Lacking differences between religion

[Darth Gromit]

Granted, I could have gotten it a few years earlier, but Budhism was founded 3500+ years before. There should be more benefits for the later religions, though the "political correctness" would falsely imply that the later religions are somehow "better". From a game's view, Buddhism and Hinduism have still provided benefits for thousands of years in comparison to the later belief systems.

There's no harm at all though - in fact there's a benefit, that of having more than one holy city rake in conversion cash - in grabbing an earlier religion and then switching to what you really want later on. In a game I just finished, I started with Hinduism, spread it to all of my cities, and once I got islam, I just started spreading that too. Once it was spread around a bit, I switched over and lost none of the benefits. In my new game, I want to go for Confucianism, but grabbed Judaism along the way just to rack up a bit of culture. Besides, I always seem to produce some great prophets and the best long term benefit they can be used for is the Shrine.

So go for the religion you want, but take advantage of grabbing an earlier one too if you get the chance.

 

[Soryn Arkayn]

There might not be differences between the religions, but some civics do give benefits and penalties to religious Civs. For example, Theocracy gives your units +2 experience, as well as being able to train Missionaries without a Monastary. That might not differentiate religions, but it does give religion certain bonuses.

That said, I do wish there was some differentiation between religions, but I also acknowledge that they would inevitably be controversial. It's definitely going to have to be modded in.

 

[Darth Gromit]

I think that's the right way to model religious differences too. It's not the religions themselves, but how they are implemented as a society that determines their effects.

 

[Martinus]

Hehe ... yes, I think the current religion system is not very well polished. I haven't been playing a lot, but I get the feeling that most people will get Hinduism/Buddhism early and then you pretty much control culture through out the game. No other strategic gameplay to get other religions beside the additional commerce.

This is probably true in low difficulty level single player, but not anywhere else. In the current 5-person MP game I am playing as Germans, the English were first to found Hinduism, the Persians then won the race for Buddhism, the Americans raced to Taoism, English picked Judaism in the meantime and the French beat me by one turn to get to Christianity. I was left with no choice but to get Islam then, as otherwise I would be giving an advantage to my opponents by adopting their religion as my state religion.

Sure, if you are first to found Hinduism or Buddhism, there is little point in adding Christianity or Judaism to the mix, but if you are facing a competent opposition then it counts a lot to have your own religion, instead of paying tithe to some other civ. Plus, having a holy city with the shrine is a great boost to your economy and culture.

 

[Martinus]

It would be cool, though, to give every religion a spread bonus for, say, 20 turns after it is founded, to simulate the early popularity and to give the later religions better edge. However, considering that there is no maximum number of religions a city can have, there is really not that much need for that, since it's not like earlier religions are taking up spots for the later religions to spread, so to speak.

 

[Darth Gromit]

yeah, this wouldn't be too bad, and might balance things out for the earlier religions. As in, they get the bonus, and get out early, but the number of available places to spread them to (and the burden of early travel w/o roads) mitigates the benefit. I think it would be semi-historically accurate too, since later religions like Islam and Taoism really did spread like wildfire when they caught on.

 

[LostKing]

Just to add some facts to the fire. On Noble I always do decently spreading Taoism. In fact, most recently I got every civ in the game save two to convert, and those two had free religion. So mine was the only state religion in the game. The free missionary does help. Perhapse more importantly is that by not wasting time on the religious tree- I have things like drama that help my culture spread generally.

 

[diffusionx]

Problem is that religions change over time. The religions we have today are nothing like they were when founded or a millenium ago. They evolve to get more followers, in response to external pressures, internal conflicts, etc. Applying a blanket trait to the religion for the entire game shows disrespect for the religion, an amazing amount of shortsightedness, and lack of scholarly inquiry. How the game treats them - as a tool in diplomatic relations, as a general trait the cities/nations have, and so forth - I think is the best way.

It would be cool, though, to give every religion a spread bonus for, say, 20 turns after it is founded, to simulate the early popularity and to give the later religions better edge.

Christianity in particular had no early popularity and was a ragged cult for hundreds of years after its founding. I think in the game, though, if a powerful civ adopts a religion and works to spread it it will spread over the world - just like real history.

since later religions like Islam and Taoism really did spread like wildfire when they caught on.

Im sorry, but Taoism is NOT a new religion. The Tao Te Ching was probably written about 600BC. Over a thousand years before Islam.

 

[Darth Gromit]

Yeah, that's a really good point. I could see how going on a tear for the religious techs could make you miss some other stuff along the way. Particularly some early wonders.

But having a bunch of religions so far has been very beneficial for spreading culture. That +50% culture bonus for the cathedral level building can blast up the culture output if you have 3 or 4 of them in a city.

 

[Darth Gromit]

Im sorry, but Taoism is NOT a new religion. The Tao Te Ching was probably written about 600BC. Over a thousand years before Islam.

Well, it was new on it's home turf in relation to Confucianism, which had been in operation long before the TTC was written (and arguably could be viewed as a "prerequisite"). But your point about it's timeline relative to the other religions is well taken, and I think Code of Laws should be moved into an earlier slot to reflect that.

 

[Dida]

Taoism and Confucianism originated in about the same period. The founders of the two religions, Lao Tzu and Confucius might very likely had met each other.

I think owning the holy city to multiple religions can be an extremely lucrative business in the game, so lucrative that it can be potentially unbalancing. There should be a penalty for having too many religions.

 

[CitizenCain]

They could give religions both positivie and negative effects and hopefully balance things out. Anyone ever play Europa Universalis 2? In that they had different effects for different religions, I think Catholic countries would produce more missionaries but their tech speed would suffer, protestant countries would produce more money but suffer instability and the eastern religions would get tech speed penalties but improved stability. Can't remember the exact details but there were never any complaints about it.

You clearly never spent any time on the EU II forums. There was always some idiot passing through who thought the way religion was set up meant that Catholics were stupider than Protestants (Protestant nations got a tech bonus - 10% in the last patch I played) or that the game was biased against Muslims or this that or the other dumbass thing. For crying out loud, they even had arguments on there about whether Sweden was too powerful compared to Denmark and how that might be because the developers were Swedish. And at least with EU II, the designers could always fall back on history as rationale, which would be harder for Civ IV to do. Best not to give the rabid hordes of over sensitive internet morons anything else to be offended by, especially if it would have questionable value in terms of gameplay. (Really, isn't this type of thing better covered in government civics anyway?)

 

[CitizenCain]

Looking at the entries for the Holy temples in the Civilopedia there definitely seems to be some favouritism for Judism / Christianity, with all of the other non "God" religions mentioning that Mohammad supposed to have, they believed in etc, with the Christian based ones mentioning Jesus and God as pure fact (also shown by all the technology quotes being Christian). If I was fanatically religious, I'd be a lot more upset by a developer saying my religion is supposed to be, and another is fact, than say being assigned as a financial religion.

Let's get a grip for a moment, shall we? Civ IV's target audience is primarily people in Europe and America. Like it or not, Europeans and Americans (and their colonial derivatives, for all you Assuies, Canadians, etc) has a strong Judeo-Christian ethic. We all know what the Bible is, even if most of us haven't read it, but I'll wager that most don't know what the Vedas are. So a quote from the "Vedas" wouldn't mean a darn thing to Civ IV's target audience. But having Leonard Nemoy thunder a well known phrase from the Bible gives the game a more epic feel. I'm sure that when Civ IV gets ported into Indian and Cantonese, they will include more quotes from the Vedas and Confucius.

And on another note, I'd just like to say that it's shameful how Civ IV has favoritism cheating on your marriage with jailbait. As proof that Civ IV encourages cheating on your marriage and statutory rape, Id like to point out that the quote for plastics comes from the Graduate. How shameful. Surely they could have found a good plastic quote that doesn't encourage felonious sexual activity.

(See? I can be over sensitive too. )

 

[dh_epic]

I think making all the religions the same was a smart move. Nobody wants to argue about whose religion is the most tech friendly, or the most war friendly. Firaxis got one thing definitely right here.

 

[Karnak]

Civ is a macroscopic game and from a macroscopic viewpoint all expansionist religions (Judaism is not one in reality) have more or less the same effect on the flow of relations and history. From the macroscopic perspective there shouldn't be any custom modifiers, and that isn't even getting into the wasp's nest that the relgious nutters would spawn at the hint that any religion other than theirs gave/gives any positive benefit at all.

 

[gunnergoz]

I can see many mods coming out about religions, including some very controversial and tasteless ones if I know my chickens...
I'm inclined to make one myself, with generic and made-up "religions" that could have some impact upon social behavior and thus city stats. Anyone here want to join the church of perpetual motion? Or the assembly of ancient a-holes? Over here we have the pope of pagan pig pornographers and accross the street we have the basilica of blithely brain-dead. Ahh, yes, I can feel the creative juices flowing already...or did I just spill my coffee on my lap?

 

[PeeDub]

I certainly think there ought to be some drawback to having multiple religions in your cities if you're in a Theocracy. Or perhaps the minor religions should shrink rather than grow?

And I think it should also be possible to "religion-flip" a civ. If you spam with enough missionaries, you should be able to force a civ to switch its state religion, especially if the number of followers of that religion are large worldwide.

There are a lot of possibilities here, even without differentiating between the religions.

 

[Dogmouse]

The "Jihad Mod"

...kinda rolls right off the tongue, doesnt it?


What a fantastic game!

 

[Dominico]

Kind of disappointed to see a strong weener vibe going on here.

Lots of "hey someone might get offended so we had better not do that!"

Quite a sickening vibe that is becoming stronger in my country. You know its illegal to have a Nativity scene in your house window in some towns in england because it might offend some religions. In many towns they dont put up Christmas decorations because it might offend certain religions.

Hey lets not have meaningfull bonus in a computer game for relgion because someone might get offended!

How come no one is worrying about the fact that English, Americans and Chinese ect are killing each other in the game over a period of thousands of years? I think they should take out the Annihilation victory method because that offends me that you have to wipe a culture out! Thats genocide.

Really its a game, and our society is becoming really scarily nanny state and worried about offence. Something which no other cultures worry about. Someone will always get offended by something, its drawing the line at where there is actually offence and where there is not. Religious bonus in a computer game are not offensive.

While im on a rant why are terrorist units not in the game? They were in the others, do we take them out in the hope if we close our eyes and bury our heads in the sand they dont exist anymore?

Nazis are in games like Medal of Honour, and they did terrible things. They should be taken out of games too!

lol thats my rant for the day Modders get to work on making religion meaningfull!

 

[GenocideBringer]

Like someone lese said, it isn't the religion itself, but how it is implemented.

Christianity, for instanced, during the middle ages, was about the most warlike and violent religion you could think of. It is far less so today.