Trading Posts

[Wylo Ren]

Are trading posts actually that good? The AI always recommends building them, just wanted to know if they're actually a good decision

[Grendalcat]

They are good for more gold. Especially in Jungle tiles, building a trading post in a city with a University adds 2 gold to the 2 food and 2 science already produced.

https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Trading_Post_(Civ5)

[DerEider]

The AI always seems to favor Gold production { think it compares total units resulting from the choice rather than the City's actual needs } as Trading Post often adds more Gold {+2g} versus +1f for a Farm or +1p for a Mine or +1p for a Lumber Camp.

I always check the city screen to see whether it may need more Food or Production soon.
Gold usually is not that critical.

On the other hand, if the Terrain is Desert or Tundra, a Trading Post may be a good choice.

[jreese46]

If I can't farm it, mine it, or similarly harvest something I need from it, I pop a trading post on it. More gold per turn is always good.

[kkeday]

Trading posts are a must in the jungle hexes. You can get a university boost in science a rationalism/Free Thought science bonus.

[Matthew]

No, they are not that good. In your core cities, the only realistic use is on some jungle tiles. Though that is also a balance as you still need production in the city and 2 food tiles don't grow a city that much.

They are mainly used to spam in puppet cities. Partially to offset the science penalty per city when you get +1 science on trading posts, and partially to keep funding military upkeep. Plus, you generally want to keep puppet population lower so you want trading posts over farms.

[Damsteri]

Trading posts were important in vanilla and Gods&Kings versions of the game, as back then the main gold income came from the coastal and riverside tiles (those yielded 1 gold each unimproved). You wanted "a gold city" on river junction with all riverside tiles filled with trading posts to maximize the gold input. That was how the economy was ran back then.

Caravans (and cargo ships) were introduced in Brave New World and they yield so much gold that trading posts were made obsolete (but not removed) as riverside gold yield was also removed. In BNW economy runs with trade routes, not with trading posts as in earlier versions. They could (or even should) have removed trading posts in BNW.

Only use for trading posts nowadays (in BNW) is jungle tiles. I rarely build trading posts in other tiles. AI builds trading posts as A) AI builds what ever is available, and B) AI can't protect their trade routes efficiently as human player. Gold is not that important for AIs.

[cuavas]

You may as well drop trading posts on tundra without fresh water or resources if you aren’t building a great person improvement. It’s either that or a fort.