A Holy City for 2 religions

I'm currently playing a game where the AI Aztecs took the AI Indians capital. The Indians had already founded a religion in Delhi and they had a Great Prophet idling in the city when the Aztecs took it. It appears that the Aztecs used that captured Great Prophet to found a religion in Delhi as well on the turn following the capture, as they hadn't founded a religion until then. Only one religion is shown as the primary, and that's the Indian one, but the tooltip shows that it is the Holy City for both. I'm curious how this is going to play out for the Aztecs; if their religion can gain primacy and spread from there.

I've never seen this before and I just thought I'd share it.

Here's a screenie:
http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/613884674572336212/4FFD9BA8DDB68FFC2B51614B71284FCD0CF0EC3F/

Weird. I'm really curious how that works. Care to post a save?

I checked up on it every few turns and it stuck around for a while. Then I think the Aztecs used an Inquisitor to purge Delhi. I think that is the case because I had been sending missionaries to that city because I had the Interfaith Dialogue belief and now my own religious followers in that city are no more.

Even more interesting, that seems to have wiped the Indian Religion completely out. It doesn't say it's a Holy City for that religion any more (it's still the HC for the Aztec religion) and in the religion window the Indian Religion isn't listed any more. However it didn't reopen the slot for a new religion to be founded. It is no more.

Now I wonder if the Beliefs selected by India went back into the pool.

So, I guess the lesson is that if you want to truly wipe out a religion, take over their Holy City prior to founding your own, then found a new one in that Holy City and then purge the old religion out.

Really interesting. I guess your first GP does not have any religious affiliations, so if someone else capture it, you can do interesting things with it.

Perhaps someone can test this in multiplayer and see how the game handles it.

When I tested it, you could indeed found a religion in another holy city. HOWEVER, you had no followers when you founded your religion in that existing city. Meaning you would need another great prophet to spread the religion. Its probably easier for the AI to cheat to spread its religion, but for a Human its not really a logical strategy.

From what I understand, when you kill another civ, there religion is removed from the info screens, even if it still exists on the map. It still spreads on the map through pressure too, and no, the beliefs are not added back into the pool. I also found that if the religion is still small, you can kill it completely by making sure its not the dominant religion in any city, then using an inquisitor on its holy city (the ex capital). This permanently removes any pressure for the old religion from the ex capital, and thus it will never spread again.

kamex said:

From what I understand, when you kill another civ, there religion is removed from the info screens, even if it still exists on the map.

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Very annoying by the way, having all my cities follow a religion and having no way to check what the actual bonuses are.

Hpuk said:

Very annoying by the way, having all my cities follow a religion and having no way to check what the actual bonuses are.

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Agreed.

Another interesting point generated by this experience is that you can use a captured Great Prophet to found a religion if you don't have one yet. I kind of doubt that would make for an effective strategy, but you might be able to exploit it by happy accident.

But only if it hasn't spread religion yet

1. Having "two" religions isn't possible by means of control, Founder belief of Judaism would only work if Aztecs retain control of it, if for some reason someone resurrects Delhi to India, then Aztecs lose the founer belief of Judaism and instead Gandhi regains the founder belief of HInduism (if he is alive before he regains control).

2. The religion never "ceases" to exist, you can't purge a holy religion (although, given the scenario, it could be complicated) but I'd asume Hinduism still exerts pressure unless Aztecs shoved an INquisitor into Delhi, in which case any religions stop exerting pressure onto Delhi (including Holy City pressure).

TheKingOfBigOz said:

2. The religion never "ceases" to exist, you can't purge a holy religion (although, given the scenario, it could be complicated) but I'd asume Hinduism still exerts pressure unless Aztecs shoved an INquisitor into Delhi, in which case any religions stop exerting pressure onto Delhi (including Holy City pressure).

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The Indians had Buddhism, the Aztecs had Judaism, and I had Hinduism. For quite some time after the Aztecs captured Delhi and founded Judaism there, Buddhism remained the dominant religion in the city. After some point both Buddhism and Hinduism were wiped out in Delhi. I believe the Aztecs used a Jewish Inquisitor to purge the other two out of Delhi. After that the Tooltip no longer showed Delhi as being the Holy City for Buddhism; Judaism only. No other cities had Buddhism, so it was no longer in the game.

Eagle Pursuit said:

The Indians had Buddhism, the Aztecs had Judaism, and I had Hinduism. For quite some time after the Aztecs captured Delhi and founded Judaism there, Buddhism remained the dominant religion in the city. After some point both Buddhism and Hinduism were wiped out in Delhi. I believe the Aztecs used a Jewish Inquisitor to purge the other two out of Delhi. After that the Tooltip no longer showed Delhi as being the Holy City for Buddhism; Judaism only. No other cities had Buddhism, so it was no longer in the game.

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That enver means it ceases to disappear, Because Delhi had 0 followers it no longer listed Buddhism as a present religion with a follower, which also removed the Holy City, once Aztecs stop forcing their religion into Delhi, Delhi will continue to exert pressure for Buddhism no matter what, the only exception is the presence of Inquistor within the city, which stops religion from pouring in.

Wow. That's odd. It must have been deliberate, because there are several cities which are a holy city for multiple religions, like Jerusalem.

The AI civs might do this whenever the opportunity presents itself. Of course, it is quite rare to witness, so thanks! There is a new thread where a player found a religion in a holy city, so (like Jerusalem) a city holy to three religions is feasible.