Was goofing around the other night and played a marathon huge low sea level with raging barbs on emp. Chopped out the GW as soon as possible then pretty much did whatever I wanted. The barbs butchered the AI. Vic was down to 2 archers in London at size one when i decided to end her pain. The oracle didn't get built until nearly 200ad. Only toko was expanding, probably do to his traits. Perciles had 7 cities by 600ad but very few improvements. He was constantly pilliaged. I actually got bored with the game.
This probably won't work on smaller maps at faster speeds because of the reduced barb spawning chances. I was using Louis who is Ind but does not start with mining so it was a close call getting it up before the barbs swarmed in. I imagine Qin or Bizmark would have an easier time since they start with mining.

well, that's a map and set of rules that make GW such a power in your game. If you played high sea archipelago the wall would be of nearly no use but, say, GLH would be overpowered instead.
However, no doubt your game was a lot of fun (at least watching the barbs to shred that nasty woman ;)

Huge marathon low sea? C'mon dood. Let's play Civ instead. In a normal game the GW is pretty useless.

Great wall is to something as the pyramids are to stupid people.

Huge marathon low sea? C'mon dood. Let's play Civ instead. In a normal game the GW is pretty useless.

That's like saying you should never play on an archipelago map because of the great lighthouse. But yeah, if you only play on archipelago maps as carthage with the GLH perhaps you should learn to play another way. Same for these settings.

On immortal difficulty building the great wall is a more reliable way to avoid getting owned by barbarians than building a second city to get copper. On deity I'd imagine it would be less useful because there's no unclaimed land for barbarians to spawn, and on lower difficulties you have more time to get copper before barbs rush you.

Great wall is to something as the pyramids are to stupid people.

Espionage, according to TTF.

Anyway, it's map dependent as everyone says. I'd stop way short of "close to useless on standard maps". Obsolete gets it in just about every game he plays, often his first wonder.

Basically, the more room you have to expand peacefully, the greater the impact of this wonder. There's a number of reasons this is true:

1. You see more barbs with more room (less AI fogbusting), and the hammer costs to contain them may fall well short of the hammer costs of just building the wall, especially on high difficulties.

2. An early great person of any kind gives you a lift. The spy is kind of unique though. I usually settle them (the 3 beakers is nice, but for more total EP mostly). The EP overwhelm granted by focusing on one AI can provide an interesting advantage. In climb the ladder V I used it to steal things like currency, feudalism, guilds, chemistry, military science, biology, and so on. Very rarely did I run the slider for a large part of the game. In other words, if your tech hurts from overexpanding, stealing certain techs can put you back VERY quickly.

3. Building on #2, SY in a bureaucracy capitol (having now tried it) can be pretty overwhelming. The infrastructure investment is far less than oxford/academy/library/university, but the interesting thing is that depending on what cost reductions you get, the conversion isn't that far away, especially if you overexpanded (steal engineering and build a castle).

4. AIs attach some power rating to it. More importantly, it's still nice to butcher AI stacks in your territory THEN invade them. It's not a reason to build the wall unto itself but it helps.

2, 3, and 4 are just icing though normally (unless you want full-blown EE and not just a faster tech-catch up or less tradeaways if you have a lead). It's ultimately a function of room to expand and the amount of hammers it saves/costs.

The Great Wall can still be quite useful even if you don't have a barb problem, because it allows you to get a great spy way earlier than anything else that can generate EPs. Just settle him and do nothing and you'll probably see everyone's research for most of the game, or direct those EPs at a close neighbor and steal techs at will after you get Alphabet. If you get a second great spy for Scotland Yard you'll have an even more ridiculous advantage.

It's a great use of early hammers if you have a decent comfort zone and don't need to REX quite so aggressively.

Espionage, according to TTF.

Anyway, it's map dependent as everyone says. I'd stop way short of "close to useless on standard maps". Obsolete gets it in just about every game he plays, often his first wonder.

Basically, the more room you have to expand peacefully, the greater the impact of this wonder. There's a number of reasons this is true:

1. You see more barbs with more room (less AI fogbusting), and the hammer costs to contain them may fall well short of the hammer costs of just building the wall, especially on high difficulties.

2. An early great person of any kind gives you a lift. The spy is kind of unique though. I usually settle them (the 3 beakers is nice, but for more total EP mostly). The EP overwhelm granted by focusing on one AI can provide an interesting advantage. In climb the ladder V I used it to steal things like currency, feudalism, guilds, chemistry, military science, biology, and so on. Very rarely did I run the slider for a large part of the game. In other words, if your tech hurts from overexpanding, stealing certain techs can put you back VERY quickly.

3. Building on #2, SY in a bureaucracy capitol (having now tried it) can be pretty overwhelming. The infrastructure investment is far less than oxford/academy/library/university, but the interesting thing is that depending on what cost reductions you get, the conversion isn't that far away, especially if you overexpanded (steal engineering and build a castle).

4. AIs attach some power rating to it. More importantly, it's still nice to butcher AI stacks in your territory THEN invade them. It's not a reason to build the wall unto itself but it helps.

2, 3, and 4 are just icing though normally (unless you want full-blown EE and not just a faster tech-catch up or less tradeaways if you have a lead). It's ultimately a function of room to expand and the amount of hammers it saves/costs.

Agreed. Good post.

The GW never gets obsoleted though. The AI does occassionally attack your cities, especially recently captured ones. So if you're imperialistic, you'll get 4X GG yield when this happens, else 2X. No matter how much you're geared towards the idea that a good offense is the best defense, it'll net quite a few extra GG points in a game where you're bloodthirsty.

I'd say the GG is the best early wonder if you know how to use espionage, are going for domination, or have a lot of space around you, but it's not quite overpowered unless you turn raging barbarians on. I'd say it's good on any map except sometimes archipelago.

On immortal difficulty building the great wall is a more reliable way to avoid getting owned by barbarians than building a second city to get copper.Well duh! Of course it is. Cannons would be even better. And?

Great Wall + Stonehenge = some fun REXing sessions

Well duh! Of course it is. Cannons would be even better. And?

I have no idea what your point is. I didn't know that it would be easier to chop the great wall than hook up copper when I first started playing immortal. I figured the AI would usually beat me to it or I could never afford to wait that long for a 2nd city. Both were false ideas that were proven wrong through experience, not simple reasoning. Civ is not a simple game. (:

I have no idea what your point is. I didn't know that it would be easier to chop the great wall than hook up copper when I first started playing immortal. I figured the AI would usually beat me to it or I could never afford to wait that long for a 2nd city. Both were false ideas that were proven wrong through experience, not simple reasoning. Civ is not a simple game. (:

He lost me there too, I guess he wants you to make a quick Steel beeline to deal with the barb arhcers? :crazyeye:

Certainly true that by the time you hook up bronze outside of your capital in immortal, it's too late and you better have either built the Great Wall or learned Archery! I tried to get the Great Wall once but it fell in 3300 BC, whoops. :mischief:

He lost me there too, I guess he wants you to make a quick Steel beeline to deal with the barb arhcers? :crazyeye:Obviously the Steel thing was facetious but the point is quite simple and valid. Of course, the Wall is better at dealing with barb archers than a copper city. Well duh! I just spam a few warriors. The warriors don't work as well as the Wall - or even the archers - and none is as good as Steel. With my approach, occasionally I get pillaged but that's life. Rebuild and move on.

It's all about opportunity costs.

I love the EE opportunities here, plan to try it out.

I've normally thought of the fog as a training ground to get my axes to 10 XP, but this may outpace its advantages.

I love the EE opportunities here, plan to try it out.

I've normally thought of the fog as a training ground to get my axes to 10 XP, but this may outpace its advantages.

You probably still want to throw a guy out there to unlock HE, or possibly attain that taking a barb city. HE is a major, major hammers boost that early on.

Right after I made my post I realized that just because I have GW doesn't mean I can't still send axes out into the fog for their 10 XP training. I have a 101 temperature right now, probably should not be posting. Delerium...

On the higher levels, you will actually want to use fog busters more than the GW. Otherwise you run into barb cities spawning at very inconvenient locations and preventing you from settling the good spots for thousands of years.

Obviously I'm talking standard setting maps here, not marathon low sea raging :lol:

Great wall is to something as the pyramids are to stupid people.

Astoundingly intelligent analogy.

Except that I can easily win a domination victory before anyone gets Democracy on a Standard Continents map thanks to a good SE and Pyramids.

Pyramids are about as stupid as Neils Bohr

WOW, alot of GW bashing here. Being an emperor/marathon player, I feel it's one of the BEST wonders in teh game. Here are my numerous reasons

1) It is the only anceint wonder that does NOT go obsolete. Even teh mighty pyramids are irrelevant post-Fascism.

2) Protection from barbarians at the beginning where fast expansion is required is NOT insigificent. It allow you to delay archery for protection (depending on neighbors of course) until you have horses and copper secured.

3) It's fairly cheap, and rarely can I NOT chop it out when I want.

4) The GSpy points are a big bonus early on as you have to wait until CoL to start producing them. There may be arguments over which GP is the best to get first, I rank the GSpy the best, perhaps second only to a Prophget if you have an early holy city.

5) Faster GGs with defensive wars. Takes a little work sometimes to get the AI into your lands during a war, but if you have leaders like Monty/Shaka/Khan you know a good-sized stack is coming. With a properly defended city, you can get a very early GG during the first war.

6) It stacks well with alot of traits: Protective allows superb defense for GG points, Imperialistic and defensive wars get's 4 times XP (it doubles the XP after the initial double from Imperisistic), Philosphical (Faster GSpy), Industrious (fewer wasted beakers).

There is a downside

A) In Isolation the early GSpy is very weak and a waste.

B) Smaller landmasses it's talents are wasted as you can fog bust.

C) Being surrounded by peaceful leaders you want to destroy also wastes it's uses.

Off topic: Huge, marathon, low sea level??? I finally understand your nickname. I can already see the headlines: "Man bores himself to death while playing computer game".:lol:

Great wall is to something as the pyramids are to stupid people.

Sounds like an excerpt from "Attacko's Guide" ;)

Astoundingly intelligent analogy.

Except that I can easily win a domination victory before anyone gets Democracy on a Standard Continents map thanks to a good SE and Pyramids.

Pyramids are about as stupid as Neils Bohr

Noone will bash you for exclusivly beating upon the poor diety AI's with praets/immortals/quechas but bragging about it being a solid strategy on the forum is something different... Yes mids can work quite well if you get stone, but if you don't it is often too expensive to build, even for a SE... As for GW, i build it very seldom, but then i never play marathon either...

Off topic: Huge, marathon, low sea level??? I finally understand your nickname. I can already see the headlines: "Man bores himself to death while playing computer game".:lol:

Though the raging barbs was just something I did for fun, I always play marathon huge. The huge size actually takes away from the tedium of marathon speed during peacetime. With the number of cities I always have something going on somewhere each turn. Much less clicking endturn. And there is nothing boring about the wars. You should see the SOD Shaka can put together when he has 15 cities.

Noone will bash you for exclusivly beating upon the poor diety AI's with praets/immortals/quechas but bragging about it being a solid strategy on the forum is something different... Yes mids can work quite well if you get stone, but if you don't it is often too expensive to build, even for a SE... As for GW, i build it very seldom, but then i never play marathon either...

No doubt. But it's something quite different to say that the Pyramids are stupid. That's just crazy talk. If the AI next to you builds them, and you have tons of food resources, would you NOT invade them to grab the mids?

The espionage is amazing. It's way cheaper to steal tech than to research it yourself.

The espionage is amazing. It's way cheaper to steal tech than to research it yourself.

Sure, if you don't mind being behind the AI in tech for almost the entire game. I always feel threatened when the AI has a tech lead. It's like my goal for the entire Ancient thru Industrial Era is to blow the AI away in tech. I've got problems man, real problems...

ok wonder from my PoV(marathon, no raging barbarians) as long as you have:

- a decent/good techer as neighbor(to infiltrate the gspy);
- can afford to prio masonry and build it(no imp. ai around, eventually lay of the land hints something will prevent your neighbors to settle towards you fast - jungle/desert, no big warmongers - if present, then you probably have to research archery anyway...)

overall, most of the wonders are worse then this one... so, decent enough I suppose... probably better with raging barbarians, though I have no clue about raging barbarians settings...

Sure, if you don't mind being behind the AI in tech for almost the entire game. I always feel threatened when the AI has a tech lead. It's like my goal for the entire Ancient thru Industrial Era is to blow the AI away in tech. I've got problems man, real problems...

Actually you do not need to be behind in techs. Just research other things. It allows you to do deep beelines into the tech tree without missing out on other techs. want steel from the lib race? then use espiuonage to grab engineering rather than teching it. Think theology is a dead end tech but like the +2 exp from theocracy? steal it.

WOW, alot of GW bashing here. Being an emperor/marathon player, I feel it's one of the BEST wonders in teh game. Here are my numerous reasons

1) It is the only anceint wonder that does NOT go obsolete. Even teh mighty pyramids are irrelevant post-Fascism.


In the modern age barbs are not a problem and I only fight wars in the modern age very few times. So it does goes obsolete, for a large part.

Actually you do not need to be behind in techs. Just research other things. It allows you to do deep beelines into the tech tree without missing out on other techs. want steel from the lib race? then use espiuonage to grab engineering rather than teching it. Think theology is a dead end tech but like the +2 exp from theocracy? steal it.

Sweet God... I never thought of that...

Holy.... I'm totally doing this in my next game! THNX

In the modern age barbs are not a problem and I only fight wars in the modern age very few times. So it does goes obsolete, for a large part.

It partially obsoletes. You still get the higher GG production bonus for defensive wars. Well defended coastal cities during the renaisance/industrial era with the great wall and an agressive other continental AI means alot more GGs. At this time your drydocks are pumping out destroyers/battleships/frigates for naval defense and an extra settled GG or 2 means alot. Again, not in every game but more often than not I see intercontinental invasions.

I'm playing a game where I captured a city that had GW and SY, but am hardly generating any EPs. I think it's safe to add that for a good leverage of the combo, you gotta flip/settle spies. Especially during the Lib race and you've got no time to beaker Engineering.

Actually you do not need to be behind in techs. Just research other things. It allows you to do deep beelines into the tech tree without missing out on other techs. want steel from the lib race? then use espiuonage to grab engineering rather than teching it. Think theology is a dead end tech but like the +2 exp from theocracy? steal it.

Sweet God... I never thought of that...

Holy.... I'm totally doing this in my next game! THNX
Me too!

I read about the benefits of espionage planning before, and I think I get the concept, but I admit I never used spies so strategically before, only defensively and never with a plan (hey, they have a tech I don't have. Go go gadget spies!)... I think it's time to add to my game skills. :)

edit - oh, this thread is about the Great Wall. I build it sometimes, usually if I am fully exposed to a bunch of tundra (more than I can afford to fogbust) and the AI are protected from Barbs because I'm in the way.

I used great wall to strong effect here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=305999

Nothing helps a sagging tech rate from expansion quite like stealing a tech at better than 1 EP/1 beaker ratio then trading it for other techs.

I've been building gwall a lot lately and am starting to get used to the potential espionage has in the game. Finding ways to accumulate lots of espionage early can really change a tech outlook.

yes Great wall= a dead neibour later.
but in most cases I just can't delay my expasion, for TR and food resource and forest to whip/chop out my axe or more workers.

Great wall or a setter& a worker? My choice is the latter.

the only situation I'll build it is: My scout discoverd masonry and I have at least 2 neibours on the same continent.

yes Great wall= a dead neibour later.
but in most cases I just can't delay my expasion, for TR and food resource and forest to whip/chop out my axe or more workers.

Great wall or a setter& a worker? My choice is the latter.

the only situation I'll build it is: My scout discoverd masonry and I have at least 2 neibours on the same continent.

No, the more legit comparison is Gwall vs fogbusting troops or another early wonder. There are plenty of situations you wouldn't want the wall, but the whole point of it is that it lets you build more workers/settlers and less military during the expansion phase. Its utility mostly comes when building it SAVES hammers.

Seems like people are arguing about two aspects of Great Wall: countering barbs or Great Spy as first GP. If you're into espionage then you might go for Gwall to kickstart EE(espionage economy) regardless while countering barbs is going to be more situational.

IMO the spy is a bit weaker than other early GPs, since he's dead weight other than his 3 bpt until alphabet. One could infiltrate I guess. That'd probably help recovery after a massive warmonger spree (steal currency and code of laws, which you can do directly if you have alphabet).

But, as you say, if one goes all-out spies, getting a couple can be useful. I'd probably settle the first one, but others would make SY in the best commerce cities. 1-2 cities with high commerce cranking EP that early will lead to a lot of techs. Problem is, this is a parity scenario at best for a while, and the path certainly isn't traditional (though potentially dominating on slow speeds). This brings us back to the original purpose of building Gwall ----> countering barbs. The more room you have to expand (war or peaceful), the more you'll see barbs, the slower your teching will be, and the more appealing being able to steal techs becomes. It's not like the wall is ever *useless*, but like everything it has an opportunity cost and difference scenarios will affect that.

Sorry, Newbie Question.

The Great Spy: I understand some of his possible uses;
Settle him to generate more Spy points
Use him to build Scotland Yard and increase spy points by 100%
or
Can infiltrate another civilization's city (+3000 espionage points)

What does that mean exactly? and how would it work in practice?

Sorry, I can't find detailed info here http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/info#People
and the info here http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/bts#espionage is pretty meagre when it comes to practical use of spys and spy/espionage points.

Is there a guide I should be aware of?

AR

when you hover the mouse over the other civ in power rating, you see EP ratio against them -
say it is 1234/5678. this means they have accumulated 1234 EP's against you, and you have 5678 EP's against them. Infiltration adds 3000 EP's to this number and bam - you now have 8678 EP's against them.
in practise it's good if they have a bunch of old techs over you and you either don't want to trade some education/RP/radio for it or have nothing to offer.
I'm however no good at espionage and rarely use spies offensively so my advice may be no great.

Thanks nanomage.

Is there a guide to espionage anywhere? I know what steal tech is - it does what it says on the tin - but what about the other spying missions.

What (for example) does poison water do, and for how many turns?

Thanks.

poison water ads 4 sick faces (scaling with map size), with 1 face disappearing per turn
so does foment unhappines.
"Support city revolt" makes a city revolt 1 turn, eliminating culture defences, but not cultural borders
"Influence civics" changes their civics to those you run yourself, as well as influence religion
a nice guide is this one
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=252496
but it is mainly about espionage costs...

Actually you do not need to be behind in techs. Just research other things. It allows you to do deep beelines into the tech tree without missing out on other techs. want steel from the lib race? then use espiuonage to grab engineering rather than teching it. Think theology is a dead end tech but like the +2 exp from theocracy? steal it.

I agree, and have been advocating this approach ever since espionage was introduced. I don't believe in the all or nothing espionage strategy many people say is the only way to approach the problem. There are many benefits from a balanced approach of investing in espionage while also researching other techs. It works amazingly well for a SE and gives great late game control.

So if my GW gives me a GSpy as my first GP I have no hesitation about settling him. In the next 100 turns I get 1200 EPs and 300 :science: from him and that's enough in the early game to be able to see what the AI are doing without raising the EP slider. Building courthouses in my cities early compounds that small EP advantage and allows a few cheap techs to be stolen or some city revolts to help the military.

Like you, I beeline deep into the tech tree, and that usually ends up as Liberalism for Nationhood and from there I research Constitution. A golden age at this time lets me switch to Rep, Nationhood, Slavery and Theocracy for drafting. Building jails means that the settled GSpy now is giving 21 EPs and 6 base :science: and at that time many other SE cities can run 3 spies each giving 7 EPs and 4 base beakers. Given that situation I now will not research any techs that the AI already has or is researching at the moment. I push my research further into the tech tree and at the same time build up the EPs to steal the bypassed techs.

Futhermore, I am careful to minimise any tech trading to powerful AIs as that helps them more than it does me and just makes the tech scene race ahead. If they have a tech I want I'll try to steal it so I don't have to give them a tech I have researched. I have no qualms about trading with backward or very weak AIs (except where they'll trade the tech on to others).

My midgame rules can be summarised as:
1. Research techs the AIs do not have and are not currently researching
2. Maintain EP superiority by investing heavily in espionage.
3. Minimise tech trading with the leading AI
4. Steal techs the AI have

@ UncleJJ and CivCorpse

Thanks for the Espionage tips! I'm usually an SE player (when possible), so I will definitely try this strategy out on my next game.

Awesome stuff. Thanks again.

Seems like people are arguing about two aspects of Great Wall: countering barbs or Great Spy as first GP. If you're into espionage then you might go for Gwall to kickstart EE(espionage economy) regardless while countering barbs is going to be more situational.

Not to :deadhorse: but there are three distinct advantages. Faster GG production for defensive wars, which is half of the Imperilistic trait if done correctly.

Not really on topic, but I ran into a visual glitch just now with the Great Wall in a game I just started as the Dutch. [see attached] Why is there no wall south of Utrecht? That's going to bug me for the rest of the game. :twitch:

In any case, I expect to learn a lot from Huayna Capac in this game, if you catch my drift.

Edit: Oh, nevermind, I see it now. It's because of that lake.

wall is built (visually) between two vertically or horizontally adjanced land tiles, if one of them is culturally yours, and the other is not (as far as i know)
there are no such tile south of utrecht - your cultural border there is always a border between land and sea, too

Which do the higher level (Emperor and higher) players prefer? Great Wall or Great Lighthouse?

I know the GL is more preferable (+100% trade route yield? HOLY CRAP!) but it's much more expensive. I can easily get it on Noble, but it must be near impossible on higher populated maps on higher levels.

Not to :deadhorse: but there are three distinct advantages. Faster GG production for defensive wars, which is half of the Imperilistic trait if done correctly.

:lol: I'd say it's not half the Imperialistic trait but double it when done correctly! ;)

For Justinian, for instance, the GW and a contrived defensive war or two is a great way to set up the Ride of the Cataphracts, for total world dominance (or at least your own continent :D). The GW also gives an early GSpy or two so you can see what your future enemies (victims) are researching. Then the defensive war gets you 2 or 3 GGs which you settle as MIs in your HE city along with a stable. Once you have Guilds your cataphracts are the dominant military force and get built fast and with high promotions. I find the Flanking2 cataphracts with several combat promotions soon dominate.

And of course with the settled spies you have enough EPs to instantly lower defences so some cities can be taken very quickly while others are taken with main army using seige and normal tactics. With Justinian, unless you're isolated, the GW is the best wonder and the one that has the biggest impact on his game.

So if my GW gives me a GSpy as my first GP I have no hesitation about settling him. In the next 100 turns I get 1200 EPs and 300 :science: from him and that's enough in the early game to be able to see what the AI are doing without raising the EP slider. Building courthouses in my cities early compounds that small EP advantage and allows a few cheap techs to be stolen or some city revolts to help the military.


You can get much better than "cheap" techs if you focus EP. EP gets cost reductions for things like religion, stationary spy, and trade network. You also become better of via EP spending and having a favorable ratio ----> just one settled great spy with EP focus will absolutely destroy the ratio in favor of you.

This often means that between just courthouses, a settled spy, and possibly a SY, you can steal a couple out of techs such as machinery, feudalism, currency, engineering, etc. Many of these can turn into trade bait too (somewhat luck dependent because you'll often want to focus early).

Considering conditions are often favorable for a better than 1 EP to 1 Beaker conversion if you have an espionage advantage, you might as well milk it.

Granted, I use a lot more cottages than you, but this advantage is independent of that. A SY + strong commerce city can do a impressive bit of work though, should you need to do some catching up.

Later in the game EE gets out of hand. Just BUILDING the espionage buildings with a decent chunk of cities is frequently enough. It's ridiculous. 40+ espionage/city at 0% slider investment. IMO this potential is ignored too much. It's very easy to make up for tech deficits when you can vulture techs so easily, and sometimes even trade them the turn after!

You can get much better than "cheap" techs if you focus EP. EP gets cost reductions for things like religion, stationary spy, and trade network. You also become better of via EP spending and having a favorable ratio ----> just one settled great spy with EP focus will absolutely destroy the ratio in favor of you.

Agreed, I'm familiar with all this, but I dislike spending much commerce to generate EPs in the early game at the 1commerce = 1 EP rate when beakers typically have a 1.25 to 1.5 exchange rate (with library, monasteries and an academy). I also use several other more sophisticated espionage tricks like the moving my capital and the spread culture mission to reduce costs but these come into their own later in the game. I feel it is a mistake to try to use espionage too early in the game, for me it is a mid game ploy.

This often means that between just courthouses, a settled spy, and possibly a SY, you can steal a couple out of techs such as machinery, feudalism, currency, engineering, etc. Many of these can turn into trade bait too (somewhat luck dependent because you'll often want to focus early).

Considering conditions are often favorable for a better than 1 EP to 1 Beaker conversion if you have an espionage advantage, you might as well milk it.

Granted, I use a lot more cottages than you, but this advantage is independent of that. A SY + strong commerce city can do a impressive bit of work though, should you need to do some catching up.

I don't turn up the EP slider until I have at least jails build in most cities and maybe a few castles and then along with Nationhood I get a good exchange rate for the spare commerce floating around. That is when I fill up on my list of techs I bypassed and refuse to trade for. Heavy EP investment against an AI before trying to steal from him, not only gives a favourable discount but also means my spies are much less likely to get caught (both while waiting and while performing the mission) and hence I get less diplomatic malusses for caught spies. I like to have my religious advantage sorted (send missionary) and open borders before I try to steal any expensive techs. I might try to switch religions and civics (if Spiritual) or run several spread culture missions before getting serious.

Since I don't use the EP slider much I don't like building more than one SY and only then if I have at least one settled GSpy there. I do, however, frequently capture 2 or 3 enemy SY while making my domination run and those are gratefully received and exploited. That captured SY city obviously builds all the espionage buildings and runs spies as a priority to make the most of the gift.

Later in the game EE gets out of hand. Just BUILDING the espionage buildings with a decent chunk of cities is frequently enough. It's ridiculous. 40+ espionage/city at 0% slider investment. IMO this potential is ignored too much. It's very easy to make up for tech deficits when you can vulture techs so easily, and sometimes even trade them the turn after!

Late game is a breeze. I often have at least 20 cities with the full suite of espionage buildings which with Nationhood give 49.5 EPs each. That gives 1000 EPs before considering any spies and I run plenty of those in foo rich cities all with +125% bonus. The problem I have on emperor is that I steal all the techs the AI have on me and then have to wait for maybe 50 turns before I can reach domination using my army and fleet. That almost means my espionage strategy has been too successful, but having a huge store of EPs does mean that I can mess with any AI trying for a cultural or Space victory. I even blow up their production on wonders they try to build so I nearly always win wonder building races even if I steal the tech from them :D

I wasn't suggesting turning the slider up early...the techs I listed are ones I've stolen in recent emperor/immortal games without touching the slider.

It's conceivable that you could use SY very early in the game as a completely ridiculous 100% modifier. I tried it with a bureaucracy capitol in the stalin emperor game here and it worked pretty well (no academies early due to always popping a spy or priest :p). That game was a bit of an anomaly though.

Which do the higher level (Emperor and higher) players prefer? Great Wall or Great Lighthouse?

I know the GL is more preferable (+100% trade route yield? HOLY CRAP!) but it's much more expensive. I can easily get it on Noble, but it must be near impossible on higher populated maps on higher levels.It is easy to get any wonder on any level if you concentrate on it. The AI does not get bonuses for building wonders. The issue is the opportunity cost. If you are building a wonder, then you cannot be doing other things at the same time. The land gets gobbled up real quick on the higher level.

BTW, the reward for the GL is actually two additional trade routes for each coastal city. As such, it is extremely context-dependent. No Wonder is more powerful on the right map - or more useless on the wrong one. So as usual in civ, the answer is... it depends.

BTW, the reward for the GL is actually two additional trade routes for each coastal city.

Oh yeah, my bad. I mixed that up with the Temple of Artemis

Actually you do not need to be behind in techs. Just research other things. It allows you to do deep beelines into the tech tree without missing out on other techs. want steel from the lib race? then use espiuonage to grab engineering rather than teching it. Think theology is a dead end tech but like the +2 exp from theocracy? steal it.

Exactly, and those saying they like a tech lead all game and to hoard their tech are probably playing easier difficulties. It's impossible to research everything yourself and have a big tech lead early-mid game in monarch and higher games. You're either going to build a huge economy and catch up late game, trade with other civs to backfill techs, or steal to backfill techs. I love to play a leader suited for warfare and focus on military techs like getting to guilds and gunpowder and then stealing the economic techs like education from softies like elizabeth. Or you can go vice versa, beeline to liberalism and steal the guilds line stuff.

I'm working my way up to Prince (playing crowded maps only on that setting so far). But I think I'll come to rest on Prince and go no further. I just got a handle on crushing the AI in techs on Noble. On Prince, I'm still tech leader, though there are usually a few techs the AI beelines for that it has before I do even in the latter medieval ages.

Come to think of it, Monarch might be the best difficulty for me after I hone Prince. I prefer to be the clear tech leader, but I don't like easily steamrolling the AI. I want some kinda fight in my prey :D

I'm working my way up to Prince (playing crowded maps only on that setting so far). But I think I'll come to rest on Prince and go no further. I just got a handle on crushing the AI in techs on Noble. On Prince, I'm still tech leader, though there are usually a few techs the AI beelines for that it has before I do even in the latter medieval ages.

Come to think of it, Monarch might be the best difficulty for me after I hone Prince. I prefer to be the clear tech leader, but I don't like easily steamrolling the AI. I want some kinda fight in my prey :D

I'd say Emperor is probably a good place to stop. After that the early AI expansion and tech rates and the barbarian onslaught is ridiculous and you can't goof around anymore like you can on lower levels. :p

and you can't goof around anymore like you can on lower levels

no goofin' around?! But goofin' is whats Blitzkrieg1980s do da best!

Huge marathon low sea? C'mon dood. Let's play Civ instead. In a normal game the GW is pretty useless.

WTH is a "normal" game?

standard size normal speed normal sea level.

standard size normal speed normal sea level.

Which map, which civs, what options, how many civs?

Point is, there is no such thing as a "normal" game. Any setup you start with will have some kind of advantage or disadvantage for somebody.

Great Wall kinda confuses me, TBH. I'm never sure what a good situation to build it looks like.

If there's a lot of civs near me, then the barb blocking won't be that useful because there's so many fog busters around.

If there's only a few civs, the barb blocking becomes more useful, however it'll be harder to find good espionage targets to take advantage of my Great Spy.

Which map, which civs, what options, how many civs?

Point is, there is no such thing as a "normal" game. Any setup you start with will have some kind of advantage or disadvantage for somebody.Point is, you are a clubhouse lawyer. I should have known better than to answer you the first time. :blush:

BTW, as I found out painfully today, GW does not block barb galleys, they will still pillage every seafood you so much as look at if you have no navy because you think you're safe. You're not.

I'm a big fan of the GW, if it's map appropriate, of course. I play Huge/Marathon/18 Civ games and I tend to get alot of mileage out of it. Also, in BTS, I've noticed that barb activity is much more vicious than in Warlords. Last couple of games that I've played on Great Plains maps have resulted in 5+ civs being whacked by barbs. On Archipelago, or maps where you benefit from AI fogbust, spending those hammers on mad rexing may be a better option.

Point is, you are a clubhouse lawyer. I should have known better than to answer you the first time. :blush:

You kidding me? Standard games vary a ton on lots of regular map scripts. You're asking for it if you call a wonder "pretty useless" ;).

It isn't, by the way, on many standard maps.

standard size normal speed normal sea level.

By that definition it must be a "noble" difficulty game as well. As "noble" is the standard against which other difficulties are measured.

You kidding me?Kidding out about what? Are you saying that there is no such thing as a normal game? Which is quite clearly what the troll is trying to say. He even brings civs into the equation as if that has something to do with it.

Standard games vary a ton on lots of regular map scripts. You're asking for it if you call a wonder "pretty useless" ;).It's true that standard maps vary a lot. Are you saying that if I called the Chicken "pretty useless", I would be asking for it too? Some wonders are quite useful. Some are not. Among those which are available early, the Wall is pretty far down on the list. If I want an early Stone wonder, I find it difficult to imagine that I would prefer the Wall to Stonehenge or the Pyramids.

It isn't, by the way, on many standard m aps.Specifics please.

"noble" is the standard against which other difficulties are measured.Really? Who made this edict?

Really? Who made this edict?
Noble difficulty is the difficulty level that Ai bonuses are based on.
Who made the edict that standard speed and size are "normal".

Kidding out about what? Are you saying that there is no such thing as a standard map? Which is quite clearly what the troll is trying to say. He even brings civs into the equation as if that has something to do with the map.

It's true that standard maps vary a lot. Are you saying that if I called the Chicken "pretty useless", I would be asking for it too? Some wonders are quite useful. Some are not. Among those which are available early, the Wall is pretty far down on the list. If I want an early Stone wonder, I find it difficult to imagine that I would prefer the Wall to Stonehenge or the Pyramids.

Specifics please.

Well, by "asking for it" I mean that you're going to get a ton of counter arguments about ANY wonder you call useless if it's the topic of the thread :lol:.

Civs are a valid consideration. They vary by "standard" map and depending on the AI you are near, early espionage early may be more or less useful to you (especially in larger land to settle setups with AIs that hold monopoly techs).

Chichen is just more power rating/gpp, but it doesn't carry the same utility as the gwall and isn't the topic of this thread. People...even some high level people...still build even that wonder, you know.

I already made a list of situations that make the wall a stronger play earlier in the thread. However, the basis for comparison for wall is not pyramids (which are more expensive and strategy-dependent) or stonehenge exclusively. You also have to weigh its utility against the hammers you'll be using up to defend against barbarians. Fog bust troops die, barbs blow by them and try to pillage and you have to chase them down/possibly lose units, and even if that doesn't happen you still have to produce sufficient units to fogbust enough anyway. If building the wall is cheap for you, saves you hammers that you'd HAVE to put in to stronger garrisons, and so forth what you might be comparing it to is fogbusters rather than another early wonder.

Unless you're on deity or something, you can get the wall without sacrificing too much. Loot at my immortal hatty game for example. Wall AND mids. You'd be hard pressed to show that the wall hurt my expansion in that game. The stolen techs factor in too. There's already plenty here to cut down the "pretty useless" assertion.

And before any name-flinging goes off, I'm hard pressed to view the poster's response as "trolling". "C'mon dood. Let's play Civ instead" is a pretty strong way to voice an opinion. Lots of players play huge/marathon (i'm not among them). How are we defining normal? Just "play now"? You can vary the settings a lot even there. The difficulty/speed/map most commonly used? Do we even have conclusive evidence what that is?

I'd take the wall over SH in a LOT of situations, and in some cases I'd take it over mids (though I don't think mids fits a relevant timeframe for comparison ----> usually stone isn't involved in Gwall unless you have it in initial BFC...not true for mids which are usually built after you have more cities and have explored more).

Noble difficulty is the difficulty level that Ai bonuses are based on.
Who made the edict that standard speed and size are "normal".Umm... no. It's simply the level where the bonuses given to the AI and the bonuses given to the human are roughly equal.

Look dood, if you want to play huge maps with low sea level and raging barbs, far be it from me to tell you that you are wrong. Play what you like. It's not what the game was designed for, but if you like it... Hey! Whatever rocks your boat.

However, if you then come back and tell me that the Wall is "underrated, overpowered and just plain nifty" when you play these settings, then I say you are simply taking advantage of the dumb AI. It doesn't know which wonders are better under which settings.

Your choice to play these settings and then to grab the Wall is at least a level difference in the difficulty. Hell, Marathon is dam near a level difference in the difficulty all on its own. That makes two levels.

Also, something else that's cool about Great Wall - it allows you to delay military techs. If you want to found an early religion, anything that allows you to delay other techs in favor of a founding tech is A Good Thing.

Umm... no. It's simply the level where the bonuses given to the AI and the bonuses given to the human are roughly equal.

Actually, just to clarify, it really IS the default difficulty the AI bonuses are based on. The whole handicap=noble that shows up underneath every single AI civ in every worldbuilder save regardless of what difficulty the human selected when creating it should be pretty strong evidence. After noble, AI hut luck is based on noble values, also.

Quite similar to how speeds are scaled based off of normal speed, difficulties are definitely scaled based on noble difficulty from just about everything I can tell.

Also, something else that's cool about Great Wall - it allows you to delay military techs. If you want to found an early religion, anything that allows you to delay other techs in favor of a founding tech is A Good Thing.

Probably not, depending on difficulty. If you want the wall on higher levels, you're going to have to head to masonry early, not later, and it's not like you can get away with skipping food techs.

Actually, just to clarify, it really IS the default difficulty the AI bonuses are based on. Umm.... yes... And? Are you saying that therefore it is better to build on the Wall on Noble than Settler? Or vice versa? :confused: Remember the topic. It's Nifty an' everything. You still haven't given me an example of when Its Niftyness shines at Normal speeds and sizes. Civcorpse is quite right that it is better when things are big an' slow an' barbarous.

I attempt to build the GW in every game for the the espionage alone. The barb-blocking is a perk. There are a crapload of techs I hate researching (see most of the religious ones) and a few Gspies early on provide enough espionage infrastructure to last the game and nab more techs than the 150 hammers and 2-3 GP are probably worth.

Obviously if you're winning with an axe rush then espionage is of little concern to you. But if you know you're going to play until at least a renaissance victory than the wall's espionage setup is more than worth it.

:king:

Umm.... yes... And? Are you saying that therefore it is better to build on the Wall on Noble than Settler? Or vice versa? :confused: Remember the topic. It's Nifty an' everything. You still haven't given me an example of when Its Niftyness shines at Normal speeds and sizes. Civcorpse is quite right that it is better when things are big an' slow an' barbarous.

No...I'm pretty sure I pointed out a list of things that the great wall does on normal speeds quite clearly earlier in this thread. I also referred you to my immortal hatsheput save. I grabbed the wall in climb the ladder V, stalin (on emperor) also and that walkthrough also shows its utility. How many players in that game matched the same REX without it?

It's obviously stronger, to the point of being imbalanced, if one rigs the settings that way (true of a lot of wonders), but I've presented some pretty clear-cut, plausible scenarios that occur on standard size/speed maps, and indeed some actual games. You can keep saying I didn't if you want to though.

Really? Who made this edict?

You. Since youre claiming that the default size and speed are to be considered "normal", surely you must see that the default difficulty setting belongs to that category too. The difference between Settler and Deity is far more pronounced than any of the world settings.

So i take it you play Noble exclusively and regard anyone who play other difficulties a clueless beginner who isnt eligible to make any statements about strategy because things are different on "normal" difficulty.

So i take it you play Noble exclusively and regard anyone who play other difficulties a clueless beginner who isnt eligible to make any statements about strategy because things are different on "normal" difficulty.Really??? Where did you did this notion from? No. I don't play Noble. I started this game at Monarch and it's been a long time since I found that level to be the slightest bit interesting.

surely you must see that the default difficulty setting belongs to that category too.What category? Normal? I don't see that there is Normal level at all. There simply is a level at which different folks are capable of playing the game. There is also a game that the AI has been designed to play. It is not Huge Low-sea Ragin' barbs. As for the map, I would guess it is tailored towards Continents. However it plays Pangea better. Any time you deviate from the settings the AI works best, you give yourself an advantage. If you go after Wonders which exploit those settings, you give yourself an even bigger advantage.

I am astonished at the amount of abuse I have taken on this thread for pointing out the basic fact that there is such a thing as a standard Civ game and that any deviation from it advantages the human.

I am astonished at the amount of abuse I have taken on this thread for pointing out the basic fact that there is such a thing as a standard Civ game and that any deviation from it advantages the human.

If playing a larger map gives the human an advantage then smaller maps must give the AI an advantage. Building the Great Wall on huge marathon with raging barbs maps is an exploit. If you had read the entire original post you would see that I even said as much. But without raging barbs it isn't.

Probably not, depending on difficulty. If you want the wall on higher levels, you're going to have to head to masonry early, not later, and it's not like you can get away with skipping food techs.

There's games you'll get where the land isn't good for either slavery/chopping and/or lacks livestock. If this is the case sometimes I'll go Great Wall (which I've been messing around with alot recently) then eschew BW and/or AH and try for Monotheism (which requires masonry). After a few techs to keep my workers busy like Wheel, Agriculture, Mining and sometimes Pottery, of course.

That Great Spy combos VERY nicely with an early holy city.

I am astonished at the amount of abuse I have taken on this thread for pointing out the basic fact that there is such a thing as a standard Civ game and that any deviation from it advantages the human.

you're acting like a self righteous arse and then you're astonished about the amount of abuse; life must be very hard for you... :rolleyes:

You still haven't given me an example of when Its Niftyness shines at Normal speeds and sizes

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=240749

but then it's low sea level so it ain't normal, right :lol:

n.b.: I don't think the GW is either overpowered or nifty or anything, but your reactions would hint that the guy said at least that the Earth is flat

n.b.: I don't think the GW is either overpowered or nifty or anything, but your reactions would hint that the guy said at least that the Earth is flat

I though that the world was indeed flat. Or so said some fried something or the other. BTW, I am pleased to inform you of my researchers' progress in Optics - I will soon be able to prove that the world is indeed flat. Don't tell me I need the internet - whatever that is - to do so.

*Advised by my psychiatrist to sleep more and play less CIV* ;)

you're acting like a self righteous arse and then you're astonished about the amount of abuse; life must be very hard for you... :rolleyes:

How does having a different opinion make you a self rigtheous arse? I think we saw some good examples in this thread where TGW is a very usefull wonder. But it may not fit everybody's strategy. Personally I hardly ever build the thing. So to question the claim of the thread title that it is overpowered is very legitimate when the example to support this claim is so different from the standard settings of the game.

Please guys, if somebody makes a valid point, argue against it. If someone is being a self-righteous arse, and I'm not calling anyone such, just ignore him as you would ignore an annoying fellow traveler on the bus who is rambling about the unfairness of the system.

Actually, I don't think that anybody is being an arse of any kind in this thread, although SW doesn't get style points for calling someone names.

I agree with Fjordan that stating "You claim X is overpowered, but X is only overpowered in certain niche situations" is a valid argument that can be countered by explaining how X can be useful in a large variety of games. Unfortunately, people got distracted by pointless semantic arguing and we still haven't received a useful answer.

(Ex: I recently got a map that was full of large lakes accessible to coastal cities. I was financial and built the colossus for 3f4c tiles with no improvements needed. Was the colossus overpowered there? absolutely! Is it normally, no I don't think so.)

By 3000 BC it should be clear if you'll benefit from GW or not. If you have a lot of room it's great to have it. Even then i don't build it on immortal+ because it's just too risky. If you miss it,it can be just about game over as you probably won't have any defense against the incoming barbs. If not game over you'll probably get pillaged badly.

If you go for it from the year 4000 BC you'll have a good chance to get it even on deity. Imo this gives up too much, you'll have to tech to masonry early and then use a lot of hammers that could also have gone into workers/settlers/archers.

There are maps where you can get hammered by barbs and where' there's just too much land to fogbust effectively.In this case prepare yourself well building roads on a lot of tiles near your cities and post archers or better between and just outside your cities. If you don't have enough workers to get these roads done you probably don't have enough workers in the first place. It's a nuisance, you're killing barbs every turn so the game progresses slowly and you must keep focus on strategy besides killing barbs. But if you do this your expansion is only slightly delayed and the barbs won't have that much of an impact.

There's one other advantage to not having the wall, you'll unlock HE.

Please guys, if somebody makes a valid point, argue against it. If someone is being a self-righteous arse, and I'm not calling anyone such, just ignore him as you would ignore an annoying fellow traveler on the bus who is rambling about the unfairness of the system.

/unlurk

:agree:

We are very lucky to have a forum comprised of helpful, intelligent, funny posters. Try going to other gaming sites and see how much flaming happens on a regular basis, and you'll appreciate the friendly confines, nay, the nurturing biosphere that is CFC.

/lurk

In terms of the great wall being underrated, I think that's a symptom of espionage in general being underrated. Seeing the enemy's cities, seeing their research, being able to destroy their wonder production, and steal techs at huge discounts from religion and trade routes can give huge advantages.

When you consider that espionage points can actually give you more per point than beakers, the great spy is potentially the strongest specialist and the most elusive in the early game.

Your capital can be an espionage city simultaneously with being commerce or production heavy, though commerce has better synergy. SY is as powerful as a national wonder, but doesn't count as one. Bureacracy can make SY powerful with the espionage slider, in your capital where you will effectively have 3 national wonders. Since you will be able to see the research of your rivals, you will be able to tell when it's approrpiate to turn your espionage or research up.

Eventually the SY city can have +200% espionage with jails and intelligence agencies. The only way to achieve this bonus for science is with all of the science buildings including oxford. That requires a larger investment in both buildings and technology.

Which do the higher level (Emperor and higher) players prefer? Great Wall or Great Lighthouse?

I know the GL is more preferable (+100% trade route yield? HOLY CRAP!) but it's much more expensive. I can easily get it on Noble, but it must be near impossible on higher populated maps on higher levels.

Always situational, but the biggest factor is map type. Archipelago will always favor GLH; pangea will always favor GW. Continents? Well if you're close to the coast and have copper then GLH. I'm not a big fan of merchants, though.

They do have synergy with each other to some extent, as more trade routes ensures that you will have trade routes with your rivals closest and most underdeveloped cities, which make good espionage targets for tech stealing.

Edit: GW can actually help you build GLH by making city defense less urgent. Which frees up hammers to build the lighthouse and then great lighthouse.

Imo GLH is much more valuable than GW on ~ 80% of the maps including some pangeaes. GW more or less expires after the initial barb phase. Spy points are not bad but certainly not game breaking. The extra generals for fighting within your borders can admittedly be very good but depends a lot on circumstances.

Those 2 extra trade routes can add up really fast though, allowing you to settle cities at a direct profit (also on the coast of a pangae).

Imo GLH is much more valuable than GW on ~ 80% of the maps including some pangeaes. GW more or less expires after the initial barb phase. Spy points are not bad but certainly not game breaking. The extra generals for fighting within your borders can admittedly be very good but depends a lot on circumstances.

Those 2 extra trade routes can add up really fast though, allowing you to settle cities at a direct profit (also on the coast of a pangae).

GLH is my favorite wonder, easy to build, easy to use. GW you really have to leverage the espionage points. I hate using the word leverage referring to wonders and leaders because ultimately your strategy should depend mostly on the map, but GW is a wonder you have to make effort to get the most out of unlike stuff like GLH and the oracle for example.

GLH is my favorite wonder, easy to build, easy to use. GW you really have to leverage the espionage points. I hate using the word leverage referring to wonders and leaders because ultimately your strategy should depend mostly on the map, but GW is a wonder you have to make effort to get the most out of unlike stuff like GLH and the oracle for example.

Another factor is difficulty level. GW is best on immortal difficulty, as barbs seem to be a greater nuissance on that level than any other. Since I've been playing mostly immortal lately, I value GW more. Any start where you can't conveniently hook up to the coast with your second city would favor GW.

By 3000 BC it should be clear if you'll benefit from GW or not. If you have a lot of room it's great to have it. Even then i don't build it on immortal+ because it's just too risky. If you miss it,it can be just about game over as you probably won't have any defense against the incoming barbs. If not game over you'll probably get pillaged badly.

If you go for it from the year 4000 BC you'll have a good chance to get it even on deity. Imo this gives up too much, you'll have to tech to masonry early and then use a lot of hammers that could also have gone into workers/settlers/archers.

There are maps where you can get hammered by barbs and where' there's just too much land to fogbust effectively.In this case prepare yourself well building roads on a lot of tiles near your cities and post archers or better between and just outside your cities. If you don't have enough workers to get these roads done you probably don't have enough workers in the first place. It's a nuisance, you're killing barbs every turn so the game progresses slowly and you must keep focus on strategy besides killing barbs. But if you do this your expansion is only slightly delayed and the barbs won't have that much of an impact.

There's one other advantage to not having the wall, you'll unlock HE.

Even without raging barbs (which I only enabled one game to see what would happen) huge marathon maps at higher difficulties are absolutely viscious with regard to barbs. You will spend more hammers on replacing anti-barb units than the GW costs. You will be constantly wasting worker turns rebuilding improvements that get pillaged.

And as for unlocking HE. You can always send a couple units outside your cultural borders to get exp

Even without raging barbs (which I only enabled one game to see what would happen) huge marathon maps at higher difficulties are absolutely viscious with regard to barbs. You will spend more hammers on replacing anti-barb units than the GW costs. You will be constantly wasting worker turns rebuilding improvements that get pillaged.

And as for unlocking HE. You can always send a couple units outside your cultural borders to get exp

Exactly. Fortify units on forested hills surrounded by fog. The barbs are quirky and will randomly attack or not attack. Once the unit has 10 exp, return to the city and send another out.

Yes GW gets better on marathon.I play normal speed immortal/deity. But here missing GW is even more disastrous. I once played a deity game on normal speed where i killed ~ 100 units before 1 AD. All warriors later axes since it was an NC, would have been more difficult facing archers. But a good road network with roads on all the improved tiles works very well. You have so much xp on your units that you kill off barbs without sustaining too much damage yourself.

Of course you can unlock HE while having GW, but then you have to build units again and you build GW in order not to build a lot of units. But indeed 2-3 good units fortified should be enough.

Raging barbs is a different story altogether, played this once on deity/marathon. You have to build capital on hill and research straight to archery and build some. Best is to have your capital 2 tiles from the sea,in this case you'll have a backyard where your worker(s) can do some work. Seafood is great in this scenario as well.

/unlurk

:agree:

We are very lucky to have a forum comprised of helpful, intelligent, funny posters. Try going to other gaming sites and see how much flaming happens on a regular basis, and you'll appreciate the friendly confines, nay, the nurturing biosphere that is CFC.

/lurk

Agreed - This is the best Forum I have ever been a part of primarily due to the "civ"ility ( :lol: ) of the posters here.

I haven't built the wall in a long time as I'm an bit hooked on the stonehenge but I might play a CRE leader soon and build it: Either Pericles for the fast Spy or Catherine for sick GG abuse.

This thread inspired me to build the Great Wall in my Augustus game that I played today. I got a Great Spy and settled him in Rome, and later on used the points I had build up to steal Feudalism, Horseback Riding and Aesthetics from Pericles. Not too shabby, considering he had been building up points and using quite a few spies in my cities.

Had I focussed things on spionage a bit more, I might have gotten more out of it. My tip is to simply play with it people and get the hang of it. I think that espionage and in particular tech stealing can become a vital addition to your basic strategies! :)

I almost always play on Epic speed, so I don't know about the effect of speed on barbs, except that they are more dangerous the more turns they have.

But I can tell you for sure that they become much more menacing with the increase in difficulty levels. The jump in barb threat from noble to prince is not insignificant. And compared to monarch, the noble barbs are positively cute. I don't have much experience above that, but I am sure that at immortal the barbs would like to party in your own backyard instead of their :P

I don't have much experience above that, but I am sure that at immortal the barbs would like to party in your own backyard instead of their :P

Barb archers at 3000 BC coming to invade your cities man. Those things are vicious. :cringe:

I agree with Fjordan that stating "You claim X is overpowered, but X is only overpowered in certain niche situations" is a valid argument that can be countered by explaining how X can be useful in a large variety of games. Unfortunately, people got distracted by pointless semantic arguing and we still haven't received a useful answer.
Thats not what that guy is claiming though. His argumentation is that playing an archipelago/Pangaea map is, quote: "It's not what the game was designed for" Which is kinda funny because it is a regular selection at game start. In your example with many lakes and Colossus, following his logic Colossus is not overpowered, its the player, making a mistake of not restarting the map so it fits his fixed ideas about wonder usefulness. He goes on claiming that difficulty settings have no influence on wonder usefulness. I wouldnt call these points "arguments".


In any case i think the point of GW is missed slightly here. Its not a defensive wonder. Its an important offensive weapon, with barbs being its ammo. Rerouting barbs targeting you to the neighbor causes him to deal with barbs, not your cities. Its a free army at no cost whatsoever. Slowing him down, which ensures more landgrab for you. Cities, taken over(or founded) are neutral, the player can take it. They are generally easy to conquer and instantly protected, you are at no war with anybody, and barbs cant retaliate because of GW - even more landgrab for you and pushing neighbors away. This way not only can you create a huge empire at little cost, but at the same time you are preventing neighbors from expanding to your direction, since you are taking over their former border cities(and being at peace). The strength of GW depends on how strong the barb threat is.

Barb archers at 3000 BC coming to invade your cities man. Those things are vicious. :cringe:

Only with events on.

Normal barbs don't enter cities until around 2000 BC or so (usually somewhat before on immortal)...depends on # of cities settled by you and the AIs and whatnot. Unless you have raging barbs checked you can still put the wall up before they're a problem pretty easily.

They're not to be underestimated though. They can smack you around pretty good if you don't have metal and have a lot of fog nearby. Archers fogbusting only takes you so far when you have more than 1 archer coming from each side of your empire, choosing to ignore your fogbust, and forcing you to attack it with archers of you own or get tiles pillaged. This is one of the subtle (and few) benefits of protective ---> you'll be much better off here. Cover archers are pretty stout vs other archers, and the extra first strike chance will give you a leg up with the fog busters, making you less likely to lose them.

The wall might still be helpful if the amount of land is great though. I've been playing the old immortal U's somewhat. IMO, it's a big help in the Genghis Khan one, was OK in hatty/sury, not so hot for washington, etc.

Neighbors matter too. You're much more likely to neglect military next to someone who won't declare at pleased, than next to shaka/nappy/monty/ragnar/GK or other dangerous warmongers.

I've had them invade my cities way before 2000 BC, that's for sure... but then again I usually try to have my second city up a little before 2500 BC. Yeah, they don't actually enter your cities at 3000 BC (but I have seen them walking around in the woods) but you better have more than warriors to escort your first settler! (unless he's really early I guess)

I've had them invade my cities way before 2000 BC, that's for sure... but then again I usually try to have my second city up a little before 2500 BC. Yeah, they don't actually enter your cities at 3000 BC (but I have seen them walking around in the woods) but you better have more than warriors to escort your first settler! (unless he's really early I guess)

They don't enter culture borders, but there certainly are archers @ 3000 BC. An unescorted settler is safe on flatlands though once animals are gone (which, ironically is earlier on higher difficulty). Just move it 1 tile/turn and move away if you see a barb. Eventually you'll want a unit anyway for :) garrison (at least one or the crowd gets pissy) but it's still nice to not have to build one right away.

At prince, it's fairly easy for me to eliminate 3-5 rivals and have an entire continent to myself before I start down the currency/code of laws/cottage spam rebuilding stage. I play large marathon usually fractal maps, and for me the barb protection is more valuable than the espionage; if I have 3-5 times as much land as the neighbors on the other continents, my tech rate is going to be waaaaay out in front, making tech stealing useless. However, having the great wall allows me to focus exclusively on settlers, workers, libraries, markets, courts, etc... Basically making a super-empire in which any victory is possible.

Raging barbs enter culture borders as soon as they're not animals.

On the comparison of GLH to GW, the +2 trade routes are limited to coastal cities, so it would have to be a fairly high seas pangea to make GLH worth its salt on that kind of map. Although on continents if I'm alone on a land mass I'll also prefer GLH because then I can just REX the coast, turtle that, and let the interior be my barb training ground until my economy can handle interior settling (some of which will be done by the barbs themselves with their cities). A non-trivial drawback to GLH though, is the amount of prep work required. Sailing, Masonry, Lighthouse... tech turns burned and 50 hammers more to build. If it ever seems 50/50 and hard to decide between the two, GW is lower-hanging fruit.

Another thing to beware of with barbs that I haven't seen mentioned, is seafood. It seems since 3.17 BtS barb galleys spawn exponentially more on fogged coasts, and an unprotected seafood tile WILL be pillaged.

On the comparison of GLH to GW, the +2 trade routes are limited to coastal cities, so it would have to be a fairly high seas pangea to make GLH worth its salt on that kind of map. Although on continents if I'm alone on a land mass I'll also prefer GLH because then I can just REX the coast, turtle that, and let the interior be my barb training ground until my economy can handle interior settling (some of which will be done by the barbs themselves with their cities). A non-trivial drawback to GLH though, is the amount of prep work required. Sailing, Masonry, Lighthouse... tech turns burned and 50 hammers more to build. If it ever seems 50/50 and hard to decide between the two, GW is lower-hanging fruit.

Another thing to beware of with barbs that I haven't seen mentioned, is seafood. It seems since 3.17 BtS barb galleys spawn exponentially more on fogged coasts, and an unprotected seafood tile WILL be pillaged.

Cost of the GLH is 200+60 for a lighthouse vs 150 for TGW. Add in the extra hammers for units fighting barbs. Plus the cost of maintaining those units and TGW is much cheaper. I have found that over the course of a game the espionage benefits from just 1 Great Spy can greatly outweigh the added trade routes from TGLH. But that is more a result of my personal style of play.

I remember reading a thread that was saying that the Great Lighthouse and the Temple of Artemis (when both built in your empire) on a water heavy map could allow you to grab almost double your land without crippling your economy. I imagine that on water heavy maps, barbs will be less of an issue until they get sailing and galleys. By then you should be well on your way to having triremes anyway, right?

It appears that the GLH vs. GW discussion is, once again, situational ;)

Deleted Double Post

The other GW / GLH comparison issue is that the GW must be taken quickly or lost to the AI. At a minimum, you have to research Mining, Masonry, and Bronze Working to chop it out, unless you are very lucky and can research Masonry and the Wheel to hook up stone in your BFC right away. IMO, to be safe the GW must be built before the first settler on higher difficulty levels.

The GLH is trickier because it requires both Sailing and a Lighthouse in addition to the techs above. It's also more expensive and has no multiplier resource.

I think they're both great wonders in the right situation. I will say that the Great Wall is a great headache-saver. Being immune to barbs is just so great.

I'd rather turn barbs off that have to shoot for the GW every game to avoid headaches ;)

The other GW / GLH comparison issue is that the GW must be taken quickly or lost to the AI. At a minimum, you have to research Mining, Masonry, and Bronze Working to chop it out, unless you are very lucky and can research Masonry and the Wheel to hook up stone in your BFC right away. IMO, to be safe the GW must be built before the first settler on higher difficulty levels.

The GLH is trickier because it requires both Sailing and a Lighthouse in addition to the techs above. It's also more expensive and has no multiplier resource.

I think they're both great wonders in the right situation. I will say that the Great Wall is a great headache-saver. Being immune to barbs is just so great.

I very frequently get a settler out prior to the great wall. It depends on the surrounding tiles if that's viable. If you have tech or mining you can get the one you don't have (assuming it lets you improve something) then head straight for masonry. Once you've gotten to the size where you're working the specials you can you start a settler, then immediately the wall afterward. Usually can get the wall between 2400-2200 BC this way alongside a city. Not too risky on most levels...though I can't speak much for deity.

I very frequently get a settler out prior to the great wall. It depends on the surrounding tiles if that's viable. If you have tech or mining you can get the one you don't have (assuming it lets you improve something) then head straight for masonry. Once you've gotten to the size where you're working the specials you can you start a settler, then immediately the wall afterward. Usually can get the wall between 2400-2200 BC this way alongside a city. Not too risky on most levels...though I can't speak much for deity.

If I do not start with mining I usually build warriors until size 2, then a settler The reason being that if i do not start with mining it takes roughly 70 turns to get miningBW. After the settler i usually whip a worker as soon as possible. Then have him prechop during the 31 turns to masonry. On marathon that is 3 forests for 180 hammers. I then chop my little heart out til I have the wall. While letting city #2 struggle along on it's own. by about 2300bc I have the wall and a 2nd city that is able to help pump settlers to catch up on land grabbing.

I'm saying that it's somewhat frequent (like 40-50% of my games) that I can get the wall and a 2nd city by that date range without chopping at all. If you have access to food and its tech, or just mining, it's that easy if you have hills to mine. The worker (which I will go first if I can improve a high yield tile, which is usually) can go improve the 2nd city while BW is researched. There's less turns of working unimproved tiles in that scenario, although of course it's contingent on starting techs, the surroundings, and yes...game speed.

Quin is awesome for that. Starts with mining AND agg plus he is industrious. Auggie caeser starts with fishing/mining so a coastal start with seafood makes it easier for him. Plus the forum gives extra Great Spy Points

Small wonders like The Great Wall, Stonehenge, and The Oracle derive much of their value from their GPP production, since in this aspect they are equal to more expensive wonders in terms of GPP generation.

The Great Spy is a lot like the Great Prophet in that its value is very situational. There are some cases where it can be extremely good, but there are also many cases where generating such great people can hurt the continuity of an already-solid strategy.

Some playing styles which rely more on chance would tend to be more compatible with wonders that generate Great Spies or Great Prophets, but the less chance-dependent playing styles tend to prefer use of less situationally-dependent great people, such as Great Scientists, or no wonders at all.

Small wonders like The Great Wall, Stonehenge, and The Oracle derive much of their value from their GPP production, since in this aspect they are equal to more expensive wonders in terms of GPP generation.

The Great Spy is a lot like the Great Prophet in that its value is very situational. There are some cases where it can be extremely good, but there are also many cases where generating such great people can hurt the continuity of an already-solid strategy.

Some playing styles which rely more on chance would tend to be more compatible with wonders that generate Great Spies or Great Prophets, but the less chance-dependent playing styles tend to prefer use of less situationally-dependent great people, such as Great Scientists, or no wonders at all.

I think I disagree. Great Spies (unless in isolation) are the least risky of all strategies. Bulb~n~Trade strategies are dependant on many things. Diplomatic status, WFYABTA, and number of civs that have that tech already come to mind.

I think I disagree. Great Spies (unless in isolation) are the least risky of all strategies. Bulb~n~Trade strategies are dependant on many things. Diplomatic status, WFYABTA, and number of civs that have that tech already come to mind.

Not to mention that gold and production > science (unless you are hopelessly behind in tech, of course :D) since you can steamroll your neighbors (with your higher :hammers: rate) if they're running away in techs.

And as I'm to understand EP > :science: because you can steal a tech cheaper than research it yourself. At least, that's what I've been reading in a few recent threads. I haven't tried it myself yet.

"And as I'm to understand EP > because you can steal a tech cheaper than research it yourself. At least, that's what I've been reading in a few recent threads. I haven't tried it myself yet."

It is, but it is highly dependent on circumstances and multipliers. The starting cost of a tech is something like 3x the beaker value, but you can get stationary spy bonus, EP ratio bonus, religion bonus, open borders bonus plus the multipliers for spy points are much better (eg compare SY to academy, courthouse/jail/etc to library/etc, spy multipliers are generally twice as good).

There is a great thread on the mechanics of espionage floating around somewhere if you want more numbers than these guesses :-)

I see, so if you can harness and specialize spies/great spies and EP as well as an SE harnesses and specializes scientists/GS and :science:, then you can dominate the tech stealing game. So this is all started with the Great Wall.

I'm guessing a hybrid economy with cottages taking care of :science: and specialists taking care of :gold: and espionage so you can pop Great Spies? Or is it the opposite? Running cottages with higher EP% rate and using specialists for science?

I remember reading a thread that was saying that the Great Lighthouse and the Temple of Artemis (when both built in your empire) on a water heavy map could allow you to grab almost double your land without crippling your economy. I imagine that on water heavy maps, barbs will be less of an issue until they get sailing and galleys. By then you should be well on your way to having triremes anyway, right?

It appears that the GLH vs. GW discussion is, once again, situational ;)

On Monarch/Emp, barbs get sailing very quickly. That doesn't overwhelm the value of GLH on a water heavy map, but without GW any seafoods you work MUST be defended, ASAP, if there is any fog at all where barb galleys can spawn.

I see, so if you can harness and specialize spies/great spies and EP as well as an SE harnesses and specializes scientists/GS and :science:, then you can dominate the tech stealing game. So this is all started with the Great Wall.

I'm guessing a hybrid economy with cottages taking care of :science: and specialists taking care of :gold: and espionage so you can pop Great Spies? Or is it the opposite? Running cottages with higher EP% rate and using specialists for science?

I've done a few test games to feel out the EE strategy and am finding that in the early game, when you're behind, the value of the EE is primarily in stealing techs; and in the mid-game, when you're militarily on the march, it remains strong now as a military adjunct for supporting missions (e.g., support city revolt, or nuking the AI's iron, horses, copper, etc.) A strong EP flow seems to be > tech lead when it comes to military dominance in these games.

In the late game the foundation for strong EP generation is laid with great spies in a Scotland Yard, such that you should no longer need any EP on the slider, and at this point you can tech ahead, race to Internet, and let that wonder be your tech-stealer for the balance of the game. Your remaining teching is beelines for whichever victory you have in mind, without worrying about having to trade backfill.

I'm slowly falling in love with espionage on Monarch--need to translate that to Emp soon (cringe).

If playing a larger map gives the human an advantage then smaller maps must give the AI an advantage. Building the Great Wall on huge marathon with raging barbs maps is an exploit. If you had read the entire original post you would see that I even said as much. But without raging barbs it isn't.

But you know what - it sounds like fun. I have been in a rut on the same game - the same tech tree - blah, blah, blah.....I am gonna try raging barbs and make the wall a priority with a different civ than I might normally try - like Korea or Arabia and see how it goes.....

I want to thank you for the idea of something different

I've had them invade my cities way before 2000 BC, that's for sure... but then again I usually try to have my second city up a little before 2500 BC. Yeah, they don't actually enter your cities at 3000 BC (but I have seen them walking around in the woods) but you better have more than warriors to escort your first settler! (unless he's really early I guess)

It depends on how many cities you have.

I know that at Prince, with one city I don't see any barbs until at least 2000BC

If I make a 2nd city, they are sure to show up 500 years or so earlier.

If playing a larger map gives the human an advantage then smaller maps must give the AI an advantage. Building the Great Wall on huge marathon with raging barbs maps is an exploit. If you had read the entire original post you would see that I even said as much. But without raging barbs it isn't.

I've never heard this before. I'm always better on smaller maps. Always. Without exception and usually by a long shot. I can't see how larger maps are a boost to the human. Larger maps have more AIs that like to pimp techs constantly with each other. On smaller maps, early military rushes are much more of a boon than on larger maps and the AI rarely does an effective early rush.

Hmm. Maybe it's different for everyone.

I've never heard this before. I'm always better on smaller maps. Always. Without exception and usually by a long shot. I can't see how larger maps are a boost to the human. Larger maps have more AIs that like to pimp techs constantly with each other. On smaller maps, early military rushes are much more of a boon than on larger maps and the AI rarely does an effective early rush.

Hmm. Maybe it's different for everyone.

THE AI tends to overexpand which can either kill it's economy forever or results in a monster empire you must deal with. Given the number of leaders in huge mapped games, it's likely you will have 1 or 2 major threats that are almost impossible to overcome. I finally got bored with huge maps as I frequently always got either a UN diplo win or a Space ship win.

Well, whenever I play larger maps, I tend to crowd it. Sometimes I'll use 18, but usually 15. 18 tends to crowd the AI so much that I early rush and grab 3 capitals and fill in my land. The result is the AI warring too much (killing their tech) and me surging. So in that regard, yes the larger maps can be easier.

2 major threats are the usual on 15 civ huge maps for me and they usually have some kind of tech superiority (in general or in military terms)

On Monarch/Emp, barbs get sailing very quickly. That doesn't overwhelm the value of GLH on a water heavy map, but without GW any seafoods you work MUST be defended, ASAP, if there is any fog at all where barb galleys can spawn.

All my game experience indicates that the Great Wall doesn't protect water at all. Whether you have it or not, you have to defend your sea resources.

On Monarch/Emp, barbs get sailing very quickly. That doesn't overwhelm the value of GLH on a water heavy map, but without GW any seafoods you work MUST be defended, ASAP, if there is any fog at all where barb galleys can spawn.

You have to defend your seafood regardless of whether you build the great wall or not. The Great Wall protects your borders on continent

OTOH I believe the Great Wall still gives you double GG points on water.

Apologies if this was mentioned somewhere in the thread, it's getting long... does the increased GG generation also apply to defensive wars on a different continent than the wall city? How about if you move your capitol, does it, erm, move the wall in that respect? :D (Don't care about the barb benefits.)

................

Apologies if this was mentioned somewhere in the thread, it's getting long... does the increased GG generation also apply to defensive wars on a different continent than the wall city? How about if you move your capitol, does it, erm, move the wall in that respect? :D (Don't care about the barb benefits.)

Its anywhere within your "cultural boundries" It expands to anywhere you do - not necessarily within the great wall itself. It states that in the civpedia I am 99% sure.

The GW gives the GG point bonus for anything your units can get combat experience for inside your culture. That includes naval wafare inside your borders and even for air interception (fighters and SAM infantry) over a city you've just captured before it comes out of revolt :).

You have to defend your seafood regardless of whether you build the great wall or not. The Great Wall protects your borders on continent

True. Re-emphasizes my point that seafood gets exponentially more vulnerable at the higher levels.

A little self thread necro. I started a game on Emp difficulty but at normal speed standard size. Just fooling around and trying a few things. I Rexxed to 5 cities before my $$$ ran out and between the AI settling and running there scouts around and the 2 fog busters to the south near the tundra, I saw exactly THREE, T-H-R-E-E, 3 Barbarians enter my borders the entire game. No wonder there is no love for my favorite wonder in the game. If my poor little exploring warrior had not been eaten by the usual lurking bear I would have checked the settings to see if I had accidently turned barbs off. Wow, what a difference game speed and map size make. If you play normal speed standard size, The Great Wall really is a waste of hammers in the early game.

I got my first Immortal win last night, it was only AP though, standard size and quick speed. Barbs were hardly an issue at all.

When I tried Epic/Immortal I could only handle the barbs on archipelago ;)

I got my first Immortal win last night, it was only AP though, standard size and quick speed. Barbs were hardly an issue at all.

When I tried Epic/Immortal I could only handle the barbs on archipelago ;)

Congrats on the win, Dude. :goodjob:

GW works best on Huge maps with lots of land as a Barb barrier. Works great everywhere if you want the GS points to run an EE.

I got my first Immortal win last night, it was only AP though, standard size and quick speed. Barbs were hardly an issue at all.

When I tried Epic/Immortal I could only handle the barbs on archipelago ;)

A win is a win. My Immortal wins have been with significant edges in the start options and powerful starting positions plus good land nearby. And a lot of luck. LOL, all 3-4 of them. Congrats

Cheers bestbrian and CivCorpse, it was only a 1735AD win though, it will be in the next HoF update tomorrow :banana:

And bestbrian is such a nice cop that I have nearly recovered now from last night police ringing my doorbell and banging on the front door saying "open up this is the police!" and then asking if I was from flat #1 (nope, flat #3). Phew ;)

My impression of espionage on the higher levels is that it's not worth the bother usually except to help in late game with diplomacy/space wins. The AI puts out such stupid amounts of eps that it's questionable if you can get techs cheaper by stealing than by teching+trading, and that's not counting the hammers needed for spies or the inability to calculate exactly when you're going to get a tech (due to failed attempts) and possible demerits from getting caught.

if the GW offers no GPP, I'll chop it.
bulbing mathematics with a GSc is of top priority.

I like the GW for the GG points as much as anything else.

The GW is fine when used in moderation, like anything else. Just don't make it a focal point in every game you play because diversity is nice.

Cheers bestbrian and CivCorpse, it was only a 1735AD win though, it will be in the next HoF update tomorrow :banana:

And bestbrian is such a nice cop that I have nearly recovered now from last night police ringing my doorbell and banging on the front door saying "open up this is the police!" and then asking if I was from flat #1 (nope, flat #3). Phew ;)

I play for the Varsity team, pal, don't go mixing me in with the JV squad. :D

Don't forget the great wall GP bonus applies to all naval battles!!! I don't know what happened to her but there used to be a poster...perhaps moderator on these fora named KmadCandy, and she loved to build the GW and spam privateers. Then she'd go about causing all kinds of havoc for the AI with pillaging seafood and blockading cities, as well as sinking galleons. With the IMP trait and the GW, sea battles contribute X4 to GG generation, so she could generate literally a dozen GGs all from pirate battles. :D

Don't forget the great wall GP bonus applies to all naval battles!!! I don't know what happened to her but there used to be a poster...perhaps moderator on these fora named KmadCandy, and she loved to build the GW and spam privateers. Then she'd go about causing all kinds of havoc for the AI with pillaging seafood and blockading cities, as well as sinking galleons. With the IMP trait and the GW, sea battles contribute X4 to GG generation, so she could generate literally a dozen GGs all from pirate battles. :D
Correct but you only get the GW bonus when your privateers whomp a caravel (or whatever) in your cultural borders. (Which means that instead of sending all your privateers out to cause havoc you want to leave a few of them at home to whomp things when they come wandering in.)

Gah, I'm amazed. According to the log KMadCandy hasn't been active since Feb 17 a year ago. I hope she's ok. Thanks for joggin' the noggin noto. I wonder if we should check in on her and let her know we miss her and are concerned.

@ Wodan: no, ALL naval battles ANYWHERE count as being "in your borders". That's what's so great about it. Aside from privateers, if you're playing on a map with continents, you can just get yourself into a prolonged naval battle with a rival and really rack up those GGs.
As for Kmad...my gut feeling is that she uninstalled Civ. I once uninstalled the game to get through exams, but being the weak mortal I am I reinstalled. Kmad probably just had enough of it and wanted to do other things with her time.

@ Wodan: no, ALL naval battles ANYWHERE count as being "in your borders". That's what's so great about it. Aside from privateers, if you're playing on a map with continents, you can just get yourself into a prolonged naval battle with a rival and really rack up those GGs.
As for Kmad...my gut feeling is that she uninstalled Civ. I once uninstalled the game to get through exams, but being the weak mortal I am I reinstalled. Kmad probably just had enough of it and wanted to do other things with her time.

Can you document this, please? I tend to agree with Wodan.

The last I'd hear about KMad was that she was ill. Hope it wasn't anything too serious. It's remarkable how the Pirate Lady's name always comes up as soon as there is a discussion on Privateers.

I am pretty sure they fixed this.

Yeah I think that Privateers worked that way before one of the patches, but it's been fixed.

Oh, well, then it's obvious. Firaxis took all the fun out of the game for Kmad and she left.

Oh, well, then it's obvious. Firaxis took all the fun out of the game for Kmad and she left.

:cry:

10charschars