Is there a benefit for founding more than one religion?

[Sebmono]

the killing religiong idea is very interesting, do you think the ai would ever think to do this? if not this could be an interesting exploit

 

[warpstorm]

the killing religiong idea is very interesting, do you think the ai would ever think to do this?

Why would they give up the biggest source of culture, money (okay, not reallly), spying and happiness in the game?

 

[mossmonster]

Why would they give up the biggest source of culture, money (okay, not reallly), spying and happiness in the game?

This may be a horrible strategy, but the suggestion was to found a first religion and promote it, and if possible start a second one as well and kill it off early so it won't be in someone elses possession and act as competition to your first religion. Sort of trying for a monopoly as much as possible.

 

[warpstorm]

Why kill it off? You can build twice as many temples, cathedrals, and collect twice as much money from your enemies.

 

[mossmonster]

Don't other empires view you in a positive light for sharing their religion? If so wouldn't you prefer your 'friends' to all share one religion rather than two different ones and therefore be less likely to fight against each other vs. fight whoever you want them to direct their hostilities toward?

 

[mossmonster]

Also wouldn't the net religious income be the somewhat same, i.e. two half strength religions vs. one full strength one, without the need to build two of all the temples, etc.?

 

[JavalTigar]

according to soren from the chat log, if you control the shrine you get the cash. there is no need to destroy it. controling them all would be a cash cow.

 

[warpstorm]

Also wouldn't the net religious income be the somewhat same, i.e. two half strength religions vs. one full strength one, without the need to build two of all the temples, etc.?

No, it is twice as much. There is no such thing as half religion. Either a city has it or it doesn't.

 

[mossmonster]

I meant that if you had two religions with say 5 cities each paying you as their holy city, or one religion with 10 cities would the net income be the same with the cost of constructing two sets of temples?

 

[RichardMNixon]

Just thought of this after reading this discussion, an interesting motive to have two religions. For those who like to play the puppet master, sending AIs into futile wars with each other while you reap the benefits, would it work if you had two religions, say Taoism and Islam, and you got 2 Taoist allies, and 2 Muslim allies, and got them to fight each other? Writing it sounds a little more difficult than it was in my head... but is it still a possibility?

 

[mossmonster]

Just thought of this after reading this discussion, an interesting motive to have two religions. For those who like to play the puppet master, sending AIs into futile wars with each other while you reap the benefits, would it work if you had two religions, say Taoism and Islam, and you got 2 Taoist allies, and 2 Muslim allies, and got them to fight each other? Writing it sounds a little more difficult than it was in my head... but is it still a possibility?

Wouldn't the net result maybe be that you used to have 4 strong allies and now you have two surviving weakened ones? Would it perhaps be better to have 4 strong Taoist OR 4 strong Muslim allies instead and have all of them gang up on your true enemies, those heathen unbeliever Christians, Jews, or whatever the strongest power block's religion is?

Disclaimer: This destroy a religion idea may be totally impractical and a really bad idea. It was just floated as a possible thought that may work.

 

[apatheist]

Now I have a question: If I am not the first to philosophy to found Taoism, can I still accept that religion? If the answer is yes then it would still be worth it to found as many religions as possible. Cause the AI is not going to go without a religion. Too much of a culture bonus to be athiest at the start.

It's not your choice whether your citizens convert. You can send Missionaries to cities to attempt to convert them, open or close your borders to control whether other nations can try to convert your citizens, and choose your state religion (or lack). The ideal case is that you have only one religion in your empire and you control its Holy City. The least good scenario is that you control none of the Holy Cities of the religions found in your empire (which probably means you control no Holy Cities period).

Would it be possible to eliminate a religion from the game by being the first to discover it, making it's holy city some 1 pop outpost then razing that city before it got a chance to spread anywhere? I could see a civ forming and razing all religions but one to have total dominance over the religous portion of the game.

You won't eliminate the religion. You'll only eliminate the source of income and culture from the Shrine in the Holy City. People can still build temples, cathedrals, and monasteries and derive the happiness and diplomatic benefits, and still be able to create Missionaries to spread the religion. The religion will only disappear when its last adherent is converted or killed.

I meant that if you had two religions with say 5 cities each paying you as their holy city, or one religion with 10 cities would the net income be the same with the cost of constructing two sets of temples?

I have to go with mossmonster on this one (big surprise).

Just thought of this after reading this discussion, an interesting motive to have two religions. For those who like to play the puppet master, sending AIs into futile wars with each other while you reap the benefits, would it work if you had two religions, say Taoism and Islam, and you got 2 Taoist allies, and 2 Muslim allies, and got them to fight each other? Writing it sounds a little more difficult than it was in my head... but is it still a possibility?

How would you manage to keep those nations from pulling you into their war? I gather it's a lot harder to start a proxy war in the first place, plus those Taoist nations will be angry at you for being at peace with the Muslims and vice versa. Plus, you can only choose one state religion.

 

[Pragmatic]

Just thought of this after reading this discussion, an interesting motive to have two religions. For those who like to play the puppet master, sending AIs into futile wars with each other while you reap the benefits, would it work if you had two religions, say Taoism and Islam, and you got 2 Taoist allies, and 2 Muslim allies, and got them to fight each other? Writing it sounds a little more difficult than it was in my head... but is it still a possibility?

You can have only one state religion, so you'd have to pick between (using your example) Taoism and Islam.

And I believe that the AI remembers your past actions. So switching back and forth won't be effective, since they'd remember you were a "heathen" or "infidel" only five turns ago.

 

[Mewtarthio]

Of course, if you snag the Pyramids, which now have their original CivI power of granting all Civics, you've got it made. Founding all seven religions is now the best possible goal for you, since you can run FoR to get +7 happiness in potentially all your cities, not to mention the fact that there's no enemy religions competing for your gold. Furthermore, you're the only guy who can run FoR, so you can prostletyze your enemies into pluralistic societies with theocratic governments, which is a recipie for civil chaos.

 

[Higis]

The pyramid only give you the government civics, not all of them (To the best of my knowledge). I might be wrong as I don’t have the game yet.

 

[Pragmatic]

It's been mentioned in Sulla's Civ 4 Walkthrough (linked in the thread of the same name) that the main benefit of founding multiple religions is in culture: each holy city generates 5 culture points.

It's simply a matter of making sure that you spam your own cities with missionaries, to keep the populace orthodox, I believe.

 

[JavalTigar]

It's been mentioned in Sulla's Civ 4 Walkthrough (linked in the thread of the same name) that the main benefit of founding multiple religions is in culture: each holy city generates 5 culture points.

It's simply a matter of making sure that you spam your own cities with missionaries, to keep the populace orthodox, I believe.

Thats true, but as his walkthru shows it spreads without missionaries.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I think he means spamming your own city with Religion 1 Missionaries to shut down Religion 2.

 

[Pragmatic]

I think he means spamming your own city with Religion 1 Missionaries to shut down Religion 2.

Exactly. I seem to recall that having multiple religions in a city causes unrest, and thus you'd want to suppress the other religion(s), even if you were the one who founded it/them.