So, how have the food/settling changes affected Pantheons?
Growth and expansion have slowed, which in turn have slowed early science.
I believe that has boosted some Pantheons and decreased the potency of others... The changes are not huge but the margin to get a religion is often razor-thin, so the impact can be felt.
We may need to look at them again (one of the downsides of such a significant balance change).
To start off the discussion:
- That means it takes longer to discover 2nd-column tech, so I believe Pantheons that rely on buildings (markets / barracks & walls) or improvements (quarries) in that column are weaker.
Pantheons relying on population numbers (God-King, Ancestor) or number of cities (Commerce, Wisdom) are worse off too.
This is the main issue in my mind.
= Goddess of Beauty is unaffected. Perhaps there's even a new strategy using it and Pyramids.
Pantheons relying on early buildings (Granaries), early improvements (camps / mines), just terrain (Renewal, Sun & Sky, Desert) or something else (All-Creation, Expanse, War) are largely unaffected too
+ Goddess of Life Love is perhaps the only Pantheon boosted directly since Settlers lowering pop actually mean faster pops.
In my most recent game, I founded last with Goddess of Protection, but I had Mount Sinai at my 2nd city (+2 faith from a very early stage).
We'll need many more observations for anecdotal evidence to matter.
I've try to vary pantheons a bit but there are those that I've never taken as I basically always play wide warmonger.
Food for pantheon is really nice and food is very important to get authority rolling.
For wide Authority I really like pantheons that provide "free faith"
God of the Sea, this is a new favourite, the free faith AND food is awesome for early game, helps churning out settlers from capital and quickly building a few pop in new cities.
There is extra flat production on workboats and atolls so in all its 3 bonuses on one pantheon. Of course, if you dont have a coastal start its a no-go.
Commerce free faith and gold, gives nice early game flexibility and keeps scaling, extra good with civs that can create city connection automatic (carthage free lighthouse, iroqois connect with forest, songhai connect with rivers)
God of protection is a favourite +2free faith from palace AND +1 culture, I'll be building walls/barracks sooner or later, cool with fountain of youth for +15heal/turn.
God of war, can be an extremly good faith source, can dud in rare cases if I'm a bit boxed in and no barb spawn space.
God of nature, very op as Incas, very rare to have enough mountains for it as non-inca but if you have, take.
God of renewal, very very good for several forest/jungle biased civs, iroqois and siam for example and worth taking as other civs as well if I have a dense forest/jungle start.
Reasonable:
God of expanse with Russia, it does however not produce as much faith as you'd think, so it requires quite an investments in fast expand and shrines.
Open sky as Mongols, they have plains bias and UB ger (granary replacement) which makes it viable, but just as russia you need to hurry up.
God of fertility I put this here but ... not sure, I've yet to try it, looks reasonable for authority if you plan going authority -> statecraft/artistry and miss out on the food bonus from fealty.
I think the +1 faith looks a bit low, if it was +2 from shrines and zero from well/watermill it would definitely be better.
There is not the extra hammers that god of the sea provides and no faith until shrines but you get the bonus food on landlocked cities.
God of the Sun could provide a strong start, granaries are a priority and allows for granary as first building in new cities instead of shrine.
The +food from wheat is not as good since it requires a tile improvement.
Beware if you are not spain, byzantium:
Earth mother and god of the hunt, provides decent bonuses but fades as your empire widens since only some cities will have the prereq tiles.
You need to improve tiles asap which probably means you're delaying setters and more shrines. Risky but the extra hammers from EM and culture from hunt is nice.
If you have good tiles for hunt then Renewal is likely to be as good if not even a better option.
Spirit of the Desert, you probably dont have that many tiles with resources, non resource desert give 0 faith. BUT now with the low food situation it can definitely be viable if you have some oases.
Avoid:
God of craftsman, it requires a tech on the second tier, save this for your tradition games or something which basically means it gives you zero faith until construction +the turns to improve tiles.
All this is on the idea that I want to found, if you dont mind taking over AI religion then other options are probably better.
1
1
boosted marsh tile.
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Citizens in a city; +1 
Culture and 
Gold and 2 
Science, +2 
