Interfaith Dialogue - How powerful is it?

[S.K. Ren]

So I'm trying to figure this one out still. What determines how much science it gives and how much is it on average for people who have used it? I understand it works on each time a Missionary 'spreads' religion i.e uses his ability to each missionary gets 2 science bumps, I'm just not sure how big those bumps are.

Bottom line: Is it worth it?

 

[PhilBowles]

So I'm trying to figure this one out still. What determines how much science it gives and how much is it on average for people who have used it? I understand it works on each time a Missionary 'spreads' religion i.e uses his ability to each missionary gets 2 science bumps, I'm just not sure how big those bumps are.

Bottom line: Is it worth it?

I only used it extensively in the late game (mostly because I misread how it worked earlier), when it was grabbing 70-100+ per conversion attempt. When you have the Great Mosque, that's up to 300 science per missionary, who's not costing you a particularly useful resource later in the game. It works extremely well with things like holy cities, where you can 'farm' them for science by spreading your religion multiple times without displacing the dominant religion. I'd like to try it earlier in the game to see if the values are similar, but I'd definitely say it's worth it.

 

[Vidszhite]

It gives you science per citizen converted AFAICT. It can be extremely helpful, as it's gotten me whole techs before, but the science per conversion never goes up, so it becomes less useful as time passes. At the start of the game, though, it can leapfrog you through the tech tree, assuming you can even get a missionary that early.

It also helps to have open borders with the people you're doing it to, since missionaries get weaker at converting people the longer they spend in non-open territory.

 

[bhavv]

And someone was just telling me its useless! But it wont work well in my current isolated game.

 

[Enkidu Warrior]

Those open borders won't stay open for long given that spamming missionaries into your neighbour's holy city is like jabbing them in the eye with a really irritating stick.

Interfaith Dialogue is a very weird option that is potentially very powerful but awkward to fully leverage. It's hard to exploit it early on unless you have a religion heavy neighbour who your don't mind enraging. If you push them to war you'll struggle to get your missionaries through, but if you bow to their demands to stop trying to convert them and make do with minority religions elsewhere you'll struggle to pick up much science.

 

[PhilBowles]

Those open borders won't stay open for long given that spamming missionaries into your neighbour's holy city is like jabbing them in the eye with a really irritating stick.

Worked in this game because of the two other holy cities on my continent, Sukhotai (holy city for Buddhism) was under Mongol control, and they shared my religion (Shintoism) as well as being my best friend (they took Sukhotai in the first place after I'd taken down its defences - I didn't need the city and it was in my interest for my most dependable ally, who only had Karakorum when our alliance began having been on the wrong end of an early war with the Huns, was as strong as possible), and Attila's Court (holy city for Tengrism) was under Maya (my) control.

Interfaith Dialogue is a very weird option that is potentially very powerful but awkward to fully leverage. It's hard to exploit it early on unless you have a religion heavy neighbour who your don't mind enraging. If you push them to war you'll struggle to get your missionaries through, but if you bow to their demands to stop trying to convert them and make do with minority religions elsewhere you'll struggle to pick up much science.

I'm expecting to go for it in my current Korean game, both thematically and because I'm a late developer religiously - so there should be plenty of cities with other religions by the time I get my first missionary. This is probably the best situation to choose it in; you don't want it if you're the first to found a religion.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

I find it to be a rather amusing option. You can tech up really fast and push your neighbors to attack your freshly upgraded troops. So it kind of works in bursts. Tech up and annoy one neighbor. Kill it off, then move on to the next.

 

[rrhal]

Does it work when you convert people in City States? They don't tend to get angry with you for converting them

 

[Harv72b]

Someone smarter than me would have to do the math as to whether it's better to use this belief and spend your late-game faith on missionaries vs. using something else and spending the same faith on great scientists. Yes, the missionaries are cheaper & stay the same price per era, but the first couple GSs don't take long to get, and you don't have to worry about travel time/repercussions from other civs.

 

[PhilBowles]

Does it work when you convert people in City States? They don't tend to get angry with you for converting them

Yes, it works with CSes.

Someone smarter than me would have to do the math as to whether it's better to use this belief and spend your late-game faith on missionaries vs. using something else and spending the same faith on great scientists.

Easy calculation - it's much easier for those civs that don't take Rationalism to get science from missionaries...

Missionaries can be set to work sooner, you may have other beliefs that give you benefits from spreading religion per se, so that you get both the science boost and a boost from conversion, and chances are you will want to produce missionaries at some point to convert cities early in the game to cement alliances and/or obtain CS influence from quests. So it's not a straight calculation of which produces more science - a GS used for a science boost gives you only a science boost, no other benefits. Yes, you can annoy other civs by spreading your religion, but you can placate other civs the same way.

If you're pursuing a faith-based research strategy there's no need for them to be an either/or choice in any event; maximising faith generation is a science strategy in itself. You may well play a strategy that doesn't require Holy Warriors, and in that case you're going to have excess faith to spend on missionaries through much of the game.

 

[Harv72b]

Easy calculation - it's much easier for those civs that don't take Rationalism to get science from missionaries...

I guess I could see this being worthwhile particularly in the pre-industrial era (when you can't buy GS anyway), but thing is I rarely buy missionaries. Getting to your religion early + spreading it strategically with one or two missionaries is usually enough to dominate my continent, combined with Religious Texts, and I'm then buying up cathedrals & pagodas with my remaining faith. If I max those out before I hit Industrial, I'll let it go for another great prophet, which I can send out with a caravel escort to convert overseas CSs.

It just seems like a perk that's going to be most useful in the early game and then largely disappear down the stretch, like most of those religion bonuses...whereas I'd rather spend those early game FPs getting my faith buildings in place to set the stage for increased faith production in the late game (when I'm buying great people). Plus, if memory serves a missionary costs you 600 FPs in the Industrial Era, while your first great scientist is only 1000. Yes, the great scientists go up 500 each time while the missionaries do not, but the great scientists don't have to be walked across the continent into another civ before you get your bonus & can be plopped down in academy form as well (which will net you far more bulbs by the end of the game than either other option).

I will say that one of the things I like most about the religion system in G&K is that there isn't a clear "best" strategy, at least not yet, and it really does behoove you to change up your go-to strategy depending on the mechanics of that particular game. That said, for a primarily peaceful strategy I'm finding it hard to beat Tithe, Cathedrals, Pagodas, Religious Texts (plus whatever pantheon suits your start).

 

[alpaca]

You get the number of followers of foreign religions times ten in research points. It's quite powerful if there is another civ nearby with a large holy city. In my current game, Siam has a holy city which yields me about one turn's worth of research per conversion attempt. Before the modern era it was quite profitable.

 

[prince_caspian]

I guess I could see this being worthwhile particularly in the pre-industrial era (when you can't buy GS anyway), but thing is I rarely buy missionaries. Getting to your religion early + spreading it strategically with one or two missionaries is usually enough to dominate my continent, combined with Religious Texts, and I'm then buying up cathedrals & pagodas with my remaining faith. If I max those out before I hit Industrial, I'll let it go for another great prophet, which I can send out with a caravel escort to convert overseas CSs.

It just seems like a perk that's going to be most useful in the early game and then largely disappear down the stretch, like most of those religion bonuses...whereas I'd rather spend those early game FPs getting my faith buildings in place to set the stage for increased faith production in the late game (when I'm buying great people). Plus, if memory serves a missionary costs you 600 FPs in the Industrial Era, while your first great scientist is only 1000. Yes, the great scientists go up 500 each time while the missionaries do not, but the great scientists don't have to be walked across the continent into another civ before you get your bonus & can be plopped down in academy form as well (which will net you far more bulbs by the end of the game than either other option).

I will say that one of the things I like most about the religion system in G&K is that there isn't a clear "best" strategy, at least not yet, and it really does behoove you to change up your go-to strategy depending on the mechanics of that particular game. That said, for a primarily peaceful strategy I'm finding it hard to beat Tithe, Cathedrals, Pagodas, Religious Texts (plus whatever pantheon suits your start).

As with all other religion bonuses, you have to decide what victory path you want to pursue. If you're going peaceful cultural/science then Interfaith Dialogue works wonders. The name speaks for itself doesn't it? You're playing nice with other faiths not pissing them off. Think of it like modern-day John-Paul II.

Think of Interfaith Dialogue in this way. I have the usual RAs, universities, academies, etc, but because of the extra beakers from missionaries I get techs faster than anyone else, I build wonders/public schools/labs earlier than anyone would have possibly gotten the tech. The effect snowballs - my labs increase my bpt even higher, my RAs even more beakers while my friends only piecemeal science, I get the atomic and info techs first. True, maybe I'll have to hard build stuff rather than simply buy as I don't have money, but what's the use of having so much if I can't buy or produce the building? I'm sitting on a hill of gold but damn, that dude already built Pisa, PT and gotten his free GS while I'm still struggling to get there.

Tithe looks powerful on the surface, until you examine it a bit further and find that it can actually harm you, as you're forgoing other vital founder beliefs. It's the belief that only Byzantines can choose due to their bonus. Metaphoric but you get my point.

If you're going war-science (as with China via paper makers in puppets) or war-culture (Aztec) then you should be picking something like Ceremonial Burials in particular. You don't really need the money from Tithe as puppets are cash by themselves. Spread, convert, piss the hell out of other founders cos that's what you will eventually do anyway. Religious wars are to be expected unless you're playing duel, then you'll be spending faith buying missionaries too and GMD will be even more important as you need to stretch the faith buck.

As everyone knows, religion is the most flexible system in GAK. We don't have to go one path - convert everyone. There should be different approaches, which is apparently the case.

 

[weregamer]

I find it to be a rather amusing option. You can tech up really fast and push your neighbors to attack your freshly upgraded troops. So it kind of works in bursts. Tech up and annoy one neighbor. Kill it off, then move on to the next.

Creatively evil. I like it.

 

[thadian]

i havent found a "perfect combo" but ive used them all at least once except the hermitage one. Im not sure if there is a "perfect combo" or not, but they are all good in the right situations... they can either fill in a deficit, or give you a ticket into something you don't have or need more of, or they can be used to strengthen a strength or maximize a specific play style.

 

[PhilBowles]

I guess I could see this being worthwhile particularly in the pre-industrial era (when you can't buy GS anyway), but thing is I rarely buy missionaries.

Well, this is the thing about the religion system - you can tailor the religion to the strategies you do use. In my current game I just got 110 science in 1200 AD for spreading the word to the 10-pop Iroquois holy city (and it doesn't seem to have harmed relations, since I'm not converting their city to my majority religion), which isn't bad for a 200 faith investment on a missionary who can potentially do it again.

I think it's a backwards way of looking at things - "I don't need this because I don't build missionaries". Rather you can look at it and think "This is an ability that allows me to gain science if I make missionaries, so I'll make missionaries". It's the same thing I've noticed with people dismissing the Honor policy that gives you happiness from defensive buildings ("Well, I never build them"). You don't take the policy because you build lots of walls, you build lots of walls precisely to exploit a policy that gives you access to a full chain of no-maintenance happiness buildings that can net you up to 4 happiness per city without any gold cost over the course of a game.

Getting to your religion early + spreading it strategically with one or two missionaries is usually enough to dominate my continent, combined with Religious Texts, and I'm then buying up cathedrals & pagodas with my remaining faith. If I max those out before I hit Industrial, I'll let it go for another great prophet, which I can send out with a caravel escort to convert overseas CSs.

A missionary spreads faith two or three times and you can get multiples - you can only have one cathedral per city (I have taken that belief as well - playing as Korea, an extra - and maintenance-free - specialist slot in each of my cities = +2 free science per city, in addition to my usual tech bonuses, Messenger of the Gods pantheon and interfaith dialogue-spreading missionaries. And somehow I'm still 5th in literacy...).

I will say that one of the things I like most about the religion system in G&K is that there isn't a clear "best" strategy, at least not yet, and it really does behoove you to change up your go-to strategy depending on the mechanics of that particular game. That said, for a primarily peaceful strategy I'm finding it hard to beat Tithe, Cathedrals, Pagodas, Religious Texts (plus whatever pantheon suits your start)

I find I'm generally choosing different ones every time - not consciously to try them out together, but just because of my particular situation in each game. In this one, for instance, I got religion very late so Interfaith Dialogue should have been ideal (unfortunately all the other religions seem to have been founded by civs far away except for the Iroquois one, and theirs was founded later than mine). Though with Cathedrals and Guruship, I have tailored my religion somewhat to playing as specialist-based Korea (and as the Maya I would usually take GP-related religious bonuses), and I've also expanded much more quickly than I usually do partly in order to maximise my science bonus from trade routes (I have 5 native cities plus Attila's Court by 1200; only Attila's Court still needs connecting by roads since it's my newest acquisition).

 

[Harv72b]

As with all other religion bonuses, you have to decide what victory path you want to pursue. If you're going peaceful cultural/science then Interfaith Dialogue works wonders. The name speaks for itself doesn't it? You're playing nice with other faiths not pissing them off. Think of it like modern-day John-Paul II....

Okay, you've sold me--I'll give it a shot & see how I like it, anyway.

 

[Brichals]

I'm trying this in my latest game. Pseudo-1 city challenge with Ethiopia (I puppeted Graz just to teach Austria a lesson and I may go crazy when I get my Mehals and keep a couple of capitals).

It's pretty nice. I got Mosque of Djenne for triple spread missionaries and the cheaper missionaries enhancer. Opposition civs don't get angry as long as you don't displace the original religion. So you can pop 3 off in one go in a size 15 holy city and it gets you about half a renaissance tech in total. Maybe a bit less than a GS bulb altogether.

For small empires not looking to spread the religion it's not a bad option.

 

[Gucumatz]

Would be interesting to try Tithe and Interfaith Dialogue together as the Byzantines. It seems interfaith Dialogue is better on quicker game speeds rather than longer game speeds due to lack of scaling.

 

[wbg]

Does the ability only work in foreign cities or can you gain science through your own cities? In my current game I'm being overrun by another religion who grabbed religious texts. There's tons of pressure pouring in from every side against my religion. Could I use my missionaries on my own cities to generate science?