What's your favorite GP and why?

Tristan_C said:

After reading the thread I have to admit I agree with Coffee mug. I'm never disappointed to see an engineer. There's pretty much always a use for him.

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not necessarily, if your at a tech disadvantage and don't have wonders available to quick build. I suppose then you could bulb or settle, or even burn for a Golden age. However late game I run Sp most times so no corps, and because I play on high difficulty no wonders. That makes a GE late pretty much useless to me, the only thing i do with them then is settle it in my ironworks city or to rush the ironworks if I haven't built it or maybe rush a national wonder in a very low production city. very rarely in a Deity game will you be able to build something like the Kremlin, 3 gorges or Eiffel tower. That being said I think GM's are the most versatile, you can always use more money. Running your slider at 100% late game with 25 + cities while at war for like 30 turns is pretty sweet...

The only time I'm disappointed to get a great engineer is when I want a golden age and I expect an artist or prophet to pop out! Don't really want to burn an engineer for a golden age. I'd rather rush a wonder with a GE... Rush Taj mahal

I felt like an idiot rushing the Taj once, but then I got over it. You still get the golden age, it does not count against you for the cost of future golden ages and it denies a golden age to the AI.

I still probably should have done something different with the GE but it seemed to work adequately.

Great Spy: These guys are very useful. As has been said already, the great wall's early spy can do some serious damage and be very useful. If espionage is a big part of your game, I can see the appeal to a Scotland Yard or too. But I very often play with the espionage slider at 0% most of the time. Overall, I could play an entire game without a great spy and not really miss him. The same can not be said of the others.

Great Engineer: I used to love engineers. But the more I play the fewer wonders I tend to build, with the notable exception of my current online game. Therefore I now find them more situational. I love them for rushing the UN as I'm usually trying to win the game early, thus building the UN before I have well developed production. But other than that I can either not build wonders, or build them manually with the help of chops, stone, marble, copper, etc.

Great Merchant: This was my vote. They're not as good at bulbing as Great Scientists and they don't build any cool buildings. But the 1 and the 6 as a settled great person is awesome. Also, trade missions are useful at every point in the game. Never do I hear myself saying, naaaah, I don't need that 2400 gold right now. Having a surplus in this game is so useful that I don't think it can be beat.

Great Scientist: My other favorite and the first great person I usually want to see. Academies are superb as is the ability to get from Civil Service to a completed Liberalism in ~15 turns. After Liberalism, I settle them and each one can net a solid 25 with representation and the proper multipliers in place.

Great Artist: Man, you guys don't give these guys any love. My favorite use for them, that I don't think anybody has mentioned yet, is culture bombing a recently captured city. The ability to capture an enemy's capital, skip the 10 turns of anarchy, have a BFC and beyond, and have it producing more military within one two turns of capture is huge in a war. If I think I will be fighting a war in the next ~50 turns, I save my GA for the war contributions. They are pretty situational though, there are indeed times when I get a GA and say crap.

Great Prophet: I can play games without these guys also. I usually settle them early in my capital for the nice hammer bonus. I kind of wish that the Great Prophet had the ability to spread a religion in ten cities with 100% success rate. That would be awesome. Too bad.

Farm Boy said:

I felt like an idiot rushing the Taj once, but then I got over it. You still get the golden age, it does not count against you for the cost of future golden ages and it denies a golden age to the AI.

I still probably should have done something different with the GE but it seemed to work adequately.

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Yeah, that was what I thought. Burn one great person for a golden age, in effect. So 2 people = 2 Golden Ages. hooray. Unless you have marble and a strong production city.

Scientist. I have no qualms about using an engineer for a GA. Once a person loses the wonder hangup thing only a corp is useful for a GE.

The Great Prophet is my favourite to get. Settle that puppy and you can keep pumping out the Settlers, taking over more land. The extra Gold pays for more Maintenance while the extra Hammers help to get you more Settlers out quickly.

Besides, all of the other types of Great People can be obtained by waiting for a tech. If you want a Great Prophet, you actually have to somewhat try to get it.

GE would be my favourite because of the flexibility - rush a wonder, research an engineering tech or settle.

I would have preferred the Prophet, but ever since some DONKEY decided to break the basics of OverFlow (how does an idiot do that anyway?), that whole thing almost goes out the window now.

Scientist easily. Not that others aren't useful, ofc, or that you don't want a healthy mix every game. If I imagine having to run a game without one type, GS is the only one I'd really miss. Though, I think it may be bigger on higher levels, where it lets you catch up / pull ahead in tech so cheaply.

HAHA! I love this topic. Every time "what's your favourite GP?" gets posted, there's always a looooong discussion.

My two cents:
I'm surprised great merchant is so low. The +1 food if you settle him seems pretty cool to me.

i like great scientists in the early game for academies and bulbing and great merchants for the era after liberalism.

i played a game in which i was still researching rifling and catharine was already producing factories and coal plants.she had really strong production cities and if left alone in a few turns would be undefeatable.
i then used a great merchant to do a trade mission for gold,then used that gold to make julius ceasar and his vassal declare on her.by the time i came into the action with my troops all her SOD and worker defence troops had been wiped off the face of the map,i then used the remainder of my gold to push for peace between julius and catharine.the rest is then history ,4 of the best production cities in her empire for free,zilch,null,nada and it only cost me saving a great merchant.

I like to get at least one engineer to rush the build of Wall Street. Once that final bank is completed its great to boost the economy a turn later with Wall Street.

babybluepants said:

Scientist easily. Not that others aren't useful, ofc, or that you don't want a healthy mix every game. If I imagine having to run a game without one type, GS is the only one I'd really miss. Though, I think it may be bigger on higher levels, where it lets you catch up / pull ahead in tech so cheaply.

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I am somewhat swayed away from GEs by this. An early GE is better than a GS, or if you want a mid game wonder (SoL or Sistine maybe), or if you want Mining Inc. But otherwise it is probably the ubiquity of GSs and the rarity of GEs that makes me prefer to get a GE. Great Scientists are probably objectively better on the whole.

Doesn't anybody like using these guys for recon? I mean, seriously...they can cross any border whether you have open borders with the Civ or not. They're better than spies that way. True, they can be SEEN, but so what? Somebody would have to be pretty damn annoyed AND have some troops ready to back up his bluff if he's willing to declare war on you just to take out your GM.

Same goes for Great Spies...doesn't anyone use them for recon, either?

I once followed Shaka's entire attack against me with one of these. It was fun to watch. I knew exactly what was in his stack, where he was augmenting it, and had a pretty clear idea where he wanted to strike well before he reached his intended target. All I had left to do was lure him into the kill zone by making it look like that city was garrisoned by a lone archer, and hiding the rest of my defenders and catapults behind hills. That was one bloody ambush. I think I earned most of my great general in about two turns.

A regular spy would get caught following a stack like that. A scout would likely get killed, and would still need to stay a safe distance away, making it hard to be 100% sure you were following the stack. Only a Great Spy can make this happen.