Founding a religion should be different

[Melkus]

Valid point, there are Mormones too which fit the way religion is portrayed in the game very well, etc.
But
I don't want to go overboard with the reformation thing. Catholicism and Protestantism, that's enough for me. These are the two major branches of Christianity, at least in Europe. Many of the other forms are somewhat in between. (It's understandable that American and European perspectives on this would be different.)

 

[screwtype]

It would work like this: First prophet in the game founds Buddhism, second founds Hinduism, etc.

I like your idea, but this is exactly the kind of misconception about these religions the tech tree promotes that I was just complaining about in another thread.

Hinduism began at least 1000 years before Buddhism. Buddhism is an offshoot of Hinduism, not the other way around.

 

[Melkus]

My bad, you're probably right. Should be the other way around.
I also admit I know next to nothing about Hinduism. After reading your very interesting thread, I will go and educate myself about it. (I've always been interested in yoga and meditation, but failed to make a more than superficial connection with Hinduism before.)

 

[gmaharriet]

I think they've missed the mark with religion in the game by making them all equal for political correctness. It seems to me that each religion should have a "flavor", just as the leaders do, affecting its influence on your society.

These could be semi-neutral and not bashing sorts of flavors...concepts like charity making your citizens happier, ethics making them harder working. Then you should have some way of going after the flavor that you think would be most beneficial for your civ.

I'm just not comfortable with the current implementation where a leader doesn't like you being a different religion, but no specific reason given for that dislike. It's just too random for my taste.

 

[CVDon]

Agreed gmaharriet. It would be nice if each religion had some kind of unique feature. Aren't cows sacred to the Hindu? If you have cows as a resource, you get +1 happy face, but you can't use them for food. Jews and Muslims are not supposed to eat pork, right? If you have pigs as a resource, you are not allowed to use them for food. That sort of thing.

 

[MRM]

I was just thinking about the way religion is built in the game. After some games it feels strange to me that the founding of a religion is tied to the tech tree. For instance, there have been situations where I didn't research a certain tech, just because I didn't feel like founding yet another religion. (I know that's silly in gameplay terms, but it takes part of the fun out of a game if you control a lot of religions.) The concept kind of works, but it doesn't feel very elegant.

Why not tie the religion founding to Great Prophets instead? This seems more logical, maybe more historically correct even. There is a step involved between getting a general philosophical idea and getting people to follow it.
In actual gameplay, it would also represent a real trade-off and a conscious effort (hire specialists to get religion early) and lower the chance of concentrating religions in one hand. It would work like this: First prophet in the game founds Buddhism, second founds Hinduism, etc. You should ALSO need a certain tech to found the religion, but it would take more effort that way.

Of course, you would have to include several ways to get some GPP early, maybe the obelisk could give you some or spiritual civs start with them (or even get a prophet for free when the necessary tech is discovered by them first, this would mix both concepts for more complexity)

After you get your holy city, you're able to build the shrine. With hammers. (After all, Jesus didn't build St.Peter's basilica, other people did. Much later. It also came with a cost.

If you make it this way, than of course you need to build a wonder to generate a great prophet so you can found a religion. ( AFAIK you can use prist specialist only if you have a temple, and you can only build a temple if you have a religon ) - so but this way it would be more interessting, because it takes more efforts to found a religion

 

[Teutonic_Knight]

There's yet another idea I've been toying around with. What if you could use a Great Prophet to "reform" an existing religion - say again Christianity - a la Luther, i.e. split it in two. All christian cities in your state would take the new religion (or perhaps only some of them). Protestantism would come with bigger benefits (commerce?), but by reforming you'd heighten the risk to piss off the leaders who stay catholic. (If you choose to turn it into your state religion, of course.)

This is a GREAT idea! This would be a great patch for the game. (or mod)
Wow, that would really put a spin on the faith in the cities!

 

[Si_Lurker]

These are the two major branches of Christianity, at least in Europe.

Umm, two, what about the Orthodox who split with Catholics in 11th century?

Not to distract too much, just pointing out.

Otherwise, more flexibility over which religion you found would be good. Issue with staggered founding with prophets would be, that everyone would found their religion on next turn from previous one and you still wouldn't have a guarantee to have Islamic arabs or Christian Spain,...

 

[Öjevind Lång]

You forgot that the first split in Christianity was into Catholic and Orthodox Christianity. Both were equal; neither was a rebel against the other. The theological differences were not crucial. Basically, the Pope in Rome and the Patricarch in Constantinople both wanted to be top dog. Then , further down the road, the Catholic split experienced the Protestant rebellion.

Öjevind Lång

 

[Melkus]

Ahh, yes. Thanks for pointing out. There are quite a lot of Orthodox Christians, indeed.
Instead of further embarrassing myself with grand statements about religious history, my vote is on a simple abstract splitting mechanism.
So you'd get "Reformed (insert religion)" or call your own flavour of a certain religion by the name of your civ, i.e. "Japanese Buddhism"

 

[mentat_emre]

Agreed gmaharriet. It would be nice if each religion had some kind of unique feature. Aren't cows sacred to the Hindu? If you have cows as a resource, you get +1 happy face, but you can't use them for food. Jews and Muslims are not supposed to eat pork, right? If you have pigs as a resource, you are not allowed to use them for food. That sort of thing.

you are right, but different effects of different religion means a lot of micromanagement. When you reach the "free religion" that will be useless. My idea is the plain types must change due to state religion. For example if your state religion is islam or judaism; pigs must must become cows, for hinduism cows must become corn maybe. i know becoming is not realistic but present situation may cause real unhappiness in the life time, ( the time we do not play civ ).
also;http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=3553048&postcount=11