How to play Philip II of Spain

[Mavynn]

I started a game on immortal difficulty as a random civ and rolled Spain. Looking at Spain's/Philip's bonuses and the Conquistador UU, I thought I should probably go for a domination victory influenced by religion. Philip gets +4 combat strength when fighting against other religions, and Conquistadors get +10 when paired with a religious unit.

My understanding from Google (though I don't know for sure) is that the +4 bonus only works if you actually found your own religion. So I decided I would do that.

I successfully founded a religion by building a holy district and pumping holy projects. But it really slowed me down. My archer rush was not at all what it should have been.

I'm doing "ok" now--I'm a little behind at turn 100 or so--but will probably eek out a win eventually. But if this were deity I would have been crushed.

How have others played as Spain? Is it possible to found a religion and still be a potent warlord early? That didnt work so well for me.

 

[slowcar]

Religion is quite difficult on deity. If you are lucky you have a religious city state nearby you can conquer as soon as they get the holy site up. Pumping projects seems like a lot of wasted production, i would not do that.
I don't know if you need to found your own religion, maybe having a different majority religion would also be enough?

 

[Victoria]

The religion cripples you early, it's easier to go for a religious win if you are going that way anyway... and of course there just has to be an inquisition!
The early armada is handy but an odd get, having frigate armadas early roll cities so you can pop in with your inquisitors

To me it's about flattish land and early luck for Spain. Their hodgepodge makeup means if you want get the best of them you have to be violent.

The game designers have made getting a religion on deity stupid because you are so hobbled for violence that you only have one choice. Get them slingers and you must take an early city with a holy site. From there it's Dom/religion heaven... it's just the first risky bit is in my opinion the only way to play them pleasurably.

Of course as @slowcar says you can have apostles of another faith but you will risk them getting the RV so you need to take them out of the game fairly early.

 

[Mavynn]

Yeah one thing I learned from this playthrough that I hadn't realized is that the religion that matters for purposes of the civ bonus, and the religion that gets spread when my conquistadors capture cities, is NOT necessarily the religion I founded. It is whatever religion is in the majority of my cities at the time. A lot of my early cities were converted, and the cities I captured early were a different religion, so the religion I founded was not my dominant religion at the time I got conquistadors. So I was unwittingly spreading someone else's religion through conquest until I realized what was happening.

If I play Spain again, I think I will just go straight domination and assume that someone else will give me their religion. Or if I get lucky and capture a holy site early then I can try to found a religion that way, as people pointed out above.

 

[agonistes]

Try researching astrology first. In the meantime get a settler out.

Build a holy site in capital, and buy its shrine, then run holy site prayers a couple of times while your second city pumps out units.

 

[EpicWestern]

Another problem with religion/domination for Spain is that you won't get the bonus against civs not following any religion. IMO being slowed down significantly with holy site, shrine, and prayers isn't worth the mid game combat bonus. For a fast deity domination win you really need to take over your first civ early on.

 

[Victoria]

is that you won't get the bonus against civs not following any religion

One of the reasons I hate the religious bonus is when you do get the bonus, so does the other side.

 

[OneMoreTurnPerTile]

Does anyone know what the additional trade route bonuses for Spain are?

 

[Mavynn]

Based on quick testing, the bonus applies to trade routes between cities on different continents and is: (a) +1 food and +1 production for internal routes and (b) +3 gold for international routes.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Conq + oligarchy + missionary + 2 great generals can cause some pretty interesting shenanigans, especially if that religious unit is your own religion. This is partly just benefiting from 2x GG, but the other bonuses push this unit into being effective deep into the game. Throwing something on par with infantry at your most dangerous opponents in the midgame should leave you a winnable position.