Talk:Trade Portal

Tips

Got some gold and copper coins from digging up golden chests? Got plenty of time crystals? Don't want to dig all the way down to find gold ore so you can upgrade your furnace and start making steel? Build a trade portal, upgrade it to lvl 3 (sapphire), and buy those three gold nuggets! Cost: 1 stone block, 200 time crystals, 31 gold coins, 1 amethyst, and 1 sapphire to get the lvl 3 trade portal. (My attempt cost 6 gold and 138 copper more to buy the nuggets.) --McClaw (talk) 19:51, 29 April 2014 (MDT)

Using a trade portal to maximum effect is a very complex activity. While it's possible to simply compare item values, those values change over time, particularly when buying and selling is going on. There are also less measurable factors, such as portal level, fuel used, time spent, and the availability of items. As has been said about many things, what you get out of a trade portal depends on what you put into it. --McClaw (talk) 07:46, 3 April 2015 (MDT)

As the level of your trade portal increases, you have more opportunities to profit from that. It's typical for crafted items to sell for more than their components cost, so a little crafting can give you a big mark-up. (With a level 5 trade portal I like to buy three copper ore, make them into an ingot and that into wire, and sell the five wire. The ore costs about 20 copper coins total while the wire sells for almost 50 platinum total.) --McClaw (talk) 12:42, 19 September 2015 (MDT)