Celts Pantheons

infidel88

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In general I think those beliefs need rebalancing, but that's just me.

1. Morrigan, Harbinger of Strife Earn Gold, Culture, and Golden Age Points from kills.


Given that you will play Celts as fighting nation (which certainly isn't the worst idea), this is by far the best belief. At the start of the game you will spawn Pictish Warriors like zerg queen and, since you should take authority, all of your little zerglings will produce faith, 2xgold, 2xculture, science and GAP on kill. You're able to get full policy tree and enhanced religion before anyone will even get a prophet.

2. Epona, the Great Mare Receive +15 Science, +15 Culture, and +15 Food when your Borders expand, scaling with Era.

This is very strong pantheon that allows your cities instantly to grow to 10-15 population turn by turn and works wonders with Tradition tree, as well as authority. But it's quite important to remember to beeline for Angkor Wat.

3. Bran, the Sleeping Guardian -+100% increase to Ranged Combat Strength, +25% Growth, and +1 Culture in every City.

Ok, so there is serious mistake in description here. RCS is only for cities, so don't think your crossbowmen will suddenly get machine guns and your trebuchets will become cannons. 25% Growth is great - that's like 33% of chinese UA! Culture is an icing on that quite decent cake.

4. Lugh, the Skilled One +4 Culture, +4 Science, and +4 Gold in Cities with a Specialist, +1 Culture from World Wonders.

Since sooner, rather than later, you'll get specialist in every city (workshop, market), that's essentially +4 of two of 3 most important yields in city. Quite good. +1 culture is nice, but not that important.

5. Dagda, the All-Father +1 Culture, +1 Gold, +1 Production and +1 Science for every 5 Followers of your Pantheon in owned cities.

This is a little bit better God-King. With 10 pop city you're killing Rhiannon or Mannanan.

6. Ogma, the Learned +1 Science for every 4 Citizens in a city, and +8 Culture when a Citizen is born.

Compare 16 pop city to Dagda. Ogma gives you +4 sci and gave like 120 cul. Dagda gives +3 sci, prod, gld and most likely already produced more culture.

7. Nuada, the Silver-Handed King +1 Culture for every 15 Gold per turn, and +1 Golden Age Points for every 10 Science per turn.


Assuming you'll get 200 gold per turn profit in medieval and 150 science, that's barely 15 cul and 15 GAP per turn. Totally not worth it.

8. Rhiannon, Goddess of Sovereignty +2 Golden Age Points, +2 Science, and +2 Gold in every City.

Looks good on paper and seems to work well with progress, but GAP are least useless of all and +2gold is valuable only early game.

9. Mannanan, Son of the Sea +2 Food, +3 Production, and +4 Gold in coastal Cities.

Ok, this is situational and I can imagine it working well with progress Celts, getting insane stats of newly found cities. But Celts don't have coastal bias, so we can assume it will work only for like half of your cities, which make it not as appealing.

10. Cernunnos, the Horned Stag +1 Food from Forests, +1 Production from Jungles.

This is so bad, I don't know how it passed any balance tests. At best (AT BEST!) you will work like 5 forest and 5 jungles in a city (but with time most of them will be chopped to get access to resources). That's 5 food and 5 prod in city of 15 population or so. 5f already in medieval is quite irrelevant. So only to get production from jungles? Yeah, early on, this may have some appeal, but it scales so badly, it's not worth EVER.
 
Its not just you. I play the celts a lot and 90% of the time you pick 1-4 (3 strikes me as a tiny bit weak though). 9 is also viable should you play on the right map.

#5- in the pantheon thread its been suggested moving this to per 4 followers, which I agree. Or give it 1 set of yields in the capital.

#10-The regular forest pantheon sort of provides 1 faith or 1 culture per forest/jungle, I'd say that's better than food and production. Even if you call them equal, you lose the herbalist benefits, and the forest pantheon is actually kind of bad anyways.

Is there an unwritten rule about celt pantheons not buffing buildings or improvements?
 
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I think its a good thread, but since there is a lot of debate still in the main pantheon thread, my suggestion would be to settle those beliefs, and then adjust these as appropriate.
 
So we need to have these be as good as a UA.

Ogma, the Learned
: make it 1 per 3S and raise the Culture to about 15-25

Rhiannon, Goddess of Sovereignty: add 2 Food or Production

Cernunnos, the Horned Stag:
add Gold and Culture added to it (1 F/P & 1 G/C); so that you're not playing an Iroquois-wannabe.
 
So we need to have these be as good as a UA.

Arguably they should be even better. The unique Pantheons are the main component of the Celtic UA, and they're replacing the effect of another pantheon, some of which are pretty good (though you also get the +3 Faith per city to make up for the fact that none of the Celt pantheons give Faith). The fact that your UA is something that you can spread to others via religion is also a downside for the most part, so with that in mind I'd want a strong bonus with some decent scaling.

Right now I'd probably only go for Epona or Morrigan (Bran's 25% growth isn't bad, but then you may as well play India/China, or even Indonesia with the 20% growth monopoly bonus they get), I don't feel like most of the others are good enough to justify picking the Civ.

throwing out some other suggestions:


Lugh: Increase the WW bonus to give it some scaling, or give it +1 Culture per specialist instead (I don't think anything actually gives culture on every specialist atm).
Dagda: Make it for every 4 followers. It should probably have some other bonus too but nothing comes to mind.
Ogma: Science should be for every 2 citizens, and maybe something like 1 Culture for every 10 Science instead of the Culture on citizen birth.
Bran: Put Ogma's +8 Culture on citizen birth here to replace the +1 Culture per city and go along with the growth bonus.
Rhiannon: Seems to be aimed towards wide empires, maybe also reduce road maintenance by 50% and unit maintenance by 20% or something along those lines?

Cernunnos, the Horned Stag: add Gold and Culture added to it (1 F/P & 1 G/C); so that you're not playing an Iroquois-wannabe.

in addition, I'd say some sort of bonus from Herbalists to fit the theme (10% growth maybe?). As is this one is probably worse than the .5 faith/culture you get from the generic Pantheon.
 
Cernunnos, the Horned Stag: add Gold and Culture added to it (1 F/P & 1 G/C); so that you're not playing an Iroquois-wannabe.
1 culture is worth a lot more than 1 gold, seems to me that forests would be much better than jungles, IDK if that is desireable. I'd give it something for herbalists
Lugh: Increase the WW bonus to give it some scaling, or give it +1 Culture per specialist instead (I don't think anything actually gives culture on every specialist atm)
I think 1 culture per specialist would be pretty broken. Lugh the skilled one is currently great. Its so good that if going tradition I have a really hard time justifying picking anything else. The single point of culture per WW is relevant for Stonehendge, but doesn't scale much.
 
I think 1 culture per specialist would be pretty broken. Lugh the skilled one is currently great. Its so good that if going tradition I have a really hard time justifying picking anything else. The single point of culture per WW is relevant for Stonehendge, but doesn't scale much.

It'd be a decently strong pantheon but I don't think it would be anywhere near broken. As-is Lugh is a good boost early but then it drops off hard, the 1 culture per WW is next to nothing, very underpowered for a UA. Honestly I don't think it'd be that amazing even with +1 Culture per specialist but it'd be slightly more competitive than it is now and gives you some staying power (making it scaling in the same manner as Korea's UA, on the other hand, might be a bit strong). Not an exact comparison, but also worth noting that Mastery is a follower belief and gives you +2 yields per specialist.
 
It'd be a decently strong pantheon but I don't think it would be anywhere near broken. As-is Lugh is a good boost early but then it drops off hard, the 1 culture per WW is next to nothing, very underpowered for a UA. Honestly I don't think it'd be that amazing even with +1 Culture per specialist but it'd be slightly more competitive than it is now and gives you some staying power (making it scaling in the same manner as Korea's UA, on the other hand, might be a bit strong). Not an exact comparison, but also worth noting that Mastery is a follower belief and gives you +2 yields per specialist.
Its already a really good pantheon, every game I pick it I lead in social policies. That includes on Diety against Poland, I really don't think adding 1 culture per specialist would be a good move. Its really powerful for wonder spamming, the science and culture make you really powerful during ancient era. It really just makes the game easy, sure you have a bit of a drop off late in the game, but you can cover that using wonders, and the celts should have late game weaknesses given that they have among the best early game there is.

You could make the culture for wonders scale with era I guess
 
Lugh - Make culture per wonder scale per era if anything, but wonders seem very unbalanced on lower difficulties. Maybe take out the wonders thing altogether and make the whole thing scale with era? Might be a tad OP in classic, but I think by medieval it would balance out.

Dagda - Make it scale per 4, I've mentioned that in the other thread when discussing god-king. It would be a solid pick at per 4.

6,7,8 and 10 are all really bad compared to the good pantheons. Not going to bother with suggestions for time reasons, but I've never chosen these because as pointed out they're horrendus compared to the good ones.

9 is fine on the right map-type, or when you happen to start on the coast. Hurts your expansion options, but gives really good early yields so who cares? Seems a little weak, but not too much to avoid picking it in ideal situations. Just enough to avoid picking it in somewhat ideal circumstances. Maybe have it give the bonus to cities next to sea, lake or rivers? If that's too strong, maybe give cities on lakes or rivers partial bonuses, like +2 food and +2 gold.
 
That could be the reason I hate Celts, I may have picked the wrong pantheons...

I'd argue that, if there are wrong pantheons for the Celts, you have every reason to hate them. Part of their fun should be their breath of options.
 

1. Morrigan, Harbinger of Strife Earn Gold, Culture, and Golden Age Points from kills.



2. Epona, the Great Mare Receive +15 Science, +15 Culture, and +15 Food when your Borders expand, scaling with Era.


3. Bran, the Sleeping Guardian -+100% increase to Ranged Combat Strength of Cities, +25% Growth, and +1 Culture in every City.


4. Lugh, the Skilled One +4 Culture, +4 Science, and +4 Gold in Cities with a Specialist, +1 Culture from World Wonders.


5. Dagda, the All-Father +1 Culture, +1 Gold, +1 Production and +1 Science for every 4 Followers of your Pantheon in owned cities.


6. Ogma, the Learned +1 Science for every 3 Citizens in a city, and +15 Culture when a Citizen is born.


7. Nuada, the Silver-Handed King +1 Culture for every 10 Gold per turn, and +1Golden Age Points for every 5 Gold per turn.


8. Rhiannon, Goddess of Sovereignty +2 Golden Age Points,+2 Production, +2 Science, and +2 Gold in every City.


9. Mannanan, Son of the Sea +3 Food, +3 Production, and +4 Gold in coastal Cities.


10. Cernunnos, the Horned Stag +1 Food and +1 Culture from Forests, +1 Production and +1 Science from Jungles.

So these are the new Pantheons.

[There's a limit of 30 Images per post:O]
 
1. Morrigan, Harbinger of Strife Earn :c5gold: Gold, :c5culture:Culture, and :c5goldenage:Golden Age Points from kills.

Given that you will play Celts as fighting nation (which certainly isn't the worst idea), this is by far the best belief. At the start of the game you will spawn Pictish Warriors like zerg queen and, since you should take authority, all of your little zerglings will produce faith, 2xgold, 2xculture, science and GAP on kill. You're able to get full policy tree and enhanced religion before anyone will even get a prophet.

2. Cernunnos, the Horned Stag +1:c5food: and +1 :c5culture: from Forests, +1 :c5production: and +1 :c5science: from Jungles.

What a jump from the bottom to the top! I never imagined how good it is until I tried it. Ok, it doesnt scale perfectly, but gives you such snowball position, it's almost unable to lose with it. You'll almost guaranteed to have 3+ forests and jungles. That is 3+ 3:c5food:1:c5production:1:c5culture: tiles. You can skip monuments overall and just focus on pumping workers, settlers and pictish warriors and zerg like crazy.

3. Epona, the Great Mare Receive +15 Science, +15 Culture, and +15 Food when your Borders expand, scaling with Era.

This is a late bloomer, but it can get your pioneer-build cities to 15 size within 15 turns.

4. Lugh, the Skilled One +4 Culture, +4 Science, and +4 Gold in Cities with a Specialist, +1 Culture from World Wonders.
5. Dagda, the All-Father +1 Culture, +1 Gold, +1 Production and +1 Science for every 4 Followers of your Pantheon in owed cities.


Most logical tradition choices. I would go Lugh over Dagda but they are extremely tight. Dagda seems to be better over time, but you'll unlock Lugh's specialist way earlier in your cities than you hit 16 pop.

6. Ogma, the Learned +1 Science for every 3 Citizens in a city, and +15 Culture when a Citizen is born.

You'll get more net yields with Epona or Cernunnos.

7. Rhiannon, Goddess of Sovereignty +2 Golden Age Points,+2 Production, +2 Science, and +2 Gold in every City.

A little better than Mannanan, but you'll lack culture.

8. Mannanan, Son of the Sea +3 Food, +3 Production, and +4 Gold in coastal Cities.


No bonus culture = crap - better take any of above.

9. Bran, the Sleeping Guardian -+100% increase to Ranged Combat Strength of Cities, +25% Growth, and +1 Culture in every City

All those bonuses are just way too low compared to above to even consider them. I mean 1 culture? You know what would be fun? 1 culture in every city PER city. Way too much probably ;) now - useless comparing to other.

10. Nuada, the Silver-Handed King +1 Culture for every 10 Gold per turn, and +1Golden Age Points for every 5 Gold per turn.

You have to get +100 gold to get as much culture as you would from 4 3-pop cities with Cernunos. No, thanks :)
 
3. Epona, the Great Mare Receive +15 Science, +15 Culture, and +15 Food when your Borders expand, scaling with Era.

This is a late bloomer, but it can get your pioneer-build cities to 15 size within 15 turns.

4. Lugh, the Skilled One +4 Culture, +4 Science, and +4 Gold in Cities with a Specialist, +1 Culture from World Wonders.
5. Dagda, the All-Father +1 Culture, +1 Gold, +1 Production and +1 Science for every 4 Followers of your Pantheon in owed cities.


Most logical tradition choices. I would go Lugh over Dagda but they are extremely tight. Dagda seems to be better over time, but you'll unlock Lugh's specialist way earlier in your cities than you hit 16 pop.

Ehm, isn't Epona like the go-to Tradition-choice? I mean no one does border-expansion better than tradition and the benefits gained are massive.
 
Matter of choice, IMO the later you create cities with epona, the better for you as bonuses scale and Lugh bonus early on can be considered more. Still, I would go Cernunnos even as tradition civ. It's just that good.
 
Yea Cernunnos is really good, I think its put the Iroquious to shame.

Dagda doesn't strike me as a go to for tradition. Lugh is great, and Epona as well (especially if you want to go Piety afterwards)
 
I made a suggestion in the Celtic thread about making it so the unique Celtic pantheons should be available to all the Celts religious unlocks, so they could take multiple. Gazebo shot it down deeming it too strong. I personally still think this is a good idea, and disagree that they are THAT more powerful than the (non-pantheon) regular belief unlocks.

As for how it is now, unless you are unlucky and start on a isolated landmass with no other civs, you would have to be crazy not to pick Morrigan. As already stated, Celts are an early war civ. If you don't harass your neighbours early on you are wasting your UU. Morrigan is made for early warfare. It's not that some of the other ones aren't good picks, it's just that Morrigan is just so good for how the Celts are built.
 
I made a suggestion in the Celtic thread about making it so the unique Celtic pantheons should be available to all the Celts religious unlocks, so they could take multiple. Gazebo shot it down deeming it too strong. I personally still think this is a good idea, and disagree that they are THAT more powerful than the (non-pantheon) regular belief unlocks.

As for how it is now, unless you are unlucky and start on a isolated landmass with no other civs, you would have to be crazy not to pick Morrigan. As already stated, Celts are an early war civ. If you don't harass your neighbours early on you are wasting your UU. Morrigan is made for early warfare. It's not that some of the other ones aren't good picks, it's just that Morrigan is just so good for how the Celts are built.
You must consider the civ as a whole. Celts pretty much have a guaranteed religion, that is a strength in itself. They have unique spearman incredibly early, so you'll mock on barbs and may rush early conquests to make room for your cities. The unique pantheon is strong enough to not need an additional unique ability. It's not as strong as other unique abilities, but it's flexible, you can adapt to almost any map (to clarify, Celts UA is the extra part you get from the pantheon AND the ability to choose among them). Your religion is not going to spread outside your domains. Those are other undervalued strengths. The Ceilidh hall takes its time and only helps if you achieved a good size before.
I always underperform with them, but I think it's just me not working correctly the civ strengths (or not picking Morrigan, I am that crazy).
 
Hope I'm putting this in the right place. I'm using EUI with the Community Patch (v88) and I'm only getting the Rhiannon bonuses in my Capital city, not in my newly-settled cities. They have the same pantheon, but don't generate the extra gold et al that I expect.

What's really weird is I have the same setup on another computer (except a slightly earlier version of the Community Patch) and the Rhiannon yields show up as expected.
 
Hope I'm putting this in the right place. I'm using EUI with the Community Patch (v88) and I'm only getting the Rhiannon bonuses in my Capital city, not in my newly-settled cities. They have the same pantheon, but don't generate the extra gold et al that I expect.

What's really weird is I have the same setup on another computer (except a slightly earlier version of the Community Patch) and the Rhiannon yields show up as expected.
Beware there is version where pantheons behaved weirdly after you founded a religion. It's fixed now.
 
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