What is the use of religion in Brave New World

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Salil

Chieftain
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Apr 4, 2006
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Hello Friends,
I am trying to find this information on the web as to what is the purpose of religion in BNW? I have founded a religion and it gives me some benefits. But most my cities are following some other religion. I understand that followers of a religion also get some benefit. So what is the purpose of spreading a religion in my own city. Also lately a great prophet has been born who can spread my religion in a city. But what will I gain by spreading religion?
 
Depending on what beliefs you pick, you may benefit from spreading your religion as widely as possible (e.g. Tithe gives you gold for followers over the world, Just War gives you combat bonus near enemy cities with your religion).

Alternatively your religion might be full of juicy Follower and Reformation beliefs (such as Cathedrals and Sacred Sites) that you don't want your rivals to have, so you shouldn't spread your religion beyond your borders.

Religion is very much what you make of it. Essentially by founding a religion you get to pick the benefits it gives you, and you get access to its Founder belief. By spreading a religion, you gain access to its Follower, Pantheon and Reformation beliefs in each city it is dominant.

Check the Religion overview screen to see what religions have what beliefs, and decide which ones you want in your cities.
 
Quick question semi related to this thread. I've always been on the belief to always found the religion, and I did, but my faith was slow, and I couldn't enhance it fast enough. Egypt spent many missionaries spreading Islam to all my cities, including my holy city. I took over his holy city (Thebes), and now the game seems to act like Islam is my main religion. If I build a missionary even in my capitol (my religion is Zorastrium- I spelled it wrong I know), it spreads Islam instead of Zorastrium. I tried building a inquisitor, and that seemed to take away zorastrium from my capitol and leave Islam.

Am I stuck with Islam? Is there no way to get my original religion back?
 
Any missionaries or inquisitors spawned in a city will be of the majority religion in that city, regardless of what your own religion is.

Your holy city will always produce religious pressure for its own religion, so it should slowly become dominant again.

If you want to reconvert your cities, you either need to find a city that is still Zoroastrian to build your inquisitors and missionaries, or you need to spawn a Great Prophet (the faster option).
 
Disgustipated said:
Quick question semi related to this thread. I've always been on the belief to always found the religion, and I did, but my faith was slow, and I couldn't enhance it fast enough. Egypt spent many missionaries spreading Islam to all my cities, including my holy city. I took over his holy city (Thebes), and now the game seems to act like Islam is my main religion. If I build a missionary even in my capitol (my religion is Zorastrium- I spelled it wrong I know), it spreads Islam instead of Zorastrium. I tried building a inquisitor, and that seemed to take away zorastrium from my capitol and leave Islam.

Am I stuck with Islam? Is there no way to get my original religion back?
Click to expand...

You used an inquisitor on your own holy city? You might be stuck with Islam for good. Inquisitors remove holy city status. Sure hope you tore Egypt a new one for pulling that one on you.

Next time, here's a useful tidbit: stationing a inquisitor of your own religion in a city, not using him, prevents religions from being spread. If you got a spread-happy AI, be proactive and get an inquisitor before it's too late.
 
I'm not sure if you can ever truly exterminate a religion.

I was playing a game as France where I got Pagodas but Catherine took Sacred Sites, and after I had all my Pagodas I captured a Barbarian Great Prophet (that had been Russian). Using the Great Prophet on my Holy City completely removed all shreds of my religion (and no more Holy City indicator). But very very slowly it started to creep back in, like say 20 turns later it had 1 follower, 80 turns later it had 3 followers... I'm not sure if it would ever have recovered and become majority (game ended at around ~7 with Paris probably being around 30 citizens), but even with a dozen cities exerting pressure all around it, my religion still reappeared from nothing.
 
Ok. So the follower belief benefits the city to which I spread it right? So if I spread it to a rival civilization then that city benefits from my follower belief. If I spread it to my own city, does it get the founder belief or follower belief? If my rival civ benefits from the follower belief why will I spread it to other civs? Also if some other civ spreads their religion to my city I get the benefit of the follower belief right?
 
Alzadar said:
I'm not sure if you can ever truly exterminate a religion.

I was playing a game as France where I got Pagodas but Catherine took Sacred Sites, and after I had all my Pagodas I captured a Barbarian Great Prophet (that had been Russian). Using the Great Prophet on my Holy City completely removed all shreds of my religion (and no more Holy City indicator). But very very slowly it started to creep back in, like say 20 turns later it had 1 follower, 80 turns later it had 3 followers... I'm not sure if it would ever have recovered and become majority (game ended at around ~7 with Paris probably being around 30 citizens), but even with a dozen cities exerting pressure all around it, my religion still reappeared from nothing.
Click to expand...

That's because the GP doesn't erase Holy City status, only the inquisitor can. Holy Cities will always exert pressure for the religion founded in it. Religions can be eliminated if you perform inquisition on the Holy City and convert any cities that have it as majority.

Even after the Holy City is removed, I believe that a city that still follows it can create missionaries/GPs that preach it.
 
Salil said:
Ok. So the follower belief benefits the city to which I spread it right? So if I spread it to a rival civilization then that city benefits from my follower belief. If I spread it to my own city, does it get the founder belief or follower belief? If my rival civ benefits from the follower belief why will I spread it to other civs? Also if some other civ spreads their religion to my city I get the benefit of the follower belief right?
Click to expand...

Follower (and Pantheon) beliefs affect all cities who have that religion as a majority, whether they belong to you or someone else.

Founder beliefs apply more generally to the civilisation who founded the religion. They don't work on a city-to-city level.

Some Founder beliefs reward you for spreading your religion outside your territory. Sure, you may also give them the benefit of your Follower beliefs, but that's the trade-off.
 
Inquisitors don't remove Holy City status. They can remove all followers of a religion in a Holy City, but even with 0 followers, it will still produce pressure for a religion, and will eventually get at least one follower back. A religion can be functionally eliminated from the game, as, even if that one follower comes back, its surrounding cities exert dominating pressure of the other religion, but it can never be totally removed, it will always come back, no matter how weak it may be.
 
Disgustipated said:
Quick question semi related to this thread. I've always been on the belief to always found the religion, and I did, but my faith was slow, and I couldn't enhance it fast enough. Egypt spent many missionaries spreading Islam to all my cities, including my holy city. I took over his holy city (Thebes), and now the game seems to act like Islam is my main religion. If I build a missionary even in my capitol (my religion is Zorastrium- I spelled it wrong I know), it spreads Islam instead of Zorastrium. I tried building a inquisitor, and that seemed to take away zorastrium from my capitol and leave Islam.

Am I stuck with Islam? Is there no way to get my original religion back?
Click to expand...

Your Great Prophets will ALWAYS spread your religion.

Missionaries and Inquisitors spread (or don't purge) the religion in the city they are bought in.

...The game really should give the Missionaries/Inquisitors different names for their different religions. (that mistake comes up fairly often)


Unfortunately if you use an inquisitor of a different religion on a holy city, The Holy City status is removed. So you might not get the automatic pressure, or the benefit of the founder beliefs (you have to both be the founder and have the holy city.)

[It would be good if a GP would give holy city status to a city converted to a religion that does not have a holy city]
 
Uberfrog said:
Any missionaries or inquisitors spawned in a city will be of the majority religion in that city, regardless of what your own religion is.

Your holy city will always produce religious pressure for its own religion, so it should slowly become dominant again.

If you want to reconvert your cities, you either need to find a city that is still Zoroastrian to build your inquisitors and missionaries, or you need to spawn a Great Prophet (the faster option).
Click to expand...

Thanks, the great prophet did the trick. I saved up a ton of faith (taking over his holy city gave me quite a bit of faith per turn), and reconverted most of my cities. I prefer mine, since it's tailored for my play style, and how I intend on winning.

I'm curious, since I did have his holy city, did I also get the bonuses for that religion?

Unfortunately if you use an inquisitor of a different religion on a holy city, The Holy City status is removed. So you might not get the automatic pressure, or the benefit of the founder beliefs (you have to both be the founder and have the holy city.)
Click to expand...

Yeah I didn't seem to get the pressure from my original religion after I used the inquisitor on my own city. Luckily the great prophet brought it back.
 
That happened to me recently.

The aggressive Ethiopians nerfed my capital just as I started up the religion and I got the dubious "Indoctrinated" achievement as a result.

Anyway, my Great Prophet brought it back.

The AI played an extremely aggressive religious game with numerous Great Prophets cruising around, missionaries and inquisitors held back for defence.

By the time I got my reformation belief all the good ones were gone. :p
 
Disgustipated said:
I'm curious, since I did have his holy city, did I also get the bonuses for that religion?
Click to expand...
not the founder bonuses no.. the regular bonuses every city of the religion gets, yes.

To get the Founder bonuses you must BOTH have the holy city AND be the founding civ

Disgustipated said:
Yeah I didn't seem to get the pressure from my original religion after I used the inquisitor on my own city. Luckily the great prophet brought it back.
Click to expand...

Were you getting the founder bonuses from your religion? (tithe, ceremonial burial, etc... can check under the happiness/faith/culture or gold tabs)
 
KrikkitTwo said:
not the founder bonuses no.. the regular bonuses every city of the religion gets, yes.

To get the Founder bonuses you must BOTH have the holy city AND be the founding civ



Were you getting the founder bonuses from your religion? (tithe, ceremonial burial, etc... can check under the happiness/faith/culture or gold tabs)
Click to expand...

I'm unsure how to check that. I took Ceremonial Burial for my founder belief (+1 happiness for every 2 cities following this religion), my Pantheon was 10% growth rate. When I hover the mouse over the happy icon at the top I get +6 for religious beliefs, but I'm not sure what that is. I have more than 3 cities following my religion, so I should be getting more.

edit: I loaded a save from before I converted my city back, and I'm not getting that +6, so that should be it. But why is it only +6? oh wait, my math is bad. I have 12 cities following, that sounds about right.

So I wasn't getting my Pantheon or founder belief, and probably not the other things as well when my city was Muslim. That will teach me not to leave it that way for so long.
 
Gyra Solune said:
Inquisitors don't remove Holy City status. They can remove all followers of a religion in a Holy City, but even with 0 followers, it will still produce pressure for a religion, and will eventually get at least one follower back. A religion can be functionally eliminated from the game, as, even if that one follower comes back, its surrounding cities exert dominating pressure of the other religion, but it can never be totally removed, it will always come back, no matter how weak it may be.
Click to expand...

Not correct. Inquisitor from another religion will extinguish the holy city character of a city (no more internal pressure, no longer able to build Great Temple or Borobudur). Yes, if there are other cities nearby with the same religion, passive pressure may eventually reconvert the city. Also, missionaries and Great Prophets may re-spread their religion to that city. And, as Disgustipated found out, even if you no longer have your religion in any city, you can spawn a Great prophet of your religion and re-spark religion's flame. Thus, the only way to eliminate a religion altogether is to conquer the religion's holy city, zap it with an Inquisitor, make that religion a minority in every other city on the map, hunt down every wandering missionary, inquisitor and Great Prophet of that religion, and kill off the religion's founder. Easily enough done, right?:crazyeye:

KrikkitTwo said:
Unfortunately if you use an inquisitor of a different religion on a holy city, The Holy City status is removed. So you might not get the automatic pressure, or the benefit of the founder beliefs (you have to both be the founder and have the holy city.)

[It would be good if a GP would give holy city status to a city converted to a religion that does not have a holy city]
Click to expand...

It would be interesting if a GP could restore Holy City status for a religion that lost that status.

Disgustipated said:
Thanks, the great prophet did the trick. I saved up a ton of faith (taking over his holy city gave me quite a bit of faith per turn), and reconverted most of my cities. I prefer mine, since it's tailored for my play style, and how I intend on winning.
Click to expand...

:goodjob:

I'm curious, since I did have his holy city, did I also get the bonuses for that religion?
Click to expand...

No, you do not get founder benefits of another religion, even if you possess that religion's Holy City (regardless of whether you did or did not found your own religion).
 
Disgustipated said:
I'm unsure how to check that. I took Ceremonial Burial for my founder belief (+1 happiness for every 2 cities following this religion), my Pantheon was 10% growth rate. When I hover the mouse over the happy icon at the top I get +6 for religious beliefs, but I'm not sure what that is. I have more than 3 cities following my religion, so I should be getting more.
Click to expand...

+6 for religious beliefs would be from 12 cities following your religion. ( 1 happy per 2 cities)

so it looks like the requirement is

1. you founded the religion

AND

2. no one else controls the holy city (if it is gone you get the founder beliefs)
 
KrikkitTwo said:
+6 for religious beliefs would be from 12 cities following your religion. ( 1 happy per 2 cities)

so it looks like the requirement is

1. you founded the religion

AND

2. no one else controls the holy city (if it is gone you get the founder beliefs)
Click to expand...

I wasn't getting the Pantheon or the founder belief when my holy city was Muslim. And not my follower beliefs either (faster growth rate while not at war, and +1 production for every 2 followers of the religion).

That will teach me not to let my holy city fall to another religion for so long. Thankfully it wasn't permanent after I used the inquisitor on it.
 
Disgustipated said:
I wasn't getting the Pantheon or the founder belief when my holy city was Muslim. And not my follower beliefs either (faster growth rate while not at war, and +1 production for every 2 followers of the religion).

That will teach me not to let my holy city fall to another religion for so long. Thankfully it wasn't permanent after I used the inquisitor on it.
Click to expand...

You get the pantheon and follower beliefs of the religion of the city (regardless of 'your' religion, ie the one you founded)

You get the founder beliefs of the religion you founded (assuming noone else controls the holy city)... and they usually are based on how many cities follow the religion.
 
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