After I get v1.0 uploaded, I will concentrate next to religion changes in the mod.

Plan is to add several new religions:

Zoroastrianism
Hellenism
Egyptian Mythology (name for this?)
Roman Mythology
Mesoamerican religion (Aztec/Maya religion probably)
Protestantism (yes, I know it's divided to many different groups IRL)
Shinto

Religious buildings for ancient religions will work bit differently than for the existing religions:

1) Cathedral is replaced by Pantheon special building. Pantheon can be built earlier than cathedral. What this means is that the older religions get access to all their religion's buildings earlier ie. making them more powerful early game.

2) Not all religions will have missionaries in the same way as current religions have. For example Hellenism will get Hellenic Wiseman to spread culture.

3) Religion might not get Monastery type building, instead they get national wonder type special buildings that are dedicated to one god of their religion and bonuses of the building reflect that god ie. god of war will give experience bonuses etc.

More religious civics will be added but this part is where I'd need some suggestions/ideas. Few civic options that I'm considering:

Blood Cult
State Atheism
Secularism (modern day)
Idolatry

What religious civic effects you think are still missing?

Unit changes:

Each religion will get access to religion specific unit besides normal missionaries. I'm not entirely sure yet what these will be (except Crusader for Christianity) but I'll do some research and hear your ideas. ;)

I have an issue with the existing religions:
Some of the shrines offer special bonuses, which actually is much fun and obviously was implemented to help the later religions.

Yet, if you have "choose religions" set up, you may pick on of those religions and then will get the bonus very early.
I admit that this is borderline to an exploit, on the other hand it is much fun.

So I would ask for your decision to either update the remaining shrines with bonuses as well or to get rid of the old bonuses.

The way I see it, different sects or denominations in a relgion are handled by different Religious Civics. So I see Orthodox and Catholicism as being represented by Christianity being represented by Organized Religion and possibly Theocracy sometimes in the case of the latter. To this, I'd add a 'Reformed' category of the Religious Civics to represent Protestantism, Calvinism, etc. It just strikes me as odd to have two denominations of one religion represented with two religions. Where is Mahayana Buddhism? Sunni Islam? In the civics. The monastic form of Buddhism (Theravada) is represented in Organized Religion, is it not? So, why not add Reform as a civic to represent the other side of the coin so that these denominations can still remain present whilst not having to name each and every one?
Furthermore, in addition to penalties and bonuses assigned to diplomacy for state religion, perhaps there'd be one for similar/opposed religious categories? Two civs of the same religion with the same religious category might get along better, whilst others may be damaging. A Theocrat is much less likely to get along with a State Atheist, Secular or Free society and when Organized Religion comes into play, they may look down upon the heathens who are still using Paganism, for instance.

I"d have to say, I like the idea of using civics to differentiate between branches of religion as opposed to having however many different dozens of religions already mentioned. I'd think it would very easily get much to confusing and too easy to be abused with too many religions in play.

If you will add protestantism, you might as well add sunnism and shiism.

If you will add protestantism, you might as well add sunnism and shiism.

Exactly! And at that point you may as well add Calvinism. Eastern Christian Orthodoxy? Greek Orthodoxy. The 8 zillion different kinds of Wicca. I like the idea of making religions more dynamic, but like i said earlier, i think it'll just get too confusing and convuluted if we just start adding religions. Quantity does have a quality all its own, however, i vote better religions, not more religions :)

I really like your mod, and it happens I also have some academic background on the political aspects of different western religions as I am a former student of Political Science. When picking new religions for your game, you should have in mind what are their main doctrines, postulates and philosophies. If you focus too much on the interpretative aspects, you will end up with too many branches of religions that are essentially the same. Christian orthodoxism and protestantism have popped up due to political reasons embased in different religious interpretations, as well as shiism and sunnism and other similar divisions in different religious branches of an unique (and bigger) religion that countains them all (such as Christianity or Islam).
You should also have in mind that religions DO change with time and adapt themselves to their societies. Can you imagine how embarassing would be a Jewish priest obeying the hundreds of animal sacrifice laws contained in the original Old Testament texts? During the Colonialism and NeoColonialism, one of the main arguments in favor of slavery (African slavery, that is) was religious: again, in the old Testament, slavery was supported. So, if you are going to create different religious branches of a 2000 years old religion, you will be also killing different civic realistic possibilities that can be assimilated to a specific timeline or religious current (you can clearly imagine Christianity + Idolatry or Iconoclasty in the Byzantine and Dark Ages period, but can you imagine Protestantism + Idolatry or Iconoclasty?!). There is also another thing you should see here: Roman Mithology IS Hellenistic, you can even name basically the same gods with different names (such as Zeus and Jupiter, or Neptune and Poseidon), so adding them as different religions wouldn't make much sense.
I also suggest Shamanism as a new religion (you have nowadays big Shamanistic religions in Korea - I don't remember its name; Haiti - Voodoo; Brazil - Candomble and Umbanda, Macumba; and most of the tribal societies are also shamanistic).

Iconoclasty would be a nice civic addition to the plot, it could increase the maintenance costs from distance to palace and number of cities (the images and relics cause more corruption and less obedience to the central power, as local power holds also a big piece of the "holiness"), increase a bit of the commerce output (the relics and images commerce was a big corruption feature, but was also a profitable market to the church and the state), increase a lot of the culture output (holy art :P), increase general happiness in cities with state religion a bit (relics and images made people closer to the holy), increase the hapiness and cultural bonuses from religious buildings of the state religion (as they were filled with theses relics and images), and a slight bonus to great people production, specially if you could somehow link it to Great Prophets or Artists. It could also enable a special unit, the relic trader, who should be invisible, able to explore rival territory, and would made some money for your civ in a foreign city and caused some unhapiness if the city doesn't have your state religion. Many relic related to events could be added, such as: "if you have cathedral-like buildings in a city - People from [city] claim to have found an incredibly important Holy relic in a forgotten coffin inside the [cathedral]. While many people in your empire have started long migrations to see the relic, some people have already tried to take possession of it and civil unrest may be near. 1 - Claim the relic is fake, ending the attempts to steal it and the civil unrest. Causes -1 happiness for x turns. 2 - Leave it to the local authorities. 60% chances of the relic being stolen, causes x turns of civil revolt, and 40% chances of the relic remaining in safety, causes +2 happiness for x turns and +1 happiness from [cathedral]. 3 - Ensure the relic's safety, costs x gold and causes +2 happiness for x turns and + 1 happiness form [cathedral]. 4 - (only available if you have the Apostolic Palace) Proclaim the relic is true with complete religious support. Costs Causes +3 happiness for x turns, +2 happiness from [cathedral], +1 population in [city], +2 free priests in [city]. 5 - (only available if at war) Use the relic as a military instrument of inspiration. Adds the fanatic promotion to all of your troops."

Blood Cult could be the name of the "Mesoamerican Religion", as it was developped very specifically in this case. Although self-mutilation has already occurred a lot in Christianity, for example, and although they drink the BLOOD of Christ and eat his FLESH, a Blood Cult has never been long-term estabilished with success in it, even because these self-mutilations were focused on the suffered pain that was a sign of self-sacrifice, not on the blood he was sacrificing to God. Many religions have used sacrifices (both human and animal), and some still use animal sacrifices, but only the mayan religion uses the self mutilation as an instrument of sacrifice specifically because of the blood offered, not because of the lives offered. Although The Mayans had lives sacrified ocasionally, their most common sacrifice was the blood: the kings of the Mayan city-states would cut themselves generally on the tongue or on the genitals and bleed in honor to the gods, who demanded blood (as they had created humans from blood) and the people would be happy, as they believed it granted the gods happiness (and, therefore, prosperity). Every single mayan also repeated that ritual ocasionally. Also, claiming that the Mesoamerican religions are majorly cultists of the blood is completely wrong, the Tepaltecs (again, I don't know their name in English, it's the tribe that expelled the Aztecs to the island in which Tenochtitlan was built, and that helped Cortez in his campaign against the Aztecs hundreds of years later) weren't cultists of the blood and expelled the Aztecs from their original lands when a Tepaltec young woman was sacrificed after marrying an Aztec leader. By the way, the Aztecs were focused on sacrifices and not on bleedings.
Blood Cult can't be really associated to a specific civic, it is specifically associated to the Mayan religion. Almost every different Native American (and not only mesoamerican) has a different type of shamanistic or Blood Cult-like religion. And, although we refer to the Aztec religion as a Blood Cult-like, it is much more to a Sacrifice Cult, as every blood of it ends up in death :P So, you should name the religion "Blood Cult" :P

My suggestion to the "Blood Cult" religion:

temple = "Sacrificial Altar", +3 happiness, -1 health
monastery = no monasteries :P, a few national wonders could be available instead (Chichen Itza could become a national wonder with VERY different civic effects, for example)
cathedral = "Pyramid", (Pantheon-like, bonus to happiness and culture, penalty to health, building costs halved with stone and additional bonus from hemp instead of incense)
the missionary could be named "Blood Cult Shaman"

Loooking forward to this one. Since I'm relatively new to Civ 4 (been stuck on Civ 3 for years) I'm still getting acclimated to this new envrionment.

If you haven't already, you may want to investigate how religion works in the game Europa Universalis. What I like about it, is that it creates conflict and civil war within a country where more than one religion is present. A good case of this was England's Henry 8th (c. 1533) when he broke off from the Pope and created the Church of England (protestant), the new state religion, and resulted in ensuing religious civil strife/war. I' m not sure if BtS covers this aspect of muliple religions in one country, if not I hope it can be incorporated in your future update. When I played England in that game, I had to use all my time and resources to put the 'revolts' down, and convert the other provences from catholicism to protestantism. This is a very realistic rendering of how this occurs throughout history.:)

Interestingly, when Martin Luther put up his thesis and the resulting split with the Church, relatively stable societies were thrown into doubt and tumult through reformation and counter-reformation. If there isn't already,there needs to be a dangerous & dire element to the game when new religions are founded and spread.

Here are some talking points of introducing a 'war of religion' in the next mod version :goodjob: :

- Multiple religions within a city should have a level of 'unstability'
- Each city should show the % of each religion in it
- The 'majority' religion within each city gives $ to the civ that has its Holy City. (ie, My civ's state rel is Hindu, I own the Holy City for Hindu, cities that have a majority of Hindu gives $ to me)
- The 'majority' religion within a city should try to match the state religion, if not, there should be a chance of revolt/succession. (ie My civ's state rel is Hindu, but one of my city's has a make-up of 30% Hindu, 10% Christ, & 60% Bud; there could be a 60%? chance it will revolt/succeed).
- Various ways to spread/change % of a religion in a city:
- by missionary (thus missionaries would be vital to spread/counter spread a rel into a city).
- by religious buildings ie shrines, temples, etc.

Questions to be answered::confused:
- can a city show a religion %?
- how exactly would a nearby temple spread/influence a nearby city's religion?
- what else could influence a city's religion?
- are there limits to how many missionary units can be built? if so, the limit may need to be set higher?
- if a city succeeds from the parent civ what would it become? a barbarian city? a vassel of another civ? an entirely new civ?

have you considered adding the "disappearing religions" mod? From what i understand after so many religions have been found cities start losing religions.
This Would be very interesting in that one would have to "upkeep" there religous hold on each city to maintain their bonuses to the holy city.

Also is it at all possible to have more than 7 religions in a game at once?

Normally i think it would be to much.

But in this context some relions could die out almost completly. while others rise to global dominance. While at the same time with proper maintainance some ancient relions or mythos could remain relevent in modern times.

Might I suggest that you create an event that allows you to call for a Crusade/Yihad against those nations that don't follow your religion?

I know this doesn't relate to the "new religion" aspect of v1.1 but this is something simple that i would like to see.

Would it be possible to ad an atomic Bomber? the way i would do it is like this

Take a tac nuke and make it less powerful. then tack a bomber graphic over it instead of haveing it look like a missle. this would make is less destructive and still give it nonglobal range.

I also thought mayber that it would be available with fission and aviation after the manhatten project.

Another idea might be to have it a limited "national unit". this would stop early
widespread nuclear attacks but at the same time simulate the tactical usage of "dropping the bomb to end the war".

Sound doable?

have you considered adding the "disappearing religions" mod? From what i understand after so many religions have been found cities start losing religions.
This Would be very interesting in that one would have to "upkeep" there religous hold on each city to maintain their bonuses to the holy city.

Also is it at all possible to have more than 7 religions in a game at once?

Normally i think it would be to much.

But in this context some relions could die out almost completly. while others rise to global dominance. While at the same time with proper maintainance some ancient relions or mythos could remain relevent in modern times.Yes, I've considered it like I've considered destroying religions (ie. inquisition) ;) Game can have "unlimited" amount of religions, the largest religion mod has over 40 religions.

Thanks for all those religion related ideas/info - they've made me think a lot of things that I wasn't aware of. :)

Will the religion add on be available soon? I have been looking into adding Zoroastrianism myself to my already edited version of RoM, however if your making this I don't have to. Having a wide variety would be great in my opinion.

Also some suggestions on obscure religions ...

Jainism (A super old religion of India)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jainism

Celtic Mythology (Fun Druids and Fairyfolk)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_polytheism

Norse Mythology (Odin, Thor and Beowulf)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_mythology

I'm the kind of person that likes a lot of everything in a mod; but there is one huge problem with having, say, more than 10 religions on the map (Especially if you have 18 or less civs on your map)

The Apostolic Palace

Having an enormous amount of religions would just about render it completely ineffective. The palace would probably only have one full member (the person who built it), and fewer voting members (unless each city is going to be capable of having at least 20+ religions, if there are 40 of them). I can just see the religion icons on the map scrolling 3 tiles away from my city square.

While it would be cool to have more religions, will too many take away from other gameplay aspects, like the Apostolic Palace? Or too many happiness bonuses from the 30 shrines in your cities?

Although... I suppose you could impose a shrine limit
And... You might be able to open the Apostolic Palace to groups of religions instead of a particular one, though that's probably easier said than done.

I've been thinking, about the Apostolic Palace.

Another way you could balance the multiple religions is by allowing multiple Apostolic Palaces to be built, BUT only allowing one per religion, AND only particular mainstream religions that are capable of building them.

For example, if you have 20 religions, you may have only 5 that can build their own Apostolic Palace.

and all those religions could cripple AI, i think there souldn't be more than 10 religions or less, then add more religion civics...

that 1 religion founded per civ rule is a great one.. :P
but still, very often AI wont change their current religion.. :(

more about religions and civics, if other religions than state religion are in city, shouldn't they give some :( without "free religion" and/or "pacifism" civic? that could give the reason for inquisitor unit..

that combined with % religions in one city would be even greater.. ;)

and for the sake of realism, disable "choose religion" option? :D

Current religion additions and changes include:

Religions
- Added: Hellenism (tech Sculpture)
- Added: Zoroastrianism (tech Dualism)
- Added: Amun-Ra (Egypt mythology) (tech Masonry)
- Added: Nagualism (Mesoamerican religion) (tech Calendar)

Buildings
- Added: Hellenic Temple
- Added: Hellenic Pantheon
- Added: Hellenic Gymnasia
- Changed: Statue of Zeus is now Hellenic Shrine
- Added: Zoroastrian Fire Temple
- Added: Zoroastrian Pantheon
- Added: Zoroastrian Shrine (replaces monastery because Zoroastrianism rejects all forms of monasticism)
- Added: Zoroastrian holy mountain shrine Pir-e Sabz
- Added: Temple of Amun
- Added: Temple of Mut
- Added: Temple of Chons
- Added: The Karnak Temple Complex (Amun-Ra shrine)
- Added: Temple of Jaguar (Nagualism)
- Added: Tikal (Nagualism shrine)

Python
- Added: Inquisition - Limited Religions

Civics
- Changed: Theocracy moved to Government category
- Changed: Paganism no longer get bonus happiness from Ceremonial Altar, no upkeep
- Changed: Shamanism moved to religion category, gives happiness from ceremonial altar, stonehenge and oracle, gives +1 health from healer hut
- Added: Inquisition choice to legal category
- Added: Sacrifice Cult to Religion category
- Added: Secularism to Religion category
- Added: Idolatry to religion category

I'm considering adding one more religion and some more (national religious) buildings. Civics need testing but I guess that part I have to leave for 2.0beta. ;)

Do you have a current GameFont_75 etc for the religions, ie Zoro. . . .

Zap, those changes are quite interesting, i'm looking foward of testing them.. :P

now that inquisition is in the game, will all non-state religions give some :( or what?

Great mod, been playing with it for a while, but this it my first time posting. Will be interest to test the new religious additions.

There should be a world wonder for each Religion

Palace of Potala: (already exists) Buddism
Alhambra: (already exists) Islam
Apostolic Palace: (already exists, but change) Christianity
Temple of Heaven: Taoism
Imperial Academy: Confucianism
Masada: Jewish
Angkor Wat (already exists, but change) Hindu
The Acropolis: Hellenistic
Chichen Itza: (already exist, but change) Nagualism
?? : Zoroastrianism
?? : Amun-Ra


I'd suggest State Atheism as one more "religion" although the only one not founded per say, but buildings for it and a State Atheism religious civic to support it.

There is no holy city, shrine or religious world wonder for SA.

Religious Civic:
State Atheism (SA), enabled by Scientific Method.
+5% production, +10% science in all cities.

Buildings:
Re-Education Center: (enabled by Scientific Method)
Requires State Atheism to build.
(All bonuses require State Atheism Civic to be active)
+1 Happy if SA is state Religion
+10% Science, turn 1 citizen into scientist, +1 culture)
Enables Unit: Atheistic Enforcer
(modeled after Monastery/Temple)

Ministry of Propaganda: (enabled by Fascism)
+1 happy if SA is state religion
+1 happy w/ hit movies (propaganda films?)
limited # per Re-Education Centers.
+25% culture
turn 1 citizen into scientist, turn 1 citizen into artist
(modeled after Cathedral)

Unit Atheistic Enforcer:
National Unit (limited in number)
Eradicates a religion and/or religious building (can only target cities you own)
(modeled after missionaries)

There should be some sort of bonus for cities which have no religions in them when under SA, not sure what exactly, probably some type of science/culture/prod bonus.

Zap, those changes are quite interesting, i'm looking foward of testing them.. :P

now that inquisition is in the game, will all non-state religions give some :( or what?
Some religious civics will give unhappiness from non-state religions -> reason to use Inquisition units.

Palace of Potala: (already exists) Buddism
Alhambra: (already exists) Islam
Apostolic Palace: (already exists, but change) Christianity
Temple of Heaven: Taoism
Imperial Academy: Confucianism
Masada: Jewish
Angkor Wat (already exists, but change) Hindu
The Acropolis: Hellenistic
Chichen Itza: (already exist, but change) Nagualism
?? : Zoroastrianism
?? : Amun-RaThanks for suggestions, I'll have to check those up. Not sure if I want to change Chichen Itza to religious wonder, would have to move Nagualism to lot earlier tech from Calendar and don't really want to use Blood Cult tech for it.. unless.. got to think about it. ;) Apostolic Palace has pretty unique functions and I don't think I want to mess with those, christianity has many good alternative choices for wonder. Amun-Ra had many pantheons so no difficulty for choices there.

I've thought lot about State Atheism before and now again, had planned to add it as another civic option, having it as a religion might be bit problematic. For example you have State atheism as your state religion and then you'd use inquisition units to remove non-state religions from your cities.. that doesn't sound right to me. :D
But your suggestions could be used with civic specific building requirements, would just have to combine one python component.

Zappara, have you checked out the savegames I put in another thread of those CTDs?

I don't know whether the problem is something I'm doing or something else, but I would like to have that CTD fixed.

Some religious civics will give unhappiness from non-state religions -> reason to use Inquisition units.

Thanks for suggestions, I'll have to check those up. Not sure if I want to change Chichen Itza to religious wonder, would have to move Nagualism to lot earlier tech from Calendar and don't really want to use Blood Cult tech for it.. unless.. got to think about it. ;) Apostolic Palace has pretty unique functions and I don't think I want to mess with those, christianity has many good alternative choices for wonder. Amun-Ra had many pantheons so no difficulty for choices there.

I've thought lot about State Atheism before and now again, had planned to add it as another civic option, having it as a religion might be bit problematic. For example you have State atheism as your state religion and then you'd use inquisition units to remove non-state religions from your cities.. that doesn't sound right to me. :D
But your suggestions could be used with civic specific building requirements, would just have to combine one python component.

State Atheism would be a combination of "No State Religion" and a State Atheism Civic choice for the Religious Civic. Both would have to be set for SA buildings to be enabled, and for any bonus from those buildings to be possible. If the Inquisitor unit can be used for both, then the Civic and/or the building can simply allow the unit to be built, although it could just as easily be its own unit as suggested which duplicate the Inquistor unit's abilities, and is enabled when the SA building is built.

Also as a "No state Religion" you reduce the probability of bad diplomacy, and a crusade against the godless heathens/state atheists would be an interesting dynamic. After all its not the same as free religion, but one in which all religions are actively repressed, which should justifiably tick state religion civs off.

And while were on the subject, a new spy espionage mission to spread your state religion to a non-open border/theocratic/SA civ would be a nice addition.