Playing as an export based state

[JimmyBeans]

Is it feasible to grow semi large using only a few exports and then importing most of your resources? How much do your exports affect prices of goods?

[joeball123]

An export economy is fairly viable as long as you're exporting finished products or at least refined resources rather than raw materials; selling Western vehicles to the Eastern Bloc is particularly profitable, though it takes some time to set up. Oil => Fuel and Bitumen is often a good industry to start out with if you're going for an export economy; there's a fairly good input:output ratio, fuel and bitumen are both quite valuable, you probably aren't going to consume a lot of bitumen domestically, and fuel imports can be a fairly significant expense if you're not producing your own.

Be aware, however, that customs houses - particularly the vanilla ones - have fairly limited practical capacity to buy and sell resources due to a combination of loading / unloading times and the way that vehicles move through them.

[Silent_Shadow]

There are still a lot of low volume, high value goods you can export like electronic components, chemicals, clothes, and the nuclear goods. Containers can help throughput issues at the customs house.

Boats are great for high volume.

[Delle(DK)]

For exports i recommend to export the "end product" instead of the basic products.
Example instead of expoerting corn, then make it into food and then you can export it.
Or instead of exporting coal and iron then make steel instead.

The most easy thing to export that give a pretty good income everyday is electricity.

[longshots444]

Originally posted by JimmyBeans:

Is it feasible to grow semi large using only a few exports and then importing most of your resources?

Yes it is.
And it's very easy.

Originally posted by JimmyBeans:

How much do your exports affect prices of goods?

If you export huge amounts of one product then the effect will be catastrophic because of the devs poor coding and total lack of knowledge on how real world economy works. They want to see you exporting small amounts of multiple products - except for cars.

Once you understand this childish thinking it's very easy to overcome.
My initial setup on a test game were these industries:

Clothing hub: Chemical factory >>> Fabric factory >>> Clothing factory.
The production from the first two factories exceeds requirements so my truck picks up 10% from the Chemical factory, 30% from the Fabric factory and then 100% [wait until loaded] from the Clothing factory. This gives me 3 streams of income, and it also means the truck doesn't have to sit around waiting for the VERY slow production of clothing.

Electronics component hub:
Chemical factory >>> feeding both a Plastics and an Electronics Component factory.
Plastics factory >>> Electronics Component factory
Pretty basic setup where your truck sits around and waits for the load.

Electronics component hub:
Chemical factory >>> Plastics factory.
Plastics factory >>> Electronics Component factory
Electronics Component factory >>> Electronics assembly factory
The Plastics factory produces so much it's ridiculous, so here again my truck picks up 50% then 100% [wait until loaded] from the Electronics assembly factory.

This gives you 6 streams of income.
You can duplicate these hubs - BUT NOT FOR AT LEAST 15 - 18 [game] MONTHS!
Plus it will probably take you a while to get enough money back to build them.

Oil >>> Bitumen and Fuel
This is a hard choice because the devs [again] don't give you much of a chance. The deposits of Oil are scattered all over the Republic and the amounts are minimal. Initial set up costs can be expensive because rail is not cheap. But, you can set up 2 refineries from your best Oil deposit and you will not affect export prices.

Transport: I don't use any form of Worker Transport. I build all my residences next to my hubs and all my workers walk to work. Yes, a few will probably die from pollution, but who cares. It's a lot easier than walking through the transport setup maze - regardless of the 379 solutions you will be offered for this problem from "the experts"!

This will get you semi-large.
What you do then is up to you.

[moa]

Originally posted by longshots444:

If you export huge amounts of one product then the effect will be catastrophic negligible the product price drops and so does the resource price because of the devs poor sensible coding and total lack of knowledge understanding on how real world economy works, but a game should be fun. They want to see you exporting small any amounts of multiple products - except even for cars.

Once you understand this childish thinking that exporting any product effects also the prices of the resources and vice versa for a limited time it's very easy to overcome.

corrected some typos

[Titanius Anglesmith]

Originally posted by moa:

Originally posted by longshots444:

If you export huge amounts of one product then the effect will be catastrophic negligible the product price drops and so does the resource price because of the devs poor sensible coding and total lack of knowledge understanding on how real world economy works, but a game should be fun. They want to see you exporting small any amounts of multiple products - except even for cars.

Once you understand this childish thinking that exporting any product effects also the prices of the resources and vice versa for a limited time it's very easy to overcome.

corrected some typos

Based


Saturation of the market. Obviously exagerated for gameplay purposes, otherwise one could just set up an oil well and do nothing.