Trade Agreements

[Zanthis]

I've heard other people complain about how trade agreements work, and I have to agree. Since each empire gets a percentage of the other's resources, the smaller empire always benefits much more than the larger. I've been pondering ways to reduce this effect. Here are some ideas:

1) I like the idea of each empire have a "Trade Resources" total equal to the resources they produce in one turn, PLUS the resources produced in one turn by all their trade partners. Then, multiply YOUR Trade Resources by the total of all your trade agreement percentages to find the bonus resources YOU get.
Ex: If I'm trading with empire B (produces 100 resources) and C (produces 10,000) and I produce 1000, then my Trade Resources = 11,100. If my treaty with B is 4% and with C 1%, I get 5% of 11,100 in bonus resources from trade, or +555. Using the existing trade rules, I'd be getting +104 and would drop B's treaty since it would be of little value (only +4)

2) I like the idea of limiting maximum trade agreement percentages by population/system/colonies. I think pop is best. Say 1% max per 500million people in your empire (20% cap still). Or 1% per colony, or 2% per system maybe. It might even be best to combine the pop/systems/colonies of all your trade partners (except the one you're figuring max trade for) to determine "market size".
Ex: Using colonies at 1% each, I have 5 colonies. I trade with B who has 2 and C who has 3. When I count up colonies to figure max trade percentage w/ B, I count as having 8, but max trade w/ C I count as having only 7.

3) I like the idea of further limiting maximum trade agreement percentages by number of WP leading to the trade partner. Say, 5% per WP. Combined with #2, if I had 5.7 billion people and 1 WP in common with another empire, I could get up to a 5% trade agreement. With a second WP, I could get 10%. With 3+, I'd have an 11%.

And now I really need to get some sleep before I ramble on even longer.