County of Fortune trading runs between regions, not between individual settlements. A region needs a market before it can take part, and the connection is either a road or a river.
County of Fortune trading: the two kinds of connection
- Land trade: a market in each region plus a road connecting the two regions.
- Water trade: a raft port in each region on the same river.
The small market is a Commoner building, so a region has to have a settlement at Village level (level 2) or better before it can build one. A raft port also counts as a market, and can receive goods over land as well as by water — which means a region with a raft port can take land deliveries from a region that only has a small market.
What can move depends on the connection. Heavy goods — logs, stone, clay and sand — cannot be carried over roads at all and have to travel by river; lighter goods can move either way. Once the connection is there, trade routes covers setting the actual route up.
Why rafts only go downstream
Rafts travel downstream only, and that single rule shapes the whole map economy. In the demo the first region has to supply the regions below it, and the sailboats that come with the Early Access ports are what finally let you ship heavy goods upstream. The developers are explicit that this is deliberate: it makes clear why wealth tended to flow downriver in history, because trading resources in that direction was so much easier.
Before sailboats arrive, the usual solution is to do the processing where the raw material is and ship the finished good instead of shipping the clay upstream. Raft ports covers the water side of that.
Planning a network
Checking a region's production and consumption balance tells you which region can supply which other region, and that is the fastest way to plan a network. Trade routes covers setting the route up, raft ports covers the water side, and higher tier buildings covers why a region can be stuck without a market at all.