How to improve the Ragusa trade node?

[Cybot]

As it is my main trade node, it seems like a pretty bad node compared to Venice and Constantinople.

What can I do to improve it? Even if I have a lot of trade power in it, the node itself is only like 2 gold worth.
Most of the trade ressources are also just Wool, Salt, Grain and Livestock with a few Cloth and Wine provinces.

Where should I focus? How and what to improve? Any tips, tricks or tactics?

[Bright Lights]

Ragusa isn't a node you generally collect in. It's main value is feeding into the more rich nodes, like Genoa and Venice. Of course, as a nation that starts in it, you sometimes can't help it. Just try to move to a more rich node, namely Venice or Constantinople.

If you want to increase your trade power in the node, markets, light ships, and upgrading trade centers will help quite a bit, although you'll always be losing money from others steering trade away - it's simply unavoidable.

If you want to increase Ragusa's value, manufactories will help with this, although they're quite expensive themselves. And, of course, you can steer trade there yourself.

And never forget the Holy Grail, Trade Ideas!

[Cybot]

Hmm, I guess i'll be better of going towards Constantinople then. I managed to have Lübeck give me 40gold a month by 1580, I have no idea if that is a good trade node. Was hoping i'd be able to do similair with Ragusa. But their trade ressources seem horrible, nothing but grain and livestock...

[Tarshaid]

Originally posted by Cybot:

As it is my main trade node, it seems like a pretty bad node compared to Venice and Constantinople.

It is, but it's mostly because Venice and Constantinople are both pretty good nodes.

Originally posted by Cybot:

Most of the trade ressources are also just Wool, Salt, Grain and Livestock with a few Cloth and Wine provinces.

Cloth, Salt, Wine (in that order) are not too bad in terms of value, Cloth should relatively quickly go to 3.6, and Salt to 3.3; Wine fluctuates a bit and I mostly forgot what changes it.

Originally posted by Cybot:

Where should I focus? How and what to improve? Any tips, tricks or tactics?

Long-term, you focus on moving to a better node (like Venice), but that obviously requires conquering a bunch of stuff. Before that, you make money leak from richer nodes upstream (since your only upstream node is constantinople, send light ships there), and stop others from leaking all your money (e.g. embargo venice). If all else fails and you can't get any decent amount of cash from Ragusa, well you're close enough to better nodes to just send privateers there (assuming you have whatever DLC unlocks it).
Unless you have a gold mine, I'd say improving cloth provinces would be the best choice if you have the monarch points to spare, especially considering that cloth reduces the dev cost by 10% (but then it's often a matter of terrain as well, and the game can sort the most profitable province to dev by itself, if you don't consider trade).

Just theorizing on it, I'd say your best shot would be to protect trade as much as possible in constantinople, since all is set to make it a relatively rich node, and all its wealth naturally trickles back to Ragusa. On the opposite, the regular Ottoman player should focus on dominating Ragusa as much as possible, to specifically stop the Constantinople node from leaking money to them.

[Arcrom21]

If you want Ragusa trade node to be top tier you will need to invest tons of money and time. But the problem is that most of value will go said nodes.

You may need to expand in these nodes to stop the drain but after that it's much better move there since upstream trade power will not help that much.

[SirTalkALot]

It would be easier to move into Venice or Constantinople trade nodes.