What do you think is the worst GP?

[Dusty4prez]

The age old question(not really ) Personally I think Great Prophets become the worst if you can't build a shrine and GA's get worse in the late game.

 

[King Flevance]

I voted Great Merchant with Prophet as a close second as the polls seemed to reflect everyone elses view too.

Merchant - I play on huge maps and usually the trade missions are rarely worth the effort you put into them and it REALLY sucks if something goes wrong and the merchant dies despite a bodyguard. So they usually end up becoming specialists for the constant commerce bonus with a couple food that I normally have plenty of.

Prophet - If you dont found a religion or if you already built Holy CIty shrines, again, they are most valuable as a specialist just because you have them. What ranked them over the merchant is that sometimes they help with their little 2 hammer boost to help a city with low production (usually island cities) up to par or at least to a reasonable amount. Building a temple goes from 100 turns to 30.

 

[Chamaedrys]

The Great Prophets have their time and their stragtegy. The Great Prophets are very powerful in the early stage of the game, cause they let you found religions and build shrines. But when all religions are founded and all shrines are build, they are nothing more than an add to your financial city.

 

[BadHorsie]

Yeah but Prophets are very good early game, and therefore better than Merchants, IMO. The trade missions are just so pointless, if they even succeed that is. I think Merchants are just useless except for the little financial boost (which is pretty much unnoticable by the time I get one).

I agree King Flevance, that the Prophets do help to boost with hammers in crappier cities.

 

[slightlymarxist]

For me, it's Prophets since I rarely bother founding a religion. I'll just take my neighbour's Holy City.

 

[dimaliok]

The age old question(not really ) Personally I think Great Prophets become the worst if you can't build a shrine and GA's get worse in the late game.

Ya great phropets are wothless industriel and on

 

[tymmail]

i vote for engineer because i found it brings little benefits in late game---many projects cannot be rushed, little hammer and beakers gain for joining city.

i find prophets are quite amusing as they brings multiple benefits with some wonder and civics (gold, beaker, culture, and hammer all in one GP!).

 

[Mewtarthio]

Great Engineers can rush anything except Internet, SDI, Manhattan, and anything required for SS victory (they can, however, rush Space Elevator). Wonders don't always get full rush, but they can take quite a few turns off.

I voted Prophet because once you have all the Shrines they become pretty much useless. They can't even rush any valuable techs (nothning at all past Liberalism, unless you get to Future Tech).

 

[`DG`]

Only scientist and engineer are significantly useful throughout the game, IMO they're what makes it worth whoring a city for GP points. There's never enough scientists to go round all the cities worth having an academy in, never enough engineers for wonders. nevermind their useful extra beakers/hammers.

The first couple of prophets are usually extremely useful, but afterwards it's the most useless waste of GP points, I use mainly for free tech. Merchants arent of much use, but their benefit is better than a priest, I use ~ 50:50 as a super-specialist:free tech. Artists can usually be put to some use even when not going for cultural victory - nothing on a great eng or scientist, but if you manipulate the odds towards eng/scientists there's usually a use for the artists when they come around.

 

[marioflag]

Personally i find that great scientist are the weakest in game.While they are useful in nearly all game they are not game breaking as other GP.I agree anyway that Prophets are really weak after all religions have been founded.

 

[Thrar]

Scientists are definitely nice imo, for the academy early, instant tech discoveries until about industrial age, and if all else fails a nice super specialist. In the oxford city with academy they'll produce up to 20 beakers!
Prophets aren't that bad either I think. Making shrines is one thing, but the super specialist is pretty good, too, can get some nice hammers to commerce cities.
Engineers are quite useful, but I find myself getting them quite rarely, since usually you can't have more than one engineer specialist until late (from forge), so the probabilities are low. I don't know what they do as super specialist, but wonder rushing rocks.
I'm not so sure about the exact benefits of the merchant super specialists - they give 1 food, which is probably the best thing any super specialist gives, and I suppose as much gold as the priests or a little more. It's been a while since I've used those, but especially for the food, they are pretty useful. Trade missions aren't so bad either. You don't have to travel the whole world, just go to the other end of your continent, through an allied civ's city, and get yourself some 2k gold.

Which leaves the artist. That's the one I haven't yet put to any really good use. Culture bombs are nice I guess, but don't help much on established borders. The super specialist just plain sucks. So, this is the one I've voted for.

 

[smjjames]

yea, the great artist is especially useful if you need to culture bomb a new city, one that needs a boost (it can help in the late game when trying to get a Cultural victory), or culture bomb a city that just flipped to my empire.

I find the great prophets virtually useless in the late game, although they can help new cities (newly settled, conquered or flipped) a little bit.

the great merchants I have the least use for, although the gold boost does help.

 

[Olleus]

Scientist super specalist isn't that good. Even with representation it only gives you 1 more beaker than a town.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Prophets are probably worst but only when you can't use them for tech or shrines as said, still they provide nice little production/ gold boost to a commercial city

 

[aaronflavor]

Hard to choose; I think they all have their uses, and which one I want most depends on the situation. Civ4 did a good job in this regard.

Unfortunately, it does a somewhat less job with late game, where they're fairly useless. Superspecialist doesn't have time to contribute much, and researching a tech doesn't give you more than a few turns of research anyway, and you've built the most significant of your academies and shrines. This is very unfortunate for games where it takes a while to find a good great person farm location and get it going.

 

[salty mud]

I chose Great Prophets. As everyone else said, they are good in the early game, but I'd prefer Artists overall. They discover good techs, and the culture bomb is great!

 

[mjs0]

Great Prophet
I often ignore the polytheism/monotheism/theology branch early on and head for techs to get to taoism or confucianism instead. So after my first great prophet builds the holy shrine subsequent ones are left to become super specialists or discover polytheism which by this point only saves a couple of turns of research.
I generally have much better options for other GPs.

 

[Older than Dirt]

After seeing the voting results, I almost begin to relish playing MP. But, I fear the contest would be much easier than playing single player.

 

[Figaro]

The Great Merchant seems to me to be the most useless, but I hardly ever get any anyway. Great Prophets are a close second - often some religions (generally Islam actually) of religions don't spread very far at all anyway so the shrine is next to useless. And there are loads and loads of them.

Great Engineers are probably the best, followed by Great Artists I think - I love culture bombing. Once you've got lots of Academies, Great Scientists aren't that great.

 

[Bongo-Bongo]

For me, Great Merchants are the worst. All though trade missions are useful, a well run economy shouldn't really need them. I only ever want one from discovering Economics first.

Great Prophet would have to be second IMO. They are good for building shrines, but when you have built all of the shrines you can, or if you dont found a religion, their use is minimal.