What Buildings Can Now Be Ignored, Post-BNW?

I've never been too good at CivV, as it is the first installment of the series I've played, and I've only been able to win a few games on King.

Now that BNW is out, which buildings do you think are absolutely useless? Since there are now so many choices in what to build, the opportunity costs need to be considered very carefully. Maybe you can help me by telling me what's important to build and what is not.

It's apparent that all victories are science victories in disguise, so I generally build all science buildings and staff their respective specialist slots all the way through research lab. Is this a mistake?

I understand that all games are situational, and this must be considered.

However, given all the various arenas (military, trade, science, culture, religion) I still almost never build, in any of my games regardless of setup,

-Stone Works

-Castle/Arsenal/Military Base (and I really only build walls in those few fringe cities)

-Barracks/Military Academy (I'd rather take the bonuses from a civ's UA or UU)

-Stable

-Forge

-Seaport (what's your take on these? worth it?)

-Zoo/Stadium (I can manage happiness just fine with lots of col's and a few wonders)

-Hospital/Medical Lab (come too late in the game and too expensive imo)

-Hydro/Solar/Nuclear Plant (again, come too late after factory and compete with the use of strategic weapons for military purposes)

-Stock Exchange (used to be commonplace in G and K but with the gold bonuses from trade, I seem to never get around to build them, and not even every city has a Bank)

With BNW I end up building all the culture buildings through Broadcast Tower in just about all my cities. Is this a mistake?

Can a culture victory still be attained on king and higher without Broadcast towers? They seem so darn expensive even with the Cultural Centers policy, and I could be using that time to build modern units for that inevitable DOW from CARTHAGE.

Are there other buildings that are virtually unimportant?

Thanks for your help.
Once again, I understand that it is all situational and depends how you start. But even if there's a few buildings that are garbage, I'd like to know what they are from you CiV vets.

Thanks

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Stone Works, Stable, and Forge are too situational. I build those if there's at least 2 of their respective resources around.

Seaport is great if there's ~3 sea resources around and you want to start building up your navy from nothing.

Hydro/Solar/Nuclear Plant I wouldn't hard-build, but they're pretty good candidates for gold buying (even better due to the more abundant gold now), especially in production challenged cities.

The rest are petty eh.

Don't ignore the happiness buildings. I always find myself struggling for happiness, but I guess it depends what level you play on.

Stone works is great, you should always build it.

I typically ignore building barracks and everyone on that line unless I am doing a domination game, then I will build barracks in all to make the heroic epic and maybe the others in one core city.

I typically try to build all of the money buildings, but it depends on my needs at the time.

Most of the plants come pretty late, but I will build them if I have nothing more urgent to build and then only in key production cities. My capital usually gets all it can.

Broadcast towers are very important and aren't expensive at all with the half cost policy. If you think they are, you aren't producing enough production in your games. This can be due to your cities not being large enough ( also why you don't care for happiness buildings). My cities are typically around 18-20 pop in the late game, and thats not even that large for some people. Hospital/medical lab usually come too late for me to care about them and I typically avoid them personally.

Stone works is great. +1 happy for 1 gold is a good deal and you also get hammers along with it.

Stables/Forge are extremely good with enough tiles, but if I only have one horse or iron tile in a city, it is hard to find time to make stables/forge a priority.

Occasionally I will build a seaport in a single city that is designated as my "rush frigates and kill all" strategy, but otherwise generally ignored.

Hydro is great. Solar/Nuclear is more hammers, which you really can never have too many of. These are usually rush-bought this stage of the game though.

Hospital is good for covering specialist slots--especially in newer cities. Not so much for generating GP at that late in the game, but because certain policies like Secularism make working specialists more useful than regular tiles.

Not sure how you are getting by without zoos. Do you only play with Civs that have inherent bonuses to religion/faith or are you just playing on a low enough difficulty that religion is guaranteed? Otherwise it is expensive to keep population growing (buying off mercantile CS's) and still not reliable. Stadiums I can understand, since by that time you generally have enough policies, luxuries, and gold to cover.

For clarification, I am playing on the King difficulty.

Stone Works is an amazing building

seancolorado said:

Stone Works is an amazing building

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I've been hearing this from a lot of you; next time I'll definitely try it. I guess since it was an added building when Stone was introduced a while after Vanilla, I never got around (or trusted myself, I should say) to building it.

WC4J said:

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It's apparent that all victories are science victories in disguise, so I generally build all science buildings and staff their respective specialist slots all the way through research lab. Is this a mistake?

Click to expand...

Nope, bang on the money.

As for the buildings:

-Stone Works: If you have the opportunity you should always build a Stone works.

-Castle/Arsenal/Military Base (and I really only build walls in those few fringe cities): I'd ignore walls as well as all of these. They can be useful, in certain circumstances, but generally I rarely find them worth the hammers.

-Barracks/Military Academy (I'd rather take the bonuses from a civ's UA or UU): I'd definitely get a Barracks, if only for the Heroic Epic. Then at least one more to ensure you have 30XP units coming out the gate. I'd avoid going any further unless you can hit 60XP, 45 XP is a waste I reckon. Although, if you're doing quite a bit of warring early on and have a decently promoted army then ignoring these is safe enough.

-Stable: I typically ignore this as well but if you have at least 2 of the required resources it can pay back its hammer cost if built early enough.

-Forge: As stable but much less likely to fulfill the requirements.

-Seaport (what's your take on these? worth it?): If you are picking up some Exploration SPs then these can be quite worthwhile. If you're not, typically less so.

-Zoo/Stadium (I can manage happiness just fine with lots of col's and a few wonders): I typically ignore these as well unless happiness is a concern which, in the late game, is rather rare. I imagine especially so at King.

-Hospital/Medical Lab (come too late in the game and too expensive imo): The Hospital can be useful, particularly in a high pop city to get a final couple of pop before the end of the game. In smaller cities they're okay, at best - the increase in pop/specialists/whatever I've found to be rarely worth the investment, whereas in more developed cities the output of running more specialists/having more pop is multiplied by existing buildings which, typically, don't exist in smaller ones.

-Hydro/Solar/Nuclear Plant (again, come too late after factory and compete with the use of strategic weapons for military purposes): Hydro and Solar Plants are awesome given the opportunity to build them and usually repay themselves quickly enough. Nuclear plants are rarely worth the hammers or the risk.

-Stock Exchange (used to be commonplace in G and K but with the gold bonuses from trade, I seem to never get around to build them, and not even every city has a Bank): This is entirely dependent on gold output, although it's rare that I don't build a couple.

With BNW I end up building all the culture buildings through Broadcast Tower in just about all my cities. Is this a mistake?

Can a culture victory still be attained on king and higher without Broadcast towers? They seem so darn expensive even with the Cultural Centers policy, and I could be using that time to build modern units for that inevitable DOW from CARTHAGE (b***h).

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Given how the new culture victory is achieved, it's pretty important to build Broadcast Towers. Poor culture could make you lose the game so anything that keeps it high is good; although preference should obviously be for buildings which help your preferred VC. Not sure how possible it is to achieve CV without Broadcast Towers.

Are there other buildings that are virtually unimportant?

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I'd add the Constabulary, Police Station and Shrine to the list. The former two can be useful but there are usually more important things to build and the latter I find is rarely sufficient to guarantee a religion and with it coming so early in the tree and competing with things like the Granary and Library it just seems a bit foolish.

A few comments:

Always build stone works.
2+ resources in a city means always build forge/stable.
Capital should always get a stock exchange.
Hydro can be insane if you're at a fork in a river.
Solar is a luxury, but nice to buy.

Agree with above, constable and police are worthless.
Shrines can be valuable on emperor and lower.

Sometimes, granaries and waterwheels are worthless imo. Especially if you can run an early cargo ship trade route w/ food to your capital. if I don't have a granary resource, I rarely build them early if at all.

You don't play the game correctly. You're not supposed to use the same exact strategy every game, you're supposed to try out new ones and get creative. You should be playing differently each time you start a new game

Seabastian Civ said:

...

Sometimes, granaries and waterwheels are worthless imo. Especially if you can run an early cargo ship trade route w/ food to your capital. if I don't have a granary resource, I rarely build them early if at all.

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Well, you can't trade food without a granary in the city sending the trade route; so are you saying to not build a granary in the capital? I can't imagine why you'd do that - early shrine or an early rush maybe?

As for the watermill, that's definitely something you should always build when you're able. +2 food/+1 production early in the game is pretty big, although I will admit that their maintenance is a little high I can't imagine forgoing it for something else if the option is available.

MadHaxxor said:

You don't play the game correctly. You're not supposed to use the same exact strategy every game, you're supposed to try out new ones and get creative. You should be playing differently each time you start a new game

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Again, as I said, I realize everything is situational. All I was asking is if there's some obvious buildings that can be ignored and any comments on how my approach to specialists in the culture/science can be optimized.

Meanwhile, your post gives me no help whatsoever; instead, you merely repeat an obvious fact of the game that I already clearly pointed out in the op.

The AI is not aggressive or smart enough to warrant wall-type buildings. In multiplayer walls can be good against a rush.

Rax-type buildings represent a drain on your economy if you're not going to be building units immediately. Stay away from these if you're not going to start pumping military units as soon as they finish.

Constabulary-type buildings are usually a waste. If you're the tech leader a constabulary in your capital is not a horrible idea, but everywhere else they're bad.

I think most other buildings are good or at least situational. Perhaps I'm forgetting something.

edit: I forgot, forge never seems worth building to me.

As everyone has said Stoneworks - Amazing.

Stable/Forge I personally build them if I can just to get more hammers (I wonder spam a lot so a difference of 10 hammers means nabbing a wonder or not.)

The Water Mill is two gold for 2 food and 1 production - that feels useless to me now.
Police and COnstable - never build.

Def all productions and money buildings I build. If I go culture then all culture.

maybe its just me but if I have the time I build Walls caslte arsenal and military base. I mean y not? they're free and make ur bombards stronger if caught in a surprise attack.

Also for my civ India the Fort Mughal is amazing. +2 culture and +2 tourism after flight.

WC4J said:

It's apparent that all victories are science victories in disguise, so I generally build all science buildings and staff their respective specialist slots all the way through research lab. Is this a mistake?

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Not a mistake. Dead on. Though, you shouldn't necessarily fill every specialist slot all the time. It depends how much excess food you have in the city. If you're stunting the growth too much it's going to cost you science in the long run. In the capital, however, this definitely should not be an issue. Especially if you open tradition (which I consider by far the best choice in the current state of the game), you should be using granaries, mills, trade routes, lighthouses etc. to get as much food as possible in the capital. I completely disagree with the other poster that granaries are optional, except perhaps in the case you are starting up a city a bit later in the game and tiles are better thanks to your tech, or you rely on a trade route or two.

As for the other buildings:

-Stone Works - As others have said, build them all the time. In fact I try to actively avoid settling on plains if I'm going to have a couple of stone to work to make sure I can build these. At least a couple of production and 1 happiness is a great deal for the hammer/maintenance cost.

-Castle/Arsenal/Military Base (and I really only build walls in those few fringe cities) - Usually I agree these can be avoided. By the time you would get around to building them you shouldn't be in a position that these make the difference. Policy changes or building Neuschwanstein (sp?) will obviously change this..

-Barracks/Military Academy (I'd rather take the bonuses from a civ's UA or UU)
-Forge - I put these together because I typically build them together in a city. If I have a city with iron and otherwise decent production then it's an ideal spot to build most of your units.

-Stable - Depends on how many resources are affected obviously, but I love settling in a spot with 5 or 6 sheep/cattle/horses (which can happen quite often actually, depending on what kind of terrain you're looking at). Working a high number of 2 food/3 hammer or 3/2 tiles early in the game can make an extremely powerful city.

-Seaport (what's your take on these? worth it?) - Again, obviously depends. 1 resource, not planning to build naval? Not so much. Several resources then heck yes.

-Zoo/Stadium (I can manage happiness just fine with lots of col's and a few wonders) - I do wonder if your cities are a bit small. I try to push growth as much as possible and happiness is usually an issue. Whether I need these depends on how lucky I've been with CS allies and settling near luxes. More like to need zoos based on when they become available; problems are usually solved by the time the stadium comes around.

-Hospital/Medical Lab (come too late in the game and too expensive imo) - I don't always build them, but usually. Growth = power, and these can actually speed things up quite a bit.

-Hydro/Solar/Nuclear Plant (again, come too late after factory and compete with the use of strategic weapons for military purposes) - not always a priority, but helpful to pump the production for important end-game builds. You want every bit of production you can get if you go SV to shave a few turns off the spaceship components.

-Stock Exchange (used to be commonplace in G and K but with the gold bonuses from trade, I seem to never get around to build them, and not even every city has a Bank) - I usually end up building them late to pick up some extra gold to shore up CS allies, upgrade units, buy key buildings or even for spaceship components with the right ideology.

With BNW I end up building all the culture buildings through Broadcast Tower in just about all my cities. Is this a mistake?

Can a culture victory still be attained on king and higher without Broadcast towers? They seem so darn expensive even with the Cultural Centers policy, and I could be using that time to build modern units for that inevitable DOW from CARTHAGE.

Are there other buildings that are virtually unimportant?

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I haven't been messing around with culture victories, but in general I disagree you should be building every culture building unless you're going for CV. Certainly build enough to give you slots to fill, but otherwise I think there are higher priorities.

As for other buildings? It, of course, depends. A couple of early shrines (even on Deity) gives you a much better chance to get your choice of pantheon, and that can make an enormous difference. Even if your chances of getting a religion are small, you eventually want to get faith production to buy a couple of GP at the end game. Under most circumstances my priorities are growth and enough happiness to fuel it, and science buildings. There aren't many buildings I consider completely worthless, but a question of which is more important now.

I have never built a Stadium in BNW...

WC4J said:

Again, as I said, I realize everything is situational. All I was asking is if there's some obvious buildings that can be ignored and any comments on how my approach to specialists in the culture/science can be optimized.

Meanwhile, your post gives me no help whatsoever; instead, you merely repeat an obvious fact of the game that I already clearly pointed out in the op.

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What I was implying was that their are NO buildings that can be ignored. It's completely dependent on what you're doing and how you play. You need to judge whether or not the building is worth it yourself, based on how you play. I can't think of one building that should be ingored no matter what your strat is

I also play King, so FWIW:

Stone Works: high value building. High priority for building, possibly first priority build in a city with multiple Quarries.

Castle/Arsenal: depends on location and situation. If I'm sticking a city right under Alexander's nose, that city is getting a Castle as soon as I can manage it. Relatively low priority for other sites.

Barracks/Military Academy: if warring, Barracks is high for all cities to snag Heroic Epic for the +15% Morale bonus, then sell off. If Japan or America, Armory is very high priority to get the juicy 3rd tier promotions. Only build dedicated unit-making facilities in one or two cities.

Stable: killer building. First priority build in cities with at least 4 pasture resources. High priority in cities with 3 Pasture resources. Low priority if with 2 or less Pasture resources.

Seaport: always build if city has at least 3 Sea Resources. Otherwise skip.

Zoo: depends on situation. Most games call for consideration of these buildings. Benchmark city size needed. I like my cities in the 20+ size by Renaissance. In my current game my Capital is size 31 with a 65 food excess - in the Medieval Era (about turn 180?). So yeah, I want happiness wherever I can get it. Nearly mandatory to beeline if I miss both Notre Dame and Chichen Itza.

Hospital: key growth building. I beeline Biology just to get the extra trade route and this building, and then I rush buy it everywhere.

Stock Exchange: only for cities that have high concentration of gold on the tiles.

Since BNW, I generally have a very low priority on Culture buildings since they don't actually do anything. I only make one when a GWAM generation is imminent. I place a priority on making Great Works, but the building for it is just to house the item.

With buildings like the Forge and Seaport especially, it's the time before they start actually paying for themselves that puts me off. Taking the seaport for example - with 2 sea resources, the gold/maintenance cancels out meaning the only effect is production, meaning that the building is going to spend the first 75-100 turns "paying" for itself before producing anything positive, and that's assuming you're building naval units a good proportion of the time. Considering you're likely already half way through the game by the time you build it, the payback is just too small for me. Of course if you get lucky and end up with 4-5 sea resources in a city then I may consider it...

mikeg said:

With buildings like the Forge and Seaport especially, it's the time before they start actually paying for themselves that puts me off. Taking the seaport for example - with 2 sea resources, the gold/maintenance cancels out meaning the only effect is production, meaning that the building is going to spend the first 75-100 turns "paying" for itself before producing anything positive, and that's assuming you're building naval units a good proportion of the time. Considering you're likely already half way through the game by the time you build it, the payback is just too small for me. Of course if you get lucky and end up with 4-5 sea resources in a city then I may consider it...

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That is exactly the wrong way to look at it, IMO. In the early days of Civ5, lots of players were complaining about there not being enough hammers in the game - while not building any of the buildings that give hammers, because "it doesn't pay for itself."

Granted, the Seaport is far enough down the line that the effect might be considered marginal, but it's not a done deal. With only 2 Sea Resources, +2 hammers for general use isn't a fantastic benefit. However, if you're at all planning on building naval vessels at the site, +15% production bonus on top of the hammer benefits is reason enough to consider the building.

If you build a bunch of Frigates, those cost maintenance without giving back gold or hammers. They do not contribute to further builds. Building Seaports is like building the ability to come up with Frigates faster, without incurring the maintenance cost.

From a pure hammer/gold perspective, having 4 or 5 Sea Resources in one spot almost mandates Seaport regardless of whether or not you're going to build naval units. The idea is not cost/investment but time/investment. What are you going to build with your 40 hammers per turn at the time Seaport becomes available that will be better than a Seaport?

University?
Library?
Museum?

You see, all these also cost hammers and maintenance, but they don't give you back more hammers down the line - they give other benefits. The question is, what are you going to do with the city after the build? If you're gunning to make the city Gold Central, you might consider doing Banks and SEs instead. If, however, you'll be making naval vessels (but not urgently), Seaport is almost always a good choice.