danaphanous
religious fanatic
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2013
- Messages
- 1,501
I play immortal usually, occasionally emperor if I want a more relaxed game for experimentation. Returned to Byzantines today to see if I could build a sweet religion--then I remembered why Byzantines annoy me on the level of difficulty I play...
The issue I have with religious civs like the Byzantines is they are set up perfectly for getting a great religion, however, due to not having any starting faith sources unless I get a lucky ruin strike the shrine often isn't enough to get the early pantheons thus I lose 15-20 turns chasing it. This snowballs. when I finally found all that is left is weaker picks. I can do it on smaller maps but big maps too many competitors get there first and I'm left with not so good choices. So are Byzantines only good on Emperor and below where the AI don't get pottery? Does anyone have any advice for getting a competitive religion going on immortal and deity and big maps?
This past game I got pottery from a ruin which saved 5 turns, built shrine in 5, and missed the first pantheon by 3 turns despite this wonderful luck. Missed the 2nd pantheon by 1 turn. Missed the third by 1 turn...it sucked. I was all ready to go with stone circles but because of this cascade due to the AI starting with pottery and it being a huge map with twelve civs this resulted in me getting the 4th founding.
The result was worse then picking someone like Shoshone or Celts despite the Byzantines supposedly being great for religion due to so much of the good religious buildings being gone. I'm trying to go wide but all but monastaries was gone for religious buildings which has no happiness. To offset I picked+2 happiness from and +2 culture from temples. Now I realize this is the same as a pagoda that costs me money and I have to hard-build and I'm stuck with like +50 faith a turn able to buy buildings every 3 to 4 turns but no way to spend it. I guess I was naive to hope I'd get 2 buildings but it would've been super nice and I was so close! I'm now wondering if the Byzantines ability is wasted on immortal. I just can't seem to get a decent religion and the 3rd choice is usually just making up for this fact. My religion with Celts on similar settings was far, far stronger and the wide empire much more feasible.
My neighbor has pagodas, cathedrals, and Jesuit Education and if she would spread it to me I would love to buy all her buildings with my massive faith output then convert them back but she isn't sending any missionaries my way. Any advice for getting her to do so? Usually this is not something you want but it would be so nice if I got her buildings in half my cities then flipped them back. I have the faith to easily do this and could get the best of both religions. So what's the best way to get her mad and start a religious war so I get tons of missionary spam?
On another note, does anyone have advice for a religious build the AI doesn't pick so often, maybe a different strategy then wide/religious buildings? The issue is those buildings are the best source of happiness from religion as well so my wide empire misses them and cities are staying smaller this round. I can concieve of some local religion that boosted growth and production in a tall empire but honestly I find tall play rather boring. I love expansion and war and the growth is wasted when I can't support it due to happiness issues so I find myself gravitating towards happiness and money from religion.
One another note I've already been attacked by two neighbors due to my aggressive expansion and crushed both. My archers are close to logistics, my cataphracts close to march & blitz and most of my dromon's got range upgrades. I may have to turn this into a conquest game. The random map rolled Archipelego too
Moderator Action: Wall of large font text reduced to normal size
The issue I have with religious civs like the Byzantines is they are set up perfectly for getting a great religion, however, due to not having any starting faith sources unless I get a lucky ruin strike the shrine often isn't enough to get the early pantheons thus I lose 15-20 turns chasing it. This snowballs. when I finally found all that is left is weaker picks. I can do it on smaller maps but big maps too many competitors get there first and I'm left with not so good choices. So are Byzantines only good on Emperor and below where the AI don't get pottery? Does anyone have any advice for getting a competitive religion going on immortal and deity and big maps?
This past game I got pottery from a ruin which saved 5 turns, built shrine in 5, and missed the first pantheon by 3 turns despite this wonderful luck. Missed the 2nd pantheon by 1 turn. Missed the third by 1 turn...it sucked. I was all ready to go with stone circles but because of this cascade due to the AI starting with pottery and it being a huge map with twelve civs this resulted in me getting the 4th founding.
The result was worse then picking someone like Shoshone or Celts despite the Byzantines supposedly being great for religion due to so much of the good religious buildings being gone. I'm trying to go wide but all but monastaries was gone for religious buildings which has no happiness. To offset I picked+2 happiness from and +2 culture from temples. Now I realize this is the same as a pagoda that costs me money and I have to hard-build and I'm stuck with like +50 faith a turn able to buy buildings every 3 to 4 turns but no way to spend it. I guess I was naive to hope I'd get 2 buildings but it would've been super nice and I was so close! I'm now wondering if the Byzantines ability is wasted on immortal. I just can't seem to get a decent religion and the 3rd choice is usually just making up for this fact. My religion with Celts on similar settings was far, far stronger and the wide empire much more feasible.
My neighbor has pagodas, cathedrals, and Jesuit Education and if she would spread it to me I would love to buy all her buildings with my massive faith output then convert them back but she isn't sending any missionaries my way. Any advice for getting her to do so? Usually this is not something you want but it would be so nice if I got her buildings in half my cities then flipped them back. I have the faith to easily do this and could get the best of both religions. So what's the best way to get her mad and start a religious war so I get tons of missionary spam?
On another note, does anyone have advice for a religious build the AI doesn't pick so often, maybe a different strategy then wide/religious buildings? The issue is those buildings are the best source of happiness from religion as well so my wide empire misses them and cities are staying smaller this round. I can concieve of some local religion that boosted growth and production in a tall empire but honestly I find tall play rather boring. I love expansion and war and the growth is wasted when I can't support it due to happiness issues so I find myself gravitating towards happiness and money from religion.
One another note I've already been attacked by two neighbors due to my aggressive expansion and crushed both. My archers are close to logistics, my cataphracts close to march & blitz and most of my dromon's got range upgrades. I may have to turn this into a conquest game. The random map rolled Archipelego too
Moderator Action: Wall of large font text reduced to normal size