What Can You Do Without?

[Nick31]

Yes, thanks for the formulaic answer. But I am left wondering why hospitals increase food to the city.

Hospitals prevent your workforce from dying as youth and from disease. Industrialized nations benefit from large numbers of healthy young people.

And it's a game...

 

[lockandload]

Hospitals prevent your workforce from dying as youth and from disease. Industrialized nations benefit from large numbers of healthy young people.

And it's a game...

Then there would be less food.

 

[Acken]

Health increase population, the game way of increasing population is through food bonuses.

...

 

[reddishrecue]

Hospitals used to be healthy in civilization 4 but now theyre just food. Units are usually more healthy now since they have a health bar,.

 

[claudiupb]

Hospital is not the only building that gives an "unrealistic" output. Aqueduct let's you keep 40% of the food spent for growing 1 pop? It makes more sense that a granary does that. Actually from a realistic point of view granary and aqueduct bonuses should be swapped. But then again it is really weird getting Aqueduct at Pottery and Granary at Engineering. If you swap the bonuses but keep the buildings at their current techs, then you affect game play a lot. I guess the food buildings are a little off because they dropped the health concept from civ 4.

 

[lockandload]

Not to belabor a trivial point, but there are many ways of increasing food that would make sense that are not used... irrigation, crop rotation. Or if you want a building ... silos, barn.

"Hospitals" is so soylent greenish.

 

[Acken]

is just symbolic for food health and growth. in game is not purely food. Aqueducts and medical labs don't make people eat less food either.

 

[darkpigraph]

"Food" in Civ 5 is just shorthand for Population Growth Potential, just as "Happiness" is shorthand for Governability. So by extending citizen's lives a hospital drastically increases population growth potential.

On Topic, i love the resource-specific buildings like stables and stone works - when they apply to 2 or more resources they help a lot. The one that i do tend to skip however is the Forge; even though their unit-building bonus is crazy useful they come at a time when i'd rather build a workshop, and it's rare to have more than one source of iron near one city.

 

[orasis]

Anti-espionage buildings. It doesn't seem to matter how many I have built ... it doesn't matter, AI spies still steal techs.

 

[LordBalkoth]

Presumably something like the following:

Hospitals help provide medical care which results in the population living longer on average which results in steady population growth.

Which is then represented by a food bonus in game.

Anti-espionage buildings. It doesn't seem to matter how many I have built ... it doesn't matter, AI spies still steal techs.

Uh...yeah? All those buildings do is slow down enemy spies. And if the enemy spy is from an Autocracy Civ, the buildings do very little.

 

[Acken]

It slows stealing but it doesn't prevent it.

 

[reddishrecue]

Only counter espionage spies could increase stealing prevention.

 

[lefuet]

... The one that i do tend to skip however is the Forge; even though their unit-building bonus is crazy useful they come at a time when i'd rather build a workshop, and it's rare to have more than one source of iron near one city.

The unit production bonus applies to ALL land units, including civilian like caravans, settler, worker, ..

 

[SeedenGreedens]

The unit production bonus applies to ALL land units, including civilian like caravans, settler, worker, ..

That could be great.. some of these buildings are really worth building because they make production so well..

 

[darkpigraph]

The unit production bonus applies to ALL land units, including civilian like caravans, settler, worker, ..

I did NOT know that 8|

I was always under the impression that it only applied to Infantry type units. I'll definitely reconsider my stance on the forge then!

Does anyone know if the seaport's naval production bonus applies to cargo ships and work boats as well?

 

[lefuet]

I did NOT know that 8|

I was always under the impression that it only applied to Infantry type units. I'll definitely reconsider my stance on the forge then!

Does anyone know if the seaport's naval production bonus applies to cargo ships and work boats as well?

yes, it does.

 

[A.J.K.]

Most of mine have been mentioned. Stables, windmills... obviously recycling centers if you have plenty of aluminum...

as far as military units, I hardly ever build chariot archers or spearmen, or most air units.

 

[shaglio]

The unit production bonus applies to ALL land units, including civilian like caravans, settler, worker, ..

I didn't know this either. So a Forge will help in pumping out those pesky non-purchasable Archeologist in the latter half of the game.

 

[MisterBoomBoom]

Walls. Castles (not until very late and I can get gold from them if I get Neuschwanstein).
Walls are a luxury in anything but the highest levels of play and often you can't layer in early upgrades via barracks if playing at higher levels because you simple don't have time to do so. I also will only build one armory in the same city I build the Alhambra if possible-making it my ONE unit build city ...and make it a coastal one at that.

 

[shaglio]

I'm aware of the merits of the Walls and Barracks lines of buildings . . . and yet, I rarely ever build them unless I've run out of other things to build. Even when vying for a Domination Victory, I still wind up buying them more than building them. They always seem to slip down my priority list in each of my games - not as low a priority as the Caravansary or the anti-spy line, but almost as low.

I also rarely build Recycling Centers, Bomb Shelters, and Medical Labs.