Public and private. Different tools.
The Market tab gives you two ways to trade — a live public order book and an engine-supplied private market. Most new players underuse private; most experienced players underuse public. Learn both.
Private market
The private market sells units and food directly from the engine. You pick a quantity, hit Buy, the cash leaves your account, the inventory arrives instantly. No waiting for another player to fill your order. No turns spent.
- Goods available to buy: food, troops, jets, turrets, tanks.
- Goods available to sell: food, troops, jets, turrets, tanks, spies.
- The private market regenerates stock over time. Buy too much and you'll temporarily exhaust it.
- Prices depend on your government and military technology.
Public market
The public market is a live order book where players trade with other players. You can list goods for sale, place a standing buy order at a price you'd accept, or buy whatever's listed right now. Listings and standing orders match continuously.
The public market trades a wider set of goods than the private market: all the units plus resources (food, oil) plus every technology track. If you want to buy raw tech points to catch up on research, you do it here.
Entry threshold
Listing on the public market and creating standing orders require a minimum amount of land or net worth. New players can buy from the public market immediately, but listing things for sale unlocks once you've grown a bit. The threshold prevents fresh accounts from manipulating the market.
Commission
Every public trade pays a percentage commission. Your government sets the rate — Democracy pays the least, Communism pays more, the rest sit in between. Commission compounds; if you flip goods you bought from the market back onto it, you pay twice.
Listing share cap
You can't list everything you own all at once. Each listing is capped as a percentage of your current inventory of that good. This stops dumping. Communism has a higher cap than other governments.
When to use each
Buy private when: you need units fast, the public market is dry, or the public price exceeds the private price. The private market is your fallback.
Buy public when: a player has listed below the private price, you want tech, or you're filling a small specific need.
Sell private when: you want guaranteed liquidation at the engine's floor price. You'll get less but you get cash immediately.
Sell public when: you can list above the floor price and you're willing to wait for a buyer. The order book shows you what people are buying and at what price.
Standing orders
A standing buy order tells the engine "I'll buy up to X units of this good if the price drops to Y." The engine matches it whenever a listing comes in at or below your price. Useful when you want to grab cheap inventory passively while you sleep.
Price history
The Prices mode of the public market shows aggregate price-history windows for each good — minimum, maximum, weighted-average, and total volume. This is how you read the season's trade economy. Prices spike before big wars and crater after them.
Live updates
The order book streams updates to your screen in real time. New listings, recalls, and fills appear as they happen. If you have the Market tab open, the status indicator at the top tells you whether you're connected to the live stream.