Medieval and Renaissance buildings elimination thread

[Mount Suribachi]

Armory (22)
Archaeological Museum (25)
Art Museum (10)
Bank (-1): ELIMINATED
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (25)
Workshop (17)
University (20)

Archaeological Museum 25 (24+1): It's very easy to fall behind in culture in the early game. It's also very easy to start producing staggering amounts of culture in the late game, and it starts, oooh, right around the time you get archaeologists. Only downside is the museum is damn expensive to buy/build, and so are archaeologists. But lots of culture, faith, tourism and era score from these, coupled with relatively easy theming.

Bank -1 (2-3) ELIMINATED: I wanted to downvote medieval walls, but I did that yesterday so it gets a reprieve and the Bank goes instead. As someone said earlier in the thread MW are in a pain in the ass for the player as they make mid-game conquest so hard, so more value for the AI than the player. As for the Bank, it's just meh. You're going to build them in your CHs when you've got nothing else to build or you need a Eureka or city state quest but otherwise...probably the weakest T2 building?

 

[mrwho]

Armory (19) -3
Archaeological Museum (25)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (26) +1
Workshop (17)
University (20)

Judging by some of the comments here I underestimate the use of military engineers quite substantially. I rarely even build encampments - I'm a peaceful player, apart from maybe taking out one neighbor in the early game to get extra space. Out of all the buildings here it's possibly the one I find myself building the least.

Love the shipyard. It can transform a meh city into a very strong one, and production is so important in civ 6 but often hard to come by in coastal cities. I can't think of another building that has as much transformational ability as the shipyard.

 

[fy00sh]

Looks like Medieval Walls lost 3 points in the last few posts. Corrected scores below:

Armory (19)
Archaeological Museum (25)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (7)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (17)
University (20)

 

[bengalryan9]

Armory (19)
Archaeological Museum (25)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (7)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (14) (17-3) The only reason I'll build these is to get to factories and power plants. Until then, no thanks.
University (21) (20+1) Not saying it's a perfect building or anything but come on, it's way to early to be downvoting universities.

 

[InsidiousMage]

Armory (19)
Archaeological Museum (25)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (20-3) (17) Even when I build this I usually forget I have it because I've already built a large enough military so the extra troops are just extra expenses. Good for upgrading to Corps and Armies but you really should already have a strong enough military when going for Domination before you have the chance to build a tier 2 Government Plaza building.
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (7)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (15) (14+1) The argument against this building is that its a bad return on investment but RoI is for Wall Street and boring people.
University (21)

 

[Leucarum]

Armory (19)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (18)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (7)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (15)
University (21)

This thread is not at all as I would have expected. Downvoting the Archaeological Museum (25-3) just because I don't think there should be as much of a gulf between it and the art museum. To take full advantage of as many culture sources as possible I usually want some of both. I don't think the difference should be so stark. Even though the archaeological museum is the best of the two. Upvoting the Grand Master's Chapel (17+1) again because honestly I'm shocked it's getting downvotes. I guess some people don't play much of a faith game? In the late game you do not want to build units and faith buying leaves your cash for other things.

 

[Vargas1]

Armory (19)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (19) (18+1)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4) (7-3)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (15)
University (21)

Grand Master's Chapel (19) - As someone who plays a lot of continent-type maps, the ability to raise a new army immediately upon settling away from your base empire is huge. If I'm playing peacefully, I can settle a few new cities and get just enough troops to protect them from other civs or barbs. If I want to invade, I can settle in the middle of tundra and use my fresh army to take over the good locations. Heck, I can even settle a city I know will lose loyalty and flip just so I can raise some troops in the interim and attack someone else. Especially if I am at war at home or need deterrence from those neighbors, I'd much rather gather a new army with faith than ship all my old troops painstakingly overseas.

Medieval Walls (4) - @Francel - for me, the reason walls are OP is because you don't need to build medieval or renaissance. Give me ancient walls and a crossbowman and I'll be able to hold off most AI armies without much trouble. By the time they get to bombards I'll either have a tech lead, have a significant army myself, or be on friendly terms with my neighbors.

 

[Josephias]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (20)
Grand Master's Chapel (19)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

Armory (19+1=20): It's not ony the building of military engineers, it is also the increase on the strategic resource cap without needing more encampments than necessary, which will allow for more potential trade and for quick build/upgrade when necessary. Building is worth an upvote.

Workshop (15-3=12): Medieval Walls have finally kept the last of its tier, so I won't repeat downvote again. Let's go with the workshop then. As some have said, it is costly and will take time to repay its worth. As the bank (and even more, because of being a 1st-tier building), it can be improved with CS envoys, but that has not saved the Bank from vanishing, and probably won't save the Workshop either.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (10)
Chancery (17) 20-3 I'm picking on this because I forget it exists most of the time. It gives some nice yields if you have a lot of city states, but overall the Diplo Quarter is a w/e building unless you're heavily invest in CS's.The actual building ability seems to be a giant meme to me. 50 science for capturing a spy? That's not anything by the time you can build it.
Grand Master's Chapel (20) 19+1 If you have any faith generation, this is great for helping any war. Spewing a bunch of 200 faith catapults and upgrading them with bombards and Victor's promotion is strong. It also has synergy with Theocracy

And it's not like you can't build spies without it. If you use the card, it's just 150 production, while the Agency costs 290. So it's not really that "free" if you care about timing.


Intelligence Agency
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

they provide 3 tourism but not on top of the tourism of medieval walls, like they provide 1 more tourism which might gave you 1 tourist for visiting that city.

Nope, it stacks with all levels of wall. 1 for ancient, 2 for medieval, 3 for Renaissance for 6 total.



Also, in this particular example, I counted about 52 or so tourism total from walls. So that's about 13% of my total tourism. I didn't build walls fully because this was supposed to be a Diplo victory but botched it so CV it was. It should have been more if I were fully focused on culture.

I mean what else could you make with 300 production (using limes) that it takes to build these walls? Even placing a theater square at this point in the game costs more than that.

 

[canadamufc]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (11) (10+1) I'm defending this again as I see it better than the Armory, Chancery, Grand Master's Chapel, Medieval Walls, and the Workshop. Artifacts are limited, and while you can only get a certain amount of GA's, it is usually more than you will ever need. Also Great Works of Art are NOT hard to theme. Good diplomacy and great person management will give you all the great works to theme all the Art Museums.

I may be doing Archeological stuff wrong, but I find them as a whole so expensive and time consuming. I get Archeological Museums at Humanism, have to wait until Natural History, train a stupid expensive Archeologist, and move them around the map so I can obtain Artifacts. And unlike Great Artists, I don't even know what I'm gonna get! You could make assumptions, like if an artifact is near my territory then it's probably mine, but you will still have trouble getting the correct era type. Compare this to the Art Museum where as soon as you unlock Humanism and get it built, you get instant value.
Chancery (14) (17-3) Uh, this building is like... really bad. By this time I am rolling in science so 50 in a burst literally makes zero difference. The +3 influence points are okay, but I get 80% of my envoys from civics anyways. Also, the Diplo Quarter is a really niche building so in some games it may not be built.
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

 

[Luxerne]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (11)
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (26)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

Art Museum (11+1) - So long as Russia isn't in the game, I never have problems picking up a few artists from that very early burst of religious artists and getting two, three or even four museums themed before I've even begun training archaeologists.

Chancery (14-3) - I slack on building this often because it's just not a priority, given the production cost. The Diplomatic Quarter itself is already low priority, given the relative ease of getting envoys and diplomatic favor elsewhere in the early and mid-game, so I generally don't build the district until the Renaissance or so, and I definitely don't get around to the Chancery until later.

 

[Siddharth Venkatesh]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (8) 11-3: This building doesn't really do much. It costs too much and the yields it provides are very mediocre at this stage of the game.
Grand Master's Chapel (20)
Intelligence Agency (22): I'm not downvoting the Intelligence Agency yet because it is still a good building but it should not be above the Grand Master's Chapel. The Grand Master's Chapel is a game changing building for faith based civs and is one of the reason they have such strong mid games (along with Monumentality). Intelligence Agency used to be great but Spies being unable to steal gold from Allies has nerfed them very hard.
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (29) 26+3: This is my pick for the best building in these eras. The university is very important too and is a close second for me, but it is not as game shaping as the Shipyard is for coastal cities. The production it provides turns weak coastal cities into powerhouses. It also combos very well with Free Inquiry Golden Ages, which most coastal civs should be aiming for anyways.
Workshop (12)
University (21)

 

[Drivingrevilo]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (5)(8-3)
Grand Master's Chapel (21)(20+1)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (4)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

Grand Master's Chapel (21)(20+1) Only just spotted this thread. I've skim-read the posts: I agree with the early elimination of Renaissance Walls, Banks, and Foreign Ministry. What I do not agree with, however, is any attempt to downvote Grand Master's Chapel.

If you asked me my top 3 for this era, GMC would 100% be there. It's very similar to Yerevan (which came 2nd in our city-state elimination thread): some games, you're not going to need it at all; but when it is relevant, boy is it powerful. Entire strategies can (and should) revolve around this building.

Intelligence Agency might be the 'go-to' when you've got nothing else to build, but GMC is still the more powerful for what it offers.

Chancery (5)(8-3) A very so-so building. I basically only build it for the +3 influence points.

 

[TCBB]

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (5)(8-3)
Grand Master's Chapel (22)(21+1)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Medieval Walls (1)(4-3)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (12)
University (21)

Grand Master's Chapel (22)(21+1) I was typing out a long argument, but @Drivingrevilo essentially said it. I'll only add this: people tend to assume that Grand Masters Chapel is irrelevant for most civilizations. But by my count, it benefits the majority of Civs:

(1.) Civs who have a direct incentive to generate a lot of faith; Arabia, Byzantines, Ethiopia, Georgia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Khmer, Mali, Poland, Russia.
(2.) Civs who, although lacking as much of an incentive, will either benefit from generating a lot of faith or can easily choose to do so; America, Aztec, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, France, Greece, Inca, Maori, Mapuche, Nubia, Sweden.
(3.) Civs who have a direct incentive to domination, so can benefit from using faith on GMC (especially if they've conquered a bunch of holy sites off other civs early on); Aztec, Byzantines (!!), Gran Colombia, Hungary, India/Chandragupta, Macedon, Mongolia, Norway, Nubia, Ottomans, Persia, Poland, Scythia, Spain (!!), Sumeria, Zulu.

That's easily over half the Civs in the game. All of these can benefit hugely from using Grand Masters Chapel for defensive or offensive purposes. And you could arguably include more: e.g. there's no reason why a generalist Civ such as Germany, Netherlands, Cree, or Rome can't choose to focus on faith (for Monumentality) before pivoting into mid-game domination.

Medieval Walls (1)(4-3) @Vargas1 expressed it best: Ancient Walls are sufficient for defensive purposes. Anything more is overkill.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

the Diplo Quarter is a w/e building

I have no idea what w/e means sorry!

Armory (20)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (5)
Grand Master's Chapel (22)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (13)
University (21)

Medieval Walls (1-3 = Eliminated) - not much reason to build these except in a Diplo game when you're heading for renaissance walls maybe.
Workshop (12+1=13) A great way to turn gold into production and G/E points, at this stage of the game you usually have plenty gold so it's a nice conversion option.

 

[Leucarum]

Armory (17)
Archaeological Museum (22)
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (5)
Grand Master's Chapel (22)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (14)
University (21)

While it isn't the most impressive building ever, the workshop (13+1) is essential to get to unlock power plants and some of the best production options in the game. It's also not super expensive so I often end up buying this one in quite a few cities...

Millitary Engineers are ok, but the Armory (20-3) has the downside of being in a district which you rarely need more than 1 or 2 of, and even then fully developing my encampments isn't as high a priority usually. This will get built somewhere, but it's getting my downvote this time.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

Armory (17)
Archaeological Museum (19) -3: I might be in a slight minority here, but I've started to dislike this building recently. First and foremost because the actual value (compared to how much you need to invest in it) is rather low these days. The tourism and culture is decent, don't get me wrong. But with the release of GS and further changes to Naturalists and the faith economy per se, the tourism value has dropped off hard compared to the ridiculous amounts of tourism that Naturalists now bring in. This is a general complaint I have with CV games as well, in that Naturalists are such a power spike compared to "older" forms of tourism, that the rewards of investing heavily into TS buildings gets quite diminished. The other problem with this building is that it is quite useless until you have teched to Archaeologists (allowing you to actually fill the damn thing), which arrive quite a bit later. In fact, Archaeologists arrive so late that Naturalists are just around the corner, so I tend to not get to build a lot of these until I start churning out Naturalists like a madman until I win the game. The Archaeologists also cost a lot of production, which is a further hindrance for me. Not as worth it as it used to be. I'll still build a few, but especially when going CV, it's just a lot easier to rapidly fill Art Museums, even if they on paper seem weaker.
Art Museum (12)
Chancery (5)
Grand Master's Chapel (23) +1: Seeing some of the arguments against this building, I can't help but feel that people are using it wrong. This is good for domination games (sometimes very good even), but it is not necessarily the best at domination games. This building is tremendously good for peaceful games, and it is because of the absolutely broken insurance value that you get from it. This building can singlehandedly allow you to get away with totally neglecting to build a defensive army, in favour of extremely greedy play where you focus on spewing out settlers and building districts and wonders. No other building has a big of an impact in allowing for extremely greedy play, like the GMC does. It is a misconception that you need to actually use the building to get value out of it. The value from the GMC comes the second you finish it, because at that point you have the ability to instantly summon a fairly large army if there ever is a need for it, and this allows you to play very greedy in the meantime. The way I see the GMC is a building that saves a large amount of turns and resources that usually go into building extra units, maintaining unit/upgrade costs, and set up defensible location. Do you have your neighbour Scythia rapidly increasing her army value from 200 to 600, and amassing forces near your border, while you have merrily plopped down districts and settlers all the while being at 100 army value? No problem, the GMC can instantly get you 3 knights, a crossbowman and some pike units in your closest border cities to fend off that attack. No longer do you have to balance that greedy play with defensive preparations. Heck, imagine if a wonder gave a bonus allowing you to faith-purcase units for faith. It would be a ridiculously good wonder in most cases, but the GMC is better - it's no wonder, and therefore never contested so you can always get it, at a reasonable price even.
The bonus this building gives you is on the power level of a civ/leader ability (Gitarja being the closest one with her faith-purchasing of sea units, which is still inferior to this thing).
Stupid good in most cases, even when you don't use it.
Intelligence Agency (22)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (14)
University (21)

 

[Vargas1]

Armory (17)
Archaeological Museum (19)
Art Museum (9) (12-3)
Chancery (5)
Grand Master's Chapel (24) (23+1)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Shipyard (27)
Workshop (14)
University (21)

Grand Master's Chapel (24) - I'll just refer to @Oberinspektor Derrick in the post above mine - I like to play most of my early games peacefully, with a focus on expansion and infrastructure (and wonder-chasing). Assuming I have good faith, rushing to GMC allows me to do that. Also, worth mentioning how easy pillaging faith is - if you're at war buy a couple of coursers or cavalry and they'll pay for themselves in a few turns.

Art Museum (9) - I like the concept and roleplay aspect of collecting GWAMs and trying to set up attractive tourist cities, but I really find that I never end up getting all that many artists. Maybe if I ran projects more often, but I usually am building out more infrastructure throughout the game, and by the time I'm ready for projects I'm building seaside resorts, natural parks, and sending rock bands anyway.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

Armory (17)
Archaeological Museum (19)
Art Museum (9)
Chancery (2) (5-3)
Grand Master's Chapel (24)
Intelligence Agency (22)
Shipyard (28) (27+1)
Workshop (14)
University (21)

Chancery: Will no one object if I downvote this? No one? Alright. It's the weakest Building left here and I feel not many people would come to its defense.

Shipyard: Pretty much the Lighthouse of this Elimination Thread. Only works if you have Water Tiles, yet it returns so many Yields.

 

[kryat]

Armory (17)
Archaeological Museum (19)
Art Museum (9)
Chancery (eliminated)
Grand Master's Chapel (24)
Intelligence Agency (23) (22+1)
Shipyard (28)
Workshop (14)
University (21)

Intelligence Agency - My go-to when I don't use foreign ministry (about 60% intelligence agency, 30% foreign ministry, 10% grand master's chapel). I find other uses for faith, but I'm not going to knock that the GMC is a very strong building. However, spies are also powerful tools, both offensively and defensively.

Chancery - On the other hand, while I will always build this, its impact is relatively small. It's funny how this incentivizes using spies defensively, but provides no bonus to it. The bonus yields are great, but come online very late.

Moderator Action: Updated colours to match text and votes --NZ