National Wonder Synergy

[Supr49er]

What two National Wonders do people build together?

I have found to my surprise that the National Park and Moai Statues work great if you're on a wooded peninsula.

Are there other great combinations? Any unusual synergies you have found?

[Ming]

I like Moai Statues and Iron Works.

I call that "instant navy"

[Quillan]

Assuming you generate a lot of great prophets, Wall Street and Iron Works go very well together, as settling the prophets gives both a gold bonus and a hammer bonus that get multiplied many times over. Globe Theater and National Epic can work in a city configured for maximum food to allow for pumping out great people, but now it's a bit of a toss up between Globe Theater (for no unhappiness in the huge city) and National Park (for no base unhealthiness in the huge city). I often put West Point in a coastal city with the Red Cross, allowing me to build high experience units of any type that don't need to spend promotions on Medic. Assuming you've configured a city as a massive commerce producer with tons of cottages, you can combine Wall Street there with Oxford for both money and science.

Now, personally, it normally goes like this for me: if I have a holy city of a religion that's been widely spread, that's where Wall Street goes. Then any corporations I choose to found will go in the same city.

[DirtyMartini]

Looking forward to more responses -- this is always a bit of a trouble spot for me.

Where i have trouble is my capital. Usually, it seems the capital is high production early and and high commerce mid to late. If I build wonders early, the capital is (usually) where they're build. Therefore, the cap generally dominates in great people points. However, I don't want to put National Epic there, as eventually the capital is going to get Oxford. National Epic/Oxford doesn't seem ideal to me, and usually the capital site has tiles you want to work rather than assigning specialists.

So, since I don't want Nat. Epic in my cap, I end up delaying it and delaying it. Sometimes it gets built very, very late, which seems like an absolute waste. Thoughts? Where do people generally build their national epic? Do you prioritize it once you have literature?

As for the rest -- Shrine city gets Wall Street. I've stopped making my shrine city cottage heavy and focused on hammers instead, otherwise Wall Street takes forever. My second city site is usually planned to be a hammer-monster to produce units, and gets heroic epic. If possible, it will be coastal, in which case it also gets Moai Statues. If not Moai, maybe it gets West Point, but that also takes forever to build. Ironworks seems like a natural fit with Natural Park, but I haven't tried that yet.

[wodan11]

If I'm planning a late game win, I usually do Red Cross and West Point, and I put this city on the coast so it can make both land and sea units.

Wodan

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by DirtyMartini
Looking forward to more responses -- this is always a bit of a trouble spot for me.

Where i have trouble is my capital. Usually, it seems the capital is high production early and and high commerce mid to late. If I build wonders early, the capital is (usually) where they're build. Therefore, the cap generally dominates in great people points. However, I don't want to put National Epic there, as eventually the capital is going to get Oxford. National Epic/Oxford doesn't seem ideal to me, and usually the capital site has tiles you want to work rather than assigning specialists.

So, since I don't want Nat. Epic in my cap, I end up delaying it and delaying it. Sometimes it gets built very, very late, which seems like an absolute waste. Thoughts? Where do people generally build their national epic? Do you prioritize it once you have literature?

As for the rest -- Shrine city gets Wall Street. I've stopped making my shrine city cottage heavy and focused on hammers instead, otherwise Wall Street takes forever. My second city site is usually planned to be a hammer-monster to produce units, and gets heroic epic. If possible, it will be coastal, in which case it also gets Moai Statues. If not Moai, maybe it gets West Point, but that also takes forever to build. Ironworks seems like a natural fit with Natural Park, but I haven't tried that yet.

Typically I would put Nat Epic in the cap. There's no particular reason to want oxford in your cap in any give game; sometimes it will be the commerce leader, but it shouldn't always be the commerce leader. If you're building plenty of cities early and making commerce specialty cities, your cap usually will be behind a couple of them (as your cap usually is a multitasked city, as it needs to build units (and wonders etc.) in the early game and also keep your commerce up.


I'd have wall street with oxford often (both in my super commerce city) if i've got a city with a ton of towns; national epic in my capital with some other NW depending on what it's got in it; and IW with either moai statues or with heroic epic (yay fast units). West Point goes with red cross of course, and beyond that I don't really have any set placements ...

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by snoopy369


Typically I would put Nat Epic in the cap. There's no particular reason to want oxford in your cap in any give game; sometimes it will be the commerce leader, but it shouldn't always be the commerce leader. If you're building plenty of cities early and making commerce specialty cities, your cap usually will be behind a couple of them (as your cap usually is a multitasked city, as it needs to build units (and wonders etc.) in the early game and also keep your commerce up.


I'd have wall street with oxford often (both in my super commerce city) if i've got a city with a ton of towns; national epic in my capital with some other NW depending on what it's got in it; and IW with either moai statues or with heroic epic (yay fast units). West Point goes with red cross of course, and beyond that I don't really have any set placements ...

"no particular reason to want oxford in your cap "?

IMO Oxford goes very well with the benefit of bureaucracy in the capital.

RJM

[Ming]

I usually save Oxford and Wall Street for my capital. And I do use bureaucracy for much of the game. After I have other great cities, my capital is usually set for research or wealth depending on my situation. It's on research when I need to race to a tech, or it's on wealth to fund a large army in the field. If neither is needed at the moment, it can build a wonder.

I put heroic epic and West point together...
And I put national epic in a city that will become my great person city. It usually competes quite well with the capital for kicking out great people.

If red cross came earlier, I would be really tempted to combine it with West Point... but that late in the game, I will just build it in one of my large production cities and use a few great generals to add to the promotions.
Also, at that point, I'm usually building a lot of tanks with my west point/heroic epic city, and they don't get the health promotion anyway.

[snoopy369]

I don't use bureaucracy late in the game, if you have a decent number of cities it doesn't give enough of a benefit. You should have enough other highly productive cities even by the era of Oxford that you are near switching out of it already (The limitation is not having the techs, but you shouldn't be that far off).

Maybe in 20% of my games my capital is my highest commerce city, but in 80% there is a higher commerce city. That city gets oxford and wall street

[Ming]

I tend to develop my capital into a commerce city early on to help afford expansion or war... (granted, if the land around it isn't good for that, that's a different story)
So my capital is usually one of my best commerce cities.

[DirtyMartini]

Those of you who don't put National Epic in the capital -- do you plan a spot for it in the very early going? As soon as I have my immediate surroundings scouted, I specifically plan for a unit pump and 1-2 commerce centers. I generally haven't allotted one of the early city sites for a GP pump, because it takes longer to set up and to show benefit. I usually end up trying to turn an enemy civs capital into a GP pump, but that seems inefficient.

[Quillan]

Personally, a dedicated GP pump is normally not a huge priority for me. My second city is generally situated for a strategic resource like copper, the third being deliberately sited for maximum production, and normally a fourth will be on a seacoast if nothing else is. I'm generally down to a best my 5th city before I start looking at specializing in producing great people, and I don't always do it.

It's terrain dependent. I need a city site with lots of food potential to do it. For me, that normally means either pretty much grassland with 1-2 food specials or a mix of grassland and flood plains. You have to have multiple squares that generate more than 2 food to work specialists, so the more food specials the better. Flood plains work too once farmed, especially once you get to Biology, but that's late game.

[wodan11]

Lately I've been playing with "mixed" GP. BtS encourages you heavily to diversify your GP.

You want a prophet or two for shrines. You want a merchant/engineer/scientist/whatever for corps, maybe even more than one of mixed types. You want scientists if you plan to lightbulb, an engineer or two to rush key wonders, an artist or two to great work key captured cities....

My point is that a GP farm seems to me to be of less utility these days, than it might have been previously. Sure, you can still do a "lightbulb" strategy where you pump out scientists, but you're probably going to have to give up on corps and shrines to do it. Same thing with other GP strategies.

So I'm feeling lately that the NE isn't such a big deal anymore; in fact, it can hurt you more than it helps, I think, unless you're really careful.

Wodan

[LzPrst]

I like putting the Iron Works with West Point. to get a military powerhouse. or Heroic Epic/production wonder (moai or similar).

the National Park and Iron works is also a way to go if you have few health resources to get your production up (engineers, works crazy with German Assembly plants)

Just a tip, I seem to have a problem in this area with being too perfectionistic. I often delay building national wonders until I have the ideal place/city for it, which is often very late. I do believe that the earlier the better. toss them up fast, cause in most cases the benefit gotten early outweighs the same benefits slightly better gotten later.

I also tend to specialize my cities. My capital is often an allrounder, doing production/trade/science very well, while I have other cities specialized towards military production, trade, science, GP, and similar. saves a lot of improvement building. I also tend to favor production over trade. I have yet to fully experiment this to the finish to see if it is really competitive, but it certainly is great fun to be completely superior in production, even compared to bigger civs.

[uffe]

Very interesting discussion...

Originally posted by wodan11
Lately I've been playing with "mixed" GP. BtS encourages you heavily to diversify your GP.

Same here. Basically the only two (or sometimes three) "planned" GPs I now normally get are the first Great Scientist for my initial science city (either the capital, or if I already have a good enough commerce city, then that) and one Great Prophet for the holy city of the first religion I have established. After these I normally do not attempt for specific GP types, but just take what I get. This way I can get a reasonably good mix for multiple golden ages, and don't have to worry about "polluting the GP pool" with wrong wonders, the capital can build most of them.

I do, however, usually make my capital a GP pump to some extent, sometimes more, sometimes less. This means that I will build the NE there, and as much world wonders as possible. I don't have a clear preference on the second national wonder in the capital, but usually it is something that is available pretty early, and what I don't want in my other main cities.

The other main cities then...First, want a commerce city for which I preferably can get the shrine. That city will most times get the Wall Street and the Oxford. In my last game I captured the Judaism holy city (War Chariot rush, as I was playing the Egyptians) early on. That was a very nice commerce city, so it got the two national wonders mentioned above. Naturally I'll establish my corporates (usually not more than one) here.

Second, I want (initially) one good production city. This one will get the Heroic Epic and West Point normally. Later production cities will get suitable combos of Iron Works, Red Cross, Moai Statues, etc.