Byzantium UA overpowered?

[sschmalz]

When G&K first came out, I thought Byzantium would be pretty weak. Then I played this month's game of the month and realized that the extra founder belief can be ridiculously powerful.

If you choose +34% faster spread as well as +30% reach, your religion would spread to just about every city in the world (especially on pangea), except for maybe holy cities of other religions.

Has anyone else considered this or even tried it? I did and it was pretty amazing.

Moderator Action: Moved to G&K.

 

[stickyfingers]

I kind of discounted those abilities but that may well be a mistake. I figured for every belief that helps it spread, that's one less belief I can use on something helpful. So what if I have a ton of followers but they hardly provide a bonus? I figured I would spread it myself with prophets. However, if it truly can spread as you say, then maybe having only a couple beliefs will go a long way because of the shear number of cities/followers.

 

[n00bxqb]

Byzantium gets two Enhancer beliefs (I haven't played them yet)?

In that case, Religious Texts + Itinerant Preachers + Tithe = Disgusting amount of money

Really, almost every Founder Belief would be extremely good w/ that combo (the # of Followers moreso than # of cities)

 

[TheGreatImber]

Yeah so you super spread your religion, now what?
You are either raking in gold, happiness, culture or faith. There is still not too much OP regarding it. Though it's amazing to see the AI use inquisitors to hopelessly preserve their religion, having a super strong religion doesn't necessarily make you OP.

 

[sschmalz]

I figured for every belief that helps it spread, that's one less belief I can use on something helpful.

The +34% faster conversion is very powerful and is the best way to passively pass your religion on to surrounding civs that have a religion of their own. It along with the +30% reach are in the same category with all the other beliefs that are intended to help you spread your religion. So, you're really not losing out on anything by choosing it besides maybe lowering the cost or increasing the effectivenss of missionaries. However, with the +34% faster conversion, you don't need missionaries (on a pangea map).

 

[sschmalz]

You are either raking in gold, happiness, culture or faith. There is still not too much OP regarding it

This seems like a contradiction and yet the first part is an understatement.

There's no reason you shouldn't have a near over-abundance of at least two of these throughout the entire game. Consider what you could do with the bonuses if just about every city and every citizen in the game followed your religion.

 

[Xiao Xiong]

Or tithe plus initiation rites plus itinerant, use the gold for shrines and spam prophets to covert clusters of city states. Massive cash early and sustained income.

 

[chazzycat]

I wouldn't say it's OP, considering they have to try very hard and sacrifice other builds to get a religion in the first place.

 

[Loucypher]

Byzanthium...OP?
...Yeah you know what, I think that with this topic, I've seen EVERY Civ in the game be called OP. Byzanthium was the last missing one.

 

[gozpel]

Most of the civs has something unique, the UA Byz has is no more than "pretty good".

Arabia, Aztecs, Songhai, Russia and the list can go on has better UA - UB.

So, Byzantium is a decent civ to play, but could be greater if you choose their ability, like with most civs. But overpowered, no.

 

[Nyanko]

Byzantium gets two Enhancer beliefs (I haven't played them yet)?

In that case, Religious Texts + Itinerant Preachers + Tithe = Disgusting amount of money

Really, almost every Founder Belief would be extremely good w/ that combo (the # of Followers moreso than # of cities)

Two any belief
Including founder beliefs, follower beliefs panthion beliefs

 

[ggmoyang]

Byzanthium...OP?
...Yeah you know what, I think that with this topic, I've seen EVERY Civ in the game be called OP. Byzanthium was the last missing one.

+1

It is OP only when one can found religion and choose 'right' beliefs, which happens rarely.

 

[TheHanzou]

the best way to go about this is to pick all faith producing beliefs and completely switch unit production over to faith.

You can basically warmonger all day while you build nothing but buildings and wonders in your cities. Lategame you can buy great persons with it. Its really effective, even more so since those beliefs arent picked by anyone else most of the time.

It does work better with spain because they not only get double tile output (which usualy is more faith since a lot of wonder produce faith), but the +4 faith per wonder belief is also doubled. Some natural wonder gives 24 Faith this way . Its just silly.

 

[jahsoldier]

the best way to go about this is to pick all faith producing beliefs and completely switch unit production over to faith.

You can basically warmonger all day while you build nothing but buildings and wonders in your cities. Lategame you can buy great persons with it. Its really effective, even more so since those beliefs arent picked by anyone else most of the time.

It does work better with spain because they not only get double tile output (which usualy is more faith since a lot of wonder produce faith), but the +4 faith per wonder belief is also doubled. Some natural wonder gives 24 Faith this way . Its just silly.

Yeah, Boudicca is a beast for this. Had a very foresty & tundra-y start with her so I picked Dance of the Aurora, and by the time I had 5 or so cities and Holy Warriors I was faith-buying units so fast my economy couldn't keep up. I ended up gimping myself with horrendous unit maintenance costs.

 

[animalguy]

Try playing Byzantium without a religion (Like the AI) and see if it is still such a powerful unique ability

 

[Lyoncet]

It's not OP; it's great when the game's easy and scales down the harder it gets. Which is sort of the opposite of what a good ability should be. :/ Yeah, double enhancer +Tithe is really good, but 1) good luck above Monarch getting your GPs in time to pull that off and 2) Tithe needs to be reworked anyways since it has the opposite problem of Byzantium: it's way too good, and gets better on higher difficulties when the AI grows like crazy.

So no, Byzantium's ability is not OP. It can be good and it can be trash, and the deciding factor is often whether or not the game is hard. It's just that something that (sometimes, if you're lucky) works alongside said ability wasn't very well thought out and (sometimes, if you're lucky) that can make Byzantium seem broken too. Same can also be said of the other "x followers in foreign cities" beliefs, but not to the same extent, just because gold is always good, while more happiness and more culture are more situational.

 

[Udey1]

So if tthe stars align, and you get the option to take all these bonuses, good luck doing so on high levels, they wind up with a powerful religion.

I dont see anything OP here, spain has an easier luck base draw.

 

[nefloyd]

Try playing Byzantium without a religion (Like the AI) and see if it is still such a powerful unique ability

uh...what? Play without their ability to see their ability isn't powerful? Good call, but first I'm going to play as Wu Zetian and delete all my great generals as I get them. Also I'm gonna run a game as Rome and build no buildings.

/eyeroll

 

[BobDole]

Play on a high difficulty where founding a religion is MUCH harder, and then come back and tell us Byzantium if overpowered.....have fun when your religion is likely to either be nonexistent or is comprised of all the beliefs the AI left on the scrap heap.

 

[Altisma]

Play on a high difficulty where founding a religion is MUCH harder, and then come back and tell us Byzantium if overpowered.....have fun when your religion is likely to either be nonexistent or is comprised of all the beliefs the AI left on the scrap heap.

Play on multiplayer where the biggest challenge is another player's skill and not a AI's bonuses that they can never fully use.