What effect do obsolete walls and monuments have?

[Fistleaf]

From what I understand, obsolete means you can't build the item and the item can only generate culture.

However, the walls description mentions "obsolete except for defensive bonus". The purpose of walls are for defense so what could this mean?

Also monuments are meant to generate culture so how come it can be obsolete and yet still serve its purpose of generating culture?

[Cyrus The Mike]

...witch I never understood, because if I'm being shot at by a 18th century musket, I want to be behind a thick stone wall. It should be obsoleted when cannons come out.

[Yosho]

Re: What effect do obsolete walls and monuments have?

Originally posted by Fistleaf
From what I understand, obsolete means you can't build the item and the item can only generate culture.

However, the walls description mentions "obsolete except for defensive bonus". The purpose of walls are for defense so what could this mean?

Also monuments are meant to generate culture so how come it can be obsolete and yet still serve its purpose of generating culture?

Well, "obsolete" means you can't build them anymore. An obsolete monument still makes cultrue, but you can't make any new monuments in cities that don't yet have them. And, while walls are useless against gunpowder units, the defense bonus still applies againt non-gunpowder units even after the walls go "obsolete"; if someone attacks you with a knight in 2000 AD, your walls still work against that knight.

[Supr49er]

I build walls so that I can build castles for the espionage points (+25%). I don't rely on walls for defense, I like to attack/counterattack before units reach my cities.

[rah]

Yep, that's always my thought. If they're attacking your city, it's already too late.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Cyrus The Mike
...witch I never understood, because if I'm being shot at by a 18th century musket, I want to be behind a thick stone wall. It should be obsoleted when cannons come out.

If I remember correctly, the use of cannons to batter down walls predates the widespread use of muskets. The "cannon" unit in Civ IV represents cannons that were more advanced and mobile than the early siege cannons. But I view it as realistic for civs to stop building new city walls with the advent of the Gunpowder technology.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by nbarclay
If I remember correctly, the use of cannons to batter down walls predates the widespread use of muskets.

Yes, quite some time. The first personal firearms were basically "hand cannons" (left wiki picture in the middle, and right picture)

[joncnunn]

When Monuments become obsolete, the practical impact is you can't build any more.
However, if you have the Ethopian equalivent, you'll lose the +25% culture bonsus and I assume the other UBs based on the Monument like the Egyptain one will lose their special power as well.

In the case of Walls, the note is EXCEPT for defense. So you can still use them after you have Rifling you just can't build any more. And if there are any UBs based on the Wall, they'll lose their special powers as well at that time. However, for defensive purposes you lose that effect as soon as your opponents moderize their armies to gunpowder units. (e.g. Knights & War Elephants becoming Crusanders [Gunpowder + Military Tradition] Cats & Trebs becoming Cannons [whenever that is], Melee & Archer units becoming Rifles [Rifling].) Now if your opponent is in the habit of building lots of Muskets (or more likely the highly useful Ethopian or Turkish ones) it may be considering sooner than that.

[wodan11]

I've always thought that was a silly way to implement it. You should still be able to build walls. They just should lose some of their benefits... perhaps they don't affect the power graph any more, etc.

Wodan

[Fitz]

Originally posted by nbarclay


If I remember correctly, the use of cannons to batter down walls predates the widespread use of muskets. The "cannon" unit in Civ IV represents cannons that were more advanced and mobile than the early siege cannons. But I view it as realistic for civs to stop building new city walls with the advent of the Gunpowder technology.

Genghis Khan, ~1220 AD. He used engineers from the conquered Chinese territories to build bombards for his invasions of the Middle East and Far East Europe. That's probably not the technical name for them, but they were gunpowder driven weapons used in besieging cities. Not sure if he used them to hammer the walls or lob them over, but he was the one that introduced the concept into Europe.

-Fitz

[Yosho]

Originally posted by rah
Yep, that's always my thought. If they're attacking your city, it's already too late.

(shrug) It depends. If you've got border cities, he can sometimes reach your border cities on the first turn of the war.

I usually don't build walls, but if I've got a hill city on the border of another power who is either at war with me or likely to declare on me, and it's located in such a way that he'll attack that city first, it's worth it, especally early in the game before there's catapults. One walled city on a hill with 3 or 4 fortified axemen can destroy quite a large attacking army.

[Fistleaf]

On a related note, when buildings become obsolete, they keep their Great People Points bonus and culture bonus like +50% culture right? What about espionage bonus points and some event-related bonus points?

[joncnunn]

The Ethopian version of the Monument loses it's +25% cultural bonus. It keeps the other point.

As mentioned before I assume the ones that give unit types extra XP stop doing so. (Native American version of Monument, Celtic version of Walls, Spanish version of Castle)

I'm not aware of any esp bonus points (neither courthouses nor jails expire) or direct Great People points attached to expiring UBs. (The Roman Forum isn't an expiring building either)

But I think the Egyptain version of the Monument's power of an extra priest (either free or allowed; can't remember) expires.

Originally posted by Fistleaf
On a related note, when buildings become obsolete, they keep their Great People Points bonus and culture bonus like +50% culture right? What about espionage bonus points and some event-related bonus points?

[Hauptman]

Yes they really were called Bombards. They made their appearance quite early, 1200ish. muskets came out around 1300-1400...

Constantinople finally fell due to the Turks 'Monster Bombard.'

[Fistleaf]

There is an event where you get espionage points for barracks. So I don't know whether it is possible for buildings with expiry dates to get such bonuses.
Wonders still keep their Great People points bonus when they expire, I believe.