Underrated UUs/UBs

^^^I think Hippodromes are okay, but the reason I don't put them in the class of Hammams and Ball Courts is that the happiness in their case is "static". Relying on culture slider for happiness is "situational", although I agree that the happy boost from Hippos is indeed very strong, especially considering that you don't have to raise the culture slider as high. Still, I prefer being in situations where I don't have to raise the culture slider for happiness. And if I do, it is usually very late game for score milk.

Both Hammams and Ball Courts are quite synergistic with expansive Mehmed and Pacal, with potential for very large early cities. That's a huge eco boost. Granted, you could have somewhat large Byzzie cities with Drama early, but at the expense of research. I don't like sacrificing research that early. Of the two, I like Hammams the best as it is a building I actually build in most games. I think Hammam is top tier. I rarely ever build coliseums, but ball courts certainly make it worthwhile.

Still, I do agree that Hippo has its uses and it can certainly be very useful during times of full on war stompage. Thus, it can give a fairly tangible benefit at a reasonable point in the game. However, that benefit comes at a cost and is what I would consider niche. Anyway, I don't think it is underrated either. I think it's always been consider somewhat middle tier among most discussions I've seen in the past and I think that is right where it belongs.

Hippodromes are also synergistic with the Cataphract as they give +2 with horses. A regular Theatre only gives +1 with dyes. You have easier access to the base happiness boost from Hippodromes than with regular theatres as dyes can be very hard to find, and Cataphracts are very awesome, 12 knights.

Theatres / Hippodromes are a lot cheaper to build than the colosseum replacements too, you can very effectively be conquering with HAs and Cataphracts, and building Hippodromes everywhere once you have drama teched, and I think that having another +2 from 10% culture is worth the 10% loss to science. They also provide culture and get your borders popping in conquered cities, they are a fantastic 'first building' to put up in every city from Drama onwards.

I have no idea how to pull off a cataphract rush though, and was too easily distracted by being able to tech a religion instead (thats just me ). I should try to learn how to do cataphract rushes on Monarch first then try again higher up.

lymond said:

Kinda sucks that Hippos don't allow for running artists in culture games though.

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Two words - Caste System.

I can take or leave Catas. Knight rushing is just not my game as they aren't very effective on high levels. Much easier to go to Curs which are much better than Catas and a better tech path. The key to Cata rush is probably Oracle>Feud or MC and No fish Machinery bulb, but on Monarch you could easily pull it off with straight teching/bulbing and should easily get some Cata stompage long before AIs have engineering and possibly even LBs. Ofc, you might want to avoid your religion fixation in that case.

I did not realize that Horse game +2 happies with Hippo, although I did know horse replaced dye, which is generally better option on most maps. I do like theatres in general. Kinda sucks that Hippos don't allow for running artists in culture games though.

Question: Does your UB show up in cities you capture? As in, if I were Incas, and I capture an enemy city with the Granary still intact, would that Granary be transformed into a Terrace? Or would it just be knocked out and I'd have to build by own Terrace?

Noobish question, I know, but I usually play Germany, and conquering cities that still have Factories isn't all that common.

Yes, it would magically turn into a terrace.

rah said:

Yes, it would magically turn into a terrace.

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One more reason playing as Inca feels like cheating. I love conquering a city and getting instant culture. The only UB that can do that.

My personal votes for underrated. Admittedly, any votes for underrated will depend on maps, speed. Feeling whether or not Fast Worker is overrated depends on if you play Normal or Marathon. Some one-move UU's are better on Marathon as well.

War Chariot - if only because so many rank it below or on a par with the Immortal (which is good).
Skirmisher - good players realize how powerful it is. So many new players underrate it.
East Indianman - decent UU. If you have Astronomy and are at war they can do wicked things to your enemy. Exploration and extra space are nice as well.
Musketeer - it isn't as awful as a lot of people think it is.

Hamman - so many forget this UB. Above average.
Ziggurat - cheap early courthouse. I'd rank it about #8.
Salon - I know some people hate it. But it gives extra culture similar to a lot of other UB's. Only downside is pollution in your GP farm. But you get GP's faster. Depends on whether or not Murphy likes you. Nice with Representation (which is an excellent civic).

Ataxerxes said:

The only UB that can do that.

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Actually, I think you can get Odeons in captured cities since coliseums are not technically culture buildings. In fact, I'd put Odeons in the underrated category. They are rather beefed up.

War Chariot - if only because so many rank it below or on a par with the Immortal (which is good).

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I'd like to meet those people just so I can find out what kind of crazy sauce they are ingesting. I'm not aware of any of these folks you mention. WC is top tier hands down and I think most would agree. Do these same people think the Dun is overrated?

Hamman - so many forget this UB. Above average.

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I agree that it is underrated. One of my favorites and I actually think it is well above average.

East Indianman - decent UU.

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I just owned a Deity Terra map with this ship. Granted a had a pretty good start, but pretty much settled 90% of the New World.

To me, the only situation in which a Salon is useful is pursuing CV. It's actually kind of nice in that scenario, a free artist is helpful and the science boost is great for all those rep beakers you'll be getting from all the other CS GAs you're running.

The problem is, though, is that by the time a city is developed to the point that an Observatory would be a feasible building, you've probably got all the culture you need. Additionally, it's not exactly a cheap building, and so you probably won't want to build it in any city that's not already dedicated to science. If it IS dedicated to science, then you're looking at polluting your Great Scientist production.

It might be a bit anachronistic, but having the Salon replace the Theatre would make it substantially better. It would be earlier, cheaper, and its bonus would synergize with the building it's replacing.

A theatre with a free artist would be a lot better than the current Salon. I still have no idea what the Salon has to do with both artists and astronomy anyway, I've never even read the wikipedia entry on it.

bhavv said:

A theatre with a free artist would be a lot better than the current Salon. I still have no idea what the Salon has to do with both artists and astronomy anyway, I've never even read the wikipedia entry on it.

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A Salon was kind of a French meeting place where all the aristocrats would come together and discuss the ideas of the day. To have it make contributions to both scientific and cultural output in a city makes a fair bit of sense - but from a gameplay perspective, not terribly wonderful.

It would be better off taking the place of a culture building, but there aren't any from the time period in which the Salon came from. Either have it take the place of a Theater, or pull a Gilgamesh and make it an early Broadcast Tower, lol

Early broadcast tower!!!!

That would be a perfect UB for the French.

the apothecary is a fairly underrated building as it gives 2 free .
the barray is rather underrated ub as it gives 1 free .
I also havent heard anyone talk about the seowon as it might not seem good but 10% extra can come in handy over time.

also EVERY ub is a niche building.

also EVERY ub is a niche building.

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Terrace and Sac Altars are not niche buildings. Bad as the assembly plant is, it's not a niche building. The ikhanda is not a niche building. Madrassa is not a niche building even if its usage is. Seowon is 100% not a niche building, and the stock exchange and mint aren't either. Neither is the hammam, if one bothers to grow their cities reasonably.

Not sure what you're talking about lol.

the uses are niche the sacaltar is only if you whip your people (I don't) the terrace is good for culture but usually you start far away from people so your culture is already good. the ikhanda is only useful if you have high maintenance. the madrassa is only useful if you have people to work those priests or aren't a caste system (i usually am). seowon is not a niche building in the sense of only rare usage but in the sense of you usually don't need it by mid/late-mid game. the stock exchange and mint are gold producers and aren't necessary if you've founded at least one religion. the hammam is a niche building as it only increases how happy your people are and by that time most people are either a hereditary rule or representation so the happy faces are just a small bonus and only necessary in huge cities.

the uses are niche the sacaltar is only if you whip your people

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It is also less expensive than a standard courthouse. Whipping is not niche though. Just because you don't use one of the best early game civics in civ IV doesn't make it niche.

the terrace is good for culture but usually you start far away from people so your culture is already good

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What manner of nonsense is this? You get a border pop available faster than a monument while building the #1 economic building in the game. Calling a granary with a fairly consistently useful extra feature niche looks really questionable. Do you know how valuable granaries are?!

the madrassa is only useful if you have people to work those priests or aren't a caste system (i usually am).

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You can't run priests using caste BTW, but madrassa also produces more culture than standard libraries and it's a freaking library; most cities early on will have it because you need it anyway to get unis for oxford later.

seowon is not a niche building in the sense of only rare usage but in the sense of you usually don't need it by mid/late-mid game.

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Derp? I don't know what else to say lol. Goes against virtually every non-"rush out most of the map to win" game I've seen over the years here.

the stock exchange and mint are gold producers and aren't necessary if you've founded at least one religion.

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Okay, you're definitely not understanding the game. First of all, usually founding a religion + shrine is a bad move. Second of all, if you DO found a religion + shrine (or capture one), "gold producers" should be going in the shrined city to multiply the income! You're literally making 0 sense with what I just quoted.

the hammam is a niche building as it only increases how happy your people are and by that time most people are either a hereditary rule or representation so the happy faces are just a small bonus and only necessary in huge cities.

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In HR, it gives you BOTH and , essentially saving maintenance in units when you'd need the building anyway for . Perhaps more importantly, math is available very early and you can grow cities SOONER than other empires potentially.

In representation it is far more valuable; you can't use cheap units to boost early on and HAVE to rely on resources and buildings like this after your initial +3 from the civic.

It seems to me you're claiming things are "niche" simply because you don't use buildings to their potential and are misunderstanding some core civ IV concepts such as how , :wealth:, and interact. I suggest reading up on the strategy article detailing how those 3 things interact at least because it goes a long way towards understanding the game in general.

I use buildings plenty its just I feel that there is no "god" building that you must play every game with and every strategy with and it always works no matter what. and I understand the game plenty I may be fairly new (200+ hours) but I have played enough to know the concepts. i.e. 30% = 70% of goes to .

maurcus said:

30% = 70% of goes to .

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what does that even mean? 30% of commerce equals 70% commerce going to Research. That makes no sense.

No "god" buildings. Sure, I agree with that, but it doesn't mean all the buildings you called niche are niche. And granaries are about as close to a "god" building you will get in this game, so calling a better granary (Terrace) niche is just insane. Anyway, "god" buildings has nothing to do with what TMIT was saying. I agree with everything he said and, honestly, all your points were completely off-base and just plain wrong.

I'm afraid you have quite a lot to learn about this game, and the forum can help you with this. And yes, you are misunderstanding some core Civ concepts.

maurcus said:

I use buildings plenty its just I feel that there is no "god" building that you must play every game with and every strategy with and it always works no matter what.

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Name one scenario where the Granary isn't a high-priority building.

well for starters a high military scenario i.e. one city state always war hills. that's what my favorite system, play celts you see that dun comes in real handy. also i meant 30% of your commerce goes to gold than 70% goes to science (provided none goes to espionage and culture) also I play A LOT and I usually win you can't say I'm exactly a noob but I apparently misunderstood some of the concepts like the goal is to win, NOT to use these talk pages to assault other players understanding of game mechanics. I may not read the games files and figure out all the formulas for the game. also I usually play as what would be called a "niche" civilization.

maurcus said:

well for starters a high military scenario i.e. one city state always war hills. that's what my favorite system, play celts you see that dun comes in real handy. also i meant 30% of your commerce goes to gold than 70% goes to science (provided none goes to espionage and culture) also I play A LOT and I usually win you can't say I'm exactly a noob but I apparently misunderstood some of the concepts like the goal is to win, NOT to use these talk pages to assault other players understanding of game mechanics. I may not read the games files and figure out all the formulas for the game. also I usually play as what would be called a "niche" civilization.

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If you're playing OCC Always War, you're going to want to be able to grow quickly to be able to work the hammers in your BFC, and if you need to start drafting, you're sure as hell going to be relying on growth. Hence, Granary is desired.

Of course you can play the game without building a single building in any city, but that's clearly suboptimal. You don't need to be a code reader to understand either the obvious or the subtle game mechanics (I'm not), but you clearly underestimate the power of some mechanics at the very least. Can you post evidence that Granary/Library/Courthouse builds make Immortal or Deity wins slower? The answer to that is a resounding "No."

Don't confuse niche with technically unnecessary. Granaries are technically unnecessary in every city. However, they are without a doubt the most important building in the game, and should be built in 99.8% of circumstances. The fact that the 0.2% exists doesn't make them niche. At all.

EDIT: It's also not really an assault on you at all. Plenty of people here are ignorant (willfully or otherwise) regarding aspects of this game, including me. But this isn't a new game or a new forum. It's been out for years, so long that hundreds of discussions have been drawn out for hundreds of strategies, gambits, and theories, and the core aspects of the game are well known, such as:

-Food and land are power
-Worker first is almost always the best play
-Granary is the most important building (growth is power)
-Settle blocking sites, as the AI won't settle through a border by foot
-Research rate should be crashed at the expense of REXing, and can be recovered with Alpha, CoL and Currency
-Bulbing Philosophy can seriously delay an AI Liberalism push if you can found the religion

It's not that there's nothing new to discuss, but arguing against something that the long-time visitors to this forum essentially know to be true (Granary = win) is bound to be unpopular.