The lamest resource

[TheMeInTeam]

Hmm, incense is a good candidate too since it's not good to work, but I'm going to stick with something like plains sheep. Livestock is just weak for so long.

Ivory must have been a joke.

 

[CCRunner]

Whales are pretty bad, as is incense. Sheep aren't great and fur usually implies that your other land sucks since it's usually in tundra.

Still, they're all better than nothing.

 

[dirtyparrot]

How is beaver bad? I mean, it has the commerce potential of gold plus a hammer. Much better than, say, whale.

Beavers are bad because they're typically situated in very unfavourable city sites. Fur in of itself isn't any worse than than most other resources.

 

[btgwynn]

Incense is ok if you can feed them, they at least give a money bag, which is why I was saying spice sucks, the bonus is hardly anything, a slice of bread and a couple coins.

 

[I-imp]

Spices is essentially the same as a State Property+Watermill+electricity. I can build that. Minus the and though.

 

[bobbyboy29]

First of all I should say that spices are AWESOME! i have no clue what you guys are on about, they are frequently in a jungle and near a river and maybe some dyes so the site screams commerce cottage city. Once improved they give 3 food, the equivalent of a farm, plus some bonus commerce. Working these tiles allows the city to grow quickly to work more cottagrs without forcing the city to compromise on coins in favour of growth. The worst resource by far is desert incense, in order to get it you have to found a junk city that will bleed cash till calendar and then only give you one happy face, also in order to get the next bonus out of it you have to build a cathedral which can only be built in 1/3 of your cities. Can i just say also that financial riverside phants can be awesome in your caps BFC, 1 cheap tech and you have +1 happy as well as a very good dual commerce and production tile.

 

[I-imp]

Ok, I agree that ivory is a useful, early resource. Similar to wine, no?

 

[PhroX]

Beavers are bad because they're typically situated in very unfavourable city sites. Fur in of itself isn't any worse than than most other resources.

However, in Fur's favour is the fact that it's also useable much earlier than many other resources. It's not the best, but I wouldn't say it's the worst.

 

[fed1943]

You do not need to work the resource to get its profits.
So,the lamest resources are the obsolete ones.
Best regards,

 

[6K Man]

Incense, because it's usually in Desert and so can't feed the citizen working it. On top of that, it's often surrounded by useless tiles. I guess it wouldn't be awful in the early early game, but I seldom see it very early.

Sugar isn't great either - basically a weak food resource that can't be improved with irrigation, unlike Rice. I'm soft of indifferent about Whales - they're not awful if you can get them.

A few of the resources would be fine if they were better located (e.g. Silver).

I actually like the Hits - sure, they're expensive, but they are +2 with Eiffel and you are obviously getting a monopoly if you grab one - meaning you can usually trade for the other(s) and for any other (non-strategic) resources you are missing. That can be very handy for bumping up your happy/health cap, just when you are running into major unhealth from Factories & power.

 

[PhroX]

Sugar isn't great either - basically a weak food resource that can't be improved with irrigation, unlike Rice. I'm soft of indifferent about Whales - they're not awful if you can get them.

I plantation the first sugar for the . The rest I just treat as a normal grassland square, but with a bonus .

 

[JonathanStrange]

Yeah, I have to second or third or whatever the Incense comments: although I think it's not a bad resources, it's generally located in less-than-ideal locations for city workers.

Don't get me wrong though, I actually think that resources nationwide effects are worth the less than optimal city placement.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

Settle on top of any lame resources and their mediocre tile yield is no longer a problem. You still get the benefit of the resource without the sub-par 3 4 tile. After all, you could have a 2 7 tile or a 4 1 tile (for feeding specialists or production).

If a resource yields 4, 3 then it is worth working. I think this is riverside grassland sugar IIRC.

Whale b/c you can't settle on it. But even that has its merits with the production it provides.

 

[Tephros]

Whales gives +1 unimproved, +1+2 improved. Add this to lighthouse, base of 11 and you get: 313. Which isn't bad, particularly if you're financial or have moai statues there. Tiles that have both hammers and commerce are also nice for GAs. Has the shortest lifespan for the bonus it seems, though.

I can't decide between fur, silk, and incense for the worst. Silk I'm always wishing I had a town there. Incense is almost always on a desert tile not worth using. Fur is often on an ice tile not worth using, is available early but then obsolete. At least you can build it on forests, though it's almost always a crappy tundra forest. Pray for the great beast event.

 

[J-man]

I think I have never worked whales, I couldn't reach it and obsoletes pretty early.

 

[Timoteo]

Copper,Iron does everything it can do and more.

Not entirely true: copper doubles production of some wonders/projects/buildings. Also, it comes sooner.

I'll vote for whale, because of the short lifespan. As far as the production bonus goes, I have never had whale in my BFS.

 

[The_Big_Con]

I have a different take on resource lameness. I ask myself "Is this resource really significant enough to have a game effect?" I know this has been mentioned elsewhere, but the potato isn't in this game, and that's a food resource with a major historical impact. And then I see crabs ... and I think, really? They thought crabs were a significant enough resource to put in the game but not the potato? I guess they needed something to put in the water. To some degree I've had the same thought about bananas, but I guess the banana has been pretty significant to some cultures. Then again, so has the guinea pig. I might have replaced the banana with some generic looking fruit and called it Fruit, and made it available in both jungle and forest.

You know what i think should be in the game, but isn't? Salt. As a food resource -- it has limited nutritional value but the fact that it helps preserve other foods would justify the +1 health. Unless you want to say that falls under "spices". But salt should really be on coasts and in deserts.

I also wouldn't mind seeing Honey, mostly because a little beehive icon would be lovely on plains, grasslands.

 

[PhroX]

I have a different take on resource lameness. I ask myself "Is this resource really significant enough to have a game effect?" I know this has been mentioned elsewhere, but the potato isn't in this game, and that's a food resource with a major historical impact. And then I see crabs ... and I think, really? They thought crabs were a significant enough resource to put in the game but not the potato? I guess they needed something to put in the water. To some degree I've had the same thought about bananas, but I guess the banana has been pretty significant to some cultures. Then again, so has the guinea pig. I might have replaced the banana with some generic looking fruit and called it Fruit, and made it available in both jungle and forest.

You know what i think should be in the game, but isn't? Salt. As a food resource -- it has limited nutritional value but the fact that it helps preserve other foods would justify the +1 health. Unless you want to say that falls under "spices". But salt should really be on coasts and in deserts.

I also wouldn't mind seeing Honey, mostly because a little beehive icon would be lovely on plains, grasslands.

I think much of this comes down to balance. Probably, the game worked best with three seafood resources and crabs was the third one they came up with, while 3 crops was best, so they didn't need to add potatoes.

I'm sure we could easily come up with a dozen more resources, but it probably wouldn't make the game better.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

There are tons of MODs out there that include an outlandish number of resources that I would never want to deal with (too many). I'm happy with the MM as is, I don't want to have to MM resources any more than I do now.

Anyway, I think the lame resource debate is kinda moot only because of what I posted above about settling on them. If a resource (usually calendar) provides mediocre tile returns, settle on it.

 

[Matthew5117]

^Agreed. Mods like Rise of Mankind is just overkill (I'm not saying the mod sucks, its great actually), that many resources makes you need to look them up in the Civilopedia.