Which is worth more? 7 gpt or 4 excess happiness per turn?

[Barking Iguana]

About to transition from Classical to Medieval Era. Epic/Large/Emperor I have a luxury to sell.

There's almost no chance I'll need the happiness during the 45 turns, except as points toward a Golden Age. So really, the question is would you pay 7 gpt for 4 gappt?

For years, I've just assumed the gappt were worth more unless I had some special temporary need for gold. But now I wonder what others think.

 

[poxpower]

Gold is much better except in cases where the extra happiness removes the need for you building happiness buildings so you can focus on something better like universities or water mills or whatever.

 

[joncnunn]

Depends a lot on what your global happiness currently is and how fast your cities are growing.
I play standard 4 (self built city) Tradition tall and so my cities are growing as fast as possible and so I find I burn thru a lot more than 4 happiness points every 30 turns on normal speed; and so (unless playing Netherlands) I almost never trade away the last copy of a luxury; except in the edge case of there's a spare one in my territory that I'm in the process of hooking up.

Golden Age considerations don't come into play; being absolutely positive I won't slip into negative happiness for even a single turn does.

My main resource of income from AI is spare strategic resources.

 

[peterabc1995]

I'm a newcomer, and I think it also depends on when you'll begin your Golden Age.
A Golden Age will provide 20% production bonus, which means a significant boost to city construction. If you're building universites, it will make you earlier to finish it, which means that you'll have scientist specialist earlier to boost your science per turn. If you're building wonders, it will also make you earlier to finish it. But if you're building unimportant things, the Golden Age bonus is less useful.

 

[Browd]

The full costs/benefits should be assessed. A Golden Age itself will provide extra gold (so the extra 7 gpt from selling the luxury should be haircut by your estimated GA gold yield) as well as +20% production and +20% culture. On the other hand, all the incremental +4 happiness from retaining the luxury does is accelerate the timing of your next Golden Age -- it doesn't give you an "extra" Golden Age. So, a better way of phrasing the question is whether giving up 7 gpt between now and your next Golden Age starts (however many turns that may be) is worth getting your next GA a couple of dozen (or however many) turns earlier than it would otherwise occur if your happiness dropped by -4 as a result of selling the luxury.

 

[Kimiimaro]

Also depends on which civ are you playing. When you'll enter late game with Brazil or Persia, I would save the happines, because the power of these civs depends on golden ages.