Are there enough Beliefs?

Emperor Steven

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Apr 28, 2012
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We've had quite a bit of information about how Religion will play out in the game over the last few weeks, but there's something missing.

The screenshot that clearly shows the Religion menu (you know, the one with a guy editing Christianity, that inadvertently revealed that the Byzantines get an extra belief) showed that a civilization's religion will have up to 5 beliefs- or 6 for the Byzantines. The first type of belief is the pantheon- and selecting one will make it unavailable to other civs. The next is the Founder belief, of which there are 13. Again, there have been indications that taking one denies it to other civs. There is also an "Enhancer Belief" that we know nothing about.

But between Founder and Enhancer are two Follower beliefs. We've seen the list in previews so far, and that list isn't long enough. With a maximum of eleven religions in a big game, there should be 22 Follower Beliefs- 23 if one of those religions is controlled by the Byzantines. There are just 14 Follower beliefs known.

So what about the remaining nine Follower beliefs? The obvious answer is that those follower beliefs might have already been selected by other religions in those games being previewed, or Firaxis is just holding out on us. But it's also possible that Follower beliefs are NOT mutually exclusive. That is, two or more civs could both have Choral Music or Peace Gardens, etc. That would prevent lost opportunities in a really huge map and explain the known number of beliefs, but it would also tend to detract from diversity of options and the competitive nature of trying to snatch up the really good beliefs before some other Civ gets them. Finally, it could be that there really are just 14 Follower beliefs, and you have to play musical chairs to get them before time runs out and you're left with an empty slot in your religion.

Are the Follower beliefs first-come first served, like Pantheons? Is there confirmation of this? And what exactly is an Enhancer belief?
 
they are mutually exclusive.

Very likely the builds they were using had 'missing' beliefs, or likely ones were added after that point (or as stated, some were taken already).

It's been stated in interviews/etc that the beliefs (all of them) are first-come first-serve.

Very likely the dev understand that they need to include enough beliefs to cover the maximum possible religion choices.
 
I think I've heard that not all the religions were going to be fully developed in one single game
 
As I recall, cuso has it right. I believe that the number of religions that can be founded in a game is roughly half that of the number of civilizations in the game.

If this is true, though, what of the Byzantines? Specifically, under what circumstances do they gain their extra belief? Do they have to found a religion to get it? At what point do they select it? Is it only available for a single religion?
 
And in the game shown, it was not the first religion founded. Some beliefs had been taken.
 
As I recall, cuso has it right. I believe that the number of religions that can be founded in a game is roughly half that of the number of civilizations in the game.

If this is true, though, what of the Byzantines? Specifically, under what circumstances do they gain their extra belief? Do they have to found a religion to get it? At what point do they select it? Is it only available for a single religion?

Let me put how Religion roughly works in G&K from the info we have.

1. At about 6 or 10 faith you get the option to choose a "Pantheon of Gods" which doesn't spread beyond your borders (which could mean that if a city is unconnected with another city via borders it won't spread to that city). You can pick 1 belief from a large pool of beliefs.
2. At about 120, you get a chance for a Great Prophet to spawn, that chance increases with each turn
3. As far as we know, there is only 1/2 religions of civs (6 religions for 12 civs, 11 religions for 22 civs).
4. When a Great Prophet spawns, you can found a religion.
5. For each religion, you initially pick a Founder belief, which only the Founder civilizations benefits from. You also pick a Follower belief, which affects any city this religion spreads to, including enemies.
6. You can only pick 1 belief in a game, meaning that if somebody picks the Dancer of the Aurora that belief is no longer avilalbe later on in the game.
7. Any additional Prophets you spawn can "enhance" religion, which is two times for regular civs, three times (I believe) for Byzantium.
8. There's a 2nd Follower Belief, meaning there should be at least 22 Follower beliefs.
9. Byzantium gets an extra belief, which means they have to found a religion.
10. YOu can only decide which belief go into your religion IF you found that religion
11. If the Holy City of a Religion is taken from it's founding 'father', the civ loses it's Founder Belief.

I think that's roughly how religion founding works.
 
Let me put how Religion roughly works in G&K from the info we have.

7. Any additional Prophets you spawn can "enhance" religion, which is two times for regular civs, three times (I believe) for Byzantium.

I think, and hope, Byzantium can choose their bonus belief with the second Prophet, or Prophets need to come fast enough to have a good advantage for Byzantium.
 
King: Thank you, but I already knew all of this.

My main question is this: If the Byzantines do not found a religion, do they gain any benefit from their UA? If yes, what is the benefit? If not, I believe they are one of the weakest civilizations in the game, as their UA is quite potentially blank. If the Byzantine '6th belief' requires a religion to be founded, and if the Byzantines gain no bonuses whatsoever on founding a religion (unlike, as we know, the Celts), then it sounds like the Byzantines have a UA that is quite possibly the worst in the entire game.
 
At this moment little is known about the Byzntines, maybe the 6th believe is just a part of their UA. I think that we will hear more about them and Maya in this month and in more about Sweden in June.
 
Theres bound to be enough beliefs. Its the kind if thing that will show up on the first round of testing.
 
King: Thank you, but I already knew all of this.

My main question is this: If the Byzantines do not found a religion, do they gain any benefit from their UA? If yes, what is the benefit? If not, I believe they are one of the weakest civilizations in the game, as their UA is quite potentially blank. If the Byzantine '6th belief' requires a religion to be founded, and if the Byzantines gain no bonuses whatsoever on founding a religion (unlike, as we know, the Celts), then it sounds like the Byzantines have a UA that is quite possibly the worst in the entire game.

Yeah, founding a religion is key to use the 6th Belief, but other civs also have their unique attributes that can be useless. Like naval bonuses on Pangaea. Or bonuses that fall flat with an One City Challenge. So yeah, if your playing Byzantium, you are very strongly guided (forced) to choose a Pantheon to generate faith to take full advantage of religion.
 
Montov, do you know if you have to found a religion to get the 6th belief, or is that surmise on your part?

Also, my issue is not that they are forced to go into religion, but the fact that they get no bonuses to ensure that they can even get a religion.

And, with due respect, England's naval movement bonus is not worthless on Pangaea maps, it is simply minimal. Similarly with e.g. Arabia's trade route bonus with a one-city challenge. In contrast, if the Byzantine's UA requires founding a religion, that UA is in fact worth zero if you don't found it. That is not even the case with England on Pangaea. I will also note that England is currently considered one of the weakest civs in the game because of the map-based nature of its UA. That is the exact basis for my contention that the Byzantines will be weak without some method of helping get a religion.

Finally, those are all choices under control of the player. Whether or not religion is in the game is not under control of the player.

I can only see a couple ways out of this dilemma:

1) The Byzantines do not need to found a religion to get their 6th belief, but only have to have a religion exist in their cities.

2) The 6th belief is not their complete UA.

3) Their final Unique benefit is either a building that grants Faith, or a unit (Crusader?) that grants faith.
 
Montov, do you know if you have to found a religion to get the 6th belief, or is that surmise on your part?

Also, my issue is not that they are forced to go into religion, but the fact that they get no bonuses to ensure that they can even get a religion.

And, with due respect, England's naval movement bonus is not worthless on Pangaea maps, it is simply minimal. Similarly with e.g. Arabia's trade route bonus with a one-city challenge. In contrast, if the Byzantine's UA requires founding a religion, that UA is in fact worth zero if you don't found it. That is not even the case with England on Pangaea. I will also note that England is currently considered one of the weakest civs in the game because of the map-based nature of its UA. That is the exact basis for my contention that the Byzantines will be weak without some method of helping get a religion.

Finally, those are all choices under control of the player. Whether or not religion is in the game is not under control of the player.

I can only see a couple ways out of this dilemma:

1) The Byzantines do not need to found a religion to get their 6th belief, but only have to have a religion exist in their cities.

2) The 6th belief is not their complete UA.

3) Their final Unique benefit is either a building that grants Faith, or a unit (Crusader?) that grants faith.

1) They have to found their own religion, you cannot decide which beliefs you choose and you do not recieve the Founder Belief if a religion spreads to your lands. So the only way to use Byznatium's 6th belief is 100% through Founding a Religion

2) Exactly, they could have a 50% rate increase of Prophet spawning or something else.

3) Crusader is very much unlikely due to a Belief known as "Holy Warriors" which use faith to be bought, which eventually means Crusaders, Templars, etc.
 
Frankly I think it's a little silly to say something is 100% certain when none of us really know how the Byzantines will function. They could be unique and able to pick an extra belief regardless of whether they found a religion or not, which would be quite a nice UA, wouldn't it? Also as mentioned this may only be part of the Byzantine's UA.
 
I tend to agree with KMS. We do not know how the Byzantine UA will work, or if it requires you to found a religion.

The most extreme form of their UA would be to choose a belief on turn 1 that affects any religion in your cities. I don't think this is how it works, but if so, it would be quite powerful (if for no other reason it denies that belief to others).

On the other extreme, it is their entire UA, it requires they found a religion, and it is gained 'last' of all the benefits. If this is the case, it is an extremely weak benefit, as it requires a specific game plan throughout the early game (i.e., found a religion) with a very marginal benefit quite a bit later in the game.

It's probably somewhere between those two, but where it falls will determine the strength of the civilization. Right now, the prognosis is not too good, IMO.
 
Frankly I think it's a little silly to say something is 100% certain when none of us really know how the Byzantines will function. They could be unique and able to pick an extra belief regardless of whether they found a religion or not, which would be quite a nice UA, wouldn't it? Also as mentioned this may only be part of the Byzantine's UA.

Yep, this. All we know from the Byzantines UA is the screenshot that shows they have an extra belief slot. That is it. Nothing more has been elaborated on it, so we have no idea how it really works so we can't say it's 100%.

Their UA may be they get to choose an extra belief for whatever religion they follow, whether or not they found it. We also don't know if they have any additional bonuses to their UA besides the extra belief. Right now this is all speculation, so until we know more it's impossible to judge how strong or weak the Byzantines will be. I highly doubt Firaxis would make it so they are unable to use their UA at all if they miss out on finding a religion (which half of the civs every game will do). Surely there is more to it than that.
 
I don't understand why people automatically assume they can select the belief if they dont' found their religion, I think that's a stupid assumption.

If you think about it, EVERY civ has a chance of not using their potential from their ability

if you play on Pangea, any civ that has a focus on seafaring becomes wer (Kamehameha, Suleiman, Elizabeth, Askia). Germany and Ottomans also lose PART of their benefit if you play without barbarians.

I seriously believe that Byzantines have to found the religion to get the extra belief. But the thing is Byzantium is suppose to focus on religion, it's their thing, so 90% you'll see Theodora finding a religion in your game, and so should you.
 
I don't understand why people automatically assume they can select the belief if they dont' found their religion, I think that's a stupid assumption.

If you think about it, EVERY civ has a chance of not using their potential from their ability

if you play on Pangea, any civ that has a focus on seafaring becomes wer (Kamehameha, Suleiman, Elizabeth, Askia). Germany and Ottomans also lose PART of their benefit if you play without barbarians.

I seriously believe that Byzantines have to found the religion to get the extra belief. But the thing is Byzantium is suppose to focus on religion, it's their thing, so 90% you'll see Theodora finding a religion in your game, and so should you.

Nobody is assuming they can select it if they don't found their religion, we're just saying we know nothing about them other than from the one screenshot we've seen, so it's naive to assume that you CAN'T. We don't know anything, so we shouldn't assume anything about them. We shouldn't assume they can found the 6th bonus with founding a religion, but we shouldn't assume they can't, either.

Yes, some civs lose their bonuses if the settings are customized a certain way, but that is done prior to the game and that is merely an option. The Byzantine bonus isn't dependent on any settings, it's how it would be every single game.

Yes, the Byzantines are supposed to focus on religion, but since only 50% of civs can found a religion, there will certainly be games that they are unable to find one.
 
We also don't know that the extra Belief is the whole of the Byzantines' unique ability. It seems like all of the new UA's for which we know the actual text include at least two components. Scourge of God has four.

we also don't know if the 'extra' belief is just another follower one, a 2nd pantheon pick when you get your pantheon (or get to start with a pantheon), or if it's a 'pick what you want from any list', or they have their own list of 'UA type' beliefs, etc...

So yeah, people shouldn't get down on it until they know how it works. :crazyeye:
 
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