Ninakoru
A deity on Emperor
OK! Sorry misunderstood from my part.
is Tithe a no-brainer?
- Thread starter Autoclave
- Start date
OK! Sorry misunderstood from my part.
It is a bit more complex than that, since less-than-4 followers in multiple cities get aggregated to determine your Tithe benefit. So, if your religion is in 4 cities, each with 9 followers (artificial assumption, of course), then you have 36 followers, for 9 gpt with Tithe, and 4 majority religion cities, for 8 gpt with Church Property.
It does vary by difficulty, and how well you spread your religion early, but I've found (through thoroughly unscientific observation) that Church Property will outperform Tithe until sometime around turn 150-170 on Deity vs. turn 200-225 on King. At Deity, of course, you have more competitoin from other religions, so Tithe's minority follower benefit is more valuable than it is on lover levels.
It does vary by difficulty, and how well you spread your religion early, but I've found (through thoroughly unscientific observation) that Church Property will outperform Tithe until sometime around turn 150-170 on Deity vs. turn 200-225 on King. At Deity, of course, you have more competitoin from other religions, so Tithe's minority follower benefit is more valuable than it is on lover levels.
Alziel
Warlord
Quite true - and this is just one of the reasons why I love Civ 5 - so many different layers to explore and consider. And this also goes to illustrate why neither Tithe or State Property are 'no-brainers' - although they both certainly can be dependent on whatever situation you find yourself in within a specific game.
Strategist83
King
- Joined
- Dec 30, 2005
- Messages
- 625
This. Tithe is extremely overrated here on these boards. Yes, it gives you more gold than the other gold-beliefs in the long run... in the long run. It will take 50+ turns for Tithe just to break even with Initiation rights, and that's only if the city has more than eight followers.
Exactly.
And there are even people who claim that "they think ahead", when they cant turn 100 gold into something more than, well, 100 gold in span of 50-100 turns.
CaptainPatch
Lifelong gamer
My preferred strategy for the long game is to become Allied with nearly every City State. With Pledge to Protect, I get a permanent 5 Influence base. Add Patronage's Consulates and that +20 = a 25 base. Then if my Prophets and Missionaries are doing their jobs, most/may of the CSs will have my Religion. So by adding Papal Primacy gives me a +15 Influence = a 40 Influence base = permanent Friends with nearly all of the CSs. Even at just Friends, that's worthwhile because it's a constant flow of Faith, Culture, Food, Happiness, and free Military units. But with just a nominal cash donation, and/or win the tech/Faith/Culture sweepstakes (+40), and/or find a Natural Wonder (+40), and/or "connect _______ to your trading network" (+40), etc., and most of those CSs become semi-permanent Allies. That in turn gives you control of the World Congress. That also makes you someone none of the other civs want to mess with because going to war with you means going to war with nearly every CS on the map. (Part of the "Walk softly, but carry a Big Stick" strategy.) Plus you get ALL of the Allies' resources. Add the whole Patronage tree and you also get a hefty amount of Research from the CSs, and the occasional Great Person. I've found this to be pretty much an unbeatable strategy.
So, I _don't_ take Tithing; I much prefer Papal Primacy.
Sturmgewher88mm
Kaiser
Wow, great strategy. I usually just throw money at the CSs, but I never realized that papal primacy and consulates stack! I guess I'll start going for Tithe later
SnowKomodo
Deity
Gold can solve all your problems in Civ, so I favor a money-related belief over anything else. Hence Tithe
With god comes wealth. Especially when you're sitting on 80k faith and can buy 6 great merchants...
Callonia
Deity
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2010
- Messages
- 2,180
Won't the faith price go up with each merchant u buy?
Yep. 1000, 1500, 2500, 4000, etc., just like any other GP bought with faith.
Callonia
Deity
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2010
- Messages
- 2,180
That means the great merchant eventually will become difficult to constantly generate while tithe provides you with steady income while great merchant will become rare for that faith civ to generate despite having great faith income.
I remain confident that tithe is still the only pick for me to pick, i never picked ceremonial burial even when gods n kings came out.
Tithe just plain works great with germany traits and combined with even more benefit with nationalism providing even further military discount
Depends on the map and starting location, i don't always have good and enough CS candidates for friendship in my vecinity or even on my continent. Take siam for example, spawning next to a few maritime/culture CS is much better than spawning next to a few mercantile and militaristic (does SIAM even get anything extra from these?)
Acken
Deity
That means the great merchant eventually will become difficult to constantly generate while tithe provides you with steady income while great merchant will become rare for that faith civ to generate despite having great faith income.
I remain confident that tithe is still the only pick for me to pick, i never picked ceremonial burial even when gods n kings came out.
Tithe just plain works great with germany traits and combined with even more benefit with nationalism providing even further military discount
Tithe is undeniably better for gold income. Saying faith compete because of great merchants is silly.
The point of faith is for engineer, scientists and musicians. The last one making pilgrimage the best belief for culture victories.
Also, pilgrimage allows for a faster/stronger spread so you have to take that into account.
But, deity AI always takes it so I often take Tithe.
sendos
Immortal
I think we've praised tithe long enough for the next patch devs (if there is one currently working on it) to consider nerfing this founder belief. I can sense it already.
So let's change the topic, if OP allows it, but it still refers to tithe: if tithe were nerfed to something like +1
per 6 followers, or something like +1 per 8 followers, would you still get it? Here are some figures:
Current: 400 followers - 100gpt
Nerf (tier 1): 400 followers - 66gpt
Nerf (tier 2): 400 followers - 50 gpt
Nerf 1 will still make tithe somewhat attractive but not so crucial, or as OP states, a "no-brainer". Nerf 2 will make for an interesting discussion, ranging from fair nerf on one hand, to a complete extermination of the belief entirely on the other hand.
Another line of argument will be similar to the starting policy tree debate between tradition and the other average starting policies. By that I mean, there would be a strong community voice not to nerf tithe but to buff the other founder beliefs, namely the culture one (forgot the name) and the
buffs as well. I recommend this approach to the devs, if they consider any changes to religious beliefs in an upcoming patch. I don't know if there is one coming soon, but I'm certain they keep a good eye on these forums and, upon seeing this thread, they'll think "let's nerf tithe. Most people agree with OP. Something needs to be done", rather than consider buffing the other beliefs to match this epic founder belief.
So let's change the topic, if OP allows it, but it still refers to tithe: if tithe were nerfed to something like +1
per 6 followers, or something like +1 per 8 followers, would you still get it? Here are some figures:Current: 400 followers - 100gpt
Nerf (tier 1): 400 followers - 66gpt
Nerf (tier 2): 400 followers - 50 gpt
Nerf 1 will still make tithe somewhat attractive but not so crucial, or as OP states, a "no-brainer". Nerf 2 will make for an interesting discussion, ranging from fair nerf on one hand, to a complete extermination of the belief entirely on the other hand.
Another line of argument will be similar to the starting policy tree debate between tradition and the other average starting policies. By that I mean, there would be a strong community voice not to nerf tithe but to buff the other founder beliefs, namely the culture one (forgot the name) and the
buffs as well. I recommend this approach to the devs, if they consider any changes to religious beliefs in an upcoming patch. I don't know if there is one coming soon, but I'm certain they keep a good eye on these forums and, upon seeing this thread, they'll think "let's nerf tithe. Most people agree with OP. Something needs to be done", rather than consider buffing the other beliefs to match this epic founder belief.Yea, i pick tithe every time, since AI doesn't seem to prioritize it much. But i don't think nerfing it would be right solution, i don't think it's OP. They already nerfed ceremonial burial (which was competition to tithe in G&K), if they keep constantly nerfing the strongest belief, there is no reason to go for religion anymore. Devs should rather buff other beliefs.
I still maintain it doesn't need a nerf. The 1st to get to a religion should get to pick a better belief than the one who gets there as 2nd.
The AI just needs to be made more aware of its power so it will prefer it unless there are some situational circumstances that make some other belief better.
I agree with the OP quite a bit, here.
While I was glad to see new pantheons with the fall patch, I'm still a bit bored with the founder beliefs. Unless you are almost absolutely certain that your religion will dominate, a lot of the other founder beliefs are not nearly as trustworthy for choosing. This is especially the case as the difficulty level goes up and it becomes less and less possible to grab multiple faith wonders (Stonehenge, Hagia Sophia, and so forth). At higher levels, only if I have both enough of the right terrain (deserts for Desert Folklore, tundra for Dance of the Aurora, stone/marble for Stone Circles, etc) as well as a faith-boosting unique building (Ethiopia, Indonesia, etc.) will I consider going for something other than Tithe. Even faith mountains aren't enough to make me feel certain my religion will dominate.
Tithe is so much more under the player's control, as your own citizens you can protect with inquisitors, and, if need be, by DoWing anyone who is spamming missionaries and prophets at you. Really, that's the main issue: you have all these founder beliefs to choose from that are based off of (primarily) foreign populations, and then you have Tithe which is based off of followers in all populations.
In general, I think now that the pantheon beliefs are pretty well-rounded (most resources now have a bonus-granting pantheon for them) they should play around with the founder beliefs. Ideally, tweak the founder beliefs to make some more useful, and add a couple. For a long time I've thought that the number of founder beliefs is a little lack-luster. I don't know at this point how much more we can expect, if anything, in terms of patches and so forth, but I'd like most to see at this point some changes to founder beliefs (among a few other things following BNW and the fall patch).
While I was glad to see new pantheons with the fall patch, I'm still a bit bored with the founder beliefs. Unless you are almost absolutely certain that your religion will dominate, a lot of the other founder beliefs are not nearly as trustworthy for choosing. This is especially the case as the difficulty level goes up and it becomes less and less possible to grab multiple faith wonders (Stonehenge, Hagia Sophia, and so forth). At higher levels, only if I have both enough of the right terrain (deserts for Desert Folklore, tundra for Dance of the Aurora, stone/marble for Stone Circles, etc) as well as a faith-boosting unique building (Ethiopia, Indonesia, etc.) will I consider going for something other than Tithe. Even faith mountains aren't enough to make me feel certain my religion will dominate.
Tithe is so much more under the player's control, as your own citizens you can protect with inquisitors, and, if need be, by DoWing anyone who is spamming missionaries and prophets at you. Really, that's the main issue: you have all these founder beliefs to choose from that are based off of (primarily) foreign populations, and then you have Tithe which is based off of followers in all populations.
In general, I think now that the pantheon beliefs are pretty well-rounded (most resources now have a bonus-granting pantheon for them) they should play around with the founder beliefs. Ideally, tweak the founder beliefs to make some more useful, and add a couple. For a long time I've thought that the number of founder beliefs is a little lack-luster. I don't know at this point how much more we can expect, if anything, in terms of patches and so forth, but I'd like most to see at this point some changes to founder beliefs (among a few other things following BNW and the fall patch).
Tithe is way easier to fire-and-forget rather than worrying about converting new cities, if you're pushing a late religion with little Faith generation. i'm playing a game next door to Ethopia who essentially has free reign with his 1st religion as Brazil didn't even bother founding one, and Korea founded the last religion. Ethopia didn't start converting my satellites until Renaissance era and my economy benefited from the passive gold until that time.
