India

[Gothic_Empire]

I'm not an expert but isn't the first religion in india, Hinduism ? or Buddhism came first

ps : it's a question, not a passive aggressive comment neither sarcasm

My understanding is that Hinduism was very different in Siddhartha Gotama's lifetime, and that not everyone agrees to call the religion of the time "Hinduism." In older Theraveda texts, the primary religion of Buddha's region and era was called Brahmanism, which is, IIRC, an organized religion that helped influence modern Hinduism a lot, but that some people prefer to classify as "Hinduism" anyway. My familiarity with the subject is only in passing, though, so I can't say for certain.

 

[Funak]

My understanding is that Hinduism was very different in Siddhartha Gotama's lifetime, and that not everyone agrees to call the religion of the time "Hinduism." In older Theraveda texts, the primary religion of Buddha's region and era was called Brahmanism, which is, IIRC, an organized religion that helped influence modern Hinduism a lot, but that some people prefer to classify as "Hinduism" anyway. My familiarity with the subject is only in passing, though, so I can't say for certain.

To be fair, the teachings of the Buddha could probably not even be called a religion. It was more lifecoaching than anything else, and he was definitely not a prophet for it, he was a teacher and definitely not divine.
It was after Buddhism migrated to China and was changed quite a bit that it actually became a real religion, started to adopt cool rituals, monk-orders and started to treat the Buddha as a divine being.


As to which came first, Hinduism might have been different (honestly, everything changes over time) but it was certainly older than either type of Buddhism.

 

[tu_79]

I'm not an expert but isn't the first religion in india, Hinduism ? or Buddhism came first

ps : it's a question, not a passive aggressive comment neither sarcasm

Hinduism is earlier, but who was the prophet? Krishna is a deity, not a prophet. Judaism has some ancient prophets, but in India the most ancient prophet I could name is Buddha.

Unless we agree that bobism is a thing, that is.

 

[Gazebo]

My understanding is that Hinduism was very different in Siddhartha Gotama's lifetime, and that not everyone agrees to call the religion of the time "Hinduism." In older Theraveda texts, the primary religion of Buddha's region and era was called Brahmanism, which is, IIRC, an organized religion that helped influence modern Hinduism a lot, but that some people prefer to classify as "Hinduism" anyway. My familiarity with the subject is only in passing, though, so I can't say for certain.

Essentially, yep. British India is one of my specialties, and it is a profoundly complex 'chicken and egg' problem, as Britain heavily catalyzed the codification of brahman traditions and folkloric/localized faiths into the super-faith of Hinduism. Controversial stuff.

G

 

[void_genesis]

After playing a few India games after the latest June 9th beta version I feel like they are still not working as a civ. They feel unique enough as a playstyle but just don't seem to mesh for me. For one thing they seem to very rarely start on or near floodplains, so a big part of the UB does nothing. Super food farms are nice enough, leading to very high populations, which should help the passive religion spread but even with lots of roads and trade routes going I could barely spread my religion to my own cities and later defend from my two neighbors who also founded. The current religion spreading mechanic only pays off when neighbors don't found their own religions. The problem seems to be that even though the pressure is high the bonus food in your cities mean they grow too fast for the number of followers to catch up easily. And the Naga Mala just plain sucks as it isn't all that strong, seems to be very expensive to build compared to other units, and can't move much or move after attacking.

One thing I would suggest as a better UA would be to give India all the effects of any religion present in their cities (polytheism). If that is too strong you could limit the religion effect stacking by era (one religion ancient/classical, two in medieval/renaissance, three in industrial/modern, four in atomic/information).

You could make this more active by allowing their prophets (and missionaries if they get them back) spread a mixture of the religions present in India's cities. This could be useful as you can spread your basket of religions to other AI civs in order to give them no dominant religion, no religious effects and lots of religious unrest. India of course would suffer no religious unrest (or is that to un-historic to stomach? ). You could also potentially make religious influence from other civs toward India stronger as well so they absorb near by religions more quickly.

Spreading your janky religion mixture to others civs and deliberately settling close to others to get their religious influence will eventually cause conflict, so the mid game Naga Mala should be a supreme defensive unit. Maybe this is where the pushback effect should come in? Could a ranged unit (2 range) cause the units it attacks to retreat if possible and if not suffer extra damage? It could be really fun to shoo enemy units out of your territory with a herd of stampy elephants. This addresses the problem with melee units having pushback ending up out of position. Putting the effect on a ranged unit means this problem doesnt occur since they dont move when attacking, and could even move after attacking if they keep the usual skirmisher ability.

 

[CrazyG]

I really think the Naga-Mala should replace skirmishers or heavy skirmishers. First of all the art is using bow and arrow, not gunpowder. Ghandi is most vulnerable to attack during classical and medieval, before the super farms start to pay off.

 

[tu_79]

Well, I'm managing to found quite easily. That's an improvement. Enhance too. But Reform... that's just another world. I needed like 5 great prophets to convert enough people. I'm going quite tall in a standard map, with just 4 cities, but I'm the leader in population. The superpowerful Indian spreading is doing nearly nothing outside India. But I'm in a bad case to support it, for my empire is in a small continent.

Using great prophets for holy sites seems... uncomfy. You see, with all those tiles dedicated to farms, the few dedicated to villages, an one or two for GPTI, there's just not enough room for holy sites. Well, there is, but I'm losing food. And yet, I just could reform in 1800, so my first holy site is about 1850.

For a civ that cannot use missionaries, syncretism, polytheism or whatever you want to call it, seems more fit.

 

[Funak]

Founding seems like a sure thing now (assuming you don't pick a really stupid pantheon or just completely ignores shrines as well as having bad luck with AI civs), I mean I've gotten the first religion with ancestor worship two times now. In a way I like it, it's kinda like Byzantium, but slightly riskier and the payout is faster.

Religious spread is still pretty meh, especially if you had bad luck with terrain (lots of forests/hills/mountains nearby), yeah you can use prophets to bulldoze your way in, but with the non-owned cities not benefit from your spread-bonus, you're essentially throwing expensive great prophet at dirt-cheap missionaries and inquisitors. I'm not saying that the Indian extra spread should apply to all cities following the religion, that would be insanity, I'm just saying that spreading is still a problem, mainly because you just don't build roads to neighboring civs, and religion without roads just doesn't spread very far.

I've been able to reform in both games I played, although it is worth mention that both those games were played on small(6 civs) Pangaea type maps.

 

[tu_79]

I think it would be better to forget about spreading outside, it's not worthy, and think of India UA as a weak Spain, where it's useless using missionaries against your cities. Next time, I'd try the Basil to reform with, and use all the extra prophets as holy sites. But if India misses, it's a very bad ability.

 

[CrazyG]

Next time, I'd try the Basil to reform with

People seem to forget about this wonder. This is my plan everytime with India.

 

[void_genesis]

So India is the religious civ that struggles to spread its religion?

 

[Funak]

So India is the religious civ that struggles to spread its religion?

Yeah, and which benefits a lot more from religion than others. Kinda like the celts.

 

[8bitBob]

So how's everyone playing our favorite nuclear enthusiast after all the recent changes?

Personally, I've been experimenting with some weird openers. My favorite currently is Earth Mother. Yes, you read that correctly. The slowing down of early game culture seems to have made getting Stonehenge much easier if you rush Monument. Earth Mother gives you +3 hammers now, which is very useful for racing for it. Combined with the reduced Prophet cost, which effectively doubles the value you get from the extra Faith, I've been founding as early as turn 75, which is pretty early these days.

On top of that, it helps your early game immensely, providing production and science via free Council very early on. Once you get Splendor and dedicate Monuments to Ancestors, it's a 5 culture 3 production Ancient Era building, which is pretty crazy. If you can start on Forest, you'll find the early game goes very smoothly.

My favorite part about this strategy is actually how it affects your expansions though. Anyone who's played Tradition understands the pain of low production settling locations. I deliberately try to settle on forests and invest in a Monument for a 1 turn build for this reason. It really makes the early game more consistent and safer. Then it snowballs you into hella culture, allowing you to cherry pick your follow up Wonders like Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, or whatever else you feel like pursuing.

That being said, if you failed to get Stonehenge, you're effectively screwed on your religion, so there's that risk.

After that, it's a matter of playing out a Tall mid game. Depending on the situation, I will either use my second Prophet to take over some easy Civs or Enhance if I feel I can get away with just using pressure. Sainthood, To the Glory of God, etc. I have very little experience with it, but India could probably make a strong Tourism Civ if you went Aesthetics. Science Victory is also still an option.

 

[CrazyG]

My game with Earth mother went extremely well. Monument first is a great opening, and India can easily get a religion even with shrine second in all cities. I found it translated into a very strong science game, because of early councils and barracks. Extra early gold on mines makes it very easy to invest in buildings

Goddess of Love seems like another powerhouse belief, just because it provides so much faith in the mid game

 

[Gazebo]

Is India's new GP cost reduction palpable?

G

 

[8bitBob]

Is India's new GP cost reduction palpable?

G

Early game? Absolutely. I feel like it's given me ten new Pantheons to try and has made India much stronger.

Late game? Barely noticeable. At some point the natural increase in GP costs makes it prohibitively expensive to continue purchasing them. There's just not enough returns to justify it. This means that I'll often only end up producing a few more Prophets than the average Civ.

I recall you mentioned wanting the ability to give India the option of investing into Holy Sites. I gave this a try, but it did not seem to be worth it in the least. Giving up your only way to aggressively expand your religion for tile improvements did not feel good. This was exacerbated by the fact that, due to not having Missionaries, India does not have great bonus yields to choose from their Founder belief. This is without mentioning the fact that India already has fantastic farm clusters due to Reservoir, which makes them less attractive.

I don't know what could be done here without giving India some unique effect for Holy Sites. Increased yields based on Founder? Adjacency bonus to other Holy Sites like for Farms, making multi tile Holy Site super clusters a thing? Building a Holy Site reduces the cost of your next Prophet? Increased Religious Pressure based on Faith output of a city, making Holy Site Faith not pointless (takes dozens upon dozens of turns just to pay for itself.) India's Prophet costs increase greatly with Era, but not amount born? I dunno. Just spitballing ideas in case this is still something you want to pursue.

If the goal was simply to make the early game more interesting and varied, job well done. Mission accomplished. Other than that, I feel like it doesn't impact gameplay much.


As an aside, I feel like a large part of this last part is simply due to the state of Holy Sites in general. They have a lot of yields, but a lot of those yields do not benefit most strategies. What do I care for Tourism if I'm pursuing a Science Victory? etc. This is made worse by the fact that most late game options for scaling GP improvements just aren't that impressive. (Looking at you, +4 GP Improvement Yields policy.) Maybe Holy Sites could be rebalanced to favor their Founder yields more in general? Better scaling options late game? I dunno. Just a thought.

 

[CrazyG]

Is India's new GP cost reduction palpable?

G

Its a great change. India plays like no other civ, I'd say that only Venice is more unique. It means that you can use one great prophet to spread and still enhance in a reasonable amount of time, it addressed his previous weaknesses very well.

Like bob said, holy sites are decent for tourism, but otherwise very underwhelming. Especially since it can be difficult to get that religion wonder as India. Their weakness isn't unique to India though, they could probably use a buff across the board.

 

[Naxelas]

With the new changes to India, is Progress just as viable a starting policy tree as Tradition for the sake of rapidly grabbing land early on to eventually spread your religion throughout? (this is assuming we aren't using the god of the expanse + sovereignty combo)

 

[Funak]

With the new changes to India, is Progress just as viable a starting policy tree as Tradition for the sake of rapidly grabbing land early on to eventually spread your religion throughout? (this is assuming we aren't using the god of the expanse + sovereignty combo)

Tradition have never really been the go-to strategy for India, they've always done well with both progress and especially authority.

 

[Naxelas]

Authority? Nothing about their kit (UA, UB, or the lateness of their UU) would make me think they had a strong capacity for a domination victory.