Is a Golden Age worth it?

[Arrian]

// Spent as "Discovery" //
An immediate +1200 beakers toward the discovery of Guilds (which costs 900 beakers, and therefore also provides +300 beakers overage).

Does that overage get wasted or not? I've hesitated on using great people to discover techs until they're worth a fair bit, thinking I'd be wasting them...

-Arrian

[Quillan]

I'm almost certain that any "overage" from using a GP to discover a technology does not carry over into your next research project. I'm also nearly certain that there is no carryover from any overage when a great engineer rushes a construction. I think it provides you a maximum of X beakers/hammers towards that particular thing. I don't think it will give you more than you need.

[Arrian]

That's what I thought. Which is why, except in very special circumstances, I will not use a Great Scientist on a tech that costs less than ~1200 beakers.

-Arrian

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Arrian
I have taken to making them into superspecialists in border cities... that way, my border expansion is more of an insidious creep rather than a BOOM! event. The BOOM sometimes will trigger a war I'm not looking for, whereas the slower, steadier way gives me some time to make sure I'm ready for the border tensions.

Sometimes it doesn't matter since you have just captured the border city.