CoE: 4 Unit Religion?

[Zechnophobe]

So, with all the changes made recently to this religion, there seems to be almost no reason whatsoever to actually adopt it.

1) If CoE is present in a city, units built there will be able to Mask, no adoption required.

2) Found the religion, sure, and build the Nox Noctis, but there's no advantage to adopting, you still get the same effect from the wonder, and can spread CoE quickly if you've the money.

3) Shadows can be built in cities with CoE, no adoption required.

4) You can join the Undercouncil without needing to be in CoE. Being in CoE while in the Undercouncl doesn't grant any special effects.

The only thing the CoE lets you do is:

A) Build Gibbon Goetia

B) Build the ShadowRider unit.

Gibbon isn't even the best Archmage Hero, and Shadowriders, while a decent late game unit, aren't the same as getting the full advantage of an entire religion.


My real point here, is that CoE was good, or at least useful, but has slowly had all of it's unique attributes moved out of it until actual adoption isn't particularly useful.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Adopting CoE has one more benefit: it stops your units from being ejected from your rivals borders when you declare war. Thus you can use an open borders agreement to position your armies to take out a rival in a single turn.


However, I believe I've heard that that function is not working.


CoE also lets you know who else is CoE, but a human can figure that out pretty easily anyway.



I for one really think that the invisibility given by the Nox Noctis should really only apply while you have Coe as your State Religion (and Dies Diei should require Empyrean State Religion to make invisible units visible). Esus as State Religion would still probably needs more of boost to make it viable.

 

[Ksi]

Magister, all you have to do is open the diplomacy screen to see who is Esus but you probably know that. It can help you get along with people too but I don't think it's worth it.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Yeah, that's why I said "a human can figure that out pretty easily anyway." I'm hoping they can fix this.

I was agreeing with the OP that Esus State Religion needs a boost.

 

[smjjames]

yea, even the mask ability that units following CoE get is too random and rather rare to really make it worth it. If it was more common, it would make it worth making assasins with that ability. Although it would be overpowered, I think you guys get what I mean.

I tried to do this with the Svartalfar and it took me over 10 reloads to get Alazkhan to follow the religion.

AFAIK, CoE is the only religion that gives some kind of bonus to units that follow it, besides the religion specific units and the cult of the dragon.

edit: Just to clarify, I'm talking about the 20% chance per religion that an unit will adopt that religion. CoE is the only one to give an automatic bonus to any unit that follows it regardless of state religion. I know there is the effect that cult of the dragon gives, but it's not a true religion in FFH.

 

[Blackmantle]

Also don't forget that you don't get the "heathen" religion modifier doesn't apply for CoE (which must be the biggest matter for CoE). But the full bonus for likeminded Civs (and CoE is rather easy to spread.).

So together with the backstabbing CoE is the ultimate in diplomacy and treachery (which should work. It was worked out in said thread that it does indeed work and it not working was only a misconception.). (And you are sure to have exellent relations with all members of your council no matter if overcouncil or undercouncil.)
And you can do really alot with good diplomacy (get techs. At times even for free, Really good Trade-Routes, other civs helping you in Wars, even forcing them if your head of a council. And even as far as not having to bother with military much if no one dislikes you).

Gibbon might not be strictly the best Archmage Hero but for sure he is the earliest if you aim for him (and not that much worse really.). But you don't exectely need to stay CoE to keep him to be honest (death 3 and Body 3 help here.)

So if you want to go for a diplomatic game where wars are fought at the bargaining table only or only if you chose to start them and very short ones CoE is for you. (and you can also cut out the tech trading for non-undercouncil members with nonmembers via undercouncil which will cease the AI asking you for techs as well as AI trading techs all over the world like mad. Another boon to diplomacy for CoE civs. Possible for everyone but CoE civs will get most out of that.)

So all in all i have to disagree and say that CoE is a Religion very worthwhile to adopt at times. If not so much as a first religion. (remember: It works the other way around as well with keeping priests and other religious benefits after switching to another religion to a certain extent.)

You can also steal Equipment with CoE recons only while running CoE (shouldnt CoE Recons / Assasins also be able to Hide while running CoE? Maybe that has been deemed to strong and hence not been implemented?) but sadly steal doesn't seem to work on the Lyre or the Crown / other "settled" equip so that one is not so good sadly.

That you don't need to adopt it actively for some of its benefits actually makes the religion more attractive to have / found.

 

[Morni]

Ehm, according to the FFH wiki, shadows also require CoE as a state religion. That's a bit of a reason to adopt it as well.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Well, then the Wiki is wrong. Shadows require Esus be present in the city, but they do not require state religion. I've often used Shadow Adventurers as the Grigori.

 

[A_Hamster]

Ehm, according to the FFH wiki, shadows also require CoE as a state religion. That's a bit of a reason to adopt it as well.

Unless the FfH team changed it in .32, that is not the case. In .31, only the UNIT needed to have CoE and be near a city with CoE to upgrade. I got four Shadows this way even though they started as Rangers or Assassins.

 

[Morni]

Well, then the Wiki is wrong. Shadows require Esus be present in the city, but they do not require state religion. I've often used Shadow Adventurers as the Grigori.

Well, that just saved my plans for a svartalfar game, then. And it seems you're right, because the wiki says the same thing about the Nightwatch, and I know for sure that they do not require state religion.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Unless the FfH team changed it in .32, that is not the case. In .31, only the UNIT needed to have CoE and be near a city with CoE to upgrade. I got four Shadows this way even though they started as Rangers or Assassins.

I don't think there ever was a requirement that the unit have the CoE religion in order to upgrade. (I don't think the game has the ability to make a unit's religion a prereq for upgrades, although I'd really like it if it did.) Only having the religion present in the city matters. The unit will be given CoE when it upgrades.

 

[darkyxinhow]

CoE is interesting for a religious victory =p

 

[smjjames]

Yea well, in my last game as Svartalfar, I got frustrated with the CoE religion thing not bieng adopted by my assassins and it took over 10 tries to get it for Alazkhan. So I decided to start from the beginning and go for FoL. I haven't decided whether I'm going to get RoK or something to make myself neutral first, but probably not as I can use those priests as terraformers.

 

[A_Hamster]

I don't think there ever was a requirement that the unit have the CoE religion in order to upgrade. (I don't think the game has the ability to make a unit's religion a prereq for upgrades, although I'd really like it if it did.) Only having the religion present in the city matters. The unit will be given CoE when it upgrades.

I could be wrong about the unit religion requirement, but I was able to upgrade to Shadows without running CoE as a state religion, which goes back to the original thread subject of CoE needs more benefits that are "State Religion only". Right now you can get nearly all of the perks without running CoE as your state religion.

 

[Willgar]

the not being ejected from rival territory is incredible powerfull (well against the AI). I often switch to CoE prior to stabbing my rival in the back. In my last game, i managed to capture 3 of the 5 largest cities of my Ljolsolfar rival in a single turn. With some creative use of the Trojan horse, was also able to get most of catapults inside a city and wait for the triggering of the dam surge of counter attacking treants. (PS - fantastic world spell)

I probably would have beaten them anyway but CoE turned a lengthy war into a blitzgrieg and they capitualted to me very soon afterwards. Cant realy understand why people complain about CoE although it would be nice if you could outwardly show another religion while secretly follow CoE internally.

 

[MaxAstro]

What would be very evil, IMO, is if everyone saw CoE civs as having the same religion they do. Therefore, Order civs see a CoE civ as running Order, but Runes civs see them as running Runes. This would be very, very evil; you'd constantly be wondering which of your religious "allies" are actually about to stab you in the back.

 

[smjjames]

Yea but a human player can figure out which religion a civ is following through various means, the look of the improvements for one, or even religion specific units.

I don't know how the AI would be able to handle something like that though.

 

[xienwolf]

Actually that one wouldn't be too hard to do. And you could even fool the human players on the improvements side of things by adding a "apparent Era" attribute to each player, so that while you are actually IN the CoE Era, your appearance will be dictated by the Era of the currently active player.

The only things which would be hard to manipulate to fool a human would be your cities not having any of the appropriate temples, or the alternative religion present. But one could also get around that pretty easily with some shaded variables (they don't do anything but modify appearances)

 

[Blackmantle]

@ MaxAstro: Now that is one really nice idea. Hope that it will work out like that one day if it is easy to do. (and if the Priest-units + Assasins + temples whould also "disguise" as Priests + Temples of that Religion, even a human could be fooled if really done thoroughly.)

Even though one has to say, that CoE is already very strong in Diplomacy as it is now and might become overpowered on that angle if CoEs whould also get the "brothers and sisters in faith" bonus. So per for AI that modifier should be left out? (for Human Players it doesn't matter anyways)

Perhaps someone will try to modmod that. (Whould also fix, that you can identify CoE-running civs on bargaining.)

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Actually that one wouldn't be too hard to do. And you could even fool the human players on the improvements side of things by adding a "apparent Era" attribute to each player, so that while you are actually IN the CoE Era, your appearance will be dictated by the Era of the currently active player.

The only things which would be hard to manipulate to fool a human would be your cities not having any of the appropriate temples, or the alternative religion present. But one could also get around that pretty easily with some shaded variables (they don't do anything but modify appearances)

You should work on getting getting your modcomp to work like this--right after including Broader Alignments in it so I can get started on my modmod.