I know it's a bit late given how close we are to the release of Civ6, but a mod overhauling the Belief system would be nice, we need polytheistic religions! From what I've seen they aren't planned for Civ6, so still an idea to consider. Inspired by Europa Universalis IV, a Casus Belli system for declaring war would be nice and of course the City State diplomacy is still far from perfect even with Vox Populi.
Casus Belli mod idea:
The Casus Belli is moved from World Congress to player-to-player diplomacy. Performing hostile actions on another player gives them an ability to declare Casus Belli war, lowering their warmonging penalty by 50% and having almost no impact on other players' opinion about the Casus Belli holder.
Deity Worship mod idea:
Great Prophet can reform a Religion unlimited number of times. Founding a Pantheon, founding a Religion and reforming it grants 3 additional beliefs and beliefs are not disabled between Pantheons/Religions.
Beliefs work like Social Policies: there are Deity branches (called Cults) with 3 beliefs each, adopting a Cult of a Deity costs 1 belief, completing a Cult allows constructing the temples of that Deity in cities following the religion and allows to declare that Deity the only true god (costs 1 belief), what changes the Religion to monotheistic, disables any other Cults and grants access to monotheistic beliefs, but in the cities following the Religion a Cult of the Old Gods effect is given, temporarily lowering Religion and Happiness, the penalty scales with the number of Cults abandoned (does not occur if only 1 Deity was worshipped). It's up to the player's choice whether they want to develop a polytheistic or monotheistic Religion.
If not a head of a Religion, the player can still spend Great Prophets to add beliefs to reform the Religion, but it requires the head of Religion to accept them. Three situations may occur:
- if the head of Religion accepts the new beliefs they are added to the Religion and the reformer gets 'You contributed to our Religion' modifier with all civs following that Religion;
- if the head of Religion refuses, the player may choose to burn the heretical prophet, what gives 'You fight the heresy!' modifier with the head of Religion, starts Trial of a Heretic effect in the city where the Great Prophet was expended, temporarily increasing Faith and Religious Pressure and an Inquisitor spawns in that city;
- if the head of Religion refuses, the player may choose to denominate the Religion, creating their own Religion with beliefs taken from the mother Religion and proposed reformation beliefs, what gives 'You spread the heresy!' modifier and Casus Belli with all civs following the mother Religion, allows the head of Religion to immediately declare a Casus Belli war and all the player following the mother Religion can choose to adopt the denominated Religion, in which case their Capitals are converted and they lose the Casus Belli; given the complexity and potential aggressiveness of that option it should be possible to disable Religious Denomination in Advanced Setup.
Polytheistic beliefs are somewhat weaker, but monotheistic beliefs come in pairs and choosing one belief in pair disables the other. This is motivated by history: ancient pantheons accepted worshipping deities of other Religions quite easily (e.g. cult of Isis and Baal in Rome), while a reformation in monotheistic religions usually caused them to be denominated (like Christianity and Islam).
Some UA ideas for the mod:
- can worship two Deities as true gods.
- while reforming a monotheistic Religion can choose both beliefs in a pair; while reforming a polytheistic Religion can choose one additional belief (Byzantium probably).
City Councils mod idea:
Available diplomatic actions are declaring war on a City State, gifting a unit to gain Influence (military, Worker or Great Person), hiring a mercenary for Gold (this has a cooldown shared between all players), trading Luxury resource for GPT and investing Gold in upgrading a resource in City State territory.
City State type idea is gone, all City States now have unique set of focuses.
Basic focus: the yield given together with Gold via the trade routes (it doesn't have to be Science as it used to be, can be Gold to increase Gold profit from trade routes) and as a yield per turn dependent on relationship with the City State.
Secondary focus: additional yield provided via the trade route when allied with a city state and as yield per turn to the allies (but at smaller scale than the basic yield).
Military focus: determines what type of military unit is donated to the player hiring a mercenary from a City State, the City State usually has few of these units in their territory for defence.
Great Person focus: determines which Great Person can the City State donate from the Statecraft branch, allying a City State also provides +5% generation of that Great Person in all cities.
Ally bonus: every City State has their unique ally bonus in addition to yield per turn and trade route bonuses, which can vary from generating units over time, additional yields from certain buildings, production boost towards certain buildings or units to immediately adopting the ally Religion and spreading it like a Holy City (like Civ6 Jerusalem).
Influence is now more like a resource, it can be spent on various diplomatic actions with a City State. It can be obtained by:
- sending diplomatic units like in Vox Populi, but these units can choose between increasing the Influence directly or to installing themselves as Envoys in the City State (covered later on),
- gifting units to a City State,
- completing Quests,
- paying Gold to improve a resource in a City State territory.
When a City State reaches population of 5 Citizens, a City Council consisting of 5 seats is formed and a new seat is added with every 3 Citizens (8th, 11th, 14th...). The initial seats are taken by neutral City State Councillors, who can be influenced spending Influence (sound bads, I know). The base cost of influencing a Councillor increases with every Councillor already controlled and voting cooldown turns left, and doubles if influencing a Councillor controlled by other player. Councillors influenced by other players can be returned to neutral state by paying half the base cost. Only one influence action can be performed per turn in every City State.
When any player controls majority (rounded up if the total is odd, 50% + 1 seat if the total is even) of the Councillors they become an ally of that City State.
Every Councillor can initiate a voting with a cooldown equal to the current City State population. Neutral Councillors can initiate a voting on their own, controlled ones only if controlling civilisation wishes to do so. Available actions are:
- Elect new Councillor (civ choice): occurs immediately and without a cooldown period when a vacant seat seat is formed (cannot be chosen from the menu). The players may choose to elect a Councillor loyal to the City State or an Envoy of a major civilisation (including their own), provided that civilisation has free Envoys (that is: not sitting in the Council) in that City State, abstaining is not possible. Envoys sitting in the Council cannot be influenced by other civilisations.
- Reelect a Councillor (For/Against): the player initiating the voting chooses a seat, if the resolution passes that seat goes vacant and an election occurs.
- Oath of allegiance (For/Against): available when a majority of seats is taken by Envoys of one civ, peacefully puppets the City State. In fact the voting cannot be lost by the civilisation proposing it, but to denote formal independence of a City State, just like in real life, the voting occurs.
- Impose sanctions (For/Against): the player initiating the voting chooses a civilisation, if the resolution passes all trade routes between that civilisation and City State are cancelled, for few turns Influence of that civilisation decreased at double speed and an embargo is imposed (no new trade routes with that civilisation and Influence gained 25% slower).
- End embargo (For/Against): the player initiating the voting chooses an embargo (if more than one were imposed), if the resolution passes the embargo ends.
- Call for tenders (For/Against): the player initiating the voting chooses a quest from the list, if the resolution passes the quest is started by the City State.
If there are any neutral Councillors they will vote in favour of City State independence, that is, against the civilisation holding majority of the votes. When their voting cooldown ends, they initiate voting an Envoy (or ally-influenced Councillor if the ally has no Envoys in the Council) out of the Council. If the City State has no ally they will propose a Call for tenders and choose a quest best suiting the City State focuses (parallel quests of the same type are not allowed).
