JFD's Rise to Power

Hype hype hype

Will it have built in compatibility with EUI, or will we have to manually merge the toppanel files?

A bit of both; it won't be a direct merge of toppanel files - that isn't necessary; updates to the toppanel are handled in their own independent file (and so only would conflict with other mods specifically editing the Faith part). But in order to support both vanilla and EUI, I'll need to have users manually copy over alternate files.

This looks very impressive. What's this about a religion spawning from an impious Papacy, though? Some kind of reformation mechanic? That would be pretty cool.

Yes, Protestantism (and its denominations, if using Tomatekh's Protestant split) is not a selectable religion; rather one that has a chance to spawn when too many members of the Curia are of low piety (followers of the State Religion of the Papal Controller are automatically apart of the Curia).

JFD said:

Yes, Protestantism (and its denominations, if using Tomatekh's Protestant split) is not a selectable religion; rather one that has a chance to spawn when too many members of the Curia are of low piety (followers of the State Religion of the Papal Controller are automatically apart of the Curia).

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Can this be set to work with religions added from mods other than Tomatekh's, maybe with a new field in the <Religions> table?

Yeah sure, I can do that. It was intended to have a random Protestant religion chosen to serve as the Reformation religion, but I'll just add a generic <Reformation> tag to the religions table, and if a religion has that, then that religion will be amongst the randomly chosen ones to be founded.

This looks extremely impressive, game-changingly impressive. I hope it all turns out well. As far as institutions go, I think something from the Americas would be welcome, no idea what though to be honest.

One of my favorite little touches is the tolerance/intolerance. I'll attempt to make my planned Iran compatible with this, as it's specifically designed for late-game faith.

Another new and quite brilliant addition to the Civ series. Well done; I'll definitely be trying this one out!

JFD said:

Yeah sure, I can do that. It was intended to have a random Protestant religion chosen to serve as the Reformation religion, but I'll just add a generic <Reformation> tag to the religions table, and if a religion has that, then that religion will be amongst the randomly chosen ones to be founded.

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Would it be possible to have religions other than Catholicism go through a Reformation, and define both which Religion can have a Reformation event and which one is created from the split?

The Reformation event won't be tied to Catholicism. It's tied to whatever State Religion belongs to the founder of the Papacy (the builder of St. Peter's Basilica, essentially).

JFD said:

The Reformation event won't be tied to Catholicism. It's tied to whatever State Religion belongs to the founder of the Papacy (the builder of St. Peter's Basilica, essentially).

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can we have a couple more of these buildings?
The Kaaba and the Ganges banks in Varanasi come to mind

JFD said:

Miscellaneous and General Changes

I have come to despise the Pantheon Race, and the powerlessness with which the player is invested as they watch the AI - who benefits from Shrines immediately on higher difficulties - steal their preferred Pantheon. So I've done away with it. Every civ should be able to get a Pantheon at their leisure. However, in doing so, I have also made the race for religion a little more competitive. Religious resources, Pagan decisions and the new Solomon's Temple wonder should encourage all religions to have been founded by the Medieval Era, so that the stage can be set for religious friction during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Moreover, to give a bit more dramatic impact to the foundation of a new religion, each foundation event will signal a religion-sensitive chant - as was in CIV.

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Can you elaborate on how you've done away with the Pantheon race? Did you simply fix the faith required to 10, or did you do something different?

You mention religious resources, what are they?

regalman said:

can we have a couple more of these buildings?
The Kaaba and the Ganges banks in Varanasi come to mind

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Not really. I'm not a fan of overloading the mod with superfluous wonders. The requirement of St. Peter's Basilica is meant to reflect how the Apostolic Palace worked in CIV (it would be the Apostolic Palace again, but St. Peter's already had art). The Papacy is the most advanced of the five religious institutions, so I think it best that the Papacy have the additional requirement of this wonder.

On that note, five religious institutions have been settled on:

The Papacy - The Papacy is an institution focused on diplomacy, and on controlling or influencing civilisations that share your State Religion. Within the Papacy is the Curia, of which all civilisations following the State Religion of the founder are members. The founder of the Papacy automatically begins as the Papal Controller. They lose this status once their Piety level reaches neutral (you lose additional piety for being controller). When this occurs, the civ with the highest faith output becomes the next controller, is given free piety, and the counter begins again. When Papal Controller, you may enact decisions that affect all members of the Curia - this includes calling Crusades against heathen civilisations, excommunicating members, or setting certain rules against them (for instance, deciding on Papal Investiture for extra faith for all members or Free Investiture for extra gold for all members - the Papal Controller getting a larger benefit, of course). When the player is subject to an AI Papal Controller, this will present them with unique events, as well as the unique "Request Indulgences" decision. If you're not happy with the way you're being treated by the Papacy - you can change your State Religion to leave (if you have high enough piety). Finally, it is important that the Curia remain pious - so as Papal Controller, you'll want to occasionally give out indulgences. This is because, for every member of the Curia with a piety level of neutral or below, there is an increased chance of a Reformation event occurring, which will cause a new religion to be founded in the capital of one of your impious members.

The Mandate of Heaven - The Mandate of Heaven is a high reward, high risk institution. Whilst piety is high with the Mandate of Heaven, you are in a perpetual golden age. But, whilst it is low, there is a chance of anarchy. Whilst you will be given a unique Mandate of Heaven decision, and unique events to go along with it, to improve your piety, you will also lose piety faster depending upon how much unhappiness and happiness you have. Finally, the Mandate of Heaven can be claimed by any civilisation that happens to conquer the capital current claimant.

The Caliphate - The Caliphate is an institution that requires a bit of micro-management to get the most out of it. Those familiar with CKII will know of the decadence system for Muslims. The Caliphate will work similarly: low piety will afford scientific bonuses, whilst high piety will afford militaristic bonuses. However, these bonuses will be dependent upon the number of religious followers in your empire. Where the Caliphate will gain its own unique decisions and events, it will lose additional piety for every city following the Caliphate's State Religion not under the player's control; so the Caliphate must be a continuous empire. The owner of the holy city for the State Religion will assume the Caliphate if the previous Caliphate has been completely eliminated from the game.

The Patriarchate - The Patriarchate is a shared institution - where all members of the same State Religion share equal - defensive - benefits. No further details at this time.

Imperial Cult - The Imperial Cult is a local institution - any civilisation (so long as they haven't founded one of the previous four institutions) can create an Imperial Cult, which focuses on production and food related improvements. However, the more Imperial Cults there are in the world, the faster piety will degrade. Of course, unique decisions and events will be available to aide in counteracting this degradation. No further details at this time.

All of these institutions can only be suspended after adopting an ideology, after enacting the appropriate decision (Secularise the State for Freedom, Endorse State Atheism for Order, and Create a Personality Cult for Autocracy) - so the decision to found one should not be taken lightly. They will, however, hopefully, add a bit more variety to your games (and hopefully the Papacy will be both an interference and a tool in your empire building).

Opera said:

Can you elaborate on how you've done away with the Pantheon race? Did you simply fix the faith required to 10, or did you do something different?

You mention religious resources, what are they?

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Yes, I've merely fixed the faith required for a pantheon to 15.

The religious resources are Lotus, Saffron and Obsidian. These are special resources that have a natural faith yield.

The Mandate of Heaven sounds like my kind of thing I am really hyped for this.

This looks amazing. Thanks to all your hard work.

JFD said:

Yes, I've merely fixed the faith required for a pantheon to 15.

The religious resources are Lotus, Saffron and Obsidian. These are special resources that have a natural faith yield.

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They're some kind of bonus resources, then, and not luxuries? You mentioned not messing with pantheon beliefs in the OP but maybe those resources would warrant some beliefs. I suppose yielding faith by themselves could be good enough too.

How are you supposed to found the institutions other than the Papacy? Through decisions?

Lotus is Bonus, the other two are luxury. As they all yield faith, I don't think they need a Pantheon - but that could always be changed after testing.

Yes, every institution is founded through a decision; each with their own requirements.

Wow, can't wait for more details! Please tell us more!

There's not a lot more to be told at this point; most are more minor details. But the list of religious buildings has been expanded thusly:

Altar, Cathedral, Chapter House, Church, Daoguan, Gurdwara, Mandir, Mosque, Pagoda, Synagogue

That said, details on progress and release might be of interest. Understandably, this mod cannot be released before Sukritact's Decisions mod (so go over there and encourage completion ). In the meantime, most of the State Religion system is in place, as well as the policy changes - just none of the Institutions and the Belief changes. I intend to release a working version of the mod with only a few Institutions ready - to get the mod in a better balanced position before introducing the Papacy.

Ah yes, and if anyone is interested in contributing short pedia entries for the Sacrificial Altar, Daoguan and Chapter House, or for the Policies: Syncretism, Monastic Education and Infallibility, then please let me know. Viregel has been gracious enough to contribute pedias for the three resources already. There is also Solomon's Temple, if anyone is interested in doing a pedia for that.

How do you even manage to do other things in your daily basis when creating so many mods?! and you managed to miss Fire Temples for Zoroastrianism.