The Religion game is impossible now

P

Peasley

Warlord
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Jul 3, 2012
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I'm playing a game on Prince as Brazil, large map, standard time and other settings. I'm not a high-level player by any means, but it seems that the AI has an insurmountable religion advantage with the advent of BNW.

I started near Venice, who, apart from the high-yield trade routes, is a very obnoxious neighbor. I went the piety route, founding a religion slightly after Venice but also snagging a reformation belief and enhancement before them. However, Venice has gone in full-force and dedicated themselves to religion, building brobodor and stonehenge, and absolutely swamping me with missionaries and prophets - there seem to be 5 of either in or near my borders at all times. At this point, there is no more pressure of my own religion left. I'm still in good shape, but it's horribly frustrating to dedicate a chunk of time of social policy to the religion game only to be totally overrun anyway.

Has anybody else experienced this?
 
The way the religion system is set-up is if you are ahead, you pull further ahead. If you are behind, you fall further behind.

If you didn't have any faith world/natural wonders and Venice did, he probably had 2-3 times more faith per turn than you.

Don't let shrines/temples fool you. They are only a small portion of the religion game and relying only on them will never be enough, full Piety or not.
 
It differs games to game.
One game only 2 AI founded their religion. Another game, 3 AIs chose Piety and grabbed Reformation super fast.
 
Matthew. said:
The way the religion system is set-up is if you are ahead, you pull further ahead. If you are behind, you fall further behind.

If you didn't have any faith world/natural wonders and Venice did, he probably had 2-3 times more faith per turn than you.

Don't let shrines/temples fool you. They are only a small portion of the religion game and relying only on them will never be enough, full Piety or not.
Click to expand...

Venice has no natural wonders whatsoever - his advanatge is stonehenge alone.
 
So, you played one game where things didn't go your way then make a blanket statement about something being impossible outright? I appreciate your frustration, but don't tarnish the games reputation over just one experience.

Well, I just finished my first BNW game with your same settings, but using Shoshone. My religion became the dominant religion with about half the cities following it and (now here's the kicker) I didn't even touch Piety!

Using my single game as my sample, I could conclude that the religion game is too easy now, but I won't :p
 
I would have taken out Venice ASAP. Wipe em out before he eats your CS allies.

On topic, the AI does seem to love piety now. Keep a couple inquisitors parked in your border cities and move them around if you see a prophet or missionary near your other cities.

The reformation belief that turns your missionaries into inquisitor hybrids is very strong for spreading a religion. Did the AI choose this one?
 
I find that the diplomatic venue for religion, WC, makes religion even stronger. I sailed around the world to locate unconverted cities, I spread my religion to them and lo! I had strong support from other nations to make Islam the world religion. This was very satisfying, not only because things went my way, but also because it was the last thing in the game that had anything actually diplomatic in it instead of me just going crazy with those delegates of mine.
 
So he has a better religion and spamming missionaries at you? Bribe your friends and kill them. Then him. The missionaries will stop coming.

Sometimes the AI will runaway. They have a good starting position that works well with the strategy they've decided to try and rapidly grow. It's very common on higher difficulties. You have to identify those AIs and destroy/cripple them. Rarely can you simply sit back and follow the same strategy/build order that you want, you have to adapt, identify opportunities and threats to win consistently.
 
Peasley said:
I'm playing a game on Prince as Brazil, large map, standard time and other settings. I'm not a high-level player by any means, but it seems that the AI has an insurmountable religion advantage with the advent of BNW.

I started near Venice, who, apart from the high-yield trade routes, is a very obnoxious neighbor. I went the piety route, founding a religion slightly after Venice but also snagging a reformation belief and enhancement before them. However, Venice has gone in full-force and dedicated themselves to religion, building brobodor and stonehenge, and absolutely swamping me with missionaries and prophets - there seem to be 5 of either in or near my borders at all times. At this point, there is no more pressure of my own religion left. I'm still in good shape, but it's horribly frustrating to dedicate a chunk of time of social policy to the religion game only to be totally overrun anyway.

Has anybody else experienced this?
Click to expand...

On prince it's totally possible to compete.

Also note that the AI rarely picks Religious Texts even if you're 2nd or 3rd to enhance/found your relgion.

Pick this buff, it will increases Religion pressure by 34%, up to 68% when Printing Press is researched and make your religion spread faster without much effort on your part.

Paired with Tithe, which gives you 1 gold per turn per 4 followers; another belief the AI will leave open, you gain a crucial economic edge as well.
 
dexters said:
Pick this buff, it will increases Religion pressure by 34%, up to 68% when Printing Press is researched and make your religion spread faster without much effort on your part.
Click to expand...

25% and 50% respectively, not 34% and 64%. Still good though.
 
dexters said:
On prince it's totally possible to compete.

Also note that the AI rarely picks Religious Texts even if you're 2nd or 3rd to enhance/found your relgion.

Pick this buff, it will increases Religion pressure by 34%, up to 68% when Printing Press is researched and make your religion spread faster without much effort on your part.

Paired with Tithe, which gives you 1 gold per turn per 4 followers; another belief the AI will leave open, you gain a crucial economic edge as well.
Click to expand...

This right here.

Being second to a religion is only slightly inferior to being first. Tithe gone? Get Church Property or Ceremonial Burial. Religious Texts taken? Get itinerant preacher.
 
Build an army, conquer Venice, and have an Inquisitor remove the religion from his Holy City.

Problem solved!
 
Religious texts was nerfed to 25%/50% though.

Is it still better than itinerant preachers? I've been preferring preachers in my games, it usually works well and I get more pressure than the others... That is, until they march an army of great prophets at me.
 
Religious texts is buffed by the fact that you can spread via trade routes, though.
 
Bagi said:
Religious texts was nerfed to 25%/50% though.

Is it still better than itinerant preachers? I've been preferring preachers in my games, it usually works well and I get more pressure than the others... That is, until they march an army of great prophets at me.
Click to expand...
Mesix said:
Build an army, conquer Venice, and have an Inquisitor remove the religion from his Holy City.

Problem solved!
Click to expand...
I consider Great Prophets in my territory to be a declaration of war. See my above comment about how to deal with Venice.
 
I agree.
Honestly religion obtainment is both too RNG-dependant, and drastically different for each civ.
Some civs get it absurdly easily (Ethiopia/Maya etc) while others have a really hard time.

The gap between the good faith civs and the horrible faith ones needs to be cut a bit.
Also, we need more beliefs and more religion foundable (the latter is already moddable but doesn't come by default).
 
Jungle Rhino said:
All I'm seeing here is that Venice built Stonehenge for you and you haven't conquered it yet? :)
Click to expand...

Lol! That's my new go-to Venice strategy.

Enrico Dandolo: Hello, how are...
Me: [Declares War] *and blows all money to make everyone else declare war*
I'll even settle a city next to Venice and hand it over to another AI just to raise tensions!

On Prince, I usually manage to found a Religion 1st or 2nd. I usually play Polynesia and embarking can make it easy finding CS. I'll see if I can find some other good tips to reduce randomness.
 
Venice is a horrible neighbor. I hoped it would be a civ it was fun to work with, but no. It's a pestilence that needs to be squashed before it infects all the City-States.
 
I'll have to disagree that it's impossible in BNW. I just won a game as Pacal (Maya), built pyramids right away in every city i made / captured and immediately went down the path of piety. very early on every single city on the pangean continent was my religion (which was also adopted as the world religion by world congress) and by the end of the game i was buying great people with faith left right and centre.

in fact i can honestly say that it was the best religion-focused game i ever played, especially since the AI reacted quite well to me in response to my spread of religion after they had founded their own (which was subsequently eclipsed by mine). trade routes spreading religion adds an interesting dimension and a lot of strength to the religion-focused game
 
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