemy/allied market, then it gets the gold from there.

[@HenryElfin]

The carts finally delivered the goods to the collapsing market during their never ending shift.

[@ShaDoW-uc7bn]

I have noticed that Hardest Ai (might be more) usually builds around 5-6 markets and places most of them in the corner. Why is that?

[@a.m.6138]

When the distance is just right.

[@KandyRappers]

Counterpoint: they prefer a 99 tile trade route and it's limited by number of digits

[@catboygremlin]

with my very limited understanding of the scenario creator (I liked AoM's better) it looks like tradecarts now prefer the furthest market.

[@Santibag]

I can already smell a second revision to this discovery.

[@emiskilrimusicproductions]

I'll have to agree with you. one of my trade carts in hd tried to pass through the villsge of my enemies, and I was freaking out. I then realised my ally blocked it off, but before that happened, the cart tried going a longer way

[@TTVShm0l]

I don't even play AOE anymore I just like watching these videos

[@684avatar]

I just really hope they bring the new civs to the HD edition.

[@derekrambo]

Do a video on Lithuanian light cav being as deadly as regular knights cost efficiency. Idk lol

[@Thunderdumpe]

It seems to me, that if the tip of your trade route gets invaded, with 100 tiles you can build shorter markets without deleting the old ones : )

[@lud4079]

Hey! Can you talk about the xolotl warrior? (the cavalry unit of the incas and aztecs that can be created when converting a stable)

[@Joker-yw9hl]

I love this channel

[@6Twisted]

Why though? Why bother making this change but half arsing it and using a hard coded number that doesn't take into account map size? If they felt the need to change it, they should have set it to map width*0.8 or something.

[@luggy9256]

Thanks for the clarification

[@ComradeTomatoTurtle]

They been spamming markets too after the first one, so eventually they make a better route. Idk if its just by chance, but eventually they start building behind or in front of their current base and I've been getting further markets every game.

[@KaX321]

Or maybe there is no in-engine way for the pathing AI to diferentiate between map sizes (or adding that slowed everything else too much)

[@JNCressey]

So you could make a double wide 100 long trade route with the lanes not affecting eachother.

[@StriKe_jk]

So, how many trade cards is optimal for a 100 tile distance?

[@dragovern]

100 carts?

[@genericyoutubeaccount579]

I need to know this!

[@Morgowitch]

How would you measure optimal? The effectiveness of trade carts will go down after the first in terms of bumping, so the most efficient route is 1 cart. Even though it increases bumping an additional cart will probably increase the overall gain, so the most effective amount is 100% supply. The optimal amount of supply that you invest for trade is a strategic decision and Spirit of the Law usually only answers mathematic questions.

[@srujan9427]

Hey spirit,seems like the wiki says,mounted samurai,ninja and Iroquois warrior are trainable,with the xolotl warrior being trained from converted stable(aztecs and incas only). Could you look into this?

[@WolfrinFenris1]

Props for creating a correction vid rather then just posting a comment or saying "eh"

[@user-cz7xy5jy1b]

Hi SoTL, will you make a video about how the cuman's Kipchak multi-arrow works? I thought it is a little bit like organ guns, but something it seems miss a lot (2 damage per shot to a moving villager) and something the damage is much high than I thought it should apply (espically on rams)...

[@joshuaphillips9164]

what about using waypoints? It'd make sence for the waypoint directing the unit from spawn determined the chosen trade route if they always return to the home market

[@MadArcherJr]

There is a new cavalry unit that the Mesoamerican civs can train if they have a stable or convert one. The stats and cost are similar to that of a knight, so would it even be worth training being that they don't get bloodlines or cavalry armor upgrades?

[@SeseelLybon]

So, I discussed this a little bit with a friend. But why not let players pick home and end market? Is that too much hassle for the player? Does the UI not support that? That's not what AoE2 is about? (This also ties in to the unrelated question of about why we have to manually ferry transport ships, rather than being able to set up a ferry like in Supreme Commander)

[@jesselamb1003]

they should add a home market option like they added with the mill

[@Dreska_]

What if you flip the example and make a line of red markets and 1 blue market (with the trade carts still being blue). ie can they change which market they're right-clicked on or can they only change their home market?

[@TheDcfan01]

you can trade with enemies too right? what happens if an enemy constructs a market 100 tiles away from your market?

[@tolunayfurkanuslu6938]

Spirit of the Trade

[@DangerDucking]

So if you have five markets next to each other, each paired with one of five on the other side of the map, will they all try to clog into 1 market on each side rather than using all 5?

[@Morgowitch]

I have some problems understanding: What do you mean by paired? How should the trade carts use all 5 markets?

[@zacharytaylor2423]

Would it really have been that hard to give trade carts their own command (like patrol) where you get to pick the whole route?

[@hi14993]

My guess is that the 100 tile range is the most efficient in terms of gold per minute have you compared how efficiency stacks up in trade cart route length?(edit spelling)

[@michabaron4129]

Hey Spirit, i've got a great and relevant DE video idea. Check out implications of Cuman Mercenaries technology. How Kipchaks work with particular civilisations, what applies and what does not. Is 10 saracen Kipchaks an ultimate raiding party that can take out lumber camps in few volleys? Which civ gets the best Kipchaks?

[@Robert-vk7je]

Can you imagine being a trade cart driver in one of these tests?

[@lazthegreat10]

The plot thickens