Natural Wonder Elimination Thread

[hhhhhh]

Somehow I don't know what to vote now... that fishing boat + amber tile kinda convinced me not upvoting HLB.
But to be fair, fishing boat get 1 production as late as Colonialism.

Zhangye Danxia [12] (15-3) If you want Great Person Points build encampments, commercial hubs and Oracle.
Païtiti [30] (29+1) Is it just Civ or every game likes to put the most powerful thing in the latest DLC? Probably most.

Eyjafjallajökull [15]
Fountain of Youth [1]
Giant's Causeway [10]
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [15]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [5]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [13]
Yosemite [14]
Zhangye Danxia [12]

 

[bengalryan9]

Eyjafjallajökull [15]
Fountain of Youth [1]
Giant's Causeway [7] (10-3) A one trick pony that's not even the best at that particular trick. It's +5 combat strength and nothing else, and you can get that bonus and more from another wonder on this list...
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [15]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [5]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [13]
Yosemite [14]
Zhangye Danxia [13] (12+1) Simply better than Giant's Causeway - I'll take a couple early great generals (which you WILL get, provides +5 combat strength, AND have another bonus on top of that) over a generic +5 combat bonus that my enemies can also get any day. And then Zhangye Danxia also gives you a couple early great merchants too! Maybe it loses head to head to some of the other wonders on this list in the grand scheme of things, but there is no way Causeway should outlast it.

 

[Drivingrevilo]

Tsingy de Bemaraha [10] (13-3) I still think this one is really underwhelming. 6 culture 6 science sounds good, but more often than not it spawns on completely flat tundra or plains tiles - meaning that, in order to work one tile of the wonder, your city will take an age to grow.

Giant's Causeway [8] (7+1) And I still think this deserves to last a few more places. +5 combat strength completely neuters the AI’s advantage on deity, and paired with Oligarchy it lets you initiate your snowball very early. Have gotten a lot of use out of GC as Chandragupta, Genghis, Gilgamesh, etc...

Fountain of Youth [1]
Giant's Causeway [8] (7+1)
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [15]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [5]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [10] (13-3)
Yosemite [14]
Zhangye Danxia [13]

 

[CrabHelmet]

Fountain of Youth [0] ELIMINATED
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [15]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [5]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [10]
Yosemite [14]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

Fountain of Youth is going now while I have the chance. Reasonable Wonder if you can settle it before T20 or so, forgettable otherwise.

Ha Long Bay being equal to Amber is silly. Amber in Coast is 1 Culture 1 Food 1 Gold. Improve it and you have 1 Culture 2 Food 1 Gold 1 Production and had to use a Builder. Ha Long Bay provides an extra Food above that, doesn't need a Builder, and you have two right next to each other. It's clearly better. Also, like... a freely improved Amber with +1 Food is a great tile, and two of them is two really good tiles. Given Matterhorn is normally flanked by a few Mountains, the practical effect it has is maybe 3 slightly-worse-than-Amber tiles, and yet Matterhorn is +7 up on Ha Long Bay. There's no logic to that.

Up-voting Zhangye Danxia. Miles better than Giant's Causeway. Giant's Causeway is good if found early on. Later, having to troop your entire army over to it and back to the frontline again is not worth the +5, you lose too much initiative. Zhangye Danxia provides Great Generals, which are +5 bonuses that actually move with your troops. Sure, you can get Great Generals with Encampments, but with Zhangye Danxia you can transform an Encampment into an early Campus or Theatre, so you're still net up by a lot more than Giant's Causeway.

 

[xaiviax]

One impassable tile

Eyjafjallajökull [15]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [12] (15-3) No Wi-Fi, what other reason is needed to down vote? Food is my least needed additional resource, and the only one I can have too much of.
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [5]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11] (10+1) On the other hand, I can't have too much culture or science.
Yosemite [14]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

Added Eyjafjallajökull back in to the list.

 

[JhGf_123]

Pantanal [2] (5-3) need to get a move on with this thread. Pantanal is never going to win, it evidently doesn’t deserve top 10 otherwise people would be defending it more, therefore it’s time to eliminate it. The exact positioning is not really relevant.

Yosemite [15] (14+1) because an upvote won’t prolong its existence here, and because I generally like the three-tier yields it provides.

Eyjafjallajökull [15]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [3]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [12]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [2] (5-3)
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [15] (14+1)
Zhangye Danxia [14]

 

[lotrmith]

Ha Long Bay being equal to Amber is silly. Amber in Coast is 1 Culture 1 Food 1 Gold. Improve it and you have 1 Culture 2 Food 1 Gold 1 Production and had to use a Builder. Ha Long Bay provides an extra Food above that, doesn't need a Builder, and you have two right next to each other. It's clearly better. Also, like... a freely improved Amber with +1 Food is a great tile, and two of them is two really good tiles.

It's worse than that... coastal amber is only +1 production if you build a fishing boat and take God of the Sea. Otherwise it's 1 food 1 gold (base coast) plus 1 culture (amber) plus 1 food (fishing boat). A 2 food, 1 gold, 1 Culture tile that required a builder charge is not the same as a 3 food, 1 production, 1 Culture tile that requires no builder. As I said, Ha Long Bay is being done dirty.

Pantanal too. It's an immediate Monument on a tile you're guaranteed fast growth by working. Monuments are 70 production. Working all 4 Pantanal tiles is effectively worth 280 production. And they will continue to provide a food surplus to get you to 5th, 6th, 7th tiles.

To me Yosemite is objectively worse even than Pantanal. Yosemite can be in tundra half the time, so even its two best tiles are 3 food, 2 science, 2 gold. I'll take 2 culture over 2 gold 2 science any day. On the single Yosemite tiles it's 1 food 2 culture vs 1 science 1 gold... a no brainer. Even if Yosemite is in plains the added 1 production isn't enough to out-value the Pantanal's culture.

Eyjafjallajökull [15]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [4]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [12]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [2]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

 

[enKage]

I think underestimated Pammukale last time with a little unfair downvote last time. I forgot it gives ammenities too, and it is that factor giving it more value since last patch. It had no value before, so I forgot it even has this bonus

Anyway
Player is dependent on map generator. So you can land in bad terrain with Roraima around, or you can land on geothermal fissure near noountains and get soon similar or better science. You can roll Tsingy nearby, or start in jungle with coffe and crabs on the cost. Yes, all of them make life easier, but are not gamebreakers, because all that can be obtained in ususal way by simplystarting in a good area with correct resources and terrain features (coffe, crabs, amber, reef blah blah) or proximity of city states

What I consider top natural wonder is that of gamebreaking value, gving you bonus, that cannot be obtained early in oher ways, and there is no chance favourable map generator would give similar effect. those wonders will give a value not possible to get any other way.
These are three wonders, and this is my obvious top3 for this elimination thread
Paititi, because its yields are too high to be obtained other way
ZD, bacuse map generator would never give you free trade route capacity and great general (followed by enlightment, mercantilism inspirations, free envoys for quest that otherwise would wait for eras)
Ik-Kyl, +50% to wonders with jungle/foest around is not possible to get by any other means.
I know some of you would start now a story starting with IF making a chain of things that would lead finnaly to having better effect (if you start near TdP you would have a bonus hammers and IF you go for bronze and IF you build a encampment 3 turns faster and IF you run project and if and if and if and between those ifs that fact of population limits dissapear). I don't want any IFs from natural wonder. Top Natural wonder has to give maximum effect with minimum engagemant and conditions and its bonuses are impossible to get other way without complete detour of usual way of playing. Like ZD. It loses value as game progress? Every natural wonder loses. maybe expet Eyja....

For some reason ZD is still undervalued here, but I won't upvote twice in a row.

Instead
Eyjafjallajökull [16] 15+1 Good volcano
Mount Kilimanjaro [9] 12 -3 Bad volcano

I can easily settle terrain where Kilimanjaro spawn without it. Settling terrain where Eyja... spawn is hard without it.
Islandic one is less destructive and fertilizes more in one eruption
Kilimanjaro opposite.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [4]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [9]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [2]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [21]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

 

[TCBB]

Mount Kilimanjaro [6] (9-3) I’m also coming round to thinking Kilimanjaro should go. I’ll gladly settle it for the fast pop 4, but you’re basically just taking 20ish turns off the point when you need a granary.

Torres del Paine [22] (21+1) Doesn’t really matter where it spawns, it’ll still render the terrain workable. My issue with several adjacency wonders remaining (Tsingy, Matterhorn, Piopiotahi, Yosemite, less so Roraima) is that if it spawns in terrible terrain, earning that +1 culture or whatever comes at the significant cost of your city being, well, tripe.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [4]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6] (9-3)
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [2]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22] (21+1)
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

 

[Amrunril]

Ha Long Bay (4-3=1) I don't know what more there is to say about this one. Two slightly above average tiles just aren't top 15 material.
Matterhorn (10+1=11) I strongly dislike these micromanagement heavy promotion wonders from a design and enjoyment perspective. In terms of effectiveness, though, upgrading the rough terrain movement of as many units as you want is hugely powerful.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [1]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [10]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [2]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [14]

 

[monikernemo]

Amber fishing boat: yes might be missing 1 prod 1 food, but point being it is still easily replicable. Consider grassland hill amber, then one would come incredibly close to yields of HLB with just one builder charge. And more over, you can't build improvements over HLB, unless you consider harbour buildings, Auckland etc.

The idea that equates 2 culture to 70 prod is erroneous when describing benefits of pantanal; working pantanal tiles comes at an opportunity cost of having your population not earn production and to get 2 culture you have to devote 1 population point, which in the long run, certainly cost more than 70 production. On the other hand, a monument frees up your population point to earn 2 culture. Of course this is all things that happens in the long run; if you are talking about just early game, it is undisputable that culture is important early but up to a certain point, perhaps post PP, working multiple pantanal tiles would be harmful to growth as you have to a sacrifice production to get culture, but after early expansion, there is a point where working. But I that being said, pantanal is still very useful for the early game.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [1]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [3] (2+1) see above.
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [13]
Zhangye Danxia [11] (14 -3) I ultimately think that this wonder is made for early wars, only one would build early CH for early income to support early war, which great merchants activation usually rely on presence of CH. Otherwise for other victory types don't really see much benefit for Zhangye Danxia

 

[xaiviax]

Matterhorn should be at 11 from post 190.

 

[linaker]

Ha Long Bay: This should have gone ages ago. Clearly, the developers recognised that it's yields weren't exactly stellar, so gave it an additional military bonus. The trouble is that bonus is almost useless. Often, the Bay appears out at sea, not adjacent to land, so you don't even get a opportunity to build a +2 Holy Site and the additional appeal is harder to access. But perhaps more importantly, for a wonder whose yields become increasingly insignificant as the game progresses, in that case, you either have to wait to work the tiles, or buy them.

Yosemite: Yes, it can be in tundra, but not necessarily flat tundra. Personally, I would not be dismissive of a tile yielding 3 food, 2 gold, 2 science, but there are 8 opportunities for woods or hills to be next to it and then you get very worthwhile yields. In the screenshot below, only 2 tiles are flat tundra. The tile with 3 food, 2 science, 2 gold, 2 production, (easily improvable with a lumber mill), puts wonders like Ha Long Bay in the shade by itself. Out of the 8 surrounding tiles, you will be very unlucky if at least two or three don't contain features giving production. And if you think flat tundra tiles with science and gold are worthless, you do not have to work them. You can build your national parks/holy sites there. Furthermore, Yosemite offers the same science as 3 libraries and a university. A university alone costs more than 4 monuments.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Hạ Long Bay [1 - 3] ELIMINATED
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [3]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [14] (13 + 1)
Zhangye Danxia [11]

 

[Drivingrevilo]

Pantanal [0] ELIMINATED. Downvote to prevent a resurgence. The benefit of working the tiles (I.e. potentially 8 culture) is far outweighed by the fact that your city will have no production.

Zhangye Danxia [12] (11+1) Surprised this one has fallen so quickly. Find it early, and you’ve probably got a lockdown on the first Great General and definitely a lockdown on the first few Great Merchants. That’s a lot of bonuses there.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Pantanal [0] ELIMINATED
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Zhangye Danxia [12] (11+1)

 

[CrabHelmet]

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [6]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [11]
Zhangye Danxia [13]

Yosemite needs to go. It can't spawn in Grasslands, it spawns in Plains or Tundra only. That means the best tile it offers is +2 Science +2 Gold +3 Production +2 Food, sure, fine, in the unlikely scenario where the overlap tile falls on forested Plains Hills, but realistically is something like +2 Science +2 Gold +1 Production +2 Food. If the ridiculous argument that Ha Long Bay is basically Amber succeeded, then Yosemite is basically a Geothermal Fissure with a bit more Gold, or Truffles on Forest Plains but with some Science. No thanks, goodbye, I'm not working this early on and later on working a few of these tiles is still fairly insubstantial.

Upvoting Zhangye Danxia. You get all 3 of the first Great Generals basically guaranteed, plus free money, and you don't even have to work it, it is entirely passive. Utterly devastating if found early, basically turns you into Gran Colombia for free early on.

 

[hhhhhh]

Yosemite should be at [10]. #191 Mysteriously added 1 to it.

 

[xaiviax]

5 days ago I wrote in regards to Mt Kilimanjaro vs Yosemite, the volcano in Tanzania provides 12 food, additional volcano benefits, both wanted and unwanted. The national park in the Sierra Nevada provides 10 food, 10 gold, and 10 science. I prefer the latter.
As far as spawn location goes, Kilimanjaro has the same possible plains and tundra of Yosemite and adds grasslands and desert, keeping it in the same overall ballpark in my opinion. I have seen both in incredible spots, and both in terrible ones. For each one, what they are surrounded by can be very different than the tiles they are actually on. And as far as grasslands vs plains, I've seen a huge patch of featureless flat grassland make Roraima a terrible spot.
My next choice for down vote would be Giant's Causeway, as I think it's weaker vs Matterhorn and Zhange Danxia. But I can't down vote the Causeway over Kilimanjaro. So an unfortunate repeat down vote for Kilimanjaro, and an up for the better Yosemite.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [3] (6-3)
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [16]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [11] (10+1)
Zhangye Danxia [13]

 

[Cpt Chaos]

I'm not sure why some people are trying to do Yosemite and Zhangye Danxia dirty here. If anybody has found the trick to getting a T30 / 35 GG without Zhangye, do please let me know. Yosemite is also able to turbocharge the early game in a big way. I've just had the crazy luck to have two games in a row with Yosemite starts (no re-rolls, seriously). The first game spawned me such that I could settle in the middle on T1, and I ended up with 10 science per turn on T10. There is also clearly some grassland next to Yosemite (as well as a couple of junk tundra tiles but so what). The second game was a bit further away so a bit less impactful, but still very useful and no junk tiles at all this time (screenshots from both games below, sadly I didn't take T1 pictures).
I certainly don't think Yosemite should win, but some that are left have clearly far less early game impact. Pamukkale gives bonuses that are nice, but have essentially no impact on the early game, when it matters most. It definitely does not deserve to be ahead of Zhangye or Yosemite.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [3]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [13] (16-3)
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [11]
Yosemite [12] (11+1)
Zhangye Danxia [13]

P.S. Bonus rainforest St Basil's, just because I know people love that stuff...

 

[lotrmith]

Building a Commercial Hub to activate a merchant for a trade route that gives you yields that half the wonders remaining provide in greater quantity doesn't impress me, nor do I consider a great generals as impactful as early yields of just about any kind.

Yield like science and culture from Tsingy, which is not only better than Yosemite's yields but also less likely to spawn in Tundra than Yosemite.

Really, T30-35 general means exactly nothing to me when compared to 30-35 turns of +1/+2/+3/+4 culture through the Ancient Era.

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [3]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [13]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [12]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [10]

Also seriously if you contributed to knocking Pantanal and Ha Long Bay off the list you should try adding more culture to your games. Just play Rome for a quick lesson.

 

[whacker]

Eyjafjallajökull [16]
Giant's Causeway [8]
Ik-Kil [21]
Matterhorn [11]
Mount Kilimanjaro [3]
Mount Roraima [23]
Païtiti [30]
Pamukkale [13]
Piopiotahi [16]
Torres del Paine [22]
Tsingy de Bemaraha [13]
Yosemite [12]
Zhangye Danxia [7]

Tsingy is the only wonder that provides culture+science.
Great merchants are not that good and while GG are great, you can easily plan ahead to get ur classical GG once swordmen and horsemen get rolling.