[suggestion] Excess resources? Global Merchant!

yeah there should be some sort of merchant that gives you really bad deals on things at first, but as you research stuff you can get better deals.  a way to either sell or trade for what you want.

The problem with materials is that there is nothing in this game that primarily costs materials.  Everything costs gold to build, so unless your gold income is absurdly high or your materials income absurdly low, eventually this becomes a complete non-issue.  As it stands right now, this resource is only meaningful in the first few turns of the game, and quickly become meaningless.  The resource should either be removed or further developed.  Something as simple as re-pricing some of the weapons  and armor to cost less gold and more materials would be a great way to make use of it. 

Some resource buildings cost only materials, like gold mine.

Adjust some buildings to cost more material & less gold.

Goodmorning all

Another option for a global merchant is outlined in https://forums.elementalgame.com/396352  where a global AI in-charge of non-notable NPCs would buy spare resources especially food, to complete quests including attacking wandering monsters on the map. 

I suggested a "black market" live Sins that had an exchange rate that would change throughout the game foreverrrr ago. Didn't get in, obviously. 

Alternatively, I think the Alchemy system in MoM is a great thing to copy. You can convert Gold <=> Mana. It was a decently large ratio, and you lost each time you converted, so you couldn't do it whenever you wanted... unless you chose that perk for your Leader 8D 

Actually I like the fact that certain resource have to be found or be dealt without. The idea of a supernatural merchant appearing from nowhere and giving resources to sovreigns, who should be the rulers of the world, but just don't have... wood... while he does and who knows where he gets it... That is something I find a bit annoying and absurd. Sorry.

I'm with BK, yeah you may end up with a lot of materials, but an organized world wide merchant merchant doesn't really fit well with the post apocalyptic story of the game.

Besides, my current game gave me no material resources at all (other than Labor pits and a few lost caravans) until around turn 250, and even then it was because I took over a few cities from an enemy sov. Until turn 300 or so, materials were a primary concern for my empire, buildings or troops, never both.  Guess it depends on the game.

Well, I didn't mean for it to sound like some sort of supernatural being, a "god of trading" if you will.  I was more along the lines of what Robbie.Price suggested.  Some sort of world trade network.  I like the idea of inns to establish trade or it could just be some sort of underground black market.  I don't care if you have to go to an inn, maybe there are merchant caravans wandering around the wilds, or just a "Trade on black market" button.  I just thought it might add a bit more spice to the game to be able to sell resources and maybe buy some interesting items.

By the way, BK, you don't know where a merchant would get wood from?  There are suppose to be other people living in the world besides just the major factions.  Thats why there are heroes wandering about that are for hire.  And I'm sure some of these people that don't belong to particular factions have trees growing on their property that they would like to sell.

Anyway, this was just a rough concept that I thought we could be refined to fit in with the game style.  It was due to me having about 1000 materials and not many other resources to work with in a game I was playing.

Thats a good idea as well.

A thought occurs to me. Make a trade network, that has to be A. researched, and B. built as a world "wonder". The trade network will simply not exist until both are done. And advantage to the person who controls the hub? Why 2-5% of every transaction in resources, goes straight into the controlling factions coffers.

This can be handled once every 10 turns , a Diplo trade screen will pop up with the accumulated "kickbacks" shown as a temporary "Diplomatic Capital" stat that can be used to purchase Material, Iron, Mounts, Crystals, Elementarum(sp?) and Gildar... maybe even Populace. Any "Capital" not used will disappear at the end of the "diplo" session.

Thoughts?

Some good thoughts here.  Here's another spurred by others...

Black Market.  Players (incl. AI) can trade any resource for any other.  The rates of exchange vary based on global occurance.  Abundant resources hold little value vs rare resources.  But every exchange between player and Black Market will come as a loss to the player.  Patronage with the Black Market allows it to grow evermore powerful over time.  As wealth is accumulated, a variety of events unlock.  Doing business with the Black Market comes at the cost of empowering an organized crime network which will prey on your populace.  All sorts of progressive events come to mind.  Such as Mercenary Guilds, Thief Guilds, Banditry modifiers... 

Perhaps player can have some options (quests) to minimize the organized crime networks power.  The Black Market would be a global enterprise consisting of local networks.  No centralized power for the players to target, so no extermination.  But can impact local networks which has global repercussions.  Some players may want to empower the crime network, others may wish to activelly limit it, while others may ignore it and deal with the consequences as they come.  Techs and quests can be used to deal with the Market and impact it's power.  ??

That all sounds more like a global... stock market.
Material down 12! Buy buy buy!

As Darvin3 said, material isn't properly integrated into the game. It simply stops being any factor whatsoever in the first 50 turns or so.
Metal can go the same route if you find a few mines.
Gold is usually the sole limiting factor in the game because you can (are expected to?) invest insane amounts of that into champ equipment and army upkeep is paid in gold only.

I think the whole resource system needs a good rebalancing before additional features like a stock market can reasonably work.
Right now it would only be a way to buy more gold at increasingly inflationary rates because noone ever needs anything else.