Tithe?

[El Caballerion]

Do you guys think Tithe (the most OP religion belief) will be nerfed in BNW? or do you think a lot of religious beliefs will encompass gold, or perhaps eliminate gold with the new trade system?

 

[Biologist]

I don't think Tithe will be nerfed. I don't think too many beliefs, if any, will be modified for BNW; that isn't where the focus is for the expansion. If anything, Tithe's importance may shrink as a consequence of more avenues for gaining gold.

As for whether Tithe can objectively be considered disproportionately powerful, that depends on what measure you're using. Certainly Tithe is generally more useful than the majority of alternative beliefs, but I can't remember a game in which Tithe alone won the game for me. That includes games in which I both selected Tithe as a belief and had massive religious pressure throughout the game.

 

[SalemSage]

Actually, I think all gold giving beliefs will be nerfed a little bit, otherwise international trade route's importance will be undermined. Not by much, so they're still usable, but if they remain the way they are, then because there's a lot less money going around in BNW, Tithes will go from nearly-always being picked to literally being picked every single time.

 

[Unresolved]

Tithe has many competitors in the Founder beliefs. Ceremonial Burial I consider just as strong as Tithe because happiness is harder to come by than gold. Church Property(I think that's the name) isn't as powerful as Tithe, but is a viable option. Especially for very wide/ICS empires. The culture belief is pretty decent for culture victories.

 

[Simplicity2]

I think most religious beliefs should be made more powerful instead. The problem is that most of the religious beliefs are just terrible. There's a few that shine and for those, religion becomes worth the hassle. For most others, there's little point. You're probably better off just not bothering. That's bad design. It means you always pick the same small set of beliefs.

In fact, the major output of religion appears to be more religion. And I *hate* that. I'd *prefer* the reverse. Beliefs give you more faith, and let me spend my faith on interesting things. Not, beliefs give you some passive benefit and faith helps you spread your passive benefit. That's lame.

 

[OldmansHQ]

I used to believe that Tithe belief was imbalanced, but... it is not. It actually does not provide that much money. By the time your religion dominates, you usually have plenty of different, more fruitful sources of gold. Ceremonial Burial on the other hand is truly powerful belief, still they should not nerf any of them, but buff some of them.

 

[Louis XXIV]

Keep in mind there's a deliberate imbalance to encourage you to get a religion first.

 

[baptismbyfire]

Well, the ability to use faith to buy Great Scientists and Engineers is pretty nice. That's mostly what I use religion for, definitely toward the end of the game. Plus the ability to shore up happiness after some wars of conquest with a bunch of pagodas is nice.

 

[kaspergm]

Keep in mind there's a deliberate imbalance to encourage you to get a religion first.

I would believe that was the reason for Tithe being so (over)powerful as it is, if not for the fact that AI never - never - picks Tithe. Instead, they seem to favor (wait for it) Pilgrimage. So if Firaxis indeed wanted to make some beliefs more powerful to make it a run for those, this just goes to show how far they are off the mark in the evaluation of their individual usefulnes.

 

[les berceaux]

I always go for Tithe, unless I'm going for a cultural victory, where I do World Church and hopefully Religious Texts

 

[BAshley]

I don't think tithe is OP. Even when I get it and my religion is dominant on emperor I only generally get about 30 gpt from it by the time the game is over - not gamebreaking.

The only belief I think OP is religious texts. The founder and follower beliefs are sort of interesting to select but RT feels like such an auto-victory against neighbouring religions after printing press that I pick it immediately without thinking that much about it. Particularly when there are much more interesting (if weaker) options I would have fun choosing. Perhaps it's just a placebo effect and it's not actually as strong as I think it is but... yeah, lol.

If I was in charge I'd either nerf it to 10% and 20% after PP or something like that, or just make your religion more powerful in cities you control. '+34% pressure in friendly cities'?

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I don't think tithe is OP. Even when I get it and my religion is dominant on emperor I only generally get about 30 gpt from it by the time the game is over - not gamebreaking.

The only belief I think OP is religious texts. The founder and follower beliefs are sort of interesting to select but RT feels like such an auto-victory against neighbouring religions after printing press that I pick it immediately without thinking that much about it. Particularly when there are much more interesting (if weaker) options I would have fun choosing. Perhaps it's just a placebo effect and it's not actually as strong as I think it is but... yeah, lol.

If I was in charge I'd either nerf it to 10% and 20% after PP or something like that, or just make your religion more powerful in cities you control. '+34% pressure in friendly cities'?

I think it is not so much that some beliefs are over powered, as some beliefs are very underpowered.

Having one or two beliefs (particularly pantheon, founder, and enhancer) that are slightly OP is OK (reward for first to get there)

However, there is a group of beliefs that are so bad
1. no one would ever pick them
2. no one will ever have to (ie there are at least 7 other beliefs that are clearly better)

Pantheon beliefs are a good example of this.. if your pantheon is late, chances are you won't get a religion, and your pantheon will be wiped out.. you at least want a decent return ... not something like +1 culture for Shrines or +15% to border growth

Enhancer beliefs are another, other than Religious Texts or Itenerant Preachers most of the others are poor. But Reliquary is very poor.. as is Just War (because you gave up a method of spreading your religion to that enemy)

 

[Montezumas Hat]

I feel like the problem with a lot of the beliefs is less about how good they are and more about how often they're useful. A lot of the best ones rely entirely on your start; Desert Folklore is the perfect example of this. Some are also only good depending on what else you can take, like the shrine/temple ones, which tend to be most useful when stacked and/or combined with shrine/temple replacing UBs.

I don't think Tithe is overpowered though, if only because of happiness for each city following. I would like to see more enticing choices though, cause as it stands if my start doesn't gel with any beliefs, then my religion is useless.

 

[Buccaneer]

I wish/hope there would be more internal beliefs to choose from (similar to the Pantheons). I tend to not care about spreading my religion to opponent's cities (except for city-states quests) and would much rather spend faith on units or great persons, not on prophets et al which could end up being a waste of faith.

 

[Gali]

There will be an additional factor to consider when debating whether to spread religion. The World Religion resolution benefits religious spread and gives a tourism boost in the capital. Could make spreading your religion for favorable votes later a worthy option in culture games. I am interested if the culture powers of religion will make Piety competitive with Tradition for culture games. It could be dangerous to spread it too much, however, since only the civ with the most cities with that religion gains the extra delegates.

Lets wait until we see the rebalanced religious beliefs until we worry about the balance of religious beliefs in BNW.

 

[Navelgazer]

Huh, for the way I play I always find myself choosing Papal Primacy even though other choices feel perhaps more interesting. (I almost always go for Patronage and Commerce, so while I'm never truly hurting for gold, PP stacks with the Patronage tree in nice ways that snowball on down the line for me.)

 

[Jman5]

I can't speak to balance, but if you pull off religious dominance you absolutely rake in the cash. Just played a game today on Immortal, standard size/Pangaea and I was making 100 gpt on tithe alone.

Maybe it's less the religious bonuses we choose and more to do with whoever can grab those early faith wonders monopolize the early +faith points.

 

[Zednaught]

Tithe becomes great on higher difficulties because large cities of the AI increase your gold. I don't think it needs changing though.

 

[radster_X]

I think most religious beliefs should be made more powerful instead. The problem is that most of the religious beliefs are just terrible. There's a few that shine and for those, religion becomes worth the hassle. For most others, there's little point. You're probably better off just not bothering. That's bad design. It means you always pick the same small set of beliefs.

In fact, the major output of religion appears to be more religion. And I *hate* that. I'd *prefer* the reverse. Beliefs give you more faith, and let me spend my faith on interesting things. Not, beliefs give you some passive benefit and faith helps you spread your passive benefit. That's lame.

Absoulutely Correct.

I think that Civ might need some more systems apart from happiness, wealth, food, culture, tourism etc. With tourism added, there may be some more religious beliefs that are actually useful, but I think we need to see some really different and unique beliefs, maybe one that gives you a unit every so turns or something, Generic bonuses of religions can often be quite boring.

Also the religious pressure system needs to be fixed. Ethiopia has a higher faith output than me and founded their religion about 30 turns before mine, and while Addis Abba is size 14 and has 12 followers exerting 32 pressure, My capital Mecca which is size 10 has 8 followers is exerting 52 pressure. Also in most of my games, one religion just ends up dominating all others, and there will end up being a bunch of religions that only have 1 city, and never spread, (even if they were the first to be founded).

 

[kaspergm]

Also the religious pressure system needs to be fixed. Ethiopia has a higher faith output than me and founded their religion about 30 turns before mine, and while Addis Abba is size 14 and has 12 followers exerting 32 pressure, My capital Mecca which is size 10 has 8 followers is exerting 52 pressure. Also in most of my games, one religion just ends up dominating all others, and there will end up being a bunch of religions that only have 1 city, and never spread, (even if they were the first to be founded).

Agreed, a city needs to excert a pressure similar to the number of citizens following that religion. So larger number of followers = more pressure to surrounding cities. Holy city should still get the 30 point bonus. Religious buildings (Shrines, Temples) could also give a bonus to pressure.