Monasteries

gettingfat said:

I think the Holy shrine itself should allow building missionaries even without monastery. It doesn't make sense to me the holy shrine has personnel to collect money but nobody to spread the religion.

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Well, it rarely makes any sense to build a Holy Shrine in the first place. I'd rather build the Chicken Pizza, and that's the truth.

This is one thing that probably takes players the longest time to understand.

Well, of course your strategy is only one way to play obsolete. Having one, solid shrine is often a good thing because that is the city where you put your corporate hqs and then wallstreet.

I rarely build Monasteries for culture - if I need culture early it comes from Monuments, which can be whipped for 1 pop.

The capital might get a few monasteries because it more than likely has good production and pulls in good commerce.

We've been "geared" towards that since we learned how powerful it was to sling to Civil Service early on.

I think we've also been giving meditation a pass for a long time and taking Polytheism because it is a pre-requisite for Literature/The Great Library. Pushing the GL back a step may change the gameplay patterns we've gotten used to.

Making monasteries cheaper would be a nice move, particularly for spiritual leaders. The change to Golden Ages and introduction of Christo Redentor has reduced the uniqueness of Spiritual. It wouldn't have to be a full 50% cheaper to build - someone above suggested 25%, which might be better. It's like being gently urged to try something that will help you. It doesn't have to be overkill like building Walls with Protective and Stone.

If you own the UoS AND are running state religion then that monestary is a better science building if your city has less than 15 raw beakers. Which can be the case in some new cities. [x*1,25 = (x+2)*1,1] => x = 14,6_

*Monestaries are cheaper, too
*But you can assign scientists with library

For the same price as a university you can build 3,3_ monestaries which give 33% increased research, so no question there.

*Universities allow oxford
*Monestaries have better culture (6,7 vs. 3)

Too bad they become obsolete. Their use in building missionaries is a small plus, but anyone can run Org.Rel for a few turns if they absolutely need missionaries. And this saves building monestary in production cities.

FH, I don't think monasteries and missionaries should be cheaper.
Monasteries are religious buildings, not science buildings.
IMHO the current balance is just right.

UncleJJ said:

This desribes my philosophy too.

I have one further reason and that is so I can spam religions later in the game without needing OR. Free Religion can be a great civic during conquests when you're fighting unhappiness due to WW, motherland and maybe emancipation (if your running Slavery or Caste System in a SE). Sending 2 or 3 missionaries to newly conquered cities can get them off to a great start. The culture expands the borders quickly and helps fight off motherland or cultural border pressure. The extra happiness means you don't need to whip the city down quite so hard allowing more tiles to be worked. Alternately the extra happiness lets you whip the city harder if you want to... and of course you can always whip in a temple or two of the new religion(s) for even more happiness and culture.

The hammer cost of a missionary in the late game (with factories and railways) is peanuts when you are paying 140 for a bomber and 220 for a battleship. You need to build your monastery before Scientific Method to use it in the late game and I find myself delaying researching that tech a turn or two just so a monastery finishes only to go obsolete immediately

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I spend virtually the whole game in OR, so I forgot about that. Yet another reason to spam monasteries of (at least) your state religion!

Monasteries also generate 2 hammers if you own or control the Apostolic Palace. Actually, I thought all full members got the 2 hammer bonus for state religious buildings, but maybe not.

axident said:

I spend virtually the whole game in OR, so I forgot about that. Yet another reason to spam monasteries of (at least) your state religion!

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I meant the non state religions, but there is is no state religion in Free Religion anyway . It is a good civic for diplomatic reasons but the 10% research bonus is nice as well. I haven't used it yet in BtS since I always seem to end up in the Apolostic Palace faction ... so sticking with that state religion makes sense and lots of free hammmers.

In some Warlords games I can see 3 or 4 shrines held by my neighbours and I plan to take them over. So I make sure I have at least one monastery of each of those religions. Then I go for the shrine city and spam that religion while in Free Religion to newly conquered cities. Not only do I get the benefits of Free Religion = 1 and 1 per religion in each city but I get some gold from the shrine too.

cabert said:

FH, I don't think monasteries and missionaries should be cheaper.
Monasteries are religious buildings, not science buildings.
IMHO the current balance is just right.

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It's true that monasteries are religious buildings, but I read a quote by a Firaxis employee one time who encouraged the use of monasteries as science buildings saying that pound-for-pound monasteries are a great early science building.

I agree to a large extent, but they seem prohibitively expensive.

I do worry though that if you made them cheaper this would create imbalance for cultural victories.

I find monasteries a touch expensive for early-game buildings, but they're great at about the time theaters are coming online. They're solid mid-game buildings providing science and culture, and they last for a while. If I have any of AP, Sistine, UoS, or Spiral Minaret, then state religion buildings get an even higher priority.

With all the wonders, a monastery gives:
+7 culture, +10% science, +2 beakers, +2 gold, and +2 hammers. Simply ridiculous. It takes 60 hammers to make, meaning at 30 turns the monastery has paid for itself. Less than that if you value beakers, gold, or commerce relative to hammers.

Non-state religion monasteries...meh. Great in commerce cities, poor in production cities, much like most economic buildings.

Melon Head said:

I find monasteries a touch expensive for early-game buildings, but they're great at about the time theaters are coming online. They're solid mid-game buildings providing science and culture, and they last for a while. If I have any of AP, Sistine, UoS, or Spiral Minaret, then state religion buildings get an even higher priority.

With all the wonders, a monastery gives:
+7 culture, +10% science, +2 beakers, +2 gold, and +2 hammers. Simply ridiculous. It takes 60 hammers to make, meaning at 30 turns the monastery has paid for itself. Less than that if you value beakers, gold, or commerce relative to hammers.

Non-state religion monasteries...meh. Great in commerce cities, poor in production cities, much like most economic buildings.

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Don't forget OR and forge modifiers, so it doesn't really cost 60 hammers, and it gives you +2 BASE hammers or +3 net hammers with OR and forge.

I think the problem with monasteries is not so much the cost as the difficulty in getting a religion. I don't think I have ever founded an early religion since I started playing Monarch and the later religions are just too unproductive to bother much about. This makes researching Meditiation very inefficient. I usually just take it as a kicker when I am trading for something else.

I used to go for early religions all the time when I was playing below Prince. I still try when I happen to be playing a leader that starts with Mysticism, but I am usually beaten to the punch by the faster-teching AIs. This is kind of sad, since religion was one of the key things that made me switch from playing Civ III.

That said, I always build monasteries once a religion spreads to my borders. They are not quite as cost-effective as libraries (10% / 60 = 0.166... compared with 25% / 90 = 0.277...) but they are great for pumping up your science city if you have the spare hammers (or need to whip off some unhappiness).

I have often wished I could "trade" for a religion -- i.e. pay the founder to send a missionary to your territory. That might be a little difficult to code, but it would be cool. (And there is some historical precedent, though admittedly limited.)

Alternatively, it would be nice if you could select any religion that has been founded as your state religion. If you didn't already have at least one city with that religion, it could appear randomly, using the same algorithm for determining a "founded" religion, but with out the ability to build the shrine.

Either of these would greatly enhance my enjoyment of the game, and I don't really see how they would affect the balance.

Given that spiritual has been weakened by changes to golden ages and Cristo Redontor maybe given spiritual half price monasteries as well as temples.

Maybe making them as cost-effective as libraries would do it? i.e., a slight reduction in cost?

They're not as cost-effective as libs if you only take the beakers bonus into account. Both have side bonuses that you cannot really compare (the ability to assign two specialists when running anything but Caste System VS the ability to generate missionaries).
What about the ability to turn 1 citizen into a priest ? After all, Priests, like Spies and Engineers, cannot benefit from Caste, and i often wish i'd be able to turn more priests than i can (especially if i happen to have built Angkor Wat).

That's actually one of the reasons I will spam Monasteries: to provide hammers for a production-poor city once I hit Angkor Wat.

I always build Monasteries. At least one per religion, as mentioned, but also one of each of every religion I can get my hands on in a Production City, or all my Production Cities, if I have time. It'll boost Science if I turn Production to Science. It'll allow me "early Engineers" with Angkor Wat, it'll give my Production City a respectable Culture (which it might otherwise lack without a Library or a Uni), and basing all Missionary Production in a Production City makes it easier to spam missionaries later on for Free Religion.

My primary Commerce Cities also get Monasteries, but the push for a "complete set" isn't very great since they typically have poor production and the Science bonus isn't logarithmic anyway. One of the ways I boost production in production poor cities is to build Angkor Wat and then rush a Monastery or two.

I always build monasteries ASAP in the earlier part of the game. The more religions the better.