First TI match later tonight, a few things I'm unclear on.

By kestrel_80, in Twilight Imperium 3rd Edition

Posted at

When you seal a trade agreement (as the active player) with a player, does the other player immediately get trade goods based on the trade contract value that you just gave him? The rules only mention the active player getting trade goods based on the value of the agreement plus three. Must the other player activate the secondary ability on the strategy card and spend a strategy token to get trade goods from the newly sealed agreement? The rules explicitly prohibit the active player from doing that:

"Note that players are not allowed to collect trade
income from trade agreements formed during the
same action. It is not possible for a player to make a
trade agreement during the primary ability of the
Trade Strategy Card, and then immediately collect
trade income from the new trade agreement by executing
the secondary ability."

Personally, I think the active player and the other player with whom the contract was signed with both immediately get trade goods, but it doesn't hurt to be absolutely clear on the rules.

How does the game proceed if no-one is willing to form a trade agreement with you after you activated the primary ability of the trade strategy card?

Posted at

I'm assuming that you're referring to the base game Trade Strategy Card. The way it works is as follows, step by step:


When you activate it you immediatly gain 3 trade goods.
After that, you gain trade goods for any active trade agreements you might have from previous rounds.
Thirdly, you let ALL players, including yourself, form new trade agreements. They must, however, get permission from you to do so.
Provided you choose the a)effect of course.
After the forming of trade agreements, all other players, in turn, have the opportunity to pay a Command Counter to get trade goods from any active agreements THEY might have from previous rounds.
NOONE gets trade goods from an agreement they formed during the current round, not even the active player.
Posted at

So in other words: Yes, trade is a slow process as you don't get to reap the benefits until next round of play. This is why it's not a good idea to exclude anyone from trade agreement forming because that person will most likely do anything in their power to get a hold of the Trade SC to choose option b) simply to get back at you by setting trade back another two rounds.

Posted at

Fnoffen said:

I'm assuming that you're referring to the base game Trade Strategy Card. The way it works is as follows, step by step:


When you activate it you immediatly gain 3 trade goods.
After that, you gain trade goods for any active trade agreements you might have from previous rounds.
Thirdly, you let ALL players, including yourself, form new trade agreements. They must, however, get permission from you to do so.
Provided you choose the a)effect of course.
After the forming of trade agreements, all other players, in turn, have the opportunity to pay a Command Counter to get trade goods from any active agreements THEY might have from previous rounds.
NOONE gets trade goods from an agreement they formed during the current round, not even the active player.

Fnoffen said:

I'm assuming that you're referring to the base game Trade Strategy Card. The way it works is as follows, step by step:


When you activate it you immediatly gain 3 trade goods.
After that, you gain trade goods for any active trade agreements you might have from previous rounds.
Thirdly, you let ALL players, including yourself, form new trade agreements. They must, however, get permission from you to do so.
Provided you choose the a)effect of course.
After the forming of trade agreements, all other players, in turn, have the opportunity to pay a Command Counter to get trade goods from any active agreements THEY might have from previous rounds.
NOONE gets trade goods from an agreement they formed during the current round, not even the active player.

Ah, that clear it up. I didn't think of checking the back part of the manual for the more complete strategy card explanations. Thank you.

Another situation that came to my mind; If you're retreating with ships that can move two spaces, can you retreat them to an activated system two spaces away?

Here's what the manual has to say about retreating:

When executing a withdrawal or retreat, a player
must withdraw his entire fleet to an adjacent system
that has previously been activated by the withdrawing/
retreating player. If a player has no previously
activated systems adjacent to the contested system,
he may not withdraw or retreat.

Adjacent system must mean an activated system right next to the system that has the space battle. But, can't a system be concidered adjacent if it's in range of the fleet? With wormholes, the systems connected with a wormhole are concidered to be adjacent. I think you should be able to retreat to a system that's within range, but I'll still play according to the rules. Or at least how I interprit them, retreat only to systems adjacent to the space battle.

Posted at

Well adjacent system does, in TI, mean a system that share a hex edge with the active system. I believe that a thematic reson why you would'nt be able to retreat your full normal movement range would be that everything is chaos and you only have the previously established regrouping coordinates to fall back on. No time for a change of plan. Or possibly that your fleeing ships take minor damage to the engines from enemies firing at your back.