Religion: how much effort should be put into it?

(1) How critical is it to found a religion?

(2) How critical is it to spread your religion and prevent different (opponent-founded) religions from becoming the majority in your cities? Is that entirely dependent on what founder benefits your religion provides?

(3) Is founding or maintaining your own religion ever not worth the cost, either in an opportunity cost sense, or in the sense of diplomatic consequences from spreading to other nations via missionary?

(4) Do you ever ignore the religion question entirely to focus on conquest, research or culture? Are there times when you won't found your own religion, but will aggressively defend against the religion of some specific opponent? Can an opponent's religion spreading within your cities ever really constitute a serious problem, maybe even a disaster?

Playing on deity, you almost never actually get a religion because the AI prioritizes one so much. A religion with strong beliefs can be significantly helpful to you, but it can be safely ignored for any victory type. Don't confuse this with faith though, for most games you still want to generate faith to purchase great people.

My answers for deity:

(1) How critical is it to found a religion?
I don't think it is critical at all. It can be a huge help if you get strong religion like Desert Folklore or Tears of the Gods with lots of gems/ pearls etc. but that is not the norm. Most of the advantages are not too game-breaking, with the exception being some of the reformation beliefs like Sacred Sites and Jesuit Education. However, this requires putting culture into Piety early, which isn't usually the best place for it.

(2) How critical is it to spread your religion and prevent different (opponent-founded) religions from becoming the majority in your cities? Is that entirely dependent on what founder benefits your religion provides?
In most games, you are usually hoping for a strong religion to come your way. Religious building like Pagodas can be helpful, and the AI does like Jesuit Education. However, if you have your own religion then it comes down to the founder beliefs as you mentioned.

(3) Is founding or maintaining your own religion ever not worth the cost, either in an opportunity cost sense, or in the sense of diplomatic consequences from spreading to other nations via missionary?
Spreading your religion to an AI that doesn't want it can quickly ruin your diplomacy with them. If they declare war on you because of it or you lose the DoF benefits like RA's, then it is very likely not worth it. It depends, but most of the religious benefits at higher levels are pretty small.

(4) Do you ever ignore the religion question entirely to focus on conquest, research or culture? Are there times when you won't found your own religion, but will aggressively defend against the religion of some specific opponent? Can an opponent's religion spreading within your cities ever really constitute a serious problem, maybe even a disaster?
Almost every game I ignore the religion question. I welcome good religions, but if I had a good pantheon that was helping my cities then I may try to deter the AI from spreading their religion to me by blocking/ intimidating with units. I don't see a disaster scenario from having an opponents religion.

1. I often found a religion by chance, I ignore it on Deity that much. Though it has its uses but you're not likely to reap the fruits of your religion on Deity every time. It is very advisable though to have a decent faith output for the sake of endgame great people.

2. Lots of times a neighbor had Sacred Sites or Jesuit Education and at that point I was like sod it, I don't really *need* my own religion. In one of the games someone posted which I took over for 100 or so turns, the neighboring Celts picked Desert Folklore because of one desert tile they had , and then went Pagodas and Cathedrals and send the missionaries my way. I couldn't ask for a better religion

3. Most of the time my religion eventually gets cancelled by a mass of Prophets, often I lose even my Holy City even if I have Inquisitors because every other city is sending out pressure.

4. If I'm focused on a particular VC, I honestly don't care if my cities will or will not be religious

I obsessively try to get my own religion on Deity. On Standard size it's very improbable due to the low nubmer of available religions unless you're a dedicated faith civ like Ethiopia or the Celts.

But since I play Large size I often get my own religion, i'd say about 75% of the time. Usually I do so through Earth mother with copper/salt + some iron, Desert Folklore, Stone Circles or Tears of the Gods. Any of these can get you a religion. Of course, the more FPT you get, the higher the chance you have of snagging Pagodas.

Sometimes the AI picks really dumb first choices, it's not 100% certian the first religion will go for Pagodas.

Worst case scenario though, you get Tithe/World Church > Feed the World and either Swords into Plowshares or Religous Community.

That's still great though, the main reason being is that you get to keep your faith generating pantheon. It's cruicial to get that faith up to buy GMs for cultural victory or late game GS/GE for spaceship victory.

None, as long as you have 1 fpt or more that's fine. Faith is really important when it comes to religion because with most things in religions the beliefs need faith to purchase but others don't so you don't always need that much faith. For example, sun god pantheon, is a good belief that doesn't need faith, but could still be brought in by a rival civilization converting your cities.

FlorbFnarb said:

(1) How critical is it to found a religion?

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It is not "critical" to found a religion in any given situation. What you will need to differentiate however, is when it is simply beneficial and opportunistic to found one.

Example: you are playing Byzantium on a lower difficulty (i.e. below Emperor), or your civilization provides you with an early source of Faith (i.e. Ethiopia's Stele replacement for the Monument), or you meet like 3 religious city states in a row (warning: do not ever count on this to happen), or you get to work a faith-based-natural-wonder early on (especially if playing as Spain... but again, not always guaranteed to happen).

FlorbFnarb said:

(2) How critical is it to spread your religion and prevent different (opponent-founded) religions from becoming the majority in your cities? Is that entirely dependent on what founder benefits your religion provides?

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Depends on your beliefs, and your situation in the game. In any game, you must consider "is it worth my time and/or faith to build missionaries or use prophets to perform manual spreads?". Often times you can rely on passive pressure after securing a majority religion in 3-4 cities to secure a geo-spatial religious-dominant zone and forget about it for the rest of the game.

FlorbFnarb said:

(3) Is founding or maintaining your own religion ever not worth the cost, either in an opportunity cost sense, or in the sense of diplomatic consequences from spreading to other nations via missionary?

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The answer really depends on the difficulty level you are playing on - the higher you go, the more risky and costly it is to divert resources (be it time, gold, hammers, or whatever) to get a religion - you have to play catch-up to the AI's ridiculous handicap bonuses and headstarts anyway.

As for spreading to other nations - that depends on your beliefs (i.e. if you have "Just War", not spreading your religion to an enemy city is about the last thing you're going to do... ), and how much you care about maintaining friendly/cordial relationships with the AIs.

FlorbFnarb said:

(4) Do you ever ignore the religion question entirely to focus on conquest, research or culture? Are there times when you won't found your own religion, but will aggressively defend against the religion of some specific opponent? Can an opponent's religion spreading within your cities ever really constitute a serious problem, maybe even a disaster?

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As previously stated, the higher difficulty level you play on, the less resources and effort you are able to funnel into religion.

And truth be told, in the majority of games played, religion is just one of those "fire and forget" things. It is never a "disaster" for an enemy religion to take over your cities, unless there are real and immediate consequences from them doing so ("Just War" is a big one, especially if you're playing MP against another human who's using that religion as an aggressive tool of war).

ThorHammerz said:

It is not "critical" to found a religion in any given situation. What you will need to differentiate however, is when it is simply beneficial and opportunistic to found one.

And truth be told, in the majority of games played, religion is just one of those "fire and forget" things. It is never a "disaster" for an enemy religion to take over your cities, unless there are real and immediate consequences from them doing so ("Just War" is a big one, especially if you're playing MP against another human who's using that religion as an aggressive tool of war).

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AIs don't usually use Just War on purpose, or if they do it is very difficult to notice because AI spreads any or most religion but wouldn't spread Just War for the purpose of secretly plotting against your civilization and eventually end up betraying your civlization and attacking the cities that the civilization had converted with the religion that has the just war belief.

reddishrecue said:

AIs don't usually use Just War on purpose, or if they do it is very difficult to notice because AI spreads any or most religion but wouldn't spread Just War for the purpose of secretly plotting against your civilization and eventually end up betraying your civlization and attacking the cities that the civilization had converted with the religion that has the just war belief.

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I don't like quoting myself but.....

ThorHammerz said:

Especially if you're playing MP against another human who's using that religion as an aggressive tool of war.

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ThorHammerz said:

I don't like quoting myself but.....

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I haven'tnnoticed anything like that in single player neither in multiplayer. If that did happen to someone then make sure to let that persontry to ppreventthat from hhappening again bbecause just war causes destruction in your cities by weakening your armies. Again, sorry for not being able to see such intelligent plays, but thank you, at least for sharing a goo play with me.