Does Byzantium need a boost?

I think small buff would be fine like

a) Byzantium starts with pottery
b) Byzantium starts with Piety opened
c) Byzantium capital starts with shrine
d) Byzantium can always find religion
 
You guys are focusing too much on rigging Byzantium to FOUND a religion.

What the UA should do is allow the player to DECLARE Byzantium a Holy City. This then would give them some extra power to whatever religion happened to be in Constantiople at the time, whether they founded it or not and would apply only to them.
 
Hi budweiser,

Whether there's too much focus on founding a religion, well, that is a matter of opinion of course. By the way, your idea is quite interesting, and has some historical flavor to it. I wonder if this mechanic is supported by the game already? Can one presently, using FireTuner or something like that, by fiat, add a second holy city for a religion? Does it work or do we crash the game? If the mechanic is already supported by the game engine and doesn't cause problems, do we increase our odds of successfully lobbying for developer action? Experience shows that developer hours tend to get scarce at this stage of a game's development cycle. Also, does your proposal constitute a replacement of the Byzantine UA, or an addition? Could they still enact one more belief than normal, and if so, would that affect the twin holy city as well?
 
budweiser said:
You guys are focusing too much on rigging Byzantium to FOUND a religion.

What the UA should do is allow the player to DECLARE Byzantium a Holy City. This then would give them some extra power to whatever religion happened to be in Constantiople at the time, whether they founded it or not and would apply only to them.
Click to expand...

Yes I quite like this as well. :goodjob:

I would like them to still get +1 belief as well, treat it as a founder belief but only for whoever holds the Holy City.
 
JohnMK said:
Hi budweiser,

Whether there's too much focus on founding a religion, well, that is a matter of opinion of course. By the way, your idea is quite interesting, and has some historical flavor to it. I wonder if this mechanic is supported by the game already? Can one presently, using FireTuner or something like that, by fiat, add a second holy city for a religion? Does it work or do we crash the game? If the mechanic is already supported by the game engine and doesn't cause problems, do we increase our odds of successfully lobbying for developer action? Experience shows that developer hours tend to get scarce at this stage of a game's development cycle. Also, does your proposal constitute a replacement of the Byzantine UA, or an addition? Could they still enact one more belief than normal, and if so, would that affect the twin holy city as well?
Click to expand...

You might be able to jimmy rig the mechanics for Eastern Orthodoxy in the ItR scenario for this? IIRC, part of it is that if certain conditions are met Moscow takes over as the Holy City for Orthodoxy and gets all the goodies that come with it.
 
budweiser said:
You guys are focusing too much on rigging Byzantium to FOUND a religion.

What the UA should do is allow the player to DECLARE Byzantium a Holy City. This then would give them some extra power to whatever religion happened to be in Constantiople at the time, whether they founded it or not and would apply only to them.
Click to expand...
Interesting as this idea is, the problem with it is that a) wouldn't it be better for Byzantium to just form their own religion (if possible)?, and b) in case they DO get to found, haven't they wasted their UA (a bit of opposite case of now, where it's wasted if they DON'T get to found)?
 
JohnMK said:
If we can achieve a consensus, something that none of us finds perfect but isn't too objectionable, then we might be able to get the developers' attention.
Click to expand...
Reasonable approach.

However, ALL of the following are not consistently effective. Thus, they get a zero from me.

  • +2 faith/turn PER other religion founded, going to +0 once max # is reached or Byzantium founds a religion
  • Modification of above idea: Only kicks in once Theology has been researched by Byzantium. Boost effect to +5 faith/turn per other religion founded, again going to 0 eventually).
  • Cataphract faith from kills
  • Guaranteed or higher likelihood of faith ruins
  • +4 faith from Holy Sites
  • Free Great Prophet
  • Free Piety opener
  • Religion & Pantheon requiring less faith
  • +2 faith in capital
  • +1 (or +2?) faith per shrine/temple
  • Byzantium starts with pottery
  • Byzantium starts with Piety opened
  • Byzantium capital starts with shrine
Click to expand...

To even be in consideration the solution should always work. If it's possible for Byzantium to get frozen out of their UA, then it's no good.

The following could work.
  • Allowing Byzantium to exceed the max # of religions with a late religion
  • allow the player to DECLARE a Holy City to whatever religion is in [their capitol]
  • Byzantium can always find religion
  • change the UA to something else altogether
The last one includes my idea, which is that Byzantium can get a free, bonus religious belief, regardless if they found a religion or not. Simple, effective, and doesn't tack on a patchy buff to the existing UA.
 
Wodan said:
The last one includes my idea, which is that Byzantium can get a free, bonus religious belief, regardless if they found a religion or not. Simple, effective, and doesn't tack on a patchy buff to the existing UA.
Click to expand...

If they dont find religion, most beliefs are totally useless. Beliefs are tied to religion so I dont really understand how this idea could work.
 
Think about it. The Orthodox church really was the last religion. It came after Islam took over 3 out of the five leading Christian cities (Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioc) leaving just Rome and Constantinople.
 
Isn't it maybe a time to sum up all the propositions and to make a poll? If someone would like to do it... Or are there still other suggestions possible?
 
I find the idea of Byzantium being able to enhance an established religion most appealing, but that seems like (1) it would be tricky for the devs, and (2) makes waiting a better exploit that rushing religion. Reading the comments on this thread makes me thing that reserving the last religion or adding an extra religion for Byzantium both have significant downsides.

JohnMK said:
How about +2 faith to Byzantium PER religion that has so far been founded, evaporating to +0 once the maximum number of religions has been founded. This helps to reinforce the idea that Byzantium was late to the game in real life, and isn't too unbalanced. They receive no benefit to founding an early religion, so the best pantheons and beliefs could well be gone, if the player or AI takes a lazy approach to faith generation. It's subtle, and suggestive. No more. There should be no guarantee that Byzantium, or anybody for the matter, is able to found a religion.
Click to expand...

This is the best idea I have read! Would N*2fpt be enough to make a difference when a clumsy AI is playing Theodora? Or should it be 3/4/5 faith per turn per founded religion?

budweiser said:
On immortal and below, I would say your chance is 90% to get a religion.
Click to expand...

That is true as a human player prioritizing religion for any civ.

The problem is that Byzantium has a UA that depends upon founding a religion, and that only happens for computer Theodora about half the time. It would also be nice to throw a bone to weaker human players, and make to make the Byzantium UA realistic to exploit for human players when playing Deity.

Wodan said:
However, ALL of the following are not consistently effective. Thus, they get a zero from me.

To even be in consideration the solution should always work. If it's possible for Byzantium to get frozen out of their UA, then it's no good.
Click to expand...

I mostly concur with your perspective, but JohnMK (et al.) have convinced me that a mechanic that almost always gets Byzantium a religion is arguably better than one which ensures it! The mechanic should also not break anything else, and be easy for the devs to patch in.
 
Wodan said:
Reasonable approach.

However, ALL of the following are not consistently effective. Thus, they get a zero from me.

To even be in consideration the solution should always work. If it's possible for Byzantium to get frozen out of their UA, then it's no good.
Click to expand...
Sorry but I don't fully agree with this. While I do think that the suggestion that Byzantium get to found even if all religions are taken, I think some of above suggestions could work if one also patched on some unrelated part to the UA. This would for me not be very different from Dido's UA on a map with no oceans or Indonesia's UA on a Pangea map, and while I know those UAs become compromised by specific map settings rather than general game progression, I do think it's ok for a UA to require an effort towards a specific game goal to shine, particularly if you get some help towards that goal (similar to how Assyrias UA requires you to capture a city from someone who knows a tech you don't know to give you the benefit).
 
Here's a thought. I don't think its a very good one but I'll throw it in anyway and let others decide
What if Byzantine gets a religion reserved for it from the beginning of the game. That means for Byzantine you can found a religion as early or as late as you like. No pressure, except the earlier you are, the more choices you have. You still have to get your Great Prophet to found the religion but the spot is always reserved.
If your not Byzantine, but they are a rival all it means is that there is one less available religion from the beginning.
It's simple and I think simple is most easy to implement. And if people feel Byzantine still needs a bit more to capture the feel of a religious empire, then perhaps 1 culture from shrines and temples would help boost the UA a little.
You could also decide whether there is any merit to the bonus belief being chosen even if another Civ already has it. For example if another civ has picked Pagodas, your extra belief allows you to take that belief also. This sort of touches on other peoples idea of Byzantine hijacking another civs religion, except you're allowed to copy one belief.
 
Hakan-i Cihan said:
I like this idea, in a way... it is original, but can't imagine how it would work out. It would just give 50 faith after the first 4 social policies. I don't know if that would be enough...
Click to expand...

It's 1/4th of 1st Great Prophet. I guess it could be more. 5 is just a nice even number but I guess 10 :c5faith: wouldn't necessarily be too much either, or some numbe between 5 and 10.
 
kaspergm said:
This would for me not be very different from Dido's UA on a map with no oceans or Indonesia's UA on a Pangea map
Click to expand...

Different topic, but I would love for the game to have the option to avoid civs whose UA was nullified by map type!

I do think it's ok for a UA to require an effort towards a specific game goal to shine, particularly if you get some help towards that goal
Click to expand...

Again, think of the AI player. The computer does not put any particular effort to exploiting UA for any civ. (It would be nice to change this, but that would be hard.) Byzantium suffers from this defect more than others because she gets no help towards making her UA available.
 
budweiser said:
Think about it. The Orthodox church really was the last religion. It came after Islam took over 3 out of the five leading Christian cities (Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioc) leaving just Rome and Constantinople.
Click to expand...

Protestantism came after both. Also, it very much defends on when you say "Orthodoxy" begins. Also, why couldn't Catholicism be considered the one splitting off?
 
MKDELTA3 said:
It's 1/4th of 1st Great Prophet. I guess it could be more. 5 is just a nice even number but I guess 10 :c5faith: wouldn't necessarily be too much either, or some numbe between 5 and 10.
Click to expand...

Actually I was thinking with marathon speed in my mind. Then a great prophet cost is 600 faith and 50 faith would be too low. But if the cost on standard is just 200, then it would be reasonable.
 
budweiser said:
Think about it. The Orthodox church really was the last religion. It came after Islam took over 3 out of the five leading Christian cities (Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioc) leaving just Rome and Constantinople.
Click to expand...

Well to be technical Sikhism is the last on our little list but none the less. And the schism between Orthodoxy and Catholicism started 325 with the first council that was the first rip and it started expanding gradually until 1054 but from 325 the early orthodoxy's practiced separately from the main church until 1054 when where officially recognized as a completely broken off from Catholicism.
 
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