Just won the grounds of the orc strategists on my beta city, cant wait till I can collect my first batch and use them in combat.. My beta city is on chapter 2 about 1/2 way through the chapter and normally the orc strategists are not unlocked until more then 1/2 way through the orc chapter, So this building will be of use for a long time to come..
I have also won the Traveling merchant 2 and 3, and since I can not make tier 3 yet and my tier 2 boosted manufactories are still very low output , Making my traveling merchants very profitable for me so far.. Yes my Traveling Merchant 3 has caused me to put cross tier trades up to gain tier 1 at a higher rate, but I have no problem getting rid of it at a 1oo tier 3 to 600 tier 1 rate.. I set the trades low like that since I'm getting the tier 3 pretty much for free anyways.. Yes I will probably sell both the merchants later on when I need the space, but now I feel that the orc strategists will help me win combats easier, which will allow me to gain province expansions faster.. I think most of the prizes are more helpful to the newer cities..
My 3 remaining cities I play on the live server 1 is in the fairy chapter, and 2 are in different stages of the orc chapter.. These prizes are almost useless to them, but this doesn't make the event worthless to participate in because there is only 1 or 2 buildings that will actually help.. I like to collect things and these prizes are just another thing to collect, even if I never use them they will be in storage, silently waiting just like most of the other event prizes I have won over the course of all the events since summer solstice... Hopefully 1 day I will have enough room to place everything and make a truly unique fantasy city on each of the worlds I play on.. A city where I can use the traveling merchant 1-3 to make a nice market square or make a nice garden of father tree variants or make something else nice that incorporates past event buildings with out having to worry about getting the most amount of value per square.. But until then, I will just keep collecting or trying to collect 1 of each building so they can just sit in storage unused..