I almost never research divine right. I don't care about the spiral minaret or versailles, the AI can have them. I think NOT having it is a valuable diplomatic tool. Instead of having tech hogs like mansa and zara coming begging for your newest tech all the time and either giving it to them or taking a diplo hit, they'll say "hey gwynnja, check this out: I'll give you divine right and you give me rifling and 8 billion gold. sound like a deal?" then you can just say it ain't happening with no penalty. it's rare to have a tech as completely useless as divine right that you can always just say no thanks and not lose points, but if they don't have something they think you want then they're bound to try to get you to gift it to them.

I agree. The one time in several hundred games of civ I researced DR, I regretted it.

One situation I would research it is if I was pursuing a Religous Economy strategy in which you build the Spiral Minaret, University of Sankore, Apostolic Palace, and the Sistine Chapel. I've heard that this can be a very powerful strategy because all of your state religion's buildings net you 2 gold, 2 flasks, 5 culture, and 2 hammers on top of what the building already gives you. GO RAMSES!:king:

The move you describe is anti-diplo.

If you desperatively need one more AI to vote for you for DV, there's nothing better than a demand.
Or you go culture/space and don't exactly have an army (smth like 2 archers / city:D) a demand is very welcome as well.

But of course if you're strong, those demands really suck (but then they're less frequent).
For this "strategy" you can also use techs like HBR, archery btw.

See it the other way around: AI loves DR by some esoterical reason ( probably because it founds a religion and has 2 wonders ) , so that tech makes a excelent bargaining chip.

Absolutely on the trading front. If you're behind, just research DR and trade your way to the top. You can still have music as your trade for rifling and a million gold.

The move you describe is anti-diplo.

If you desperatively need one more AI to vote for you for DV, there's nothing better than a demand.
Or you go culture/space and don't exactly have an army (smth like 2 archers / city:D) a demand is very welcome as well.

But of course if you're strong, those demands really suck (but then they're less frequent).
For this "strategy" you can also use techs like HBR, archery btw.

I rarely research HBR before i can get it done in just a few turns, and I often wait until just prior to either machinery or feudalism for archery.

I don't often go for DR, but when I do I don't regret it. The two wonders are good, especially versailles, and yeah you can trade it for a lot of good stuff, even after the wonders are built and the religion is founded :rolleyes:

I go for the Spiral Minaret. The underpinning of my game is cash, and more often than not I never adopt Free Religion until after Mass Media, so the money rolls in and my empire balloons. Versailles is cool too (particularly on Terra maps) but more often than not State Property is a late game priority so Versailles and the FP often never get built. But Spiral Minaret is necessary for the Civ running the AP because of the income bonus that I presume you get from everyone else's state religion buildings as well. In one of my games the whole world was, for a time, Buddhist, and there was my gold mine spiraling up into the sunset in Athens. Made a huge difference to a non-Financial/Organised leader.

I think I bulbed it once with the free GA from music. It's a good tech to trade with at that stage of the game.

I go for the Spiral Minaret. The underpinning of my game is cash, and more often than not I never adopt Free Religion until after Mass Media, so the money rolls in and my empire balloons. Versailles is cool too (particularly on Terra maps) but more often than not State Property is a late game priority so Versailles and the FP often never get built. But Spiral Minaret is necessary for the Civ running the AP because of the income bonus that I presume you get from everyone else's state religion buildings as well. In one of my games the whole world was, for a time, Buddhist, and there was my gold mine spiraling up into the sunset in Athens. Made a huge difference to a non-Financial/Organised leader.

The income from the SM, like the hammers from the AP, are generated directly by the buildings. Unlike the AP, the gold only comes from buildings of the SM owner.

Can someone explain to me why does AI give so much value to the DR? It is a dead end tech, that enables 2 wonders and a religion, once it is discovered and wonders are built, it is absolutelly uselless. So why do I get thos "fair" trade proposition from AI: like we give you DR and you give us some modern or future era tech that costs 2 to 3 times the amount of beakers and throw in some gold on top too???!!! I seriously think there is a bug involved.

If I have a largish empire, I try to get DR first because I want versailles. Once versailles is almost complete it's still a great trading chip.

If I'm behind on tech's I might research it to try and trade for techs I need since the AI loves it so much.

If Neither of the above apply I tend to ignore it for quite awhile.

Can someone explain to me why does AI give so much value to the DR? It is a dead end tech, that enables 2 wonders and a religion, once it is discovered and wonders are built, it is absolutelly uselless. So why do I get thos "fair" trade proposition from AI: like we give you DR and you give us some modern or future era tech that costs 2 to 3 times the amount of beakers and throw in some gold on top too???!!! I seriously think there is a bug involved.

That's not a bug. It's in the hope you might not notice what a raw deal it is.

Re the SM - oh well, worth a try. I've been playing based on that assumption but never mind. It's still a good way to bolster your cashflow nonetheless.

The first person to research Divine Right should get a Great Prophet.

I don't care about the spiral minaret

Your loss. Pretty stupid mistake though.

If you're pursuing a cultural victory the religion from DR can be pretty huge.

Your loss. Pretty stupid mistake though.

I suppose. :blush: I guess I'd rather push towards liberalism and build a huge army to prepare for the late game rifle/cannon vassaling spree.

I agree. The one time in several hundred games of civ I researced DR, I regretted it.

One situation I would research it is if I was pursuing a Religous Economy strategy in which you build the Spiral Minaret, University of Sankore, Apostolic Palace, and the Sistine Chapel. I've heard that this can be a very powerful strategy because all of your state religion's buildings net you 2 gold, 2 flasks, 5 culture, and 2 hammers on top of what the building already gives you. GO RAMSES!:king:

OH YEAH. I go for AP whenever I can, and, if I get it, Sankore and SM. Sistine Chapel is just gravy if CV is not your goal.

OH YEAH. I go for AP whenever I can, and, if I get it, Sankore and SM. Sistine Chapel is just gravy if CV is not your goal.

In my experience the Sistine Chapel is more useful for creating cultural pressure in the Medieval-Renaissance period than for a cultural victory. It helps of course with a cultural victory, but cathedrals and corporations generate far more culture.

The AI is really stupid. In one of my games Cyrus built the Spiral Miranet while running Free Religion, and it didn't change its civics after the wonder was built.

So basically don't get DR so you can reject trades instead of demands.

The first person to research Divine Right should get a Great Prophet.

And given the religion that's founded what would that prophet be called :hmm:

I think founding the last religion is reward enough for being first. If you haven't got you own religion at that stage of the game it can be quite handy. If you're going for a cultural victory another religion shaves turns off the finish date.

I've researched it once because I was ahead in tech anyway and wanted to build Versailles.

Apart from that I agree with others who've said that since it's such a coveted tech by the AI it's great for trading. Research it first and trade it to everybody in the same turn for a lot of other techs.

It really should give another, more universal bonus (like +1 Happy for State Religion?)

I agree. The one time in several hundred games of civ I researced DR, I regretted it.

One situation I would research it is if I was pursuing a Religous Economy strategy in which you build the Spiral Minaret, University of Sankore, Apostolic Palace, and the Sistine Chapel. I've heard that this can be a very powerful strategy because all of your state religion's buildings net you 2 gold, 2 flasks, 5 culture, and 2 hammers on top of what the building already gives you. GO RAMSES!:king:

I'd agree it seems useless if you aren't building your economy around religion. I've always ignored it in the past, but now that I'm playing on Prince I make damn sure I have a religion to keep my economy stable.

I had a game on Prince that I quit for lack of a challenge after I was making 40+ gold per turn with the research slider at 100% while going crazy with military spending. Probably due to my specialized economic city that featured the income buildings for 2 religions, along with multiplier buildings like the Market. It was generating 90+ gold per turn by itself. And I hadn't yet built the Spiral Minaret.

Contrast that to my only attempt on Prince without a religion: so poor I was losing money even with my research at 10%, with my economy grinding to a halt from 200+ turns at war. (Aggressive Civs, Raging Barbarians)

I like to build the Ankor Wat, The University of Sankore, The Apostolic Palace, The Sistine Chapel and The Spiral Minaret. Together these make temples incredibly powerful.

Granted you have to be a serious wonderhog for this, but in case you are, researching Divine Right looks better and founding a religion doesn't hurt either. I do it all the time.

I always like to have Versailles and place it either in a high production city or in the middle of a far flung newconquered territory. I often sacrifice a GE to help build it.

I only just discovered the religious building quartet. I must say that it is powerful too making the SM quite handy. (Yes I am a wonder hog)