What is the worst Unique Building?

[Higher Game]

And yet, comically enough, rep specialists are still superior to the non-seafood, so your UB benefit is roughly 1-3 commerce in such a city. That's surely worth waiting >150 turns rather than getting something else sooner! Or not. Never mind that least resistance is not always best.

If this is a Portuguese friendly map full of overseas islands to expand to, universal suffrage is a stronger choice than representation because it helps build infrastructure in fresh new cities. At least, it's good for a granary and lighthouse before the whip comes out. The pyramids come in handy here.

If lots of seafood is available, it makes specialists less appealing, not more. A fast growing city can grow to use coastal tiles quickly. Without resources, it's probably better to cap it at size 7-8 or so and put down specialists, unless it has been settled early and long term growth has the time to pay for itself. With fish/crabs/clams, size 12+ is a better option to consider. A feitoria in a city like this can easily bring 6+ commerce over a normal customs house, which is further enhanced by other improvements.

Every wonder has variable mileage. Gwall is right around the "trash" level on standard maps for a lot of starts.

It's a poor island map wonder, for sure.

Don't quote something that doesn't apply here and attempt to use it to pass off a failing argument. The seowon and stock exchange are both FAR more consistently useful than the feitoria to any competent player - they are stronger bonuses and can easily take advantage of city specialization. They also are viable in a larger city # on top of being stronger basic bonuses. Not only that, the are both available sooner.

How is flexibility inapplicable? A feitoria can work for espionage, gold, science, or culture. Those other buildings can't. This drawback shouldn't be ignored.

A very trashy benefit on what is generally your most marginal tiles available comes in handy more than extra raw multipliers in specialized cities that are built sooner? Are you *really* trying to make that argument? Really?

I question how much those raw multipiers really contribute. A specialized, large city with 80 commerce, at 50% science slider, gets 10 beakers from a university and 14 from a seowon. A feitoria city only has to work 4 coast tiles to match the seowon's improvement (at a big city, no less), and this is before that commerce is further enhanced from other improvements.

Raw commerce is better than raw multipliers.

Never mind that the ROI on a feitoria has to be sufficient to make it a plausible build, and that almost all of that ROI comes from the basic effect of the building, not the UB benefit. It's a pretty sound joke to claim the feitoria is consistently useful to begin with, but comparing it to 10% extra yield in one's best cities sooner makes it hard to even take anything you're saying seriously.

The customs house is consistently useful. The feitoria is a solid improvement over it. 10% extra yield is like a free monastery, good but not amazing.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If this is a Portuguese friendly map full of overseas islands to expand to, universal suffrage is a stronger choice than representation because it helps build infrastructure in fresh new cities. At least, it's good for a granary and lighthouse before the whip comes out. The pyramids come in handy here.

I don't know what to say. $$$ rush before 100% gold multipliers is horrible, and universal suffrage without heavy investment in towns is also. If you want hammers in those cities, you whip. You only need pop 2 (expansive) or 4 (otherwise) to whip a granary, and then things get fast. That approach is a lot better than bleeding out your tech pace to set up a marginal city.

How is flexibility inapplicable? A feitoria can work for espionage, gold, science, or culture. Those other buildings can't. This drawback shouldn't be ignored.

It's the "no plan" quote that is inapplicable/inappropriate in this context. A feitoria can work for any of that...poorly, late, and on the last tiles you want to work. Those other buildings boost the way the city was SPECIALIZED. Maybe you should think about that term, because it's a prime key to success in this game. Each of the buildings mentioned improve the returns in highly specialized cities. A ~1-3 commerce boost in a weak city has nothing on an EARLIER 20 beaker/turn boost because that 10% is in your bureaucracy city.

I question how much those raw multipiers really contribute. A specialized, large city with 80 commerce, at 50% science slider, gets 10 beakers from a university and 14 from a seowon. A feitoria city only has to work 4 coast tiles to match the seowon's improvement (at a big city, no less), and this is before that commerce is further enhanced from other improvements.

Cute. Too bad those coast tiles are the last thing you want to work in that kind of city. I like how you continually ignore that buildings like the seowan come sooner too.

By the way, you are operating on some extremely stupid assumptions, to try to prove your point. How about I cheat back then? 100% slider, 80 base commerce, bureaucracy capitol. A seowan is worth 12 beakers in this city over what a university could do. Not even your precious feitoria...if for some reason you'd work anything it helps other than seafood...beats that. With deficit research and building wealth being prevalent in high level play, the 100% isn't excessively unlikely, either.

The customs house is consistently useful. The feitoria is a solid improvement over it. 10% extra yield is like a free monastery, good but not amazing.

Should I rest my case just quoting this? Customs house is consistently useful, even if you're in mercantilism? Even if you're at war with most of the world? Even if there are 5-8 buildings and units that are better builds?

Also, a "free" monastery (though that isn't quite right) is not something you should ignore. A monastery has the same to return as an observatory. But no, we would rather have a crappy bonus on a building that comes later, of course!

Raw commerce is better than raw multipliers.

You better add "sometimes", or you're going to look really silly.

 

[Higher Game]

I don't know what to say. $$$ rush before 100% gold multipliers is horrible, and universal suffrage without heavy investment in towns is also. If you want hammers in those cities, you whip. You only need pop 2 (expansive) or 4 (otherwise) to whip a granary, and then things get fast. That approach is a lot better than bleeding out your tech pace to set up a marginal city.

Gold rushing a starting granary and maybe a lighthouse isn't "bleeding out" one's tech pace, and I don't consider a specialist economy unless I'm philosophical. I like towns. Portugal can make plenty of them, being expansive.

It's the "no plan" quote that is inapplicable/inappropriate in this context. A feitoria can work for any of that...poorly, late, and on the last tiles you want to work. Those other buildings boost the way the city was SPECIALIZED. Maybe you should think about that term, because it's a prime key to success in this game. Each of the buildings mentioned improve the returns in highly specialized cities. A ~1-3 commerce boost in a weak city has nothing on an EARLIER 20 beaker/turn boost because that 10% is in your bureaucracy city.

A massive Portuguese nation (carrack colonies, expansive, imperialistic) is better served with feudalism, free speech, or nationhood, instead of a 1 city civic. This becomes more true on larger map sizes, less true on smaller; you mileage may vary.

I like bureaucracy the most for picking up the university of sankore (I don't bother with divine right), if my capital is productive and I have industrious/resources to help out. It's still a gamble.

Cute. Too bad those coast tiles are the last thing you want to work in that kind of city. I like how you continually ignore that buildings like the seowan come sooner too.

Yes, they come a couple techs earlier. They all have time to give similar returns by the late industrial era, though.

By the way, you are operating on some extremely stupid assumptions, to try to prove your point. How about I cheat back then? 100% slider, 80 base commerce, bureaucracy capitol. A seowan is worth 12 beakers in this city over what a university could do. Not even your precious feitoria...if for some reason you'd work anything it helps other than seafood...beats that. With deficit research and building wealth being prevalent in high level play, the 100% isn't excessively unlikely, either.

Running science at 50% isn't a stupid assumption or cheating. Wealth building is about as efficient, ironically, as working coast tiles; the hammer to gold conversion is very poor, and it doesn't even go through improvements. It's for workshop spammed AI cities with few surviving improvements you just conquered, not town based home cities.

Should I rest my case just quoting this? Customs house is consistently useful, even if you're in mercantilism? Even if you're at war with most of the world? Even if there are 5-8 buildings and units that are better builds?

Customs house is available with the same tech as free market, which for a non-rep non-phil leader is better than mercantilism. It's not hard to keep up 3-4 trading partners out of vassals, religious allies, and overseas rivals who leave you alone.

Also, a "free" monastery (though that isn't quite right) is not something you should ignore. A monastery has the same to return as an observatory. But no, we would rather have a crappy bonus on a building that comes later, of course!

I'm not ignoring it; I said it was good. It's just not vastly superior to the feitoria.

You better add "sometimes", or you're going to look really silly.

Sometimes, then.

 

[Iranon]

I don't consider water tiles all that weak. They're worth growing into when you have nothing better to do - say, in a filler city without food resources on its own (although I would borrow one to grow to my cap). They are also useful in a whipping cycle - regrow with water tiles, then throttle growth with specialists - they'll get at least some use in my better cities.

*

Having said that... most Unique Buildings affect most cities, the ones that don't had better be amazing when you can buld them. The Feitoria usually isn't, comes on a building that's a little situational even when you can build it and is unlocked by a tech that obsoletes another one.
You may want Free Market anyway, you may have a trade situation that makes Customs Houses useful, you may not have bothered to build Castles... but this adds qualifiers to redeem a building that's not impressive even at its best.

I won't get into Mercantilism or the relationship between specialists and PHI - I've written too much on the subjects already.

The flexibility argument for raw commerce is a little dubious. Most empires want science, most empires outside OCCs (hardly Portugal's natural habitat) need to make some concessions to generate gold. If you want Espionage, you may want to avoid Economics anyway.
If the Stock Exchange is irrelevant in most cities because you can run at 100% science, it's likely to make that up by being fantastic in the city that pays all the bills.

Adding insult to the injury: In most cities where the Feitoria is impressive, I'd probably prefer the Sacrifical Altar since that allows me to get infrastructure up quickly for snowballing gains. It generally does more to make water tiles worth working, at an earlier time.

 

[CornPlanter]

15 votes for Stele?
15 for Research Institute?
And only 4 for Freitoria?

Mint, Obelisk, Ger, Baray got more than zero votes...?

Yes, you can tell General Discussions subforum from Strategy subforum without even looking at the name...

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Gold rushing a starting granary and maybe a lighthouse isn't "bleeding out" one's tech pace, and I don't consider a specialist economy unless I'm philosophical. I like towns. Portugal can make plenty of them, being expansive.

Anyone can make lots of towns. But until you put up heavy infrastructure and are post-democracy, pretty much all of your towns are going to be in 1-2 cities, unless you're financial with amazing land. Rush buy w/o the gold multipliers is an awful idea.

A massive Portuguese nation (carrack colonies, expansive, imperialistic) is better served with feudalism, free speech, or nationhood, instead of a 1 city civic. This becomes more true on larger map sizes, less true on smaller; you mileage may vary.

Of course it's map and empire dependent, but a raw base commerce multiplier is pretty rare in this game. Those civics have to be used to other potentials or the capitol has to be pretty bad before bureaucracy loses even if you're around 10-12 cities. I guess for large maps with a hard push for expansion and warfare together you might want vassalage. Otherwise, you are waiting for nationhood or waiting until free speech is actually a decent payout (factoring the civic upkeep, but also change in output).

I like bureaucracy the most for picking up the university of sankore (I don't bother with divine right), if my capital is productive and I have industrious/resources to help out. It's still a gamble.

? Sankore is rarely a gamble below deity? You can kind of tell if they can get it or not usually.

Running science at 50% isn't a stupid assumption or cheating. Wealth building is about as efficient, ironically, as working coast tiles; the hammer to gold conversion is very poor, and it doesn't even go through improvements. It's for workshop spammed AI cities with few surviving improvements you just conquered, not town based home cities.

50% isn't cheating, but neither is 100%. If you're brokering tech for gold and building wealth, 100% isn't exactly difficult often.

What I put in bold is WRONG. In BTS, wealth, research, and culture go through *hammer* multipliers, allowing cities set up for units to contribute very meaningfully to economy if you have enough units for the time being. The ironic part here is that in this case your oh-so-flexible commerce hurts you when working coast vs mines. Mines go through hammer multipliers and the building output is independent of the slider. This can allow you to pay off debts and run your high science slider through the city(ies) with the best multipliers - like an academy and later oxford capitol or any other strong city.

Non financial cottages are often, to quote one of the best players on this forum, "a trap", and take so long to pay back the investment of working them that you come out behind.

Great scientist bulbing can also rip early-mid game coast to shreds comparatively.

Customs house is available with the same tech as free market, which for a non-rep non-phil leader is better than mercantilism. It's not hard to keep up 3-4 trading partners out of vassals, religious allies, and overseas rivals who leave you alone.

Sometimes. It depends on map size. Don't forget that your trade partners also get your trade commerce, and that's not always insignificant. You also forgo some espionage if for some reason you build castles (maybe you're spain), and certainly an alternate tech path takes one out to communism for SP + shop spam.

Yes, you can tell General Discussions subforum from Strategy subforum without even looking at the name...

It initially surprised me a bit how little overlap there is in posters between the two subforums, especially given that often similar questions/ideas are posed in each. I agree that the general knowledge/skill of S&T is better than GD, and probably better than any other subforum than GOTM and its subforums, the succession games, and possibly HoF. Probably the best call the XOTM and succession games home, but S&T isn't far behind.

Yet for some reason I still don't know, there is significant splits between subforums. It would make more sense if people looked around a bit.

 

[CornPlanter]

Yet for some reason I still don't know, there is significant splits between subforums. It would make more sense if people looked around a bit.

Well basically S&T is all one needs to learn Civ. What you didn't find there, you wont find @ General too. There's also Modding forums but modding takes so much time that most of serious moders just dont have time for learning Immortal+ (unless they are really talented and/or have no hobbies apart from Civ). Whats the purpose of General I dont really understand... talking about how you like civ, or which civ's color scheme is the best?

Back to topic... I was a bit surprised you voted for Assembly Plant. It's something you build in every single game (provided that the game lasts that long, of course). I understand that being the latest building in the game is a major drawback, but still, do you consider it worse than Freitoria? Worse than Hippodrome? I dont play Byzantines often, but I do play Portugals and I almost always just skip Freitoria in favor of other buildings/units... dammit, that's skipping Unique Building, can it get worse than that?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Well basically S&T is all one needs to learn Civ. What you didn't find there, you wont find @ General too. There's also Modding forums but modding takes so much time that most of serious moders just dont have time for learning Immortal+ (unless they are really talented and/or have no hobbies apart from Civ). Whats the purpose of General I dont really understand... talking about how you like civ, or which civ's color scheme is the best?

Back to topic... I was a bit surprised you voted for Assembly Plant. It's something you build in every single game (provided that the game lasts that long, of course). I understand that being the latest building in the game is a major drawback, but still, do you consider it worse than Freitoria? Worse than Hippodrome? I dont play Byzantines often, but I do play Portugals and I almost always just skip Freitoria in favor of other buildings/units... dammit, that's skipping Unique Building, can it get worse than that?

I rank it and Feitoria very closely in the "almost trash" area. It can't touch the double culture slider effect theater.

When considering the worst (or best) UB, I think of it in terms of "value over base building". This is where the assembly plant is really putrid: SOMETIMES, you get a cost reduction on it if you have the correct resource. You also get spec slots at a point in the game where you've probably already set up the engineer for mining inc (if you haven't, you might miss it), and generally cities that build factories work engineers as a last resort over hammer tiles available.

It was hard to pick between Feitoria and AP though. The deciding factor for me was 1) Craptoria comes a bit sooner (minimum 1 tech sooner, possibly more) and 2) Bad as it is, it has value-over-base in some cities.

So in essence, I picked something that has a higher chance to provide a marginally useful bonus (AP is almost nothing w/o coal) and is available a bit sooner. It's hard to take meaningful rankings at the very bottom of the barrel seriously though.

 

[NihilZero]

The Hippodrome can produce crazy amounts of . If you need to overcome war weariness or emanciation irritation, there is no building more powerful. And if you happen to be running an economy that doesn't need the science slider, then it costs you almost nothing...

 

[vicawoo]

Rush buying banks, especially stock exchanges, is a decent investment.

 

[Sportyatuncw06]

I voted for the Dun. I think the guerrilla promotion is very situational and mostly useless and I don't like playing as Celts anyways, not to mention I don't build walls in 80% of my cities anyways.

Shale plant is #2 worthless in my book. I almost never build coal plants due to pollution anyways.

I don't love dikes/carthon/feitoria due to the fact they must be on water and as much as half of my cities aren't depending on the map. Nice Ub's but I would rather have something I can use everywhere.

Mausoluem doesn't excite me. Nor does the ziggurat. I am baffeled as to why it was left off this list.

I think the mall and research institute are great UB's. Granted they are late game, but most of mine go late anyways and I think they are two of the strongest buildings if you looks solely at how they upgrade from standard buildings.

 

[CornPlanter]

not to mention I don't build walls in 80% of my cities anyways.

I dont build walls but I do build Duns. Duns are really significant improvement over the basic walls. They are not very good by any means, but comparing to walls...

As opposed to Freitoria, where nobody really builds original building and nobody really builds Freitorias either. Like I said, if UB is so trash that you dont want to build it at all under almost any circumstances, it takes the cake.

You can also compare the cost of Dun and Freitoria. Dun usually can be built within 2 turns at most, right? Small cost for small benefit. If average coastal city could build Freitoria/Customs House within a single turn at it's time, that would be a good beginning to fix this crapy building.

 

[CornPlanter]

Those ideas seem pretty nice, has anyone ever had success with that?

I really doubt it, given that Gunpowder obsoletes Walls/Duns Sorry about that...

Nor does the ziggurat.

Now you gotta be kidding. We are talking cheaper courthouse that comes with priesthood, right? For civilization with top tier rush UU? I would rate ziggurat among the top UBs, if not the top one.

Shale plant is #2 worthless in my book. I almost never build coal plants due to pollution anyways.

An error, I dare to say. Coal plants' benefit is far better than drawback (polution). I used to shun them too, pollution graphics are so disturbing But aside from graphics, you can do some math and see if that extra 1 or 2 population in a production city would give you as much as Shale/Coal plant does. That's given that you have no means to fight pollution, which is not always the case.

 

[Silu]

Rifling obsoletes Walls, not Gunpowder, so you can have Muskets and Grens benefit from the Dun if you go that way. Gunpowder-based units ignore the Wall defense bonus (which, by the way, is not obsoleted by Rifling), there's a difference.

That said, attacking with a bunch of G3 Muskets is one of those plays that seem cool on paper but tend to really suck in reality. Kinda like promoting the bulk of your army M1->March (without the Red Cross) to "keep the advance going", or using CKNs the way they're supposed to be used (really expensive suiciders)

Nevertheless mass G units can be stellar in pillaging and choking wars on hill-heavy maps, and some G3s are nice to have as nutcrackers/softeners in regular siege-driven war even though they aren't that great when massed.

 

[CornPlanter]

Rifling obsoletes Walls, not Gunpowder, so you can have Muskets and Grens benefit from the Dun if you go that way. Gunpowder-based units ignore the Wall defense bonus (which, by the way, is not obsoleted by Rifling), there's a difference.

My bad. Gotta try them one day

 

[NihilZero]

How anybody could forgo the immense power of +50% production for the sake of avoiding a few points of unhealthiness is beyond me. At worst you might lose a couple of pop which may or may not cost you a worked tile. The gains more than outweigh this, and with factories and power you can build as many health buildings as you like at great speed if you are really all that worried about a little smog. In any case the pollution argument applies even less to the shale plant as it gives you cleaner energy letting you ditch your coal, and another +10% on top of the 50%!

Of course, you won't usually build powered factories in GP farms and other high population, low production specialist cities. if you want to though, there is always the National Park, and the Shale Plant works fine with it.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Shale comes too late to be considered a top UB, but it is still a useful one and the health differential gives it WAY more value-over base than many alternative UBs in its era. It's not even close to bottom UB.

 

[kochman]

I went with Research Institute because it just comes SOOOOO late in the game.

 

[Ataxerxes]

I voted for the Dun. I think the guerrilla promotion is very situational and mostly useless and I don't like playing as Celts anyways, not to mention I don't build walls in 80% of my cities anyways.

Shale plant is #2 worthless in my book. I almost never build coal plants due to pollution anyways.

I don't love dikes/carthon/feitoria due to the fact they must be on water and as much as half of my cities aren't depending on the map. Nice Ub's but I would rather have something I can use everywhere.

Mausoluem doesn't excite me. Nor does the ziggurat. I am baffeled as to why it was left off this list.

I think the mall and research institute are great UB's. Granted they are late game, but most of mine go late anyways and I think they are two of the strongest buildings if you looks solely at how they upgrade from standard buildings.

Agree with most, but have to disagree on a couple.

I like Shale Plants, I know about the unhappiness, but I try to trade heavily for resources (or capture them). Love the extra hammers for more military.

Mausoleum isn't bad. I like extra 2 happiness. Not top-tier, but not terrible.

Ziggurat, I agree with Corn Planter. It's a great UB: half-priced courthouses available much earler. What's not to love? Especially if you like getting an axe-rush going with the UU, which is quite good. Even though Protective is weak, everthing else works for Gilgamesh.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Nor does the ziggurat

You wonder why a cheap courthouse available on the path to monarchy wasn't included?

Coal plants are generally the best of power options, shale plants even more so. What do you use, nuke jokes? Waiting 20000+ beakers and 30+ normal speed turns to gain the power boost?

Dun is a bit situational and it is down there but I'm still a little surprised it has such a COMMANDING lead.