Rate the Beliefs - part I: Pantheon beliefs

I disagree with just about everything said about Dance of the Aurora.

This belief is a great one if you have a tundra start bias, like Sweden. In one game I was able to get around +7 faith just after choosing it.
 
I disagree with just about everything said about Dance of the Aurora.

This belief is a great one if you have a tundra start bias, like Sweden. In one game I was able to get around +7 faith just after choosing it.

Are you sure Sweden has a tundra start bias?
You can use it, but at the expense of growth and/or production. All your good tiles are the ones without the faith, except unforested hills, which aren't generally spammed by the map generator.
if you have a tundra start and are going wide then it can be passable, but it's very rarely amazing.
 
All pantheon beliefs have a value of X where X is 1-5 based on map conditions.

I usually default to fertility rites unless:
1.)going for a cultural victory where it's either Oral Trad, Open Sky, or Jungle Fever (sacred path), depending on which gives the most culture for all cities, not just capital (though capital city culture tiles are weighted 1.5 since hermitage will end up there)
2.)playing as Carthage and being lucky enough to have a suitable map, or playing a dom-oriented game where at least 2/3 of the cities are/will be coastal and have an average of 2 sea resources -> GofSea
3.)Having at least 5 gold/silver or incense/wine resources among my first few cities, where I might pick the appropriate culture/faith pantheon over Fertility Rites
4.)IF while scouting I find that nearby city locations do not provide diversified luxury resources I may compensate with GofLove

All the rest are really unappealing to me:
-I'd prefer not to pick a pantheon that gives exclusively faith as religion in and of itself is not a victory condition. If I desperately need a specific founder/follower belief, I'd rather prioritize Stonehenge, which is usually not that hard to get, and cross fingers for a religious mountain, but usually I'm flexible enough with the beliefs to take my 2nd, 3rd, or 4th choice and other aspects of the overall strategy take priority.
-Sacred Waters(1) - while some cities may be riverside, all cities will eventually reach size 6, making this choice inferior to GofLove almost always.
-GofHunt(1) - you'd need a very, very specific city setup for this to increase growth more than Fertility Rites, and Fertility Rites applies to all your other cities as well.
 
I know when I put 0 on something, it is because it will always be strictly worse than another option. In no case would I ever take it, and the reasoning of riverside being rare to common but 6 pop being an eventuality is exactly why Sacred Waters got 0.

That being said, they are all situational (Sacred Path is my fallback if all else fails or I pop a faith rune on turn 1, etc.) and as such, none are 100% picks, but I am much more likely to pick certain ones in some situations. For instance, you would probably rather have religious settlements when playing as the Iriquois, over fertility rites. It also isn't very good if you are going wide and rate of growth isn't so important (and sometimes bad).

Also don't be scared away from faith generating beliefs. Though religion dies out, you can still work with faith well into the late game, so it will never be just wasted.
 
-Sacred Waters(1) - while some cities may be riverside, all cities will eventually reach size 6, making this choice inferior to GofLove almost always.
Sacred Waters isn't that bad.

You get the happiness bonus immediately (if you meet the geographic conditions) whereas you will often need to wait awhile before you reach population size 6.

Some city spamming strategies just want lots of small cities, so reaching size 6 might not ever happen or take a very long time.

The AI already gets massive happiness bonuses but other civs will benefit from your Goddess of Love more than they will likely benefit from your Sacred Waters. In multiplayer, this would be even more significant.

Rivers already have major advantages. I have had games where I settled mainly on (or only on) rivers. So in those cases, Sacred Waters was definitely better than Goddess of Love. Also, a few civs (like the Aztecs and the Floating Gardens) are going to be settling on rivers anyway (though the pantheon does not allow for sacred lakes).
 
Also don't be scared away from faith generating beliefs. Though religion dies out, you can still work with faith well into the late game, so it will never be just wasted.
Faith generating beliefs can be very good.

However, there is the downside that if you spread your religion to other civs, the faith generating effects will simply help the others civs get their own religion which will then compete with yours.
 
Faith generating beliefs can be very good.

However, there is the downside that if you spread your religion to other civs, the faith generating effects will simply help the others civs get their own religion which will then compete with yours.
That depends - a belief like Desert Folklore might only get other civs a small or no amount of faith if they don't have any significant amount of desert tiles within their region.

PS: I've done average over votes given so far, but I'd like to have more votes.
 
This list is pretty silly... almost every pantheon depends on the situation. Literally all depends on the map and your strategy.

That being said, there are certain pantheons that are worthless (Im looking at you religious settlements.) Also, fertility rites comes into play way too late in the game to actually be good. Start of the game is key to CIV. Thus, God of Craftsman can actually be really good if youre not investing in religion and dont have any other pantheon beliefs that are that great. Id certainly take it over fertility rights. +1 production per a city is actually pretty huge if you get it early.
 
This list is pretty silly... almost every pantheon depends on the situation. Literally all depends on the map and your strategy.

Yep. Pantheons are entirely situational.
 
All the rest are really unappealing to me:
-I'd prefer not to pick a pantheon that gives exclusively faith as religion in and of itself is not a victory condition. If I desperately need a specific founder/follower belief, I'd rather prioritize Stonehenge, which is usually not that hard to get, and cross fingers for a religious mountain, but usually I'm flexible enough with the beliefs to take my 2nd, 3rd, or 4th choice and other aspects of the overall strategy take priority.

Stonehenge may be relatively easy to get, but it is still a distraction from preferred build order for almost any strategy. You do get a GE point, but otherwise not great. So, if I can claim a useful faith-giving pantheon based on tiles I'm otherwise going to work (desert folklore (love getting faith from flood plains and mines), quarry faith (whatever it's called--who doesn't develop and work quarries for basically the entire game?), religious icons, etc., but not tundra faith unless I'm absolutely desperate--lumber mills are more valuable than cleared tundra) I will do so and then focus my build order on more useful units and buildings.
 
As a quick note, +4 faith from Natural wonders is pretty terrible. Unless you're Spain, in which case it is sick - because the bonus is doubled and applies to every wonder. Imagine if you get the Great Barrier reef, producing 4 hammers, 4 gold, 6 scinece (or whatever it was) PLUS 8 faith - twice or maybe even thrice! Or how about Mt. Sinai producing 24 faith per turn? Uluru is quite a favourite: 4 food and 20 faith. nomnomnom
 
Haven't convinced me on either count:
-Sacred Waters: even as Aztecs, where you would want to prioritize riverside cities, all those cities will eventually reach size 6 (and REALLY quickly too with that UB) so there's no gain in taking Sacred H20s over GofL, save slightly earlier access. Also, one of the benefits of floating gardens is increased flexibility of the watermill replacement; not only is growth rate increased by percentage and maintenance reduced, but watermills(FGs) can be built in cities that are next to a lake as well as the default riverside, so you don't need every city to be riverside to take advantage of this great UB. Obviously you'd be better off financially if you could, but unless you're using a map editor or re-rolling for a specific start, you're not going to be able to have every city take advantage of the UB or pantheon happiness, whereas with GofL you are. As for intentionally planning to have cities never reach above size 5, if that's your plan than the empire would probably be better off without that city entirely. As for getting the bonus earlier, I usually micromanage cities enough to ensure that from size 1-3, they're prioritizing growth which makes size 6 come pretty quick. On a random, unedited, not re-rolled map, I'd rather have double the happiness from a pantheon than have half the cities getting it earlier.
-faith exclusive pantheons- I do acknowledge that it's a way to get from pantheon to religion quicker, and that faith doesn't die out so much late game as you can buy great people, and if that's how you want to do it, go ahead. But like I said, with religion/faith playing the role that it does in this game, as a means but NOT an end (no religious victory condition), it seems less than optimal to me to use your faith to reach a bonus that only gives more faith. As for Browd knocking my Stonehenge alternative strategy, like I said,
usually I'm flexible enough with the beliefs to take my 2nd, 3rd, or 4th choice and other aspects of the overall strategy take priority.
Out of 8 games that I've won so far, the only one that late-game belief picks were so important that I wanted to be the first (well, second, as it was) to a religion and enhance it before too many beliefs were picked was a specific Theodora cultural victory game, in which I wanted to combine cathedrals/pagodas AND have both oral trad/sacred path. Other than that specific victory condition with that specific civilization on that specific map, there aren't too many situations where I wouldn't mind taking a backup option if beaten to my preferred belief. In just about every other conceivable circumstance, I'd rather have a pantheon that helps burn through social policies, or increase coastal city production, or increase the happy cap, or, my default, increasing population growth which speeds the addition of extra working citizens, increasing the technology, production, and gold of the empire.
 
Are you sure Sweden has a tundra start bias?
You can use it, but at the expense of growth and/or production. All your good tiles are the ones without the faith, except unforested hills, which aren't generally spammed by the map generator.
if you have a tundra start and are going wide then it can be passable, but it's very rarely amazing.

I've seen maps that have several mining luxes or unforested deer, though. It can be pretty good, just not as often as the desert one.
 
As a quick note, +4 faith from Natural wonders is pretty terrible. Unless you're Spain, in which case it is sick - because the bonus is doubled and applies to every wonder. Imagine if you get the Great Barrier reef, producing 4 hammers, 4 gold, 6 scinece (or whatever it was) PLUS 8 faith - twice or maybe even thrice! Or how about Mt. Sinai producing 24 faith per turn? Uluru is quite a favourite: 4 food and 20 faith. nomnomnom

Oh I can testify to just how sick it is - I'm currently playing Spain and managed to settle both Mt. Sinai AND Uluru and I took this pantheon belief. Oh - and Korea have a city next to me which is settled by the Great Barrier Reef. I think I'll take that Korea, thank you very much!

So yes, lots of nom-noms for me right now (44 Faith's worth of nom-noms to be precise) ;)
 
Haven't convinced me on either count:
-Sacred Waters: even as Aztecs, where you would want to prioritize riverside cities, all those cities will eventually reach size 6 (and REALLY quickly too with that UB) so there's no gain in taking Sacred H20s over GofL, save slightly earlier access. Also, one of the benefits of floating gardens is increased flexibility of the watermill replacement; not only is growth rate increased by percentage and maintenance reduced, but watermills(FGs) can be built in cities that are next to a lake as well as the default riverside, so you don't need every city to be riverside to take advantage of this great UB. Obviously you'd be better off financially if you could, but unless you're using a map editor or re-rolling for a specific start, you're not going to be able to have every city take advantage of the UB or pantheon happiness, whereas with GofL you are. As for intentionally planning to have cities never reach above size 5, if that's your plan than the empire would probably be better off without that city entirely. As for getting the bonus earlier, I usually micromanage cities enough to ensure that from size 1-3, they're prioritizing growth which makes size 6 come pretty quick. On a random, unedited, not re-rolled map, I'd rather have double the happiness from a pantheon than have half the cities getting it earlier.
-faith exclusive pantheons- I do acknowledge that it's a way to get from pantheon to religion quicker, and that faith doesn't die out so much late game as you can buy great people, and if that's how you want to do it, go ahead. But like I said, with religion/faith playing the role that it does in this game, as a means but NOT an end (no religious victory condition), it seems less than optimal to me to use your faith to reach a bonus that only gives more faith. As for Browd knocking my Stonehenge alternative strategy, like I said,
Out of 8 games that I've won so far, the only one that late-game belief picks were so important that I wanted to be the first (well, second, as it was) to a religion and enhance it before too many beliefs were picked was a specific Theodora cultural victory game, in which I wanted to combine cathedrals/pagodas AND have both oral trad/sacred path. Other than that specific victory condition with that specific civilization on that specific map, there aren't too many situations where I wouldn't mind taking a backup option if beaten to my preferred belief. In just about every other conceivable circumstance, I'd rather have a pantheon that helps burn through social policies, or increase coastal city production, or increase the happy cap, or, my default, increasing population growth which speeds the addition of extra working citizens, increasing the technology, production, and gold of the empire.

Was aztecs suggested for sacred waters? That'd be one of the last civs I'd take it with. As the netherlands UA is great for expanding quickly, Waters is great for an early REX on a wide (not ICS) strategy, so you still care about rivers but will not get a load of pop that quick. It can make the REX a lot easier than the 6 pop one would. Atecs wouldn't benefit from a per city benefit, I wouldn't take either with them.
For an early REX, I'm not sure I'd prefer any other pantheon, except perhaps MoG.

Faith pantheons - The founder and enhancer are the daddy beliefs, pantheons can be quite good and followers are generally more meh (exceptions being the buildings). The faith pantheon is a decent sized sacrifice but can definitely be worth it for a better founder and earlier spread. It's more to be considered as another option for getting your religion if you don't start next to sinai or deity AI takes out SH before you (pretty much every time for me, I never build SH or GL because of this.)
 
That being said, there are certain pantheons that are worthless (Im looking at you religious settlements.)
I agree that border expansion is weak and Religious Settlements is one of the worst pantheons (if not the worst), but I guess it might be okay if you are playing very few cities and want to expand to the 4th and 5th rings quickly (which can't be bought) in order to get luxuries/resources.

Also, fertility rites comes into play way too late in the game to actually be good.
Too late? You can get a pantheon running around turn 20-30 which is still quite early. At that point in the game you don't have much infrastructure let alone food production, so Fertility Rites won't really kick in until you have improvements and Maritime city states and food buildings.

Even if you beeline ToA (which is a bit better since it boosts total food production rather than net food) you probably won't get it built until the 40's and 50's which is even "later" than getting a pantheon.

Thus, God of Craftsman can actually be really good if youre not investing in religion and dont have any other pantheon beliefs that are that great. Id certainly take it over fertility rights. +1 production per a city is actually pretty huge if you get it early.
I am actually very curious about God of Craftsman. Traditionally I've ignored it since 1 hammer seems rather pitiful in the grand scheme of things.

Depending on your resources, God of the Sea can easily be the best production belief, contributing 3 or 4+ hammers.

I do like Monument to the Gods, but it's interesting comparing it to God of Craftsman.

Craftsman requires a size 3 city (fairly trivial though new cities will need to wait a bit). It only provides a single hammer, but you get it for the rest of the game.

Monument to the Gods works on any size city. It provides +15% production for Ancient/Classical wonders. If your base production is 6.67, then it will yield 1 hammer, meaning that if you have 7+ hammers, Monument to the Gods will yield more hammers than God of Craftsman. Of course Monument only works on wonders (Craftsman helps with buildings, units, and projects) and it only works for the early wonders.

So I really curious about God of Craftsman vs Monument to the Gods. Maybe I should give the Craftsman a try some time.

What have your experiences with it been like?
 
As a quick note, +4 faith from Natural wonders is pretty terrible. Unless you're Spain, in which case it is sick - because the bonus is doubled and applies to every wonder. Imagine if you get the Great Barrier reef, producing 4 hammers, 4 gold, 6 scinece (or whatever it was) PLUS 8 faith - twice or maybe even thrice! Or how about Mt. Sinai producing 24 faith per turn? Uluru is quite a favourite: 4 food and 20 faith. nomnomnom
One with Nature is fine even if you aren't Spain.

Natural Wonders have great tile yields normally so you will usually be working it anyway. Getting +4 faith from one tile is good.

In addition, Natural Wonders can be worked instantly (if in your territory) unlike Stone Circles which requires certain techs and improvements first.

Even in non-Spain games, I like to settle next to Natural Wonders. In many cases, a natural wonder ends up being roughly equivalent to a free Great Person improvement. I think Grand Mesa and Old Faithful are probably the weakest, though Krakatoa and the Barringer Crater are usually placed in unfavorable terrain.



Haven't convinced me on either count:
-Sacred Waters: even as Aztecs, where you would want to prioritize riverside cities, all those cities will eventually reach size 6 (and REALLY quickly too with that UB) so there's no gain in taking Sacred H20s over GofL, save slightly earlier access. Also, one of the benefits of floating gardens is increased flexibility of the watermill replacement; not only is growth rate increased by percentage and maintenance reduced, but watermills(FGs) can be built in cities that are next to a lake as well as the default riverside, so you don't need every city to be riverside to take advantage of this great UB. Obviously you'd be better off financially if you could, but unless you're using a map editor or re-rolling for a specific start, you're not going to be able to have every city take advantage of the UB or pantheon happiness, whereas with GofL you are. As for intentionally planning to have cities never reach above size 5, if that's your plan than the empire would probably be better off without that city entirely. As for getting the bonus earlier, I usually micromanage cities enough to ensure that from size 1-3, they're prioritizing growth which makes size 6 come pretty quick. On a random, unedited, not re-rolled map, I'd rather have double the happiness from a pantheon than have half the cities getting it earlier.
That's okay cause I haven't been convinced on the value of Goddess of Love! :)

-faith exclusive pantheons- I do acknowledge that it's a way to get from pantheon to religion quicker, and that faith doesn't die out so much late game as you can buy great people, and if that's how you want to do it, go ahead. But like I said, with religion/faith playing the role that it does in this game, as a means but NOT an end (no religious victory condition), it seems less than optimal to me to use your faith to reach a bonus that only gives more faith.
I agree that Faith and Religion by itself doesn't do anything.

However, the flexibility of the Belief system means that Religion can easily help you with: Gold, Happiness, Science, Production, Diplomacy, Culture, War, etc. So building a strong faith foundation sets you up nicely to then convert all that accumulated Faith to something that will win you the game.
 
Was aztecs suggested for sacred waters? That'd be one of the last civs I'd take it with. As the netherlands UA is great for expanding quickly, Waters is great for an early REX on a wide (not ICS) strategy, so you still care about rivers but will not get a load of pop that quick. It can make the REX a lot easier than the 6 pop one would. Atecs wouldn't benefit from a per city benefit, I wouldn't take either with them.
Actually I did suggest Aztecs for Sacred Waters. In the maps I play, I rarely see Lakes. Aztecs will already prioritize rivers (and lakes) due to their unique building, so it makes sense that they will benefit more from Sacred Waters than other civs. You are right that the happiness/city benefit may not always be useful for them.

Faith pantheons - The founder and enhancer are the daddy beliefs, pantheons can be quite good and followers are generally more meh (exceptions being the buildings). The faith pantheon is a decent sized sacrifice but can definitely be worth it for a better founder and earlier spread. It's more to be considered as another option for getting your religion if you don't start next to sinai or deity AI takes out SH before you (pretty much every time for me, I never build SH or GL because of this.)
I also want to point out that it is a lot easier to spread your religion early on than later, so the faith pantheons really give you a leg up on that front.

Once other religions take hold, it may take several missionary uses to convert a city. And as the game progresses and cities grow larger, it may require multiple missionary uses to convert a city even if there is no religion present.
 
That's okay cause I haven't been convinced on the value of Goddess of Love! :)
They apply the same bonus. One applies to river cities, which can't be all your cities, unless you're really lucky or editing the map. The other applies to all your cities that reach at least size 6. You can make all your cities reach size 6. You can'tmake all your cities riverside, until they add the digging-the-Panama-Canal wonder.

I agree that Faith and Religion by itself doesn't do anything.

However, the flexibility of the Belief system means that Religion can easily help you with: Gold, Happiness, Science, Production, Diplomacy, Culture, War, etc. So building a strong faith foundation sets you up nicely to then convert all that accumulated Faith to something that will win you the game.
Or just cashing in on it early, using the pantheon to push you towards something that will win you the game. Basically:
faith -> pantheon giving stuff to win the game. Later upgrades to religion continue to add more stuff that wins the game

vs.

faith -> pantheon giving more...
faith-> and waiting for
more faith ->
almost found that religion. Woulda been nice to have cities growing faster, or producing more, or more happiness during this pivotal time. but instead I chose
more faith -> hey 200 faith :) oh yeah, that's the minimum for a chance :mad: for any benefit, I need to wait for
more faith ->
religion founded -> finally start doing something useful with it
 
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