Apostolic Tradition OP ?

[De_Genius]

Apostolic Tradition Receive Golden Age Points and Food equal to the # of Followers of your Religion
to your Holy City when you spread your Religion to cities other than your Holy City. Bonus Scales with Era.

I have tried this recently on Marathon and it seems kind of insane.
With a church providing me with 3 spreads per missionary, I can crank out almost 1 pop per missionary along with providing me with at least 1000 GAP.

I only play on Marathon, so I don't know if it scales too well with game speed.

How does you feel about it ?

 

[Horvath Broncos]

I think all of these beliefs that scale with the number of cities need a serious nerfing. Especially in bigger maps. I don't think this is as OP as Council of elders which got a deserved nerf but deserves some nerfing.

 

[Owlbebach]

Its okay. In fact it gives you something like 8-10 additional population in capital and 3-4 additional golden ages. Nice, but not OP

 

[De_Genius]

In a huge map I can get a constant Golden Age and at least 15 extra population. Since this is an extra effect and not a policy or something independent, I think it should be toned down.

How does this one feel on maps of different sizes and game speeds ?

 

[Horvath Broncos]

Bigger the map bigger the problem. I play on an huge map with 20 civs and the yields from these city number based beliefs get out of control pretty fast. I once suggested some kinda scaling based on a map size but it did lead to anywhere.

 

[Owlbebach]

In a huge map I can get a constant Golden Age and at least 15 extra population. Since this is an extra effect and not a policy or something independent, I think it should be toned down.

How does this one feel on maps of different sizes and game speeds ?

What i told you was Large map with 15 civs. What difficulty do you play?

 

[CrazyG]

Its okay. In fact it gives you something like 8-10 additional population in capital and 3-4 additional golden ages. Nice, but not OP

I've got a lot more than 10 population from it before. I had a game as Byantium where my progress capital had 76 population when I entered industrial, and of course its easily infinite golden age

 

[Owlbebach]

I've got a lot more than 10 population from it before. I had a game as Byantium where my progress capital had 76 population when I entered industrial, and of course its easily infinite golden age

Wasn't that before era scaling was removed? And thats Byz, i think Byz is at least top3 civ in the game, if not top1

EDIT: I mean on average you have something like 30 cities with your religion. It is 450 food and golden age points for every spread. In my last game i had +300 food per turn in my capital and by the time i reached Modern Era it was less than 30 pop. Not sure how did you manage to get 76 pop, did you have like 60 cities following your religion? Anyway thats not an average result (not to mention that 76 pop is useless)

 

[LukaSlovenia29]

When I manage to get apostolic tradition and churches, the combo gets very strong. Not sure if "OP", but definitely very strong. I'm sure Gazebo is keeping an eye out on any founder belief overperforming compared to others. But if it gets nerfed, I'd only propose a small nerf, food&GA points aren't as valuable as Council of Elders' science&production, plus you need to be actively spreading your religion, it doesn't reward passive spread as such.

 

[CrazyG]

Wasn't that before era scaling was removed? And thats Byz, i think Byz is at least top3 civ in the game, if not top1

No its still kinda broken without era scaling. I remember I posted a picture where I had +17,000 food in my capital more than I needed, which was with era scaling. Without era scaling I'd still have like 8,000 excess food built up. A citizen at that point only costs like 800 food, and I was still getting food. The only problem that can happen is you accidentally convert literally the entire world and can't spread with missionaries anymore, but if you do the rewards for something like glory of god or ceremonial burial will break the game anyways.

You can reach a point with Pacifism where you pay 170 faith for a missionary that earns 1,000+ food. Its not super broken just because its food, and enormous amounts of food won't break the game as easily as production or science will. I think these spread related ones should either cap or have a logarithmic scale

Oh and I would also support a light nerf on Theodora. She is probably the best civ in the game because she can stack multiple spreader beliefs and spread very easily will all her bonus faith

 

[LukaSlovenia29]

I agree, a cap on food&GA points seems like a good idea (as it would for certain other founder beliefs instead of outright nerfing them as a whole).

And I think Theodora is a top civ. The best religion civ plus a great UU (knights with 30 CS, cover AND defensive terrain bonuses). Not sure if OP, but definitely too strong for me to enjoy playing with (unless I venture into Deity).

 

[Gazebo]

I think I'm just going to remove Era scaling from the founders and glory of god. It makes sense, as there's a natural scaling element to them already (city growth for population, passive religious spread for cities). I've tinkered with scaling based on percentages and whatnot and it is very difficult for the player to predict just exactly what they'll be getting from a bonus. Besides, founder bonuses should be at their peak of power in the medieval-early industrial period - having them fall off a bit post-industrial feels thematic and also gives non-founders a chance to catch up.

G

 

[Gazebo]

No its still kinda broken without era scaling. I remember I posted a picture where I had +17,000 food in my capital more than I needed, which was with era scaling. Without era scaling I'd still have like 8,000 excess food built up. A citizen at that point only costs like 800 food, and I was still getting food. The only problem that can happen is you accidentally convert literally the entire world and can't spread with missionaries anymore, but if you do the rewards for something like glory of god or ceremonial burial will break the game anyways.

You can reach a point with Pacifism where you pay 170 faith for a missionary that earns 1,000+ food. Its not super broken just because its food, and enormous amounts of food won't break the game as easily as production or science will. I think these spread related ones should either cap or have a logarithmic scale

Oh and I would also support a light nerf on Theodora. She is probably the best civ in the game because she can stack multiple spreader beliefs and spread very easily will all her bonus faith

We can nerf her, but let's discuss it in her thread.

G

 

[CrazyG]

We can nerf her, but let's discuss it in her thread.

G

A lot of her power is tied to these beliefs, so I'm not sure if she would be OP if the beliefs are better balanced

 

[Gazebo]

A lot of her power is tied to these beliefs, so I'm not sure if she would be OP if the beliefs are better balanced

Makes sense. We'll try removing the era scaling and see what that does. I think it is the right call.

G

 

[De_Genius]

What i told you was Large map with 15 civs. What difficulty do you play?

I play on Huge map on Marathon King difficulty (by mistake mostly, since I normally play on Emperor). I think I have about 50 cities now with avg. 15 pop in each one, giving me 10-15 turns of food per spread. With a church that can be done 3 times, and even with me paying 1000 faith per missionary which is about 5-6 turns, it saves me so much food that I have removed most of the food tiles in my capital and focus purely on production and specialists.

 

[ElliotS]

I think the correct choice is to scale for map sizes. Otherwise anything that's not OP in huge is horrible in standard. Going over the recommended 8 civs and even the normally possible 12 on huge is going to shift balance obviously.

 

[Gazebo]

I think the correct choice is to scale for map sizes. Otherwise anything that's not OP in huge is horrible in standard. Going over the recommended 8 civs and even the normally possible 12 on huge is going to shift balance obviously.

Map sizes already scale by virtue of the number of cities and religions competing over said cities. As I said, I'm avoiding this kind of functional scaling because it is difficult to translate it into numbers that the player can predict. Removing era scaling allows for even the most expansive religion to have its founder beliefs obsolete over time.

G

 

[Owlbebach]

I think I'm just going to remove Era scaling from the founders and glory of god. It makes sense, as there's a natural scaling element to them already (city growth for population, passive religious spread for cities). I've tinkered with scaling based on percentages and whatnot and it is very difficult for the player to predict just exactly what they'll be getting from a bonus. Besides, founder bonuses should be at their peak of power in the medieval-early industrial period - having them fall off a bit post-industrial feels thematic and also gives non-founders a chance to catch up.

G

That might work but numbers should be adjusted, with current numbers they will become useless without era scaling

 

[ashendashin]

That might work but numbers should be adjusted, with current numbers they will become useless without era scaling

Doubt they'd be useless. They'll still be easy to catapult with early on, where it really matters. If you succeeded in spreading across a continent on huge, then the numbers will remain strong up to renaissance, even. Council of Elders, for example, could expect an easy 150 production and science, with the production being somewhat less exploitable, but still noticeably bumping up wonders pre-industrial. I agree with G that it shouldn't remain so relevant past that point.