(Congress Proposal Discussion) Reconciling Beliefs: How would you make beliefs fit together better?

[pineappledan]

Hello all,

It has been bugging me for some time that beliefs in VP don't seem to form consistent patterns for what their bonuses do. It Bothers me enough, in fact, that I made an entire mod partially aimed at re-working existing beliefs so that their bonuses properly correspond to their type.

Here is what I understand each belief type is supposed to do:
Founders: instant bonuses that scale with the number of followers or cities
Followers: localized city bonuses that other players can make full use of in their own cities, even if they have >1 religion in their empire
Enhancers: On-empire effects. They also "enhance" your religion, so they must give abilities that help you spread, give per-turn rewards for spread, or provide some sort of faith sink
Reformations: Tech-locked religious bonuses. You would need to have progressed partway through the game in order to fully use them. eg. boosting a building that isn't buildable until Industrial

List of violations to these conventions:
Founders:

• Divine Inheritance:
  • Gives 20% of All Yields in your capital during a GA. This is a per-turn bonus, and it's % based scaling on yields.
  • It does not interact with the size of your religion at all.
  • we already have a follower that does the same thing, kind of (Synagogues give % during a GA)
• Theocratic Rule:
  • Gives 15% in all cities during a WLTKD.
  • This is a per-turn bonus, and it's % based scaling on yields. It does not interact with the size of your religion at all.
  • This is a localized bonus, and we already have a follower that does the same thing, kind of (Synagogues give % during a WLTKD)
• Hero Worship:
  • Gives on city conquest, scaling with the population of the city
  • This is an instant bonus, but it doesn't scale based on the size of your religion (number of followers or cities). It's really close to fitting the mold, but not quite.
  • It also is the only belief that shares an identical bonus trigger with another belief: Crusader Spirit

Enhancers:

• Mendicancy:
  • Provides a flat 2 in all cities.
  • This is a localized effect, and looks too much like a follower. Its other bonus is something that boosts missionary spread though, so it's mostly fine
• Symbolism:
  • 5GAP in your Capital and 2GPP of all types.
  • This provides no bonus or reward for spreading, and it's not a faith sink either.
  • It's also considered a top-tier pick, so one of the "best" enhancers is one that doesn't properly do its job.
• Syncretism:
  • Has 1per 15 generated in the city.
  • This used to be a pantheon bonus, and now it's also on the Gurukulam follower belief. That is a better place for it, because this is a localized, on-city bonus.
  • The doubling on this 1 bonus should be removed, and Gurukulam is the more "proper" fit for this type of bonus

Reformations:

• Crusader Spirit:
  • +10% Combat Strength in foreign land and vs other religions. when you conquer cities. This is the only reformation belief that has no tech-locked ability. It has its full strength unlocked even at the start of the game. It also happens to be the only belief that has an identical bonus with another belief (Hero Worship Founder also gives a bonus on conquest)
• Faith of the Masses:
  • Gives 1 for every 2 Cities following your religion.
  • This is clearly a per-turn reward for spreading; it belongs on an enhancer
• Global Commandments:
  • Gives 15% religious spread speed.
  • boosting passive pressure is clearly a spread-assisting ability. Once again It should be an enhancer

So, some questions for the community:

• Do you agree with my taxonomy for belief bonuses and where they belong?
• Do you think it is desirable that we make more beliefs conform to this pattern?
• Do you see some violations that I have missed?
• How would you rearrange bonuses or change existing bonuses in a way that fixes these problems?

 

[pineappledan]

I’m noticing people are already hitting the polls, but no comments yet.

If people like the “rule-breaker” beliefs, could they please specify which ones they are particularly fond of, or if they mean ALL of the beliefs?

 

[AndreyK]

Mendicancy, Theocratic Rule and Faith of the Masses are my favorite religious choices.

 

[pineappledan]

Please clarify?

mendicancy was changed last Congress (moved the Per generated toa follower belief and moved pressure erosion onto it). Do you like the new version?
Is the particular mix of those belief bonuses what you like, or would you like that bonus just as much if it was somewhere else?

For example, if per cities following your religionwas moved onto symbolism (which currently has no scaling ability), would that be okay, or does it have to be on faith of the masses?

 

[Anarcomu]

I think your assertion is true and there is indeed a underlying rule for beliefs ; however, being able to pick special beliefs that better suit your play-style means that some homemade religions does not follow the common road of 1 bonus from number of followers, 1 bonus to spread, etc.
So you end up with a bigger variance.

 

[Teholb]

I prefer a structured approach both for balance, as well as playability. I understand that it's nice to have weird options, but they also make it exponentially more difficult to balance/predict impacts.

 

[gwennog]

I'm not sure I can help, I've never analyzed finely as you do and above all, English is not my natural language, I don't retain any names from beliefs. I will cite two changes you made in New Beliefs that are really necessary in my opinion.

• Way of Noble Truths is really unbalanced and too powerful, removing it and splitting its skills between Nunciatures and Apostolic Tradition is a good thing.
• Sacred Sites but the bonuses are still much too strong (a +2 instead of +4 will be more than enough). It's easy to take the first policy of Fealty and have 3 buildings bought with faith while playing Artistry.

Overall, respecting the rules you have set out would go in the right direction, should they be absolute? I don't know but I mean it for playability.

 

[pineappledan]

Having these rules adhered to would make beliefs more legible. You can get all these effects already, but it would mean you wouldn’t be able to stack just, all the scaling abilities.

For example, you can create completely non-scaling religion right now, with theocratic, a belief building, symbolism, and to the glory of God. This would nuke any incentive to grow the religion. Conversely, you could get a scaling founder and enhancer, and there’s faith of the masses, for a scaling reformation.

I just don’t know why we should want that? I don’t like that the players can choose to opt out of incentive structures so completely

 

[Legen]

I was tempted between second and third option. Religions vary a lot around the world, not every religion tried to convert people across vast regions like Christianism and Islamism did; Shinto and Judaism are examples of insular religions that did just the opposite. And I think we should be able to vary the religions in the game just as much. As such, I don't think beliefs should be so closely standardized.

To me, the most important for me is just the relative power level within the same type of belief. I agree that there is some pattern, but not an actual rule for how each belief type must be designed.

 

[ZetaLambdaNinja]

Religions vary a lot around the world, not every religion tried to convert people across vast regions like Christianism and Islamism did; Shinto and Judaism are examples of insular religions that did just the opposite.

I agree; I would want any tweaking of enhancer beliefs to still include "non-spreader" options to reflect this.

That said, I find myself agreeing with many of the notes in the OP. Some of them I hadn't considered before, but the spread on Global Commandments and Symbolism have always stuck out like sore thumbs to me.

On Hero Worship, would it be possible to scale the conquering bonus on the number of followers of the religion? Feels like that would make sense thematically; if the bonuses are generated from the idolization of a great war hero, more people to admire that hero would translate to more faith/GAP.

 

[Dimmy]

I play with your mod, it's a no brainer and I like having these "rule-breakers" beliefs.

 

[pineappledan]

I agree; I would want any tweaking of enhancer beliefs to still include "non-spreader" options to reflect this.

There are already a few enhancers that don’t enable or reward spread that I think are good and fine:
- Prophecy makes prophets cheaper, but you can just use them to spam holy sites and not spread with them.
- zealotry has a big faith sink (military unit purchase) and a negligible scaler reward (strategic resource quantity)
- Inquisition buffs inquisitors, which are all about defense, not spreading

On Hero Worship, would it be possible to scale the conquering bonus on the number of followers of the religion? Feels like that would make sense thematically; if the bonuses are generated from the idolization of a great war hero, more people to admire that hero would translate to more faith/GAP.

It would be new code to make it scale differently, but definitely doable, if a DLL modder was inclined to add it.

It would be the same amount of work to add an entirely new trigger event than to change the scaling on city conquest. The yields could go off from winning a war or from a GGeneral birth, for example. Then crusader spirit would be unique as the only city conquest belief

 

[pineappledan]

For that matter, I have no issue with non-spreading founders… technically. The problem is that all the non-spreading founders we have are also costless. Right now divine inheritance and theocratic rule don’t rely on spreading or any form of faith investment, but they’re supposed to be balanced against spreaders like Holy Law which require huge amounts of Faith, work, and time expended on missionaries to bring online, while incurring considerable diplomatic costs. The balance is just not there; the two aren’t comparable.

I think it’s possible to design non-spreading founders that Also require faith investment. See my new beliefs mod for an example of one:

 

[azum4roll]

Beliefs that provide bonuses to Holy City should be Founder or Enhancer only, as people who adopt your religion won't be able to benefit from these. Violations are Divine Teachings and Faith of the Masses. They can be simply turned into Holy City/Capital.
I don't really care that Reformations are fully effective once unlocked, as long as they're all balanced relative to each other.

Founder effects don't have to be instant yields, but they should scale with how much you spread your religion.

Divine Inheritance can be changed to +X% of all yields during golden age where X is the number of cities following your religion, capped at 20.

Theocratic Rule can be changed to +1% in all cities during WLTKD for every 16 followers of your religion, capped at 240 followers.

Swap Hero Worship and Crusader Spirit; new Crusader Spirit can get at conquest scaling with number of foreign followers in the conquered city AND the number of cities following your religion (capped at some number), and new Hero Worship can have yield on GG/GA birth + faith purchasing military buildings + yields on military buildings.

Since we reward spreading on ALL Founder beliefs, Syncretism needs to be changed to either provide more yields on foreign followers in owned cities (to offset losing Founder bonuses and the faith needed to keep capital religion), or entirely reworked.

Symbolism is so strong I don't know what to do with it.

 

[Stalker0]

Right now divine inheritance and theocratic rule don’t rely on spreading or any form of faith investment, but they’re supposed to be balanced against spreaders like Holy Law which require huge amounts of Faith, work, and time expended on missionaries to bring online, while incurring considerable diplomatic costs. The balance is just not there; the two aren’t comparable.

I'll disagree on this one. Just because there is a wide variation doesn't mean the two aren't comparable. Now I don't mind adding in beliefs that are non-spreader but utilize faith expenditures in different ways, but this doesn't invalidate existing beliefs either.

 

[ma_kuh]

I like the idea of taking a look at the various phases of the religion game and ironing out the types of decisions you're making at each stage. I voted for consistency in the poll, but I also think that "non-spreading" Founders and other rule-breakers deserve a place in the game for many of the reasons expressed in this thread.

I would probably break down Founders into:

• Spreaders - they should scale on city count or follower count (or maybe on spread actions, and move the by-count effects to Enhancers?), and they expect to spend most of their faith on Prophets or missionaries, at least in the early game; they probably get a reformation sooner than other belief types, giving them an edge in the religion race
• Spenders - they have alternative uses for faith: buying buildings (or special wonders?), buying units, and other things that converts their faith into another yield; they might never get a reformation, and they may need to invest in religious defenses (inquisitors or specific beliefs) or risk being overrun

Enhancers I would try and gear towards:

• Leveraging an already-dominant religious presence, possibly by moving the city-count and follower-count scaling here and replacing it in Founders with more spread-oriented effects/triggers
• Making inroads against other religions (helping you win out when trying to convert non-Founders, for example). Manifesting this as an empire bonus seems fine, but I would probably shy away from giving the "special faith sinks" to this tier of belief. Unless you did something like pre-Industrial faith purchases are granted by a Founder, and post-Industrial ones are granted by a corresponding Enhancer... but I don't know about that.

For Reformations I would try and solidify them as victory-condition enablers. They're mostly there already I think, with a few exceptions. For instance, there's no real comparison between Holy Land and Global Commandments if you're trying to actually get votes for a Diplomatic Victory. They both nominally work for Diplo civs, but one actually gets you closer to winning whereas the other I guess lets you leverage an attempted DV into something else? Seems lackluster.


Also, pulling in something I saw in the Discord but hasn't been mentioned here: to help balance Founders with non-Founders, Follower beliefs would need to be stronger relative to Founder beliefs. Enhancers and Reformation should stay strong --at the point those come online you've invested significantly more into your religion, but getting the first Prophet isn't the heaviest lift.