Trading

How you spend Rare Metals on rival colonies instead of selling them to your own sponsor. Each rival colony offers one Trade Good in return, priced in Rare Metals and sorted into a theme Group.

Trade Good by sponsor

Sponsor	Trade Good		Value per Rare Metal	Group
International Mars Mission	250 Sponsor Research	30	27.8 M	Research
USA	1 Tech Reveal in each research field (6)	30	30.0 M	Research
Europe	5,000 Research	30	27.8 M	Research
India	12 young Colonists (no specialization; only Nerd and Enthusiast)	30		Colonist
China	6 adult Engineers, random traits	30		Colonist
Church of the New Ark	3 middle-aged Gurus (only Workaholic and Religious)	30		Colonist
Blue Sun Corporation	10 each , ,	30	21.6 M	Economy
Brazil	100	30		Economy
Japan	120	30	20.0 M	Economy
SpaceY	1 Rocket	60	25.0 M	Other
Terraforming Initiative	+3% each terraforming parameter	30		Other
Paradox Interactive	1 Breakthrough reveal	30	16.7 M	Other

Value per Rare Metal prices the Trade Good on the reward-value scale (the one money (M) scale this wiki uses) and divides by the Rare Metals paid. Colonists, Food and Terraforming Progress are not on the scale yet, so those cells are blank.

No Colonist you get from any trade is ever a tourist - every one is a permanent settler, whatever the sponsor.

A Colonist arrives at the youngest age of its stated band - a "young" Colonist at the start of Youth, an "adult" at the start of Adult, a "middle-aged" Guru at the start of Middle-Aged, never partway into the band. This maximizes the years they serve.

How a trade works

1. Rivals at game start. You choose which rival colonies are possible on the Mission Setup screen (the Possible Rivals row, a checklist like Possible Sponsors). The map is then seeded with up to three of your checked rivals, trying for at most one rival per Group (Research, Colonist, Economy, Other) where your choice allows, so your trades spread across the groups instead of doubling up.
2. Each rival spawns a Special Project - but only after your Founder Stage. Its trade appears as a Special Project on the Planetary View, like Launch SETI Satellite or the Comm Satellite (see Special Projects) - one project per rival. It sits right next to its rival on the surface, not a random location, and unlike other Special Projects it raises no "New Special Project" notification - it is a standing offer you read from the rival's panel, not a one-off event. Trading is locked until you finish your Founder Stage (until the colony is approved): no trade project spawns before then, and until then the rival's panel reads "Trading is possible after you finish your Founder Stage and can be done every 10 Sols" in place of the repeat-and-escalation line.
3. You send your own rocket. Launch one of your own rockets on that Special Project, loaded with the rival's required Rare Metals (30, or 60 for SpaceY). It is your rocket - no rival rocket is involved. A trade pays the rocket's regular launch fuel to fly there, the same as every special project (70 Fuel for a standard Rocket, 50 with Advanced Martian Engines); there is no Fuel in the trade payload. The loaded rocket shows its Rare Metals payload in its own info panel (the game carries trade Rare Metals as an export, which the standard cargo list would not otherwise show).
4. You get the good. The round trip takes 1 Sol. When the project completes your rocket flies straight back carrying the good: Metals, advanced resources and any Colonists ride home in the returning rocket itself. Goods with no cargo (Sponsor Research, Tech or Breakthrough reveals, terraforming) apply directly on completion. SpaceY's good is a Rocket: your rocket returns and a second Rocket arrives in orbit for you to land.
5. Reappears, and rises. After you complete a rival's project it comes back 10 Sols later, but each run costs 20% more Rare Metals than the one before. The prices in the table above are the first (base) cost.

Trade flavour text

The flavour line below shows on both the rival's panel and its trade Special Project, explaining the trade in a sentence with the real effect baked in. A rival colony now exists only to offer this trade: all of the old rival interaction is deleted from its panel - the Contact, Distress Call, Trade (trade routes) and Covert Ops buttons are all removed, along with the mod's old trade-routes readout - and the flavour line is the only thing the panel adds.

The vanilla Space Race Trade Pad is deleted as well: it is removed from the build menu, and a regular Landing Pad can no longer be converted into one (the "Convert to Trade Pad" button is gone). This closes the only vanilla path that made a rival send an unsolicited "New Trade Offer" (Accept / Reject) popup, so the Special-Project trade above is the sole way to trade with a rival. mod-survive/Code/StS_NoTradePad.lua does this.

Sponsor	Flavour text
International Mars Mission	The International Mars Mission pools a dozen nations' science. It shares 250 Sponsor Research in return for 30 .
USA	The USA never keeps a good idea to itself. It reveals one tech in every research field for 30 .
Europe	Europe funds knowledge for its own sake. It grants you 5,000 Research in return for 30 .
India	India sends its brightest young hopefuls. Get 12 young Colonists, all Nerds and Enthusiasts, for 30 .
China	China's academies turn out engineers. Get 6 adult Engineers in return for 30 .
Church of the New Ark	The Church of the New Ark ordains the devout. Get 3 middle-aged Gurus, Workaholic and Religious, for 30 .
Blue Sun Corporation	Blue Sun never runs short. It ships you 10 , 10  and 10  in return for 30 .
Brazil	Brazil's farms feed a continent. It sends you 100  in return for 30 .
Japan	Japan's Automatic Metals Extractors mine round the clock without crews. It ships you 120  for 30 .
SpaceY	SpaceY builds rockets faster than anyone alive. It hands you a spare Rocket in return for 60 .
Terraforming Initiative	The Terraforming Initiative wants a green Mars. It nudges every terraforming parameter up 3% in return for 30 .
Paradox Interactive	Paradox thrives on the strange and unexplained. It uncovers 1 Breakthrough to research in return for 30 .

The idea

The currency is always Rare Metals. In the base game you sell Rare Metals to your own sponsor for 24 M each. Here you can instead send them to a rival colony and get that colony's Trade Good in return, paid in the rival's own good rather than Funding.

Worked example: send the USA 30 Rare Metals and get one Tech Reveal in each of the 6 research fields, worth 900 M, so 30 M per Rare Metal.

Sources

Surviving Mars with the Survive the Storm mod. The Trade Good per sponsor is also listed on the Sponsors page.

mod-survive/Code/StS_RivalTrades.lua (trades, delivery, escalation); StS_RivalChoice.lua (Possible Rivals selection and seeding); StS_RivalTradeInfo.lua (flavour line and Contact-button removal on the rival panel).