How does the game choose where to found a Holy City?

[Styrofoam]

Does anyone know how the game chooses where to found a holy city when a religion is founded? From what I've observed I don't think it's random, particularly since early or first religions seem to avoid your capitol. In a game I'm playing I want to lightbulb Theology to get myself a third holy city, but it keeps winding up in my Confucian holy city.

 

[Gorey]

It favors the biggest Non-Capital city that has no religion present.

Not sure how it decides if that condition can't be met.

I guess if one were about to bulb pacifism, you could control where the holy city is by whipping the cities other than the one you want it in so its pop is larger. Never tried it though.

 

[Chiyochan]

I am interested in this threads answer

 

[jhflif]

If a religion gets founded in a city that already founded one, does it not also become that religion's holy site as well? I don't really try to be the first to a religion though, and every time I create one it tends to pop up in a city that's pretty far away from my capital and not very big at all, and I've never managed to create more religions than I had cities. There was another thread on this where someone explained it much better though, and it wasn't really all that long ago. I remember that it said that new religions will never be founded in your capital as long as there is another city in your empire.

 

[jhflif]

Ok, so through abusing World Builder I have found that yes, a city can found two religions and be the holy site for both of them. However, this usually will never happen and as far as I can tell, religions will never be founded in the same city so long as it is possible to avoid doing so. And, religions tend to be founded in frontier cities that aren't so big, perhaps so that they can be spread more easily to opponents. There is a strong preference against founding religions in your capital.

 

[mariogreymist]

I have successfully manipulated a second holy city in the same locale as the first, but it required a couple of very specific conditions:
1 - All cities must have the same number of religions (the algorithm always chooses cities with the least number of religions) or the holy city must have fewer than all the others.
AND
2 - The holy city must be the biggest non-capital (Bigger cities are favored by the formula) by some margin. With Confucianism in both cities, Taoism was founded (in my example) in the holy city only after whipping the population in the second-biggest non-capital to well below the level of the holy city.

I have the saved game here where you can play with it to find the exact amount which must be whipped off at Pasargadae to get the Taoism holy city in Istanbul. (When I played it I took no chances, whipping off five pop for a building, which had the desired result) There is a GS in Persepolis to found Taoism, so it can be tested quickly and easily.

And yes, I know this game is already won. (well, not literally, but one would need to be an idiot to lose from this position)

 

[Peteusmax]

I'm not sure what you guys are going on about honestly, as I often found multiple religions in the same city (then build their cash-generating buildings there with Great Prophets, and add Wall Street for all the income I could ever need.) Having three religions founded in the same city is not uncommon on Prince-Monarch difficulty.

There seems to be some randomness to it, but the AI seems to most often choose the last city to be founded. If you do a quick start in the Ancient period, place one or two cities and a settler, then use the settler to found an additional city while rushing two or three ancient religions - You will probably find all of them showing up in the settler-founded city. Regardless of its size or previous religions founded there.

Since having multiple religions founded in your Wall Street city is a big advantage, you want to consider the timing of your placement of those first couple of settler-founded cities carefully!

 

[mariogreymist]

A lot of us are more likely to spam explorers than found 2 ancient religions, much less all three. That's where the disconnect is, Peteusmax. Short of getting buddhism/hinduism from a lucky hut, I never get any of them. I very frequently get two later ones, and having them in the same city is beneficial, as you say. And the first religion you found will indeed be in the most recently acquired city. This is why taking the capital last (or razing anything left) is often the best move in a rush to secure a landmass in isolation. And to get Taoism in that captured capital by not founding any cities between CoL and Philo is just not an option when one has taken a purely economic approach; the efficacy of which can be demonstrated in the save file in my previous post. (Am later in the game now...will easily get RR with liberalism)

 

[davelisowski]

in my current game, i have both hinduism and judaism in my capital city.

when you only have one city, the religion has to be founded there. after those were founded, then i added more cities to the empire.

much later on i founded confusianism and that was in a different city.

 

[Calm_Blue_Ocean]

I know this strategy may sound a bit goofy and counterintuitive, but it works for me on Monarch. I tend to build up my capital before I start spamming settlers. I also build stonehenge and research Hinduism and Judaism BEFORE I found my second city. After this I pump out settlers and spam religion non-stop for a while. This makes for a really slow start but it means I end up founding two widespread religions in my capital. Later, when I switch to bureaucracy and add Wall Street, etc I am rolling in cash. My neighbors don't leave me a lot of real estate, but they all love me. I spend much of the game playing catch-up, but eventually I am able to build powerful armies and take my neighbors' land by force. It might not be the most efficient way to play, but it's quite a lot of fun.

Edit: Dave apparently beat me to it.... maybe it's not that goofy.

 

[mariogreymist]

I guess a lot of this is size/speed dependent too. I play a lot of huge/marathon games on water heavy maps and I find that ignoring the religious path as much as possible (only what I need for HR/CoL) is frequently beneficial when I can get my own land mass. I've even managed to get confucianism as the most common religion in the world on occasion, by way of an early liberalism/astro with the glh then using privateers to keep any other continent from contact with anyone but me. All hail the pirate king.

Though, I can see how two early shrines could fund a kingdom fairly well through the middle ages, and be used as a military asset when starting on a crowded continent (one that won't be taken with axes/chariots). Mostly though, I just find it more efficient to steal the buddhism/judaism/hinduism holy cities with chariots or axes rather than make them with beakers (a much less certain undertaking).

 

[Infantry#14]

play occ on noble or below. Found all 7 religions.

 

[Countmonte8242]

This is probably a first for me at this level, but in my current monarch game I actually founded the first 4 religions in my capital before building a second city. Only 7 opponents made it possible, but even in this case it was really odd. Playing a civ that didn't start with mysticism, so I had to research myst / hinduism to get the first. I guess I just had the perfect combo of opponents that none of them went for buddhism early on, so I was actually able to grab it after. Decided to actually build the oracle for christianity before a first settler due to the map layout and the fact that I had marble access / forest for a really quick build.

 

[Scoottr]

I've found the holy city is usually the newest and smallest city I have. Ie. never where I want it!