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State of Sartarite trade to the Holy Country, 1625-1627ST


Squaredeal Sten

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What do you think the state of Sartarte trade south to Heortland, to Nochet etc. Would be following the Dragonrise, 1625ST through 1627ST.?

I would think it would have been seriously disrupted 1623-1625 ST  by the Lunar invasions of the Holy Country.  But with Sartarte trade northward to Peloria and Tarsh now disrupted, there is every reason for Sartar to trade southward. Plus, Ernaldans can make pilgrimages to Nochet again.

The obstacles would include: Anarchy and warlords in Heortland.  A Wolf Pirate presence in Choralinthor Bay.  Chaos from the Print unleashed by the Lunars and not bottled up again.  

What am I missing?

 

 

Edited by Squaredeal Sten
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Status of Trade: Likely 'damaged but slowly improving'

- Damaged because the Lunars are no long protecting trade routes [their primary motive for invading Sartar and Esrolia in the first place] and improving because open warfare has moved on from Esrolia's land routes.

Problems:

- Restless Beastmen in Beast Valley

- Grazelander raiding

- General banditry

Summary: Caravan trade has always been a dangerous profession. It's a lot more dangerous now, but the profits from a successful caravan are enormous. There is a friendly government in Nochet, the biggest city in the world, so there is a hungry market for Sartarite luxury goods and oddities. Both Sartar and Esrolia are self-sufficient in the necessities of life but there is probably a solid market for thinks like Orlanthi statuary, ritual items, Sartar styled weapons and armors, etc.

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I am thinking Sartar exports both wool and wool cloth.  According to the Guide, also bronze - but if you read the Boldhome entry in the Starter Set, the  Boldhome bronze smith guild's usual source appears to be mines that I believe are in Tarsh, though I can't map spot the location.  Probably now in hostile or disputed territory.  If so they should be trying to source bronze from...Caladraland?

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Well, I should think that a society so focused on agrarian industry like Esrolia would probably be self-sufficient in woolens, leather, and other animal products.

At this stage of the game, [your 1623-25 timeframe] Etyries routes and contacts are now gone and Issaries merchants are working hard to fill the void... both from an monetary and political alliance point of view. I really do think that at this moment a lot of trade is going to be in the small high-value goods... dyes, spices, gemstones, etc. ... instead of bulk goods like metals and cloth.

Insofar as bronze goes, I was always under the impression that Sartar was self-sufficient in bronze but it might be an issue of quality of ore too. Perhaps a Lunar source of tin combined with Esrolian copper makes a better quality bronze?

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1 hour ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

What do you think the state of Sartarte trade south to Heortland, to Nochet etc. Would be following the Dragonrise, 1625ST through 1627ST.?

I would think it would have been seriously disrupted 1623-1625 ST  by the Lunar invasions of the Holy Country.  But with Sartarte trade northward to Peloria and Tarsh now disrupted, there is every reason for Sartar to trade southward. Plus, Ernaldans can make pilgrimages to Nochet again.

The obstacles would include: Anarchy and warlords in Heortland.  A Wolf Pirate presence in Choralinthor Bay.  Chaos from the Print unleashed by the Lunars and not bottled up again.  

What am I missing?

In the period 1622-24, the Lunars still hold Karse, Durengard/Leskos, and Whitewall and can bring trade from the Empire through Sartar to the port and back.  The Siege of Nochet in 1623 clearly disrupts delivery of goods to Nochet, but there are still ships that could continue trade to Rhigos, and inbound ships might go to Karse instead of Nochet. Heortland rebels exist and raid poorly guarded caravans.

As of Seaseason 1624 though, the Wolf Pirates return.  Not only is the Siege of Nochet broken, but Heortland is liberated, and the Lunars driven out of Durengard, Karse, and Whitewall.  Now you've got Heortland raiders and bandits, Wolf Pirate raiders, etc.  1624-5 becomes difficult to bring goods north from Karse.  But through Fireseason 1625 King Broyan lives and the Wolf Pirates are spending their loot from the major battles and the sack of the City of Wonders in Nochet, Casino Town, etc.  Likely Broyan's bargain with Harrek helps keep the route from Nochet to Karse to Whitewall open, and the Lunars still want trade.  Wilmskirk and Boldhome are likely transfer points for major caravans.

Broyan's death and the Dragonrise alter the situation by mid-1625.  Wolf pirates employed by Broyan now camp at Karse and Newtown below Whitewall.  The Olontongi tribe has formed at Newtown as well.  They all take their cut of any trade, and other clans/tribes in Heortland (and Sartar) likely raid caravans too.  I think trade continues, but merchants have to shell out a lot of tribute and "protection" money and pay for extra guards.  

It continues in this way at least to 1627.  And gets worse in central Heortland from raids by scorpionmen.  Both Kallyr and Samastina want trade to continue.  Samastina can use the Grazelands route to Tarsh, though slower.  Kallyr likely needs trade, but her position is tenuous and her death leaves another gap.  Without the Prince of Sartar to enforce justice on the Royal Roads, things deteriorate further.

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Love it. TLDR answer from me is that the unique strategic nature of Nochet as hub of maritime trade still outweighs the incremental risks and challenges of plugging your caravan into that network. If you have stuff north of Nochet, you want to move it south. If you have stuff west of Nochet, you want to move it east. Once you get it to Nochet, you want to sell it, buy new stuff there and then come home to start the cycle again. The last few decades have been crazy but nothing in the literature suggests it got crazy enough to do more than temporarily interrupt that flow of people, ideas, stuff and money. 

Where it changes from year to year is what you carry, who you work with and the route you use. Like sven says, Dragon Pass was always a hairy enough run that you didn't want to bother shipping bulk goods across it. Keep it small, keep it light, keep it extremely valuable. Crystals. Artifacts. Scrolls. Iron. As the route gets more or less hairy, your mix might adjust. Some classes of trade good might be embargoed on one side or another for political reasons . . . then you decide if you're a trader or a smuggler. The story of that decision is the story of trade in the 1600s and 1610s. It needs to be told and will be some day.

IMG the early 1620s are superficially similar despite all the upheavals. Then Kallyr is actually bad for business by making it complicated (less pleasant if not actively illegal) to trade with Peloria through Boldhome while not replacing that established customer base with much of anything. No problem, everyone with a northern interest books a room in Queens Post instead and people, ideas, stuff and money keep flowing. Again, the customer base and the things you carry shifts from year to year. Some markets are getting cold. Others are too hot to handle. Red Earth in the south is simpatico with Red Moon in the north and they love to send each other lavish presents.

Argrath is the one who really changes the game by making the Pavis route important. Stuff and money flow across the wastes. It needs to go through Boldhome. It can't go through Queens Post. As long as Argrath tells you Pavis is important, you keep investing resources on that side. You don't need to go up past Furthest any more. In theory, enough of you break on through to fabled Kralorela and the Eest that you retire like mythic kings. Nochet needs silk. Nochet gets a trickle of Seshnegite iron among other things. You can afford that iron and everyone on the trail wants a taste.

If the Seas Close (and I have not seen the truth of this yet personally, it might be an allegory or a nightmare, something meant to be read metaphorically), Boldhome becomes the end of the road and Nochet recedes to become a kind of agricultural hinterland, where the crops that feed the armies come from. Boldhome doesn't make anything much beside power and a few rustic local handicrafts. All the world's treasure flows in and the caravans leave empty of everything but coinage and information. But it's hard to project that far out without being proved wrong.

Edited by scott-martin
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18 minutes ago, scott-martin said:

If the Seas Close (and I have not seen the truth of this yet personally, it might be an allegory or a nightmare, something meant to be read metaphorically)

Or the land-based equivalent, when the Elf Reforestation sprouts up!  Better hope those Royal Roads the dwarfs built have a counter for stone-breaking tree roots.  Even the Grazelands becomes problematic.

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If you want to get luxury goods from the Holy Country (and overseas) into Dragon Pass and Peloria, you need to use the Sartarite road system. Political instability, war, chaos, and the rest become risks you need to price into things.

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4 minutes ago, scott-martin said:

What this means for traders who stayed on that route, I don't know.

Hire brontosaurs who can significantly graze/prune the trees as they go, and trample the trees that are in the way. 🙂  The Maran Gor cult becomes very, very important.

Edited by jajagappa
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9 hours ago, scott-martin said:

IMG the early 1620s are superficially similar despite all the upheavals. Then Kallyr is actually bad for business by making it complicated (less pleasant if not actively illegal) to trade with Peloria through Boldhome while not replacing that established customer base with much of anything. No problem, everyone with a northern interest books a room in Queens Post instead and people, ideas, stuff and money keep flowing. Again, the customer base and the things you carry shifts from year to year. Some markets are getting cold. Others are too hot to handle. Red Earth in the south is simpatico with Red Moon in the north and they love to send each other lavish presents.

The Long Winter, the Dragonrise, the withdrawal of the Lunars, as well as the arrival of the Wolf Pirates and Kallyr and her Sartarites will definitely make trade more dangerous.  It is likely trade has been bad for years now.  However, every leader in the area is going to want to get trade flowing again, even if they are bandits.

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5 hours ago, Darius West said:

The Long Winter, the Dragonrise, the withdrawal of the Lunars, as well as the arrival of the Wolf Pirates and Kallyr and her Sartarites will definitely make trade more dangerous.  It is likely trade has been bad for years now.  However, every leader in the area is going to want to get trade flowing again, even if they are bandits.

Oh yeah. That's the calculation that makes the recent past (say 1616-24) feel like the default status quo for the merchants we see in the books. It's not as fun as the old days. You have more headaches and margins are narrow because one way or another you have to spend to deal with them. But anyone still in the business after a decade of upheaval has figured out how to persist in that environment. People who didn't have had a decade to hit the exit one way or another. And to those people in the business when the curtain goes up on 1625, this is "normal." You've been doing it for years, in the words of the immortal Kate Bush.

IMG "normal" persists for a couple of years. The Grazer route destabilizes somewhat, creating challenges as well as disruptive opportunities. The Boldhome route remains marginally more comfortable but the return profile deteriorates: you've lost access to a lot of valuable stuff in the north that is worth money if you get it on a ship, and the local customer base is in shall we say flux. Maybe for a couple of years you're reduced to touring homesteads for scraps of knitting to send down to the sailors or gambling a stamp on exotic fringe routes like what the Miths have. You're used to this kind of thing. It's not wonderful but the last decade has not been wonderful.

From all accounts it starts feeling like a boom around 1627. Maybe this was once "normal" but after so many years of mediocre it feels like up. Weird stuff starts flooding out of the desert. Stuff that's boring to you starts flooding into the desert because it's exotic to them. In a couple of years, you make the right contacts and stuff that only the Red Hair Trackers used to be able to get for you and schlep all the way uphill from Peloria becomes available. Everybody wants to be a Desert Tracker now. It's a fashion craze, a religious revival. Hyena futures go contango for the first time since time. Again, maybe this is "normal" when you factor out all the bandits and flash floods and world war and smog and whatnot . . . but to the people you meet in the game, there's always bandits and smog. As you note here, some of your best customers are bandits and smog.

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Taking a wider picture, in this period we expect the War against War in Fronela to get underway. That probably means the Loskalmi will be trading for more iron and weapons, and selling as much as they can to pay for them. Seshnela is trying to reopen the old Quincapolic league trade routes, specially as the invasion of Ralios is playing havoc with the land route through Maniria, to the joy of the Wolf Pirates. I also expect there are not as many Wolf Pirates as it seems, but you have Red Vadeli disguised as pirates and not leaving survivors to complicate trade. Nochet is under pirate pressure, with a reduced land trade from the West, and the Eastern trade now coming also under pirate pressure, if we take as granted the sacking of Corflu and Wolf Pirate bases on that coast. And Seshnela will be selling more goods North than East, between the demand from Fronela and the pirate menace, so less for Nochet. Which IMG means less iron for Dragon Pass. I wonder what happens to iron after it goes throuigh a dragon digestive system, but surely there were several tons of iron there.

With the Pelorian markets blocked by the on and off Sartar-Tarsh war, though both the Fazzurites and Sartar will be open for business, their main export will be wool and bronze, so probably exotic enough going east by ship, but not much. I expect many Sartarite traders turn to Pavis and Prax, specially as I expect the tribes the Lunars kept down will be anxious for trade, and wool and bronze is probably what they need. I also expect Argrath will support such trade, to keep his Praxian allies happy.

Nochet will be having a bad time till Harrek goes to Pamaltela, though the Maniria land trade will recover when Seshnela is pushed back from Ralios, and there wiil be even better trade opportunities when the West starts to unify. I would expect strong antipirate actions in the East, and that may well remain more important than the Pelorian way for Nochet, at least till Tarsh falls to Argrath.

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On 8/11/2022 at 2:15 AM, Darius West said:

It is likely trade has been bad for years now.  However, every leader in the area is going to want to get trade flowing again, even if they are bandits.

I have been thinking about that. And the incentive structure may be wrong.  It's a multi-player game and the first who reduces his tolls (or his banditry) on a major road  will reduce his own take substantially, but most of the benefit will accrue to the other players (clans, kings, bandit leaders and also of course the merchants).  To get everyone to do it would require an overall ruler or a confederation that might act as a group or perhaps an Issaries heroquest. 

So it may be Issaries Goldentongue traders as a class ( with a few Argan Argar ) trying to restore a lower level of tolls .   By diplomacy assisted by magic and maybe violence or threats?  Problem is there is no Issaries pope. So one major temple might take the lead - or not.  Looks to me like an opportunity for heroic leadership.

On the other hand an Individusl Issaries who acquired some leverage over a clan might negotiate lower tolls for himself only, to acquire a monopoly over the route.  Looks to me like an opportunity for heroic feats but with a different goal than benefitting everyone with free trade.

Which will the players choose?

 

 

 

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On 8/10/2022 at 3:26 PM, svensson said:

....Insofar as bronze goes, I was always under the impression that Sartar was self-sufficient in bronze but it might be an issue of quality of ore too. Perhaps a Lunar source of tin combined with Esrolian copper makes a better quality bronze?

As i understand it from this [preview of Boldhome, https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/catalogue/websites/facebook/runequest-on-facebook-july-2021-highlights-2/#ib-toc-anchor-31

"The Bronze Workers Guild of Boldhome smelts bronze out of copper by alloying it with tin (both of which are mainly brought to Boldhome by caravans from Esrolia or Tarsh   "

Their Tarsh source is going to be on the other side of enemy lines after the Dragonrise, and war means more demand for bronze.  So I'd expect the price of bronze in Sartar to go up.  And the Holy Country is falling into anarchy post-Belintar, so that source becomes problematic too. 

 

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6 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

 It's a multi-player game and the first who reduces his tolls (or his banditry) on a major road  will reduce his own take substantially.

Market forces will balance this out however...  If a leader offers reduced tolls and a safe passage, then more and more of the merchant traffic will favor their territory.  Those leaders who don't react will find they miss out, and will likely have to try their luck at banditry, which is a dangerous short term answer to a long term problem.

6 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

To get everyone to do it would require an overall ruler or a confederation that might act as a group or perhaps an Issaries heroquest. 

I like this idea (any political excuse for a hero quest is a good one, amirite?).  On the other hand, I see this as the means of speeding up the natural process of what would happen naturally.

6 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

 By diplomacy assisted by magic and maybe violence or threats?  Problem is there is no Issaries pope. So one major temple might take the lead - or not.  Looks to me like an opportunity for heroic leadership.

The Issaries "pope" is the trader with the most money.  While the richest person might not be an Issaries high priest, this is how merchants keep score.  Mr Goldgotti might be a good choice.

6 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

On the other hand an Individual Issaries who acquired some leverage over a clan might negotiate lower tolls for himself only, to acquire a monopoly over the route.  Looks to me like an opportunity for heroic feats but with a different goal than benefitting everyone with free trade.

This will certainly happen regardless imo.  In fact, most clans will have an inter-tribal trade agreement that potentially even supersedes even clan feuds.  Each clan in every region affected will have at least one trader who negotiates on their behalf, and while trade might not be the highest priority in a time of universal catastrophe, it will serve as a way to help solve many of the worst problems of any catastrophe by bringing in goods from less affected or unaffected areas. 

I don't think many areas will opt for monopolies however, and likely don't have the authority to seriously grant one for more than a very limited time.  Historically only Kings could grant monopolies and would normally only grant them for a limited period, as ultimately they require enforcement, which is expensive and annoying, and really only serves to make a rich person (who may challenge your authority in the longer term) richer.  Kings will be far more likely to offer 'rewards' that are actually punishments, such as "I shall grant you ownership of these extensive orchards", which turn out to be grossly underproducing because nobody has figured out what the problem is, or "I shall grant you a monopoly of tolls on the Newhaven to Oxley road, which is badly maintained and underused because of its passage over a ridge where bandits hang out.

2 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

"The Bronze Workers Guild of Boldhome smelts bronze out of copper by alloying it with tin (both of which are mainly brought to Boldhome by caravans from Esrolia or Tarsh   "

I would assume that there is also a lot of re-melting and re-casting of surplus bronze goods as well.  Plenty of re-casting of ploughshares into swords going on imo.

Edited by Darius West
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8 hours ago, Darius West said:

 

I don't think many areas will opt for monopolies however, and likely don't have the authority to seriously grant one for more than a very limited time.  Historically only Kings could grant monopolies and would normally only grant them for a limited period, ....

I believe you mistook what I wrote about monopoly.   if only one trader has  lower tolls then he or she has a de facto monopoly, without anyone "granting" one.   His competitors will not be competitive, because they won't be able to match his prices.  So no piece of paper with the word "monopoly" on it is needed.

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9 hours ago, Darius West said:

Market forces will balance this out however...  If a leader offers reduced tolls and a safe passage, then more and more of the merchant traffic will favor their territory.  Those leaders who don't react will find they miss out, ...

That faith in "the market" doesn't fit the situation because we have been told there is only one road route into Heortland.  The alternative is by water via The Creek Stream river route to Nochet and then by sea across Choralinthor Bay.  That's very circuitous if you start out in Boldhome.  Maybe not too bad if you start in Clearwine.  But the sea crossing is now subject to piracy by the Wolf Pirates, see Jajagappa's description in this thread.

So there are not many competing routes.  It is not a competitive market situation at the macro level. Only at the merchant level.

There is actually a historical situation that matches my pessimistic model.  That is medieval Europe.   As I understand it in France the local nobility burdened trade with tolls.  It lasted centuries.  Even without a single clear choke point on the map.   Even the rise of the monarchy did not totally erase it, and the monarchy did grant monopolies.   Intra country free trade did not completely come true until the Revolotion.  Perhaps one of the French participants on the forum will correct or affirm my impression.

Another historical example: Why are there many picturesque castles on the Rhine?  No  the medieval petit monarchs were not building to enhance modern tourism.  Each castle was a point at which they could charge tolls.

Edited by Squaredeal Sten
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4 minutes ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

The alternative is by water via The Creek Stream river route to Nochet and then by sea across Choralinthor Bay.

I highlighted this part as prelude to saying I think you're both right. Formal monopolies aren't well entrenched within the Issaries establishment (the Great Sister system is different) but sweetheart deals and specialized knowledge can provide enough of a competitive edge for an especially ambitious merchant to theoretically push all rivals off the route. 

In practice, this doesn't seem to have happened lately because the texts suggest more fragmentation / less consolidation along the main line. I'm not fully (93%) convinced that the big players have explicitly gotten together to keep the road open to anybody who can pay the tolls . . . this might just as easily be lingering House of Sartar fair practice backed up by Geo and other utility providers who are probably deeply embedded with the big merchants anyway one way or another. Whatever the agenda, the syndicate operators IMG seem to want to keep the road open to every Harst hopeful with a shingle and some buttons. 

Thinking about it, this provides great protective cover for smugglers and other politically sensitive contraband the syndicates don't want to touch out in the open. They can work with some bandits more than others. Every bandit is different and has different material needs. Maybe in the near future the incentive to flood the zone recedes and the cartels can compete more aggressively for something like joint monopoly control of the road . . . unless of course the hero wars change the game too much in the meantime.

And of course the best sweetheart deals and most specialized knowledge will continue to effectively provide monopolistic power to the merchants who care to cultivate unique routes, products or relationships. That stuff is too well documented in the literature and too much MGF to downplay.  But I think it's the hungry ones who pursue these jackpot schemes because for whatever reason they've been forced out of the mainstream. Maybe they don't play well with others. Maybe there's some grudge or infraction only known within Mother Market. Every oddball is different.

My question would be what religious impulse (profit motive) suppresses monopolistic competition around Dragon Pass in this era. Why are we so open to keeping the barrier to entry low enough to give the oddballs access to the greatest caravan route in the world at the tightest natural chokepoint? Absorbing what you guys have been saying gets me thinking that this is how the upland Issaries establishment runs munitions and supplies to the storm people (and friends) in Heortland all the way down to the sea as the 1620s get hot. The syndicates in Nochet and beyond may not be so passionate about this issue (sea power) but friends of the house of Sartar still has some pull.

When and if the motive mix shifts, however, I think the line I quoted reveals how challenging it would be to truly monopolize trade down to the Holy Country. You can charge a toll to restrict access to a road . . . but the river is a whole lot more democratic (hard to police the entire bank) and does all the work. Once you have a boat, you don't really have to feed it. On the other hand, taking cargo up river again is going to be at least a little less easy. The Marsh and New River system altered the historical calculus on that front but either way it's been the status quo for 300 years now . . . I would not be surprised if Belintar didn't deliberately screw with that landscape to serve his own esoteric mercantile designs.

Funny how we don't hear so much about Argan Argar and the Jeset Boatmen these days.
 

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52 minutes ago, scott-martin said:

Formal monopolies aren't well entrenched within the Issaries establishment (the Great Sister system is different)

"Great Sister watches out for you," as the votive mosaics have it. Her harmoniously-orchestrated monopolies are self-evidently better for consumers than the disorderly, (small-c) chaotic alternative. The so-called "free market" is dominated by Bulls and Bears, terrifying creatures of the Storm Gods. Why be "monopolistic" when you can be a Monopolist? (Etyries Temple good standing and significant processing fees required from all applicants. No refunds. Hail Moonson!)

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11 minutes ago, Nick Brooke said:

Hail Moonson

Can't spell monopoly without M-O-O-N, laws yes.

1560759329_Lyle_Lanleycopy.png.4a735ef2d9e31916478c15f6c378c481.png

I'm sure that when the world is perfected the White Sea will be transformed into delicious lemonade. But then, by definition, we will have achieved Permanent Full and the periodic expansion/recession cycle will end. Until then, we all have other things to worry about!

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4 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

That faith in "the market" doesn't fit the situation because we have been told there is only one road route into Heortland.  The alternative is by water via The Creek Stream river route to Nochet and then by sea across Choralinthor Bay.  That's very circuitous if you start out in Boldhome.  Maybe not too bad if you start in Clearwine.  But the sea crossing is now subject to piracy by the Wolf Pirates, see Jajagappa's description in this thread.

The Creek Stream River drops some 700 meters in around 300 km between Duck Point and Nochet - much of it in territory controlled by Beast People or Trolls. That's not nearly as easy as the nice straight roads of Sartar, protected by a nice friendly Orlanthi Prince.

That nice friendly Orlanthi Prince of course charges tolls. But the only "monopoly" granted is to Issaries, who gets to oversee all markets. 

 

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48 minutes ago, Jeff said:

The Creek Stream River drops some 700 meters in around 300 km between Duck Point and Nochet - much of it in territory controlled by Beast People or Trolls. That's not nearly as easy as the nice straight roads of Sartar, protected by a nice friendly Orlanthi Prince.

That nice friendly Orlanthi Prince of course charges tolls. But the only "monopoly" granted is to Issaries, who gets to oversee all markets. 

 

Maybe we can have another thread on the Creek-Stream River route from Colymar lands  to Nochet.  I'll do that.

But back to the Boldhome-Heortland route:  IMHO it's bad for business when that friendly Orlantghi prince is controlled by the Lunars, rebels either extort from or attack the caravans,  then the prince is assassinated, while all during the early 1620s the Lunars actively create anarchy over the part of the trade route south of Sartar? 

Then we have a couple of years of war zone anarchy reminiscent of RW Somalia, barely interrupted by Kallyr's regime which was still working on exerting control and never lit the flame of Sartar.    Then more anarchy until Argrath shows up.  And Argrath's focus has to be to the north, on the Lunar threat. 

 

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12 minutes ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

Maybe we can have another thread on the Creek-Stream River route from Colymar lands  to Nochet.  I'll do that.

But back to the Boldhome-Heortland route:  IMHO it's bad for business when that friendly Orlantghi prince is controlled by the Lunars, rebels either extort from or attack the caravans,  then the prince is assassinated, while all during the early 1620s the Lunars actively create anarchy over the part of the trade route south of Sartar? 

Then we have a couple of years of war zone anarchy reminiscent of RW Somalia, barely interrupted by Kallyr's regime which was still working on exerting control and never lit the flame of Sartar.    Then more anarchy until Argrath shows up.  And Argrath's focus has to be to the north, on the Lunar threat. 

 

No doubt the Lunar invasion of the Holy Country was bad for business. What had been the safest leg of any journey became the worst, with trolls imposing new tolls, bandits, and even scorpion men. The Lunars were not numerous enough to patrol the roads, and much of their army was bogged down in siege warfare or garrison duties.

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Given the difficulties of the main trade routes between Nochet and Sartar - and the relatively brief period that the oceans have been open again - how common would it be to find items of Teshnan or Kralorelan origin in Dragon Pass (after having been brought through Nochet, of course)? What about Pamaltelan goods?  

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