capturing a religion

What happens if you have no religion, and you capture all of an AI's cities? Is there any way to take their religion? Seems like it would be realistic - seems like if you overtook a country where there is a national religion, and you take the capital/holy city, you would take over control of all the aspects of their religion.

You wouldn't even have to capture all their cities, just their capitol. If you want that religion, spread it to your cities.

Like cain said, you can just adopt their religion, and if you destroyed the founder I guess you could become the care-taker of that religion. I don't know if it's possible to acquire the founder belief for a religion you didn't even found, though.

You don't get the Founder belief for doing this, so no, you really can't. You won't start spawning Great Prophets that can spread that religion either.

This would make for a really cool unique ability though. Maybe for the Ottomans.

But the Ottomans never spread Orthodoxy, they were Muslim.

animalcross said:

But the Ottomans never spread Orthodoxy, they were Muslim.

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Missing the point a bit, they conquered Mecca and became the big shots in Islam.

True_Candyman said:

Missing the point a bit, they conquered Mecca and became the big shots in Islam.

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Still they were muslims for centuries then. Most of the Turks were converted around 9th and 10th century, well except the Khazars. And the Turks formed the core of the Ottoman empire.
Another point is the Ottomans didn't capture Mecca. They defeated the Mamluks in Egypt early 16th century and become the protectors of Mecca, now the Ottoman Sultans became also Khaliefs.

Which is why they would be neat for a UA where instead of founding a religion you can take control of one by seizing its Holy City.

Arachnofiend said:

Which is why they would be neat for a UA where instead of founding a religion you can take control of one by seizing its Holy City.

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"You will be assimilated. Your Founder and Enhancer beliefs will be adapted to serve us. Resistance is futile."

Thats a good idea. That would eliminate the chances of building a grand temple in the other religion's holy city.

so you can't spread another civ's religion?

Arachnofiend said:

Which is why they would be neat for a UA where instead of founding a religion you can take control of one by seizing its Holy City.

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I wouldn't mind it if it was a general game mechanic, that upon conquering a holy city you could switch from religion for the whole empire and benefit from the founder beliefs. For a Civ's UA only this would be underpowered. Because you have to take over in most cases a capital. But the probability that you have a neighbour with a holy city is also situational. It could be even the case that all religions are founded on another continent.

BUDISMYBUDDY said:

so you can't spread another civ's religion?

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You can spread another civ's religion, but you apparently cannot benefit from it's founder beliefs.

Huh, learn something new every day - I had always assumed that the owner of the Holy City derives the benefits of its Founder Beliefs.

In my last game, I did't found a religion but after capturing Roman capital, I got their religion and converted my own cities. So, you can adopt other civs' religion.

But you cannot benefit from that religion's founder belief.

Biologist said:

"You will be assimilated. Your Founder and Enhancer beliefs will be adapted to serve us. Resistance is futile."

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Yess

I personally wish you could. If you controlled the holy city and a majority of your civ had that religion, you should start getting founder beliefs. It would encourage you to fight over holy cities more often, which would be an interesting dynamic.

Hakan-i Cihan said:

I wouldn't mind it if it was a general game mechanic, that upon conquering a holy city you could switch from religion for the whole empire and benefit from the founder beliefs. For a Civ's UA only this would be underpowered. Because you have to take over in most cases a capital. But the probability that you have a neighbour with a holy city is also situational. It could be even the case that all religions are founded on another continent.

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The Janissary is a solid mid-tier civ unto itself, having a somewhat situational (but still very powerful, especially if there is no limit to how many Holy Cities and therefore Founder beliefs you can take control of) UA wouldn't hurt the Ottomans at all.


I feel like making it a general game mechanic is counter to the design of religion. It's supposed to be a unifying force in the pre-industrial era, making it beneficial to seize the capital of the guy you're supposed to have religious unity with would kind of completely destroy the diplo bonus. Of course, you could make the argument that having a single civ break the rules of the game would be less than ideal as well...

Arachnofiend said:

The Janissary is a solid mid-tier civ unto itself, having a somewhat situational (but still very powerful, especially if there is no limit to how many Holy Cities and therefore Founder beliefs you can take control of) UA wouldn't hurt the Ottomans at all.

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Probably this gives a good view of how you are approaching the Ottomans, The Janissary civ . Even having benefit of multiple founder beliefs by controlling multiple holy cities would not beneficial enough. First of all you still have to make large efforts for conquering a holy city and it is not sure you would be succesful. Would be somehow like the UA of the byzantines. If you are unable to capture holy cities you lack an UA. And you have to look at the UA from the perspective of the AI too. Would they be efficiently using such an UA? Early warmongering is also penalized a lot diplomatically. So either you have to take the penalty or wait until late classical early medieval era.

On the other hand the title "Hadim-ul Harameyn" (servant of the holy cities) was given to Ottoman sultans after the Holy cities Mecca and Medina became under Ottoman rule. And especially if you consider that the cities were under Portugese threat in the period before the Ottomans acquired Hejaz (the region of the holy cities), it would definitly thematically a good representation. But gamewise the way you suggest it could be problematic.

Arachnofiend said:

I feel like making it a general game mechanic is counter to the design of religion. It's supposed to be a unifying force in the pre-industrial era, making it beneficial to seize the capital of the guy you're supposed to have religious unity with would kind of completely destroy the diplo bonus. Of course, you could make the argument that having a single civ break the rules of the game would be less than ideal as well...

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I don't think it would counter the mechanic from the AI perspective. If they would attack the "we are following your religion" modifier wouldn't be that decissive. But on the other hand for players the modifier would now be neglected all together if they would set their mind on capturing a holy city.