First Expansion - Religion?

[snarzberry]

I'm a big fan of the idea I read in other threads about using the City State system to introduce religion. The basic idea is that you'd have Holy City States that spread different religions, gave their allies certain benefits, demanded certain things of them, affected diplomacy and even called crusades etc.

I think it'd be a good way to kill two birds with one stone whilst using an already existing part of the game.

1. City states are a good base idea, but they are bland and need some life and character injected into them, this would do nicely. When a CS currently demands something of you there is no emotional attachment to them, even if they are your ally. You don't even think of them as people or characters in your Civs story, they're just a part of the game that gives you extra food or culture. This would be different and far superior if it was sometimes the leader of your faith that came knocking with demands.

2. I think it's fair to say that most players feel that there is a big religion sized hole in Civ 5. I know that is debatable, but I think it's true. It's just so much fun and is so immersing to be wiping the infidels off the face of the earth. It also gives other Civs more reason to befriend you and each other. It adds more interesting diplomacy dynamics to consider.

IMO religion is an obvious first choice as an expansion pack as there is just so much material there to add depth and flavor to the game and it can have a major effect on both the warlike and peaceful play styles. Developers would do well to remember that many civ players who have in past versions focused on a peaceful builder style felt very left out by Civ 5. Religion is an obvious area where huge additions to building/peace-mongering can be implemented.

The way I'd like to see it implemented is as the City State model above. If it was the Holy Protestant City State you're allied to then you are a Protestant Civ. You'd deal with, I don't know, Martin Luther or some such historical figure with an animated character like the other leaders via diplomacy screens. These special HSC could have unique units like missionaries/inquisitors/voodo-priests that would be on the map causing various effects.

Being allied to certain religions would give you the ability to build different buildings, such as mosques and cathedrals and to train unique units like knights templar and warrior monks.

I know most of this has been discussed in previous threads, I was just curious to hear everyone's opinion on how religion should be implemented as I think that this is a great idea. If you don't think that religion needs any further development in Civ 5 then please feel free to comment and argue why.

 

[cman2010]

I like your ideas would add alot to the game.

 

[joyous_gard]

I remember when CS first came out I thought they would start becoming part of your Civ and stuff. Like start being more like you and you would engulf them in culture. Oh well.

I think the first expansion will have a lot of cheap stuff that will pander without costing too much. Civs of course, new tile improvements/resources. Can't see religion making it back. They talk about balance but I think the real reason was political (too testy to market even though they kept it pretty neutral in IV).

My prob is even if they put out lame expansion like I mentioned, I might buy it just because I want some more resources and tile enhancements. So lame.

 

[lschnarch]

Unfortunately, I think this proposal would not work under the current circumstances.

You want the HSC to send out even more units to get into your way and block the path of your units?
And as CS work the way they work, wouldn't you just buy the religion which suits you the best in any given moment?
And there aren't any trade routes along which religions could be spread. So make it just randomly or based on distance? And what if you're sitting just at the other side of the continent?

Yes, city states could have been an option for implementing religious concepts, but thanks to the overall design of this game, I don't see how it could work.

 

[Frozensky]

I'd rather see the DUCKS project come to fruition, and then city-states expanded as a stand-alone mechanic.

I mean, I see where you're going, but having religious city-states doesn't change the fact that city-state interaction is sinking money into them for prizes.

 

[Roto-Router]

I miss religion as well, but I have to agree with Ischnarch; as long as you can buy CS love, nothing interesting will come of CS quests, including religious quests.

It might be more interesting if you had "spiritual" City-States from which you could not buy influence with gold. They could send missionaries into your and AI civs' territories (or some other mechanism for spreading religion). They would send generate quests which would be the only way to gain some influence with them, and if you gained enough influence to become friends or allies there would be some benefit (no good ideas on what that might be). For these quests to be fun they have to be feasible to perform; not the CS quests like we have now that are either not worth going out of your way for (generating a great person) or are actually a really bad idea to perform (invading another CS).

 

[snarzberry]

Unfortunately, I think this proposal would not work under the current circumstances.

You want the HSC to send out even more units to get into your way and block the path of your units?
And as CS work the way they work, wouldn't you just buy the religion which suits you the best in any given moment?
And there aren't any trade routes along which religions could be spread. So make it just randomly or based on distance? And what if you're sitting just at the other side of the continent?

Yes, city states could have been an option for implementing religious concepts, but thanks to the overall design of this game, I don't see how it could work.

Hmmmmm.... you're forgetting that there is an additional unit level to hexes on which workers and settlers operate. The HSC units could move on this level, and I think that would be best because, as you say, they wouldn't be interacting with and we wouldn't want them getting in the way of military units.

As for how you become a particular religion, or how you win a HSC's praise and friendship, I hadn't actually made any suggestions as to how that would work. There's nothing to say that it has to be a boring as usual investment of gold over time like it is now. I agree with you that that model can be vastly improved upon and that's what expansion packs are for, improving.

There could be a new class of Great Person created, the Great Prophet. When a HSC exists on a map at some random time during the game at a random location a GProphet is born and introduces religion in that city. The HSC contacts you to say how wonderful it is that your people are embracing the true faith and suggest that you adopt it as your state religion. You take it from there and make decisions about how it plays out.

You could hoard the religion to yourself or you could spread it and there could be advantages and trade-offs to both lines so that there is are various strategic decisions to make. It also adds a type of 'random event' that most people enjoyed in Civ 4.

I'm not saying this is necessarily how it should be done, I just came up with it off the top of my head in response to your desire for a different system to the current gold for benefits. Any other/better ideas would be welcome.

 

[SpearMan153]

warrior monks - cool

I agree adding new and improved religion (now with 50% more holy war - we put the FUN in FUNdamentalist!) would be great for an expansion.

Like many on the forum I find it fun to play game designer so here are my thoughts on a system I'd like (I'll have a go at modding it at some stage).

1. I want ideologies rather then just the organised religions. So you found an ideology rather than a religion and that ideology can be religious or secular in nature. that way you can have religous nuts, and communist nuts and facist nuts and whatever nuts) and the system can carry on into the modern era and not just kind of stop at scientific method.

2. Ideologies are founded by GA (I don't want to have to have multiple cultural great people types).

3. Knowledge of ideologies is spread to other civs/cs through open borders and RA and via diplomatic trade (adopt or die). I don't like having to spam missionaries and convert each and every city on the map so I'm going for a state level rather then state level plus city level system. ais will prefer pick the ideology that best fits their victory condition/flavours/current diplomatic/strategic goals.

4. Adopting a religous ideology gives additional benefits to temples, monuments and monastries (+happy, +culture). Adopting a secular ideology gives addional benefits to libraries, universities and public schools (+culture).

5. When an ideology is founded the civ founded it picks from a number of options that determines that ideologies outlook and focus.

So you have:
- religous or secular (secular gets unlocked at appropriate era)

- evangelical or insular
evangelical want to spread their faith - extra benefits for each civ/cs adopting (+happy, +culture per civ/cs)
insular are happy to keep their beliefs to/for themselves - flat extra benefit (+culture to religous/secular buildings)

diplomatic outlook one of:
- brothers in the faith: +diplomacy/influence to civs/cs with same ideology (in crowd)
- brotherhood of man: small +diplomacy/influence all civs/cs (peace monger)
- one true faith: -diplomacy/influence with civs/cs with another ideology (war monger)

focus:
- pick SP tree that ideology will focuses on: will get reduced cost for SP in that tree
religous ideologies can pick the first row only (early SP trees)
secular ideologies can pick the second row (later SP trees)
can only pick from unlocked SP trees

Initially CS will have no ideologies. A CS with no ideology will automatically adopt the ideology of the civ that is allied with. You may only ally a CS if it has no or the same ideology - goes to friend level only no matter how much influence is purchased. A GA may convert a CS to a new ideology (like a GM trade mission) this also gives a large amount of influence.

EDIT:
Oh and when you take out a CS you can select "Regime Change" to forceably convert it to you ideology and then "liberate" it (additonal option on conquest instead of just puppet/annex).

 

[Moss]

Moderator Action: Moved to Ideas and Suggestions

 

[Camikaze]

Yeah, this was discussed in quite a lot of detail in this thread, if anyone cares for a read.

I must say, I do like the concept of combining city states and religion. They seem to be made for each other in terms of game concepts.