Definitely not?????? And you know that because?????
Let me give you some advice. With the right friends you can get any GB.
You are approaching this as a starting player. You have absolutely no clue how the game will develop when you move on and you already think you invented the wheel. If that Oracle is so precious, how come you are the only one that noticed? Look at the ranking. No one has a high Oracle. Are they all clueless, or are you?
Dude you make way to many assumptions and everyone of them has been horribly wrong. I know this because I know the game well enough to know it. As for your advice I already know that as well but that was not what I was talking about and you actually know that due to other conversations we are having. My implication was what other great buildings as a brand new never played the game before do not already have a long list of high level friends can you easily get. Your assumption that I do not know the game and/or I am approaching it as if I were a newbie is wrong. Yes, I am approaching this particular scenario partially from the point of view a new player, because frankly it is aimed at helping them as much as it would help a veteran player not in the know. I just generally do not need to advise most veteran players because frankly, like me, they already know this stuff and most likely have already invested greatly into another GB that makes the Oracle redundant. What I am trying to do is supply information so that a newer player can make a much better decision about the building as a lot of other folks (who have all those other buildings) cannot seem to see its usefulness perhaps because they forget what it was like to be a new player or they are just so used to the work around that gives them access to things that perhaps they ought not have access to.
Part of the reason a lot of people do not have the Oracle is because it did not come out until much later. Another reason a lot of players do not have the Oracle is because Veteran players like yourself cannot see its usefulness because you already have all those other buildings and have invested so much into them that it makes no sense to go back to an early building like the Oracle that frankly now they do not need. So instead of seemingly explore its positives for other players you appear to prefer to try and hammer on any and every con that you can find. So new players are perhaps swayed away from using the building. To not use it because because non of the other high level players are using it, is the same kind of logic that caused the most advanced vehicle to be subjected to the width of 2 horses rear-ends. Aka very poor thinking in my opinion but it happens because of short-sighted thinkers.
FP income allows you to get everything else in the game. Higher the income the faster you can progress. Space to accommodate bigger GBs is easily obtained as you progress simply through tech, medals, diamonds and the map. Sure Oracle may be small, but if you can get everything you need much faster why worry about the space?
Really I do not recall an Expansion that you can buy with FP sure FP can facilitate lots of things but so can optimal use of space and in fact the 2 combined can accomplish even more than either one of the by themselves. Further I am never going to run out of FPs but you will eventually run out of Space as it does have a maximum limit. Still you are right in that you are free to do things the way that works best for you. All I am trying to do is present options for the newer players so that they can make much more informed decisions for themselves. Frankly it all greatly depends on ones personal strategy which most of the nay-sayers seem not to consider. Not everyone wants to play the game the way you do and doing it differently is just as good as the way you are doing it. This game was, per the designers comments, made to facilitate multiple strategies and to be played out over a long period of time. Which is why they do not want any proposals that makes the game easier or faster to play.
BTW I am curious how do you rationalize your apparent need for speed against the fact that the game designers specifically designed the game to be played at a much slower pace ??
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Of course all of this discussion is actually way off topic now. So please refrain from making such comments going forward. This article was to outline the the happiness value of the Oracle and expound upon what the oringinator of this article covered under their Happiness topic. In my opinion they are doing this so that players can make well informed decisions of their own based off of critical data presented in a non-biased manner. Which was initially what I presented. Other than that yes I voiced an
Opinion then backed it up with the empirical evidence I was presenting but my post was primarily about the empirical evidence and not my opinion. I was simply introducing the evidence with an observation I made based on that evidence.
So far neither of you have produce any empirical evidence to contradict mine. You have simply stated that in your opinion you can do things another way (one of those ways is to do something that contradicts one of the designers prime directives). Okay great you can do alot of things in this game alot of different ways (including things that are a bit exploitative) it does not make any of these startegy based ways bad just different. So far the evidence presented stands unchanged and non-deniable.
1) Up to The Future the Oracle beats all buildings at producing Happiness per Square
2) One can combine the Oracle with the Babel as early as the Bronze Age and increase population along with happiness without the need for more space (nor having to resort to special friends to get buildings that one would not normally have access to "making the game easier" so I would not be surprised if the designers eventually nerf this since it contradicts one of their prime directives).
3) A building that maximizes the usage of space in this game is a good building.
So if you would like to address anyone of these 3 items going forward by all means do so. If not its just a matter of opinion and no one is ever wrong when it is based on opinion.