Which are the 'must have' wonders?

[DarkSchneider]

The list of must-have wonders in Civ2 was too long to count, and most of them were truely must-have, that is, I generally started over if I missed more than one of them. The wonders in Civ4 are more subtle, and it's hard to say that any of them are must-have under most circumstances. Still, there are a number of them that I will try for nearly every game and am very sad when I miss.

Which wonders do you think are the must have's of Civ4?

[Para.B]

Pyramids for ever

[JerichoHill]

There are no must have wonders. It all depends on your playstyle.

The ONLY wonder which I could even begin to qualify as a must-have would be the Oracle, solely for its free technological advance. By getting the Oracle, you can help out whatever strategy you're doing.

Religion? Code of Laws
Expansion? Code of Laws
Militaristic? Iron Working, Forges
Naval? Navigation, or something for Harbors

It is the only wonder to allow for tweaking of your economy and production, and at higher difficulties levels, is also necessary for maintaining some sort of tech parity with the AI.

[Ogrelord]

I usually go for wonders that put something in every city.

Stonehenge
Hanging Gardens
Eiffel Tower
Three Gorges Damn

[Veteranewbie]

Well what I've learnt in Civ3, not building wonders enhance your gameplay

[ellie]

Oracle?. Nice but didnt get it last game.

I like stonehenge, i loved the kremlin as well. could have managed without them though

[Maestro_Innit]

Depends entirely on what Civ you play with, what traits you have and what your overall strategy is. I always try to get the pyramids though - having the civics available is just too tempting!

[punchandpie]

I gotta go with the Pyrimads since it opens all the Goverment Civics without research. Especially handy if you are warmongering and you have Police State in the early stages of the game.

[Stalker0]

I'd say the pyramids are probably the most powerful. It opens up representation which normally gives you plenty of happiness early on. Also, I start putting guys on specialists when my cities start hitting the happiness limit, so now I'm double researching.

[Zombie69]

The pyramids are the most powerful, but there are no must-have wonders.

In fact, the game would be pretty bad if there were. It's all about choices now.

[DarkSchneider]

Oh I forgot, here are my votes:

Kremlin - There are entire portions of the game where my cities are buying up various buildings, might as well get them at half off.

The Pyramids - Early representation is killer, as is middle game sufferage.

Three Gorges Damn - Same as in Civ I and still great. Will generally pay for itself as long as you have enough cities on the continent, also allows power in cities that couldn't otherwise have hydro.

The Pentagon - Allows you to get level 3 units without running a specific Civic

Statue of Liberty - For me, this means 3 gpp and 2 production per city. All the benefits of the Merc Civic without the drawback.

[ellie]

About the pyramids.

Its a lot of shields to sacrifice at a crucial part of the game.

When do you start building them?. Once the core of 4-5 cities are down?.

I got beaten by 2 turns last game to them (used gold to upgrade army instead).

[Angoth]

I gotta go with Stonehenge. The culture is such a help without additional investment that there is no equal (at least for my playstyle). Everything else comes when it comes. For example, if you don't bust out the Pyramids, you'll get the civics by adjusting your tech focus when you need to. I can see the advantage of not NEEDING to, but, for my style it's not that much of an adjustment and doesn't slow me down enough to notice.

Behind the must have Stonehenge, I'll say the Oracle. The tech jump from hammer investment is a slight early advantage that can be leveraged into a few more rungs up the tech tree later on which can be devastating.

Must have tech: Anything that lets you found a religion early. I play anyone that starts with Mysticism for exactly that reason. But, I don't mean to hijack the thread.

Peace

[b-dubb]

No wonder is must-have. If I couldn't have picked 'none', I would have gone with the Pentagon, as it's XP bonus with vassalage and theocracy will help your troops take any other wonder you need.

This comes from my Civ2 days: I would play deity & let the AI get all the wonders and STILL kick its behind. In Civ3 however, I had trouble moving up difficulty levels until I read a gread thread about playing without the wonders. You free yourself from that heavy construction burden and allow yourself a different tech path. In Civ4 now, I am playing the same way, found no religions, and build no wonders (it's hard to do when you see stonehenge, not built, 6 turns, but I still don't build it.)

Wonders are a crutch.

[Mooncusser]

I also have to say Stonehenge. But, then again, I suck at playing Civ 4...

I am just learning how to beat Noble, and I have to say that I love to use Stonehenge to solidify my early borders and cordon off territory. Once I've accomplished that, then I concentrate on building my cities and developing them to their economic potential.

It's accomplishing that build and development in a timely manner without weakening my defenses too much that is my problem area right now.

[Drake007]

Originally Posted by b-dubb

Wonders are a crutch.

Agreed . I for sure would rather have 7/13 axemen than the pyramids. You have to research masonry for it too which is basically useless. Only wonders I aim for sometimes are the great lighthouse (water maps), the great library (space race) and the oracle.

[Ziggy Stardust]

I'm iin the middle of a wonderless game and so far it's the most enjoyable game I played.

Reasons:
- Getting the wonders is stressfull, there's always a time-limit
- You learn to play the game more efficiently.
- You don't lose the cities production for a lot of turns.
- As I understand, at the higher levels (I'm at Prince atm) you are behind in tech and can't build them anyway. Not a good time to learn to play without wonders.

[Brighteye]

It's 'Three Gorges Dam', not 'damn'. A dam blocks a river, 'damn' is an expletive.
I love Stonehenge because of the cultural expansion.
Of course wonders are a crutch/help: that's the whole point of them. If they weren't more powerful than normal buildings there'd be no point in building them, and the game would be less interesting if wonders were removed entirely. No wonders are truly must-haves, but some are clearly extremely useful, and Stonehenge and the Pyramids seem to be regarded as two of the best. It doesn't make sense to avoid a wonder if it fits your strategy.
Of course, if it's too much production for you to spare, then it doesn't fit your strategy, but surely deliberately avoiding them entirely is akin to OCC: it's an entirely different game?

[Ziggy Stardust]

Of course. But what I found out is you really learn the difference wonders make by playing a game without them.

I found out that, indeed, none of them are must-have but merely an advantage in the right strategy, as you mentioned.

[DarkSchneider]

Actually, I think any wonder where you have the strategic resource is worth building, since you are building them at at least 100% production bonus you can always suspend the wonder and then cash out the money. A few times missing a wonder has turned out to be a blessing, since I was essentially building wealth at 2.5x bonus.