Wonder priority

[shyuhe]

I'm surprised that so many people dismiss the Taj and MoM. MoM can be tough to get depending on your tech choices but it's an awesome wonder to have (or conquer). Taj goes well with a liberalism sling to MT or steel or rifling and preparing for war in ~10 turns.

GW is useless on normal settings. If you're playing with raging barbs and the GW, you're just playing with gimped settings. GLH is an excellent wonder if you plan for it.

 

[ben-jammin]

I'm surprised that so many people dismiss the Taj and MoM. MoM can be tough to get depending on your tech choices but it's an awesome wonder to have (or conquer). Taj goes well with a liberalism sling to MT or steel or rifling and preparing for war in ~10 turns.

GW is useless on normal settings. If you're playing with raging barbs and the GW, you're just playing with gimped settings. GLH is an excellent wonder if you plan for it.

Love love love the MoM, and it goes without saying that once you get it you're going to do e verything possible to get the Taj as well. I usually try to win the music race and then trade it for calendar to build the MoM for a nice 12 turn golden age from the great artist. Plays nicely into great scientists to bulb your way to liberalism before the rest and take nationalism to build the taj.

 

[FlyingSwan]

Big fan too of the MoM,that coupled with the parthenon coupled with a PHI leader coupled with Pacifism and caste+a GA=magic.

 

[Zechnophobe]

+10% science is pretty good.

It doesnt give you a "different play style," it gives you good bonuses without having to miss a turn of anarchy just to adopt a religion that will often have diplomatic consequences that can cost you the game. I've played many a game where I was never able to take advantage of a religious civic bonus until pacifism nyway because i just straight up could not afford to adopt a religion. It's quite easy to keep neighbours pleased without having a religion, much harder (sometimes impossible) to do with a different religion. So sure, you can just stay in no religion, but then you get zero bonuses. That affects tech trading as well as declarations of war, which does quite significantly impact your game if not giving you a "different play style" which is a strange way to measure how good something is. Plus the Shwadegon Paya is a cheaper wonder than the Pyramids with its production bonus from what is usually a more common resource. It comes at a time when your production should be higher and expansion is less pressing, and is in my experience less of a race against time to build (though its true that occasionally the mids will go super late, but it's not something you bet on if you're planning to build it in the first place).

I think you maybe didn't follow my full list of posts here. I had made the comment that only a few Wonders are 'game changers', and your response saying the SP was a 'game changer' didn't fit with my definition. I'm not defining the quality of a wonder by its value in making you play differently, but rather stating that some strategies have, at their core, the existence of a wonder. Specialist Economies are much MUCH stronger with Pyramids than without.

And yes, Pyramids cost a lot, and if you are planning on building them, you must make a dedicated effort to, especially if you aren't industrial, and don't have stone. (Check out Yatta's Immortal Game where he shows a good way to get them). This really enforces my point. The reason you would go SO FAR out of your way to get the Pyramids, risk and all, is because once you have them the entire face of the game changes.

You pick up the Shwedagon Paya because it is cheap and you have gold. Heck, the SP is two techs away from Philosophy, so using it for Pacifism isn't really that impressive. The +10% science compared to +3 science from specialists is (assuming an average of 1 specialist per city) only comparable if your cities average 30 science each. A pretty impressive goal early on. Rarely will that happen... unless you are using a lot of scientist specialists .

 

[MarigoldRan]

If I have gold, I like SP for fail gold.

 

[Mylene]

Silly stuff like huge maps or raging barbs aside (where it is just abusing the settings), GW is one of the best wonders. You can steal so many techs with the GSpy, for a really not that huge hammer investment. And they often pay back for themselves..no more axes/chariots/archers needed.
There is just the problem of getting it on high difficulties

I would rate like that..
Mids - prolly the most powerful. If you are also SPI or PHI, this is an overpowered wonder imo.
Mainly cos the time frame to build it is long, and making use of chops beats the AI to it.
There is also the great engineer points, and you might just get all these hammers back later.

Great Lighthouse - is good but often a pain to get, cos you usually have to build it in your cap..maybe the wonder that cripples early expansion the most. But if there is lots of coast, it fixes all economy problems.

Oracle - bribing AIs into war early makes it powerful, esp. with warmongers on the map.

ToA - well...the games i built that can be counted on 1 hand I just never seem to have time for it

TGL - lots of relative early GS points at the best possible time, one of the strongest..but this route gets sooo old after a while

Shew - mostly useless cept for fail gold, here it can be nice with gold...Philo is often bulbed, Mono is cheap, Theo or FR are usually used later

MoM - a mixed bag, certainly nice to have but often impossible to get

Taj - If you have a high production city and marble it's good, if not it usually takes too long and the usefulness of another GA decays

 

[yatta77]

Mids - prolly the most powerful.

Same opinion here.
AP and UN, from another prospective, for the fact they allow a specific victory condition, might also be considered extremely powerful.

In someone is interested, few more opinions on the 'mids might be found in this recent thread:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=425228

 

[UncleJJ]

GW is useless on normal settings. If you're playing with raging barbs and the GW, you're just playing with gimped settings. GLH is an excellent wonder if you plan for it.

GW is far from useless, if you find that you're probably doing something wrong. I rate it highly for the third and less mentioned ability; the +100% GG points inside cultural borders. This is particularly useful in the late game and applies to naval and air battles inside own borders as well as land ones. A newly captured city still in revolt counts as cultural borders and in that way the GW can be used offensively by provoking the AI to counterattack. Fighters and SAM infantry can earn a lot of GGPs by interceptions, typically 4 or 8 each time. Privateers hidden in a port can pick off wandering caravels even into the late game and gain extra GGPs. In some games the GW can provide an early game GSpy and one or two extra GGs even if there are no barbarians to consider on that map setting.