Dev Diaries: More Religion

[Leoreth]

Current ideas:
- settle seven great people (or specifically prophets, scientists and statesmen) in the Jewish holy city
- make sure at least half of all Christian cities have Judaism
- have pleased relations or better with all civilizations with a Jewish minority

 

[MechatronicJazz]

Sure, both going wide and going tall should be possible. But you also don't see Persia and Mongolia building all wonders associated with these religions. Access to multiple religious buildings is already a benefit on its own.

I really like the tall vs wide concept being applied to religions. The only thing I wonder about with this is balance for civs that typically have two or three religions, like China, Korea, India, Muhgals, etc. Would they be wide or tall enough to benefit from either? Or would the desired effect be to see these civs typically choose one religion and suppress the others? This is especially important for civs like India, China, and Korea whose UHVs include building things from two religions. I realize this kind of balancing would come after the basic mechanic is implemented, but I'm just wondering.

Basically, would a middle ground between tall and wide still be viable?

 

[Leoreth]

There already is the notion of more leniency for the competition between syncretic religions like Confucianism/Taoism or Hinduism/Buddhism, for example in the stability code, religion unhappiness or religion spread chance (i.e. Confucianism does not count as another religion already being in the city to reduce the chances of Taoism spreading).

The same concept can easily be applied to the piety calculations. In fact, once piety is in place and factors these things in, all those arbitrary extra rules in the other systems could be removed and rely directly on piety instead! For example, instead of Hindu and Buddhist civs not disliking each other, Hindus would not dislike non-Hindus with high Hindu piety. Since Buddhism tolerates Hinduism, keeping high Hindu piety is easy for Buddhist civs and so on.

For civs like China this means that going Confucian/Taoist is the tall option where you choose your state religion for the preferred bonuses. Adding Buddhism is the hybrid option (which should also be viable, although probably only with high religious building density and without access to the best religious powers). Throwing in Christianity as many Chinese strategies do right now would be the wide option.

 

[citis]

Jewish URV should encourage remaining small somehow.

One true god: Judaism is the sole religion in all your cities. All your cities have temple.

- settle seven great people (or specifically prophets, scientists and statesmen) in the Jewish holy city

I prefer specifically prophets.

 

[Leoreth]

But other religions do that already.

 

[Tigranes]

There is a one very serious consideration that no one seems to point out: this mod does not have a single civ which had a Judaism as their official religion. Therefore no URV will feel very historical in the mod as it is right now. The plight of Jewish people in itself is a very remarkable feat and deserves to be reflected in the Earth's simulator, but no matter what URVs will be chosen at the end no one of us could think of a single civ in game for which those URVs would feel natural or even fun.

 

[Leoreth]

If you think that then don't convert to Judaism. As you said you have to go out of your way to do it.

 

[citis]

There is a one very serious consideration that no one seems to point out: this mod does not have a single civ which had a Judaism as their official religion. Therefore no URV will feel very historical in the mod as it is right now. The plight of Jewish people in itself is a very remarkable feat and deserves to be reflected in the Earth's simulator, but no matter what URVs will be chosen at the end no one of us could think of a single civ in game for which those URVs would feel natural or even fun.

I think the concept of "Jewish Empire" is problematic if you think about it from historic perspective. All civs in this game are empires, even controlling a single city represents a vast area on earth.

The contradiction between true god and deities from neighbouring cities is central in Judaism. Judaism was formed in a religious environment, when every city had its own god.
A "Jewish Empire" would be extremely unstable, because subject cities would require religious freedom, the right to worship their own gods.

When a Jewish Empire would emerge and how? The emperor moves the palace to Jerusalem, because it is a holy city. His successor marries a jewish wife from David's lineage and unify the religions? Well, this cannot happen, because the successor must abolish the worship of his father's deity. It cannot happen... Only in games .

 

[Panopticon]

It's a video game.

If some things in the real world had gone differently, other things would have been different too.

 

[Hightower]

Thoughts on replacing Confucianism and Taoism with a single religion, Shenism, or Bai Shen, that more accurately reflects the totality of Chinese religion? Would require some work on the Chinese UHV also, of course.

 

[Hightower]

There is a one very serious consideration that no one seems to point out: this mod does not have a single civ which had a Judaism as their official religion. Therefore no URV will feel very historical in the mod as it is right now. The plight of Jewish people in itself is a very remarkable feat and deserves to be reflected in the Earth's simulator, but no matter what URVs will be chosen at the end no one of us could think of a single civ in game for which those URVs would feel natural or even fun.

It does feel like we're heading for including the Israelites as a civilization.

 

[Leoreth]

URV changes coming with the next batch of changes:

Judaism:
- Chosen People: have a total of 15 Great Prophets, Scientists and Statesmen in Jewish cities
- Promised Land: have legendary culture in the Jewish holy city
- Diaspora: have friendly relations with six civilizations with a Jewish minority

Secularism:
- Tolerance: control the Cathedrals of all religions
- Humanism: make sure there are 25 Universities, 10 Great Scientists and 10 Great Statesmen in Secular civilizations
- Modernity: make sure the five most advanced civilizations are Secular

Open for discussion of course.

 

[cudfather]

Is controlling every cathedral even possible? That's more warmongering than in Germany's UHV.

 

[FinalLegendZero]

Is controlling every cathedral even possible? That's more warmongering than in Germany's UHV.

I'm pretty sure he meant one of each type of cathedral, not every cathedral in the world.

 

[Leoreth]

I'm pretty sure he meant one of each type of cathedral, not every cathedral in the world.

Correct.

 

[Tlönitte]

URV changes coming with the next batch of changes:

Secularism:
- Tolerance: control the Cathedrals of all religions
- Humanism: make sure there are 25 Universities, 10 Great Scientists and 10 Great Statesmen in Secular civilizations
- Modernity: make sure the five most advanced civilizations are Secular

Open for discussion of course.

I really like these ideas, but again I feel the last two are still easy, half a turns work with spies and you can win both. I think Humanism and Modernity are both trying to achieve the same thing. We could change Humanism to a lower quantity just in your own Civ, but I like the pan-civ idealism. Something military? You must raise all secular civs military strength to at least yours?

Also would there be a way of discounting vassals from the modernity goal, otherwise that goal basically becomes get 5 vassals, as they are almost always the most advanced in game

 

[Leoreth]

What do you think about giving Catholicism to Divine Right + Orthodoxy, similar to Protestantism? Assuming the schism has not been triggered on its own already. Usually that should happen after Arabia spawns with it.

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

I don't think tying two religions to the same tech is a good idea.

 

[Makudomi]

What do you think about giving Catholicism to Divine Right + Orthodoxy, similar to Protestantism? Assuming the schism has not been triggered on its own already. Usually that should happen after Arabia spawns with it.

I completely support it, and being honest with you, I can't imagine anyone but a player who specifically wants to found Catholicism alongside Orthodoxy being able to accomplish that feat (which is good!). It offers a "back door" that's extremely hard to access while not upsetting the historical flow of the game -- beating Arabia to Divine Right takes a concentrated effort that the AI will virtually never accomplish. Outside of player intervention, this scenario isn't going to happen in a way that puts Catholicism and Islam in the same city, largely because of the Orthodoxy prerequisite.

 

[Leoreth]

That's the idea. Alternatively, if we do want to keep all religions in separate techs, Catholicism could be founded with Orthodoxy and either Feudalism (decentralization of power) or Music maybe? It's thematically tenuous.

All this is only a temporary solution by the way, things that are planned for 1.15 will present better solutions.