by StormKnight
Looked at another way. If you are down to the final panorama spot and you have 4 panorama tiles you may be tempted to skip two spots for the 8 points. But in skipping those two spots you give them to your opponent for free. If he gets 2.5 points per spot and a bonus because of them... that's 8 points.
Marshal, you've posted some interesting analysis here. I'm not sure it's all correct though. In this example, for instance, you assign 8 points to the active player and 8 points to another player. But it seems very unlikely to me that the same player will take both of those spots you skipped. So in practice, wouldn't you be more likely gaining 8 points while giving 4 points (on average) to two different opponents? That sounds like a good trade!
Most spots will be worth more than 2 if taken optimally. If you got lucky, one farm + one souvenir spot could yield you 4.5 points per stop. But that takes drawing 3 cost '1' souvenirs. But...if you are the character that buys one and gets one free, or buys one for 1, the odds of that go up. And you can have spare money that you weren't likely to spend anyway, so you don't need to counter it with additional stops. And you are setting up for a 7 point souvenir on a later stop!
On the other hand, what if I skip a green panorama spot toward the end when the bonus is already gone, and the players behind me have either completed it already or not started it? At best they are getting 1.5 points, and some of them have nothing to gain by it!
I'm now starting to think there is more to jumping ahead then it first appeared. :)