Are Advisors Ever Useful?

[Save_Ferris]

In Civ II, they weren't really helpful as much as for entertainment. In Simcity 4, they were okay, but you didn't really need them. In Civ V, they're a joke and just comment on how well you're doing. Have you ever needed advisors, or are they unneccessary to the game?

 

[Omega124]

The advisors in Simy City 4 were delightfully insane. The budget advisor is all "OH MY <snip>, STOP SPENDING SO MUCH MONEY", no matter what I do. PERHAPS YOU NEED TO SPEND MONEY TO MAKE MONEY! Oh, don't forget the civil advisor, who hates it when you try to upgrade roads to streets. Yeah, how about you get one of those car accidents because the roads are all congested! But my favorite is when they disagree with each other. For example, when I buy a nuclear power plant, the power advisor goes "Hell yeah, we got ourselves some nuclear power", while the enviormental advisor (Which I'll admit I always ignored) goes "NO! PLEASE NO! NO! GOD NO! NOOOOOOOOO!"

 

[Skwink]

The advisors in Simy City 4 were delightfully insane. The budget advisor is all "OH MY ****ING GOD, STOP SPENDING SO MUCH MONEY", no matter what I do. PERHAPS YOU NEED TO SPEND MONEY TO MAKE MONEY! Oh, don't forget the civil advisor, who hates it when you try to upgrade roads to streets. Yeah, how about you get one of those car accidents because the roads are all congested! But my favorite is when they disagree with each other. For example, when I buy a nuclear power plant, the power advisor goes "Hell yeah, we got ourselves some nuclear power", while the enviormental advisor (Which I'll admit I always ignored) goes "NO! PLEASE NO! NO! GOD NO! NOOOOOOOOO!"

I totally agree. And who EVER listens the the hippy (enviromental) advisor?

 

[Truronian]

Strategists in the ROTTK series are pretty useful, as they let you know how likely your plans are to work.

 

[MaxaTheGreat]

I totally agree. And who EVER listens the the hippy (enviromental) advisor?

Nobody does . There's also the health and education advisor... Every 2 minutes it seems she yells INCREASE FUNDING!!!!1!!11!




On topic: Civ 3 Advisors are pretty helpful for me. For example, the foreign advisor tells me when a deal is going to work or when it's not, so I can edit it before making the deal.

 

[Smellincoffee]

I don't think you could play games like Pharaoh without looking through the advisor windows, but there the advisors are just information windows and not actual people. One of my favorite parts about SimCity 3000 is the way it made cities seem real by adding interest groups and chatty advisors. If you actually ask their advice when petitioners come, some of it really makes sense even outside the game. I'd never considered that flat taxes might be unfair until pondering the Industrial Waste Tax and asking Constance Lee for her advice.

For new players to Civ3, the Science Advisor might be useful ("Feudalism will let us build Pikemen, but we'll need Iron to build them"), but mostly they just serve the same purpose as in Pharoah....giving you information instead of advice. It's been years since I played Civ3 with the tutorial option on, so I don't know how useful their advice is there.

 

[Quintillus]

Sim City 3000 is the game that comes to mind where they could be useful. Occasionally the Education or Public Safety advisor could be helpful for letting you know things were starting to get out of control, when you might not have realized it yet. Similarly, the Utilities advisor could give you a heads-up on when you were nearing capacity, without having to check a plant yourself (or wait until a fire started because your plant blew up). Sure, I could have found out this information elsewhere, but it's easier to ask the advisors than to go find a college, library, jail, fire station, and a power plant individually.

And I agree with Smellincoffee that the interest groups added some depth to the game, and the ordinances were great. That sided with one interest group would occasionally bring out other interest groups was good, too. All they needed to make it more realistic was mass protests and the occasional riot in reaction to enacting ordinances or raising taxes.

In other games, such as Civ, they can be useful as tutorials, but are generally not helpful once you know the game. The Military Advisor is marginally helpful by giving relative strengths in Civ3, but otherwise the most useful part of the Civ3 advisors is them telling you, "Compared to you, most people have the IQ of a carrot!" or "Sleep is for the weak!" (in other words, it's really late at night!).

 

[bestrfcplayer]

There not useful, just ANNOYING BEYOND BELIEF!!!! Especially in Civ games.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

And who EVER listens the the hippy (enviromental) advisor?

Only time was when she shut down my water pump.

Other than SC4, can't really think of any useful advisors. Quick question: has anyone ever actually built enough units to convince the Civ V military advisor that you aren't defenseless?

 

[Omega124]

Only time was when she shut down my water pump.

Wait, your advisors can do crap like that in SC4?

I don't remember this.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

As far as I know it's only with the Environmental Advisor and water pollution. I think she says something about having an order to do so. That's why my water pumps are in the Residential/Commercial cities now.

 

[Skwink]

As far as I know it's only with the Environmental Advisor and water pollution. I think she says something about having an order to do so. That's why my water pumps are in the Residential/Commercial cities now.

Wow, never knew that!

 

[W|M]

Why didn't you get a Water Treatment Plant as well?

I find in-game pollution to be disgusting, so I avoid it.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Those plants are expensive and take up valuable space.

 

[GenMarshall]

I lump advisors as "STOP HELPING ME GOD DAMNIT!!!! ".

 

[MaxaTheGreat]

Why didn't you get a Water Treatment Plant as well?

I find in-game pollution to be disgusting, so I avoid it.

Why build a treatment plant when you can build your pump elsewhere?

 

[W|M]

Those plants are expensive and take up valuable space.

At least they prevent the Environmental advisor from shutting pumps down if you are being really stupid you misplace them.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Why build a treatment plant when you can build your pump elsewhere?

This is the best possible solution.

 

[sophie]

I lump advisors as "STOP HELPING ME GOD DAMNIT!!!! ".

 

[Omega124]

As much as that's funny, I never remember him being that annoying. He may have popped up once or twice in my entire computing history, and all of them were on public (School) computers anyways.