I've won a ton of games with it since I got BTS, and found that handled properly the AP can be literally game-breaking (or should I say ending?)

I just ran a screwaround game on emperor playing as a random civ on shuffle (got JC of Rome). Started on a continent with mansa musa and only him. Found out later the other continent had monty, shaka, ghengis khan, and willem (someone must have gotten bumped without me noticing, not surprising with that bunch :lol:).

Mansa founded Hinduism, I forget which of the warmongers got Buddhism, but it was probably Monty. MM founded Confucianism and Judaism also, while I founded Taoism, for a change intentionally.

The plan? AP diplo win, from very early on! I was hindu like MM, but once I founded taoism, I took that missionary straight to the capitol and spread it there, switch to it, and built the AP in it. I immediately converted back to hindu.

The funny thing about the AP is that you can use resolutions and even call victory while not in the religion if you own it. In other words, you can be in a non-ap religion with an ally, and have them vote for you. Building it in a later religion such as Christianity or Taoism basically allows you to control who has the AP religion. This opens up a lot of abuse :goodjob:. Some nice tricks:

1. AP "assign cities" using your culture pressure.
2. AP "spread the religion to 1 city" and force people into wars.
3. Diplo victory

The fun thing about the 3rd is, if NOBODY is running the AP religion and you control it, you are the only candidate available in the vote. Also, it's likely that you've only spread it to a friend, who is not eligible to vote for himself so he'll vote for you.

In this game I manipulated things pretty hard core. I went FR briefly to get open borders with the likes of Monty and Shaka (gifting missionaries basically lets you spread to theocracy civs), spread the AP to one of each AI's cities other than MM, whom I spread it to most of his cities.

MM switched into FR. Just before I spread the last missionary (to monty) to enable the vote, I bribed MM to adopt pacifism. Bam, back to friendly.

I wound up with a diplo win as Rome in the 1600's, having never declared war and holding exactly 7 cities :rolleyes:. Best part of all, the game lasted 1 hr 30 minutes on epic :crazyeye:.

The hardest thing about doing this is keeping the rival AI out of the religion, which means you'll typically want to target civs that are big (so you don't spread it to all cities and watch them convert) or ones that founded a different religion (they're not likely to switch to your AP religion, occasionally FR).

I'm exploring the potential of this victory approach in more depth, particularly the trading potential of the tech path that makes getting the AP in an obscure religion possible. I didn't seem to fall behind until pretty late (won liberalism), although I was running a SE and unless you expand more or pick up the pyramids SE will sag shortly after Liberalism (unless you can get to constitution, which I couldn't as I was doing too poorly).

The victory conditions thread lists AP diplo as a 3 in luck, but I'm not sure I agree with that now. It seems more like a 2, as if you have the AP and a non-spread religion (the ever-noob friendly CoL slingshot for confuc should be enough :p) you can dictate who has votes, and that's very powerful.

Not great for score though, even winning in the 1600's I only wound up with 42kish :p.

I took that missionary straight to the capitol and spread it there, switch to it, and built the AP in it. I immediately converted back to hindu.
When does the "AP Religion" get locked in? Is it when the build starts or when it completes? So would you have to stay in the intended religion until the wonder is completed or can you start the build and switch back to your main religion right away?

To me the AP is broken in its current form, and I also think it is too complicated to understand. Many of the tactics you described are very counter-intuitive. The entire thing smells of abuse.

I still don't have a firm grasp on the AP, regarding which options become available when, and how the various religious choices (including FR) influence eligibility. Is there a good definitive guide outside the Civilopedia, or is anybody willing to write one?

When does the "AP Religion" get locked in?
Its locked when its completed. One of my fav tricks is the old switch-a-roo also. Build the AP, and the turn before its done, switch to a religion that only you have, and then you control not only the votes, but the all-important hammers from the buildings. SPI leaders are especially strong for this trick because of cheap temples and no anarchy.

Yep, my highest score victory on noble--close to 50k--was a diplomatic victory using AP shennanigans. Actually, I usually build the AP even if I'm not going for a diplomatic victory--it is so powerful I don't want an AI civ to have it.

Ok, I understand how the AP works, but I've very very rarely find it to be broken. Pretty much only one game I can think of when it was, when I repeatedly had everyone declare war on Montezuma, until he eventually capitulated to me

Am I doing something wrong? Not spreading my religion enough, using a religion that's too common?

I want to understand why this is as broken as everyone here seems to think it is (and possibly find out, at the same time, why Diplomatic Victories are so 'easy')

Ok, I understand how the AP works, but I've very very rarely find it to be broken. Pretty much only one game I can think of when it was, when I repeatedly had everyone declare war on Montezuma, until he eventually capitulated to me

Am I doing something wrong? Not spreading my religion enough, using a religion that's too common?

I want to understand why this is as broken as everyone here seems to think it is (and possibly find out, at the same time, why Diplomatic Victories are so 'easy')

I never said it was broken because you do have to sacrifice a superior tech path to get it, and you have to use it strategically. It is very powerful though.

IIRC, to get the DoW vote option the target can't have the AP religion. If you are at war with them, you can drag everyone who does have the AP religion into the war also (unless they defy which usually won't occur). This is possible even if the nations declaring only have 1 city in the AP religion, and unlike diplomacy victories you CAN force this by yourself. You get mutual military struggle points for this :lol:. Even nicer, the diplo anger from the AI DoW's will last.

Also while IMO it's easier than some other victory types, AP diplo isn't all that easy. You have to get open borders in order to spread the religion, and you DO have to get someone to vote for you. You need to be running your economy/military well too, so you don't get killed before you can actually abuse the AP.

I'm going to start making it in more of my games to take advantage of the DoW dogpiles though. It seems like a great way to snipe cities if you can swing it.

Our current succession game (JFC-2) is running exactly as you're describing--the Christian city was razed early on, and everybody is non-Christian, leaving the AP holder (us-Mongolia) being the only candidate for AP residency. We do have more than 75% of the votes which we will rectify by converting our opponent's (France) cities just enough to run 2nd to us.

However, is it possible to call on the diplo win option, with us being the AP resident (in free religion) and nobody else being full members of Christianity? I thought there was a rule barring automatic wins. Unless voting members can win also, we may have to convert to Christianity and induce another civ to do so before calling on the vote.

Please clarify...:confused:

He got another civ to friendly which meant it wasn't a self-voted win. There doesn't have to be an opponent.

Our current succession game (JFC-2) is running exactly as you're describing--the Christian city was razed early on, and everybody is non-Christian, leaving the AP holder (us-Mongolia) being the only candidate for AP residency. We do have more than 75% of the votes which we will rectify by converting our opponent's (France) cities just enough to run 2nd to us.

However, is it possible to call on the diplo win option, with us being the AP resident (in free religion) and nobody else being full members of Christianity? I thought there was a rule barring automatic wins. Unless voting members can win also, we may have to convert to Christianity and induce another civ to do so before calling on the vote.

Please clarify...:confused:

The rule is that you can't vote yourself in exclusively. There is no need for there to be an opponent on the ballot though :).

Half of my game posts on this forum have me winning this way lately, it ends games that are won quicker, and even cheeses out some non-deserved wins :p.

There's also another "abuse" factor:

1) Demand something or make a trade with a player you want dead that isn't a Full Member of the AP..
2) Propose an AP resolution calling for War on the Infidels, specifically the player from above
3) Laugh as the AP DoW overrides the automatic 10-turn peace treaty and conquer the player's cities.

I won my first diplomatic game using the AP recently and I was pretty excited about it. It was a pangea map and I was trying for a domination win and took out two small neighbors early as I was on the eastern edge of the continent and secured the largest landmass with an axe->maceman attack but had to slow down to rebuild my economy. In the meantime, Mansa was the second largest civ, and in third was Isabella on the other side of the globe.

At the end of my warring I had taken one civ and vassaled Gilgamesh when Isabella finally converted one of my cities to Christianity which was her religion. Now since she was on the other end of the continent, I set her up as a close friend early and used her to attack others with a good score to ensure I could maintain a military edge over my closer opponents. Since I was playing Brennus. Now I hadn't previously run into the AP but Isabella has built it so I was getting the bonus and was eligible for votes so I decided to spread the religion to all my other cities using OR to help me build infastructure but wanted to keep Christianity for the diplomatic bonus.

I originally has 10 votes or so right after I got my first Christian city, and Mansa and Huayna were the leaders at the election. but neither could secure enough votes. After I put Christianity in all my cities I had also finished the hanging gardens, and since I was no longer whipping as heavily since I was out of war my empire was easily the most populous. When the election came up I won easily since Isabella wasn't eligible and I switched to Theocracy to get her to friendly and prepare for my next offensive campaign. When the option to choose a diplomatic victory came up, I took it and to my great surprise I got the vote from Isabella, and my vassal, and because of the size of our empires I won easily and finished the game some 500 years earlier then I expected.

I learned a few important things from this about the victory condition

1) I didn't need to have everyone happy with me, I just needed a big empire and another biggish empire to REALLY like me. I had just declared war on a few other civs so I literally only had one ally and a vassal with two small cities to give me the edge.

2) Diplomatic strategies can be very flexible. By making a good plan to manipulate the relationships between other civs to try and win a warmonger victory, I was able to nail a diplomatic one instead. My keeping another strong civ happy we posed an unbeatable team for world dominance one way or another. This was my first game where I went in with a clear plan for controlling the behavior of the AI and it worked like a charm.

3) Spreading religions can be useful. I hadn't really bothered moving religions around much before besides for cultural victories, but the diplomatic bonuses are great, and they work well with spiritual to get the most benefit from the religious civics. I also make missionaries to build culture in new cities so I can start with a granary instead.

AP is a huge wonder, completely a case apart of all the Civ IV wonders. Consider that the AP:

-Can force peaceful AI to make your wars
-Can save you from a unwanted war
-Can give you cities without a fight
-Can give you a pretty controlable diplo win
-Give hammers to cities with certain buildings that you would build anyway most likely

I would build a wonder with only one or two of this items gladly.....

I hate the AP.

I usually try and found Taoism or Islam, and then convert and build the AP. Bam, I don't spread the religion beyond it's holy city, so the AP is essientally not there. I then switch back to the old religion.

I love Civ abuse :D

What if you are having a hard time getting an OB agreement with a civ that has none of the AP religion yet?

A trick I've heard of (but have yet to execute): Make a caravel with a missionary of religion X aboard, then gift it to the contrary AI. Hopefully in a few turns, religion X will appear in one of its cities.

I've heard this works even when the AI is in Theocracy, as long as the AI is spreading the non-state-religion to itself.

Anyone out there confirm that this works? :confused:

Yup, it is true ( unless you're using last version of Bhruic's patch, that blocks it ). I've done it a couple of times myself ..... Theocracy has a poor wording in description: what it does is prevent unwanted non-state religion spread: you ( or the AI ) can still spread a non-state religion in your (it) territory if you (it) want(s) to....

Yes it does Peepers.

Yup, it is true ( unless you're using last version of Bhruic's patch, that blocks it ). I've done it a couple of times myself ..... Theocracy has a poor wording in description: what it does is prevent unwanted non-state religion spread: you ( or the AI ) can still spread a non-state religion in your (it) territory if you (it) want(s) to....

I'm glad that bhruics fixed it. The obvious solution to such "non OB" problems is to dogpile that AI with the entire world using the AP DoW mechanic...if they're not in your religion they're infidels don't forget :lol:.

^^I don't think that Bhruic's solution is a good one ( Theo AI will simply refuse missionaries... reminds me too much the Religionless Theo Izzy of vanilla days ) but the problem exists and needs a solution.

The issue is that there is always the trick of founding a city, spread AP religion and gift it to the theo civ. That one is clearly harder to solve.

To me the AP is broken in its current form, and I also think it is too complicated to understand. Many of the tactics you described are very counter-intuitive. The entire thing smells of abuse.


It does indeed seem broken, and that is why I refuse to build it. Those wins don't seem to make me feel right, just cheap.

However, at least it has been modified since its first release, which was even more-so broken than it is now.

I like building the AP, but I have rarely used it for the win. Usually, its for the hammers, AND simply more control.

I have a question though. In my current game (PYL III, Religious Fanatics, playing Zara), the AP was built by Justinian, who was Hindu at the time. Its 1650 AD now, and I have converted to Hinduism, vassalized Saladin (Justinian has Charlemenge and Sury as vassals), but my Hindu buildings arent giving me hammers. I though ALL buildings of the AP religion gave the hammer bonus. I even conquered the Hindu Holy City, Mecca, and it has the Shrine, and the Shrine has the +2 hammers, but no other Hindu buildings are getting the hammer bonus.

Now, when the AP was actually built, I was Confu, and I have actually defied a couple resolutions to return cities to Sal and Sury, and I am considered a "voting member" not a "Full Member". I now have enough votes to block any resolution I want too, but I still do not have the hammers. Anyone know about this?

It was because you defied the resolutions. If you defy an AP resolution then you lose the +2 hammers bonus from the religious buildings and also get 5 unhappiness in any of your cities with the religion in. This lasts a long time but can be reversed by voting for another AP resolution that passes. Getting control of the AP is very useful, even if you don't use it to win a diplomatic victory, because you can decide whether any of the resolutions the game offers should be voted on. If it is detrimental to you or another civ you don't want hurt you can simply not allow the vote.

I'm playig a game now and I have AP religion buildings (non-state religion too) and I'm getting the hammers. I'm not using the Bhruic patch.

I really like to build the AP for the production as I'm a serious production whore. Everything else about it is just gravy for me, also I don't like diplo victories...

It was because you defied the resolutions. If you defy an AP resolution then you lose the +2 hammers bonus from the religious buildings and also get 5 unhappiness in any of your cities with the religion in. This lasts a long time but can be reversed by voting for another AP resolution that passes. Getting control of the AP is very useful, even if you don't use it to win a diplomatic victory, because you can decide whether any of the resolutions the game offers should be voted on. If it is detrimental to you or another civ you don't want hurt you can simply not allow the vote.
I thought it might be related to that. Is the "no hammer" thing permanent? The +5 unhappy has gone away (I actually had 2 cities with +10 unhappiness, LOL) but still no hammers.

Also, can I actually get control of it now, other than taking it by force? As a Voting Member, will I be eligible for leadership? Currently, Saladin is actually the "President" even though Justinian built it (I voted for Sal last election, right before I attacked him, and took Mecca and 3 other cities). I have more votes than Justinian now, and Saladin still has 3 cities, 2 of which are over 12-pop. Will he be forced to vote for me (if I am even eligible for the vote).

I may just go stomping through Justinians land anyway, and conquer the darn thing. He has half a dozen wonders in that city, and still doesnt have Rifling (I have Rifling and Steel). Oromos are strong when upgraded to Rifles vs Caph's, they dont have "immune to first strike" like Knights.

I feel like the AP is kinda like vassals: A good idea in theory, but how it was implemented requires more tweaks to make it workable.

I just wish the AP had some sort of option to refuse the decision to accept the religious victory vote. Like in master of Orion, where if the high council votes someone the winner, you can refuse to accept the decision and instead have a "final war" of you vs. everyone else.

I just wish the AP had some sort of option to refuse the decision to accept the religious victory vote. Like in master of Orion, where if the high council votes someone the winner, you can refuse to accept the decision and instead have a "final war" of you vs. everyone else.

This would be terrific and very fun :).

I already like using this sucker for dogpiles too.

The unhappiness from defying will fade with time (like whipping unhappiness, only slower). However the +2 hammers will only return when you vote with the majority on a new AP-vote (this could be really quick, or take ages, depending on how quickly the new vote comes up.)

I just wish the AP had some sort of option to refuse the decision to accept the religious victory vote. Like in master of Orion, where if the high council votes someone the winner, you can refuse to accept the decision and instead have a "final war" of you vs. everyone else.

If I remember correctly, when you are the Resident then you can decide to not allow the vote for the religious victory. Also if you are a large voter you can abstain and there will be insufficient votes for the other civs or you to win. So if you think winning by the AP is cheesy you can effectively stop it by taking control and stopping anyone from getting that victory, including yourself. I'd say that was an additional challenge rather than making the game too easy. The AP is a great game feature in my opinion and a major addition in BtS.

If I remember correctly, when you are the Resident then you can decide to not allow the vote for the religious victory. Also if you are a large voter you can abstain and there will be insufficient votes for the other civs or you to win. So if you think winning by the AP is cheesy you can effectively stop it by taking control and stopping anyone from getting that victory, including yourself. I'd say that was an additional challenge rather than making the game too easy. The AP is a great game feature in my opinion and a major addition in BtS.

This is true. However, you don't even have to call the vote. You can just pick the "no action" option or whatever. If you're the AP chair, it's impossible to win this way if you don't want to. If you're not AP chair, you probably don't have THAT commanding of a lead in the religion, though I could envision some extremely rare exceptions.

You also don't have to go spreading it around if you don't want the win. Accidental AP wins are rare...I've only had one and it was after I'd wiped out everyone but a friendly civ and his vassals, capturing the AP in the process. I didn't even spread the religion in that one, but I'd captured more cities than the remaining vassals had, and my only competitor liked me and wasn't in that religion. He had more votes than I did and voted me a win. Even then, I was willing to win that way, or I'd have not called the vote.

Every other AP win for me has been intentional, and in many cases schemed (aka capturing the AP and using it to win, or building it early in a rare religion...typically christianity but occasionally something like taoism or confuc.)

Does everyone actually view this as "cheap" instead of just "powerful"? Not only do you have to have it, you need 75% votes. You have to pick a religion to get someone to like you, without getting killed. You also need OB with everyone or you'll have to go to war anyway, and if you spent too much effort on the AP that might be harder than normal, although you can probably draw some religious allies into the fray at least.

There are lots of strong wonders, like the mids really turbocharging the SE and making games a lot easier.

I agree that the AP makes the game easier, but often if you clear the diplomatic conditions necessary to win using it (aka someone ultra friendly with you and people not killing you), you can usually last in the game long enough to win other conditions also. I had a game where my AP attempt failed (PYL III, actually), but the diplomatic leverage I'd set up was more than enough to pick civs off one by one until I was the largest civ on the planet.

IMO it's not any cheaper than buddying up with a strong AI and teching to space, or winning via culture.

If I remember correctly, when you are the Resident then you can decide to not allow the vote for the religious victory. Also if you are a large voter you can abstain and there will be insufficient votes for the other civs or you to win. So if you think winning by the AP is cheesy you can effectively stop it by taking control and stopping anyone from getting that victory, including yourself. I'd say that was an additional challenge rather than making the game too easy. The AP is a great game feature in my opinion and a major addition in BtS.
This is very true. In the game I referenced above, I voted Saladin in as Resident, then I took out 4 of his cities. Since those cities put me WELL over the top for a voting majority, as each subsequent vote for a new Resident came up (not me, BTW, I was not eligible for leadership until I actually took the AP city) I constantly "abstained", and thus, neither Justinian or Sury ever gained control of it. Eventually, I took out the city with the AP, and now I am the Resident.

The hammer thing is still kind of weird. Any city that I owned when I defied a Resolution still does not get the +2 hammers (even though it was over 100 turns since my last "defiance" and all the unhappiness is long since faded). Any city I took after that point (4 from Sal, 2 from Sury, 3 from Justy) has the +2 hammers listed under the Temple and Mandhir. I am still playing that game, actually, the AIs have managed to spy their way to tech parity (grrr), so I am now just planning to wipe Justy out and win a Domination victory very soon. It was a fun game, BTW, (shameful plug for the PYL series, heh)

I wont call it "cheap", TMIT, but I do admit that I rarely pursue this kind of victory condition, simply because I prefer a more warring-building type of victory (meaning Domination, Conquest, or Space). So many AP wins seem to be fairly unplanned, kind of "oh, ok, I win now, I guess".

In your case, where you specifically pursue this as a firm strategic plan, its not cheap or cheesy at all IMHO. The strategy requires reasonable skills, a tech line that is not so hot, strong diplomatic ability, and missionaries instead of units. Its not the easiest intentional path to victory. Now, the "hmm, I conquered the AP city, what does this Religious Leader vote mean? HEY! It means I win!!!" is a tad cheesy, though.

I wont call it "cheap", TMIT, but I do admit that I rarely pursue this kind of victory condition, simply because I prefer a more warring-building type of victory (meaning Domination, Conquest, or Space). So many AP wins seem to be fairly unplanned, kind of "oh, ok, I win now, I guess".

In your case, where you specifically pursue this as a firm strategic plan, its not cheap or cheesy at all IMHO. The strategy requires reasonable skills, a tech line that is not so hot, strong diplomatic ability, and missionaries instead of units. Its not the easiest intentional path to victory. Now, the "hmm, I conquered the AP city, what does this Religious Leader vote mean? HEY! It means I win!!!" is a tad cheesy, though.

Lol I hate space and culture. I have nothing against those victory conditions but they require patience that I often seem to lack.

Along those lines, I'll use the AP (or UN) either as part of a focused strategy, or just to backdoor out of a domination if it looks like it's going to take forever. Again, patience issues :p. Notice virtually all of my games, even the harder ones, are sub 5 hours on epic (JC RPC I took over being the exception, since that had 18 civs and needed conquest - that game was around 5:20). Most are well under 4. If it looks like I'm going to have to tech for 80 turns to catch up to the enemy militarily, I'll go for diplo rather than sitting there at friendly until I stab them with 60 mech infantry and 80 cruise missiles. If I can't get diplo then tough luck for them though, space isn't my thing unless it's required in a roleplay (only recent SS win was "win this game I" by futurehermit) or something ;).

My main objection with the AP are not the cheap wins. It's the fact that you can use its "diplomacy" without actually working any diplomacy. If you don't control it yourself you might have to pull some serious religious stunts to simply save your butt, and religions are often hard enough to handle even without the AP in play (since your relations with the AIs depend so heavily on them).

Maybe my opinion will change when I understand the AP better.

My last game I could have abused the AP this way, I had 3/4 of the votes in the AP (Confucian), with my vassal and a friendly AI neighbor the only others with the AP religion spread to every city
The other continent had 4 Civs, all relatively small split between Buddhism and Hinduism and none with Confucianism in any cities yet. With some diplomacy/EP work I could have easily spread Confucianism to one small city of each of the four and voted myself into a Diplo victory rather quickly, but that's really cheesy to do.

Bleys - once you became Resident, did you put up any votes that passed? Isn't that the key to getting the hammers back? I know on the rare occasions I take charge of the AP, I don't have a lot of votes to put up and so don't initiate many.

Bleys - once you became Resident, did you put up any votes that passed? Isn't that the key to getting the hammers back? I know on the rare occasions I take charge of the AP, I don't have a lot of votes to put up and so don't initiate many.
Not yet, in fact I just became Resident a few turns back, so I am waiting for an actual "vote" on something too see if I get the hammers back in all my cities. I will let you know, trying to wrap this game up.