Change of the missionary mechanics

[queenpea]

I think the problem is in Antiquity the Legacy paths are good In themselves even without Legacy points (Wonders, Settlements, Resources, Techs)
in Exploration...
Science:.. super yields are nice
Military: more land is nice
Economic... money is too easy from other means
Culture:... benefits of spread/Relics are too low.

I agree with you on everything except the economic path. Settling in distant lands also gives you military points, and because these cities are resource-rich, they are valuable in Exploration and remain valuable in Modern due to their factory resources.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I don't think anyone here is saying to revert back to VI

I would prefer they improved it but in a straight choice I would go for the version in VI.

 

[Krikkit1]

I agree with you on everything except the economic path. Settling in distant lands also gives you military points, and because these cities are resource-rich, they are valuable in Exploration and remain valuable in Modern due to their factory resources.

The settlements are good, but the Fleets aren't as important... it doesn't matter whether you get the resources online on 10% age completion or 90% age completion you still carry them over.... but if you get them online at 90% age completion, you don't get any Fleets.

 

[queenpea]

The settlements are good, but the Fleets aren't as important... it doesn't matter whether you get the resources online on 10% age completion or 90% age completion you still carry them over.... but if you get them online at 90% age completion, you don't get any Fleets.

My point is that once the fleets are gone, you still have solid, resource-rich settlements.

When relics are gone, you have...hey, it was the journey, not the destination.

 

[King Flevance]

I really like this idea. I have always liked the idea of religion not being able to be directly controlled in Civ by nations. Influenced for sure but not controlled as we are not playing a church, but a statehood. Choosing to embrace or persecute a faith in your empire should be more the focus. The narrative event system could have a lot to offer here too.

I have a few other ideas but religion could be fun as something that needs to be reacted to by the player instead of something calculated.

 

[Krikkit1]

I really like this idea. I have always liked the idea of religion not being able to be directly controlled in Civ by nations. Influenced for sure but not controlled as we are not playing a church, but a statehood. Choosing to embrace or persecute a faith in your empire should be more the focus. The narrative event system could have a lot to offer here too.

I have a few other ideas but religion could be fun as something that needs to be reacted to by the player instead of something calculated.

I disagree with this... especially in Exploration Age. The player shouldn't be the only factor in Religion, but they should be a major one (especially since the player is not "the state" but "the civilization")

I do like the idea of Players not "Creating" the religion... but instead

There are a certain number of Religions available in both lands. Less than the number of players.
Each Religion has a number and a (hidden to start) location
When a player builds their first Temple, that Settlement Adopts a Religion with a nearby location (unadopted religions weighted more)
If it is the first time that religion has been adopted, then a nearby IP becomes a Holy Site... If there is no nearby IP (due barb cleansing) maybe a Natural Wonder

Once a Religion is on a Settlement in your empire you may "adopt" it as your Religion. (you can change this)
More than one civ can have the same religion
Spreading your current religion to foreign Settlements gains you Relics (based on Reliquary Beliefs)
Theology civics let you add Enhancer/Follower/Reliquary beliefs to your current religion.. No Founder Beliefs for a regular religion since it is shared among multiple civs.

Civs that adopted the same religion get relationship bonuses... Civs that adopt a religion that is present in another Civ's Settlements gain Influence bonuses in all their dealings with that civ

Highest level Theology civics also allow you to "Schism" your Religion to make your own Version (with a Founder Belief) [This helps break the power of Exploration Age Religion, when every civ has their own]

Missionaries are the only way to do Conversions (outside of the first Temple and some Narrative Events), your Missionaries always follow the Religion you adopted.
Missionaries pay Influence?Gold?etc to convert Urban and Rural populations
Urban and Rural populations would have 'pressure' for various religions (building up based on their History, civ they are under, neighbors, etc.)... this would determine how cheap/expensive it is to convert them.

 

[Elhoim]

TBH, just go with Civ 4 system and allow several religions in a city. Make the missionaries more rare, and so instead of trying to whack-a-mole cities back and forth you need to focus on how many resources are you willing to put on expanding your religion.

 

[rocksinmypath]

I don't think religion in this game can be salvaged with simple fixes like bringing back religious pressure. The current system is more or less just a copy of what didn't work in the previous game, and we're hoping that it would work well in the new game by making it even more similar to how it was in the previous game.

I think the way to salvage religion, regardless of how feasible it is, is to tie it closely to diplomacy. Religion really presents a perfect opportunity to really expand on the new diplomacy game that was brought to Civ 7. The way it is implemented in Antiquity, featuring basic endeavours, sanctions and espionage toward other leaders and interactions with IPs, works very well, but it feels a little simplistic and makes you want more. Religion can provide that.

Instead of converting settlements with missionaries, we can just use influence for conversion. With so many things that need your attention in the Exploration age, the game needs fewer units. Converting a settlement should be as simple as: click on its banner, then click on the "Convert to Religion Name for X influence?" button. The amount of influence required to convert a settlement would primarily be determined by how many conversion actions have already taken place. For instance, a settlement that doesn't follow any religion could cost 10 influence to convert. To re-convert it, it would cost 20, then 30, and so on. There can be a distance factor as well, meaning settlements close to others that already follow your religion should be cheaper to convert. Proselytization-related endeavours and sanctions can decrease and increase conversion costs, respectively. Why would another leader agree to an endeavour that would allow you to convert their settlements more easily? Because that same endeavour would allow the other leader's settlements to get bonuses from following your religion for the duration of the endeavour. Religion-focused towns can be placed strategically to affect conversion costs of nearby settlements. Another idea is to have the religion specialization absorb the hub specialization, which is broken at the moment. For example, a religion town can generate 1 influence for every nearby foreign settlement that follows your religion. Either way, it would make the religion specialization way more useful than it currently is.

There should also be a change to the cultural legacy path objective. Instead of collecting relics, the Exploration culture game should be about converting a significant portion of the world to your religion and maintaining your religious hegemony throughout the age. It would be similar to religious victory from 6. This way, there would be far less incentive to rush a religion, although there would still be some incentive to start converting settlements early because each conversion action increases the cost of future conversions.

 

[CoconutTank]

Y'know, I'm wondering why presented great works from previous ages can't be brought along during transitions. They occupy slots on different buildings (except for the Palace I guess), so it's not like players can necessarily get a head start on hoarding great works of the current age. Maybe they could provide reduced yields from what they originally gave from the previous age if snowballing is a concern. Blue Friedrick would only create great works for the current age only if that's somehow a concern.

 

[Krikkit1]

Y'know, I'm wondering why presented great works from previous ages can't be brought along during transitions. They occupy slots on different buildings (except for the Palace I guess), so it's not like players can necessarily get a head start on hoarding great works of the current age. Maybe they could provide reduced yields from what they originally gave from the previous age if snowballing is a concern. Blue Friedrick would only create great works for the current age only if that's somehow a concern.

They definitely should have tied into archaeology. Most of the Artifacts you dig up Ought to be Codices and Relics from civs in the area.

 

[UWHabs]

I don't think religion in this game can be salvaged with simple fixes like bringing back religious pressure. The current system is more or less just a copy of what didn't work in the previous game, and we're hoping that it would work well in the new game by making it even more similar to how it was in the previous game.

I think the way to salvage religion, regardless of how feasible it is, is to tie it closely to diplomacy. Religion really presents a perfect opportunity to really expand on the new diplomacy game that was brought to Civ 7. The way it is implemented in Antiquity, featuring basic endeavours, sanctions and espionage toward other leaders and interactions with IPs, works very well, but it feels a little simplistic and makes you want more. Religion can provide that.

Instead of converting settlements with missionaries, we can just use influence for conversion. With so many things that need your attention in the Exploration age, the game needs fewer units. Converting a settlement should be as simple as: click on its banner, then click on the "Convert to Religion Name for X influence?" button. The amount of influence required to convert a settlement would primarily be determined by how many conversion actions have already taken place. For instance, a settlement that doesn't follow any religion could cost 10 influence to convert. To re-convert it, it would cost 20, then 30, and so on. There can be a distance factor as well, meaning settlements close to others that already follow your religion should be cheaper to convert. Proselytization-related endeavours and sanctions can decrease and increase conversion costs, respectively. Why would another leader agree to an endeavour that would allow you to convert their settlements more easily? Because that same endeavour would allow the other leader's settlements to get bonuses from following your religion for the duration of the endeavour. Religion-focused towns can be placed strategically to affect conversion costs of nearby settlements. Another idea is to have the religion specialization absorb the hub specialization, which is broken at the moment. For example, a religion town can generate 1 influence for every nearby foreign settlement that follows your religion. Either way, it would make the religion specialization way more useful than it currently is.

There should also be a change to the cultural legacy path objective. Instead of collecting relics, the Exploration culture game should be about converting a significant portion of the world to your religion and maintaining your religious hegemony throughout the age. It would be similar to religious victory from 6. This way, there would be far less incentive to rush a religion, although there would still be some incentive to start converting settlements early because each conversion action increases the cost of future conversions.

I would probably agree mostly here. Especially since the medieval had a lot of religious conflicts, tying religion to influence, and then having it also play a part in relationships, maybe could add another twist.

Like in my last game, I picked the "bonus for cities with wonders", because Isabella build like 10 wonders in her capital in the ancient era. So I basically parked missionaries on that city and constantly kept it at my religion, since I needed that culture to keep pace. But I was also allied with her the whole age. If I had to constantly spend influence to keep it converted, and each time I did that I got a knock to my relationship, basically eventually it would have triggered war.

 

[Horatio Thorne]

Have the missionary costs increased? In my current game it costs me way more than usual to buy one.

 

[7thFloorDown]

My main issue with the missionary system is that it is micromanaging on a scale I thought the devs wanted to avoid. My strategy is always the same and has worked at every level:

Get Piety, found a religion, buy a temple, choose Tithe (+4 gold for every foreign settlement following your religion), and spam missionaries through building and purchasing. I'm making 2200 gold per turn (about 10% of that is from Tithe) with 90% of the world converted to my religion (standard map, marathon/long ages). This strategy really pays off when I'm playing a leader/civ combo that doesn't generate gold the way Mongols do.

 

[MutilationWave]

My main issue with the missionary system is that it is micromanaging on a scale I thought the devs wanted to avoid. My strategy is always the same and has worked at every level:

Get Piety, found a religion, buy a temple, choose Tithe (+4 gold for every foreign settlement following your religion), and spam missionaries through building and purchasing. I'm making 2200 gold per turn (about 10% of that is from Tithe) with 90% of the world converted to my religion (standard map, marathon/long ages). This strategy really pays off when I'm playing a leader/civ combo that doesn't generate gold the way Mongols do.

That's funny, it's the opposite of how I play. I pick convert enemy capitals, do them each once and convert all my own settlements. Build a few more missionaries for recovering from other civ conversations during religion happiness crisis which I get every single time I play. I get the rest of the relics from civic masteries. No amount of gold is worth it to me to have to deal with any more of that crap, especially not 220 gpt.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

That's funny, it's the opposite of how I play. I pick convert enemy capitals, do them each once and convert all my own settlements. Build a few more missionaries for recovering from other civ conversations during religion happiness crisis which I get every single time I play. I get the rest of the relics from civic masteries. No amount of gold is worth it to me to have to deal with any more of that crap, especially not 220 gpt.

Same here. Basically, the Religion Game has become a complete non-game to me: Piety, pick Relics from enemy capitals, build 1 - 2 Temples, build 3 - 4 Missionaries, convert enough capitals to get enough Relics, End. The Religion/Relic part of the game is generally over well before Turn 50 of Exploration Age, and everything else about the religion game is Nice To Have (potential extra Gold, Culture, etc) but absolutely not necessary.

This kind of thing is really bad game design, when one of the four Legacy progressions is reduced to a standard single method of achievement. It might as well not be in the game at all.

In fact, it is emblematic of the game's fundamental, basic problem, which is not the oft-discussed Civ transitions or division into three semi-distinctive Ages, but the fact that 'Victory' is based entirely on linear progressions of every type of Legacy in every Age, so that 'victory progressions' of Culture, Economics, Domination, etc each follow the same paths in each Age: conquer X settlements, gather X relics/Great Works, build Z of Y. After a fraction of the games I played in either Civ V or VI, I am already getting bored with the basic Civ VII game play: the only thing left is to play a game with every possible Leader/Civ combination, but I doubt if I'd bother, given how little real difference there is among most of the combinations.

Adding to this sense of in-game Ennui is the lack of agency the game design gives to the gamer. You cannot tear down any structure unless you Overbuild. You cannot interact with any independent City State because there are none - all City States have to be controlled by a Civ to Exist. We have Navigable Rivers, but no way to block them with forts or any other structure: enemy ships can always sail the length of the river unless stopped by opposing Units, and, equally dull, there is no way to extend or connect Navigable Rivers for enhanced movement and trade.

This is typical all through the game: even when bright new things have been added, like Navigable Rivers, they seem to have stopped thinking about them and the mechanics and possibilities associated with them as soon as they had the basics implemented. Once the bright and shiny 'newness' wears off, there is very little left.

It's going to take a lot of DLCs to correct the half-implemented mechanics the game released with. Good luck to them.

 

[MutilationWave]

Right on all points, and well-said. Your experience mirrors mine. I got re-excited by Carthage and then my Bulgaria explo was ruined by the city connections bug, which made me unable to do treasure fleets. If I don't get to keep my cities into modern and I can only carry over 3000 gold, what am I supposed to be doing? Guess war it is.

I was also super disappointed because I allocated my military legacy points to expansion to get "Legend Unlock: 50% bonus on converting town to city" or something like that. Only to find out I can't click it. So I looked up legend unlock and I have to be level 7 with that leader to select it? It's emblematic of the poor UI that I even have to do an internet search to figure that out.

That means I'd have to play two full games with Augustus to be able to pick that attribute. I'm sorry, I spend a lot of time on civ, but I'm not here to grind leader levels. I pick a different leader/civ every time and play slowly.

What do you or anyone else think of this idea I came across on here the other day: the ideal way to play would be to get science and culture and smash through the ages getting settlement limit upgrades and future tech and civics as many times as possible. Doesn't sound fun to me but they could be right.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

What do you or anyone else think of this idea I came across on here the other day: the ideal way to play would be to get science and culture and smash through the ages getting settlement limit upgrades and future tech and civics as many times as possible. Doesn't sound fun to me but they could be right.

Well, as a military historian, the first thing I did was experiment with how a military domination/conquest game would work in Civ VII

Basically, it doesn't.

The combination of Settlement limits and multiplying damages from razing settlements puts a severe cramp in how much conquering you can do in Antiquity and Exploration Ages: you might eliminate one opponent in each Age, but more than that can make you vulnerable to being over Settlement limit by the Crisis period, which is Not Fun at all. Furthermore, unless the opponent you go after is entirely in Distant Lands, you may not get enough 'points' to reach Golden Age militarily in Exploration (unless you are playing Mongolia The Outlier Civ).

And, of course, the Modern Age Domination 'victory' relies entirely on getting to nuclear weapons, not on conquest - it is a Science Victory in disguise.

Which leaves Science, Culture, or Economic Legacy paths to follow. As posted already, Culture is a 'Gimme' in Exploration, and Science nearly so in Antiquity: its just collect Codeces through Civics and build enough Libraries/Academies to hold them all.
Economic Victory in Antiquity is, basically, get enough Camels, trade enough Resources: Win.
Economic Victory in Exploration is entirely find city sites with 5 - 6 Treasure resources, settle, trade: Win.

Which is a long way of saying that of the 4 x 3 = 12 ways of 'winning' in the 3 Ages, at least 7 are all or mostly broken/predictable/quickly Dull.

As said, this is the major defect in the game design as currently presented: two much of the prescribed Legacy progressions are utterly predictable and linear, so that the replay value approaches Zero.

 

[UWHabs]

Same here. Basically, the Religion Game has become a complete non-game to me: Piety, pick Relics from enemy capitals, build 1 - 2 Temples, build 3 - 4 Missionaries, convert enough capitals to get enough Relics, End. The Religion/Relic part of the game is generally over well before Turn 50 of Exploration Age, and everything else about the religion game is Nice To Have (potential extra Gold, Culture, etc) but absolutely not necessary.

This kind of thing is really bad game design, when one of the four Legacy progressions is reduced to a standard single method of achievement. It might as well not be in the game at all.

In fact, it is emblematic of the game's fundamental, basic problem, which is not the oft-discussed Civ transitions or division into three semi-distinctive Ages, but the fact that 'Victory' is based entirely on linear progressions of every type of Legacy in every Age, so that 'victory progressions' of Culture, Economics, Domination, etc each follow the same paths in each Age: conquer X settlements, gather X relics/Great Works, build Z of Y. After a fraction of the games I played in either Civ V or VI, I am already getting bored with the basic Civ VII game play: the only thing left is to play a game with every possible Leader/Civ combination, but I doubt if I'd bother, given how little real difference there is among most of the combinations.

Adding to this sense of in-game Ennui is the lack of agency the game design gives to the gamer. You cannot tear down any structure unless you Overbuild. You cannot interact with any independent City State because there are none - all City States have to be controlled by a Civ to Exist. We have Navigable Rivers, but no way to block them with forts or any other structure: enemy ships can always sail the length of the river unless stopped by opposing Units, and, equally dull, there is no way to extend or connect Navigable Rivers for enhanced movement and trade.

This is typical all through the game: even when bright new things have been added, like Navigable Rivers, they seem to have stopped thinking about them and the mechanics and possibilities associated with them as soon as they had the basics implemented. Once the bright and shiny 'newness' wears off, there is very little left.

It's going to take a lot of DLCs to correct the half-implemented mechanics the game released with. Good luck to them.

The other part of the religion game is that while you can get some decent yields if you actually want to push into playing the religion game, you can pretty easily spend no effort to get all the relic needed. I've always gone to the "one relic for each opposing settlement in distant lands", and if you slot in the +1 charge, each missionary is 4 charges. It's really not hard to get a missionary out to those newly founded island cities, so you could in theory get the 12 relics with only 3 missionaries. Maybe it stretches up to 5 or 6 of them total, but compared to the effort to rush and chase 7 wonders in the antiquity, or to get enough cities and get your treasure fleet convoys, it's just very blah.

Frankly, even if they changed the victory condition to give you one point per turn per city converted, and set it to 150 or whatever balances things as the requirement, at least there you'd have to keep and maintain conversions. Maybe you give other points for converting opposing settlements, or distant lands, or give like a point per turn for each slotted relic, and have the requirement higher, but something that at least means you need to keep being active and fighting for points would give some dynamic feel to it, even if it is just a whack-a-mole conversion.

 

[tedhebert]

The other part of the religion game is that while you can get some decent yields if you actually want to push into playing the religion game, you can pretty easily spend no effort to get all the relic needed. I've always gone to the "one relic for each opposing settlement in distant lands", and if you slot in the +1 charge, each missionary is 4 charges. It's really not hard to get a missionary out to those newly founded island cities, so you could in theory get the 12 relics with only 3 missionaries. Maybe it stretches up to 5 or 6 of them total, but compared to the effort to rush and chase 7 wonders in the antiquity, or to get enough cities and get your treasure fleet convoys, it's just very blah.

Frankly, even if they changed the victory condition to give you one point per turn per city converted, and set it to 150 or whatever balances things as the requirement, at least there you'd have to keep and maintain conversions. Maybe you give other points for converting opposing settlements, or distant lands, or give like a point per turn for each slotted relic, and have the requirement higher, but something that at least means you need to keep being active and fighting for points would give some dynamic feel to it, even if it is just a whack-a-mole conversion.

I go for one relic for every enemy settlement with 10 urban population... it doesn't even have to be on distant land so that's much easier imho

Also, one other thing religion is important for is converting your own settlements in distant lands for the military path !

 

[Krikkit1]

And, of course, the Modern Age Domination 'victory' relies entirely on getting to nuclear weapons, not on conquest - it is a Science Victory in disguise.

Civ 7 Nukes need 0 science... If you can conquer your opponents with Tier 1 Horse Cavalry, then you can win the military victory.. all you need is conquest and some production. (Ideology helps)