ruff_hi
Live 4ever! Or die trying
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LotR Series...
- Thread starter Arathorn
- Start date
Jabah
Emperor
Shillen said:
Only problem is getting into Theocracy without discovering Christianism
and before having too many other religions 'polluting' your cities (resulting in commiting suicide, razing most of your own cities).Of course I don't think you have lots of chance going straight to Theocracy (theology) without getting any early religion, or maybe that will be the challenge...
Jabah
ChrTh
Happy Yule!
Jabah said:Only problem is getting into Theocracy without discovering Christianism
Of course I don't think you have lots of chance going straight to Theocracy (theology) without getting any early religion, or maybe that will be the challenge...
Jabah
Go archipelago, hope you have no one immediately next to you. Wait until Buddhism, Hinduism, and Judaism are found before researching those respective techs, and then shoot straight for Theology.
Roster:
Arathorn
LKendter
Jabah
Kylearan (Prince only)
MadDogTrebonius
Game is full.
Please, all, comments on game speed? I think I'll go Normal unless I hear an outcry for a different speed.
No. Great Prophets belong in the Holy City, enlightening the masses. They may not be used for a Golden Age. (In the rules as written. If the team wants to discuss rule modifications, I'm always willing to listen before the game starts, but I retain the final say.)
Yes, we can't "liberate" a city which is already liberated!
The "peace and harmony" clause may indeed require us to go PAST a city with just TOTR to reach cities to raze. Such is the life of Izzy.
@ruff_hi and Snaproll: Sorry. The game closed fast. I don't have the personal time bandwidth to start another game right now. If the variant is popular, I am always happy to see my ideas run with in other games, so please feel free to copy the idea, if you'd like.
To the Team:
When starting the game, I will have the option of pursuing an early religion. Do I want to do that? Do we want to be the Buddhism jerk (we'll have a good shot at it)? Take the safety and Hinduism? Worker techs first and THEN shoot to found Christianity? What's the plan?
I personally like the idea of a very early religion and then as early a Shrine as we can manage to hopefully lessen the need for a hundred zillion missionaries. If we have stone around, Stonehenge very early could be great. I lean towards going for Meditation, as an early temple could give us a priest, if we need/want, to help get the Shrine built faster.
I can't play today, but I could hopefully post a start position, if we can agree on game speed and map form.
Arathorn
Arathorn
LKendter
Jabah
Kylearan (Prince only)
MadDogTrebonius
Game is full.
Please, all, comments on game speed? I think I'll go Normal unless I hear an outcry for a different speed.
No. Great Prophets belong in the Holy City, enlightening the masses. They may not be used for a Golden Age. (In the rules as written. If the team wants to discuss rule modifications, I'm always willing to listen before the game starts, but I retain the final say.)
Yes, we can't "liberate" a city which is already liberated!
The "peace and harmony" clause may indeed require us to go PAST a city with just TOTR to reach cities to raze. Such is the life of Izzy.@ruff_hi and Snaproll: Sorry. The game closed fast. I don't have the personal time bandwidth to start another game right now. If the variant is popular, I am always happy to see my ideas run with in other games, so please feel free to copy the idea, if you'd like.
To the Team:
When starting the game, I will have the option of pursuing an early religion. Do I want to do that? Do we want to be the Buddhism jerk (we'll have a good shot at it)? Take the safety and Hinduism? Worker techs first and THEN shoot to found Christianity? What's the plan?
I personally like the idea of a very early religion and then as early a Shrine as we can manage to hopefully lessen the need for a hundred zillion missionaries. If we have stone around, Stonehenge very early could be great. I lean towards going for Meditation, as an early temple could give us a priest, if we need/want, to help get the Shrine built faster.
I can't play today, but I could hopefully post a start position, if we can agree on game speed and map form.
Arathorn
Jabah
Emperor
No preference for Speed.
Not sure Archipelago is much better for religion spreading as I saw (in LK116) our religion "jump" to an AI capitol in a far away island...
I think I would prefer avoiding the earlier religions, but preventing any from coming to us will be difficult. Maybe mixing Speaker and ChrTh ideas would work.
Getting the 'island' map (with only 1 medium island per civ) with options 'no tiny islands' and 'no extra (medium islands)' and 'high sea level' might do the trick to avoid the earlier spreading.
But do we want that or do we want to try to live dangerously
Jabah
Not sure Archipelago is much better for religion spreading as I saw (in LK116) our religion "jump" to an AI capitol in a far away island...
I think I would prefer avoiding the earlier religions, but preventing any from coming to us will be difficult. Maybe mixing Speaker and ChrTh ideas would work.
Getting the 'island' map (with only 1 medium island per civ) with options 'no tiny islands' and 'no extra (medium islands)' and 'high sea level' might do the trick to avoid the earlier spreading.
But do we want that or do we want to try to live dangerously
Jabah
I think not founding an early religion IS living dangerously. Do we really want TOTR to be in a foreign capital, which we can't capture? That's a distinct possibility with avoiding the early religions. That seems worse to me than having to give away a core city (that we can later raze and rebuild).
Arathorn
Arathorn
Jabah
Emperor
The safest way will probably then be something like:
- island, no other island/+high sea -> probably no contact before astronomy
- lots of spiritual opponents (so we don't have to wait too much)
- get a early religion (Monotheism for Judaism seems better as it is also a mandatory tech for Theology), still not sure about that.
- don't explore (except our island)
- get as much into theology without discovering it
- wait for christianism to be found, then finish theology and adopt theocracy
But maybe the island kind of map where you have to have astronomy to make contact is a bit cheating... (IF religion can't 'jump' oceans early that is).
If we go for another kind of map, getting a early religion is probably right, but we have to make sure that the AI will research up to theology pretty fast.
Jabah
- island, no other island/+high sea -> probably no contact before astronomy
- lots of spiritual opponents (so we don't have to wait too much)
- get a early religion (Monotheism for Judaism seems better as it is also a mandatory tech for Theology), still not sure about that.
- don't explore (except our island)
- get as much into theology without discovering it
- wait for christianism to be found, then finish theology and adopt theocracy
But maybe the island kind of map where you have to have astronomy to make contact is a bit cheating... (IF religion can't 'jump' oceans early that is).
If we go for another kind of map, getting a early religion is probably right, but we have to make sure that the AI will research up to theology pretty fast.
Jabah
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2001
- Messages
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With seeing the comment about LK116 you have to remember a key factor - *open borders*. I have seen several comments that confirm these ease the spread of religions. It will be hard on the economy, but we must avoid open borders until we can establish a theocracy. At that point we can open them up with a provision that *all* of our cities have our religion.
I think a very early religion is a key. What I can't recall is which tech gives organized religion. If nothing else, we need to build our monasteries early and IIRC both goals come from the same tech.
I think a very early religion is a key. What I can't recall is which tech gives organized religion. If nothing else, we need to build our monasteries early and IIRC both goals come from the same tech.
Religions can "jump" oceans. They can spread pretty much anywhere. I don't think they spread without trade routes or a shrine, but early shrines can pop religion up all over the place. I don't think we want to risk that, do we?
I do think we want Monotheism pretty early, though. That allows Organized Religion, which allows Missionaries to be built without the expensive Monastery first. While it doesn't REALLY protect us, most AIs are reluctant to use missionaries to spread religion in the early game. If we make sure our cities follow TOTR immediately, they're not likely to get a second religion. If we have a neighbor with a religion that we think he might push, we can just close borders to prevent missionaries. Closed borders don't prevent natural spreads, but closed borders and a religion already in place do (I'm pretty sure).
Mid-game, I'm thinking we'll want to encourage our allies (those following TOTR) to adopt Theocracy. That will keep them locked into TOTR and minimize the number of cities we'll need to burn later. I think, anyway.
Arathorn
I do think we want Monotheism pretty early, though. That allows Organized Religion, which allows Missionaries to be built without the expensive Monastery first. While it doesn't REALLY protect us, most AIs are reluctant to use missionaries to spread religion in the early game. If we make sure our cities follow TOTR immediately, they're not likely to get a second religion. If we have a neighbor with a religion that we think he might push, we can just close borders to prevent missionaries. Closed borders don't prevent natural spreads, but closed borders and a religion already in place do (I'm pretty sure).
Mid-game, I'm thinking we'll want to encourage our allies (those following TOTR) to adopt Theocracy. That will keep them locked into TOTR and minimize the number of cities we'll need to burn later. I think, anyway.
Arathorn
Given that oceans do help in spreading religion due to easy trade routes, I think we ought to have a pangaea-ish map. How about Great Plains? Although that does have a ton of rivers, also providing easy trade routes. But I like the Great Plains map script and I haven't seen anyone play that one yet.
So either we avoid early religion until we can get a 'clean' Theology, or we get an early one and research "one behind" all other civs. I think religion the earlier the better, personally. I leave the specific choice up to Arathorn, though I agree with your Buddhism reasoning.
And I don't care on the normal vs. epic choice. If we're going to be at war a lot, I think that epic might be easier in that it will be easier for us to plan ahead than the AI.
So either we avoid early religion until we can get a 'clean' Theology, or we get an early one and research "one behind" all other civs. I think religion the earlier the better, personally. I leave the specific choice up to Arathorn, though I agree with your Buddhism reasoning.
And I don't care on the normal vs. epic choice. If we're going to be at war a lot, I think that epic might be easier in that it will be easier for us to plan ahead than the AI.
One trick that might help us is that we can research religion techs up to "1 turn left" and then switch, allowing us to research the religion tech in 1 turn after the religion is founded. This would help us not miss out on religion wonders.
Is there research beaker decay?
Is there research beaker decay?
Kylearan
compound eye
Normal game speed is fine with me. I've only raised the question about game speed because I expect us to do a lot of warfare, and depending on map layout/type, time could become an issue.
I'm all for founding an early religion, and would vote for Buddhism. After founding our religion, we will want to avoid the other religious techs until their respective religions have been founded elsewhere, and Buddhism is the cheapest religious tech, so we can focus on worker techs etc. sooner.
An alternative would be to research Masonry first, then Polytheism. If nobody has founded Hinduism one turn before we discover Polytheism, we switch to something else until Hinduism got founded, then switch back to Polytheism->Monotheism at full speed, founding Judaism. That's the fastest way to get to organized religion, with only a minimal risk of Buddhism or Hinduism spreading to us before we found Judaism. But this plan would slow us down economically, so I'd prefer to simply found Buddhism instead.
-Kylearan
I'm all for founding an early religion, and would vote for Buddhism. After founding our religion, we will want to avoid the other religious techs until their respective religions have been founded elsewhere, and Buddhism is the cheapest religious tech, so we can focus on worker techs etc. sooner.
An alternative would be to research Masonry first, then Polytheism. If nobody has founded Hinduism one turn before we discover Polytheism, we switch to something else until Hinduism got founded, then switch back to Polytheism->Monotheism at full speed, founding Judaism. That's the fastest way to get to organized religion, with only a minimal risk of Buddhism or Hinduism spreading to us before we found Judaism. But this plan would slow us down economically, so I'd prefer to simply found Buddhism instead.
-Kylearan
Jabah
Emperor
I am not sure I understood the Buddhism grab. We then will have to WAIT for someone to get at least Judaism (Monotheism) then Christianism (Theology) before we can go respectively into Org. Relig. and later Theocracy. delaying and risking having religion getting into our cities.
I could be wrong but going for Masonry then Monotheism (then gifting it to everyone - after alphabet) seems to be faster.
I am not sure (ie I have no idea) about religion jumping ocean (before astronomy), but I am pretty sure it can spread (obviously on its own) while you have closed borders.
Map with lots of rivers are probably asking for trouble...
Jabah
PS Epic might be easier indeed as we have to do some cleaning before ending the game.
I could be wrong but going for Masonry then Monotheism (then gifting it to everyone - after alphabet) seems to be faster.
I am not sure (ie I have no idea) about religion jumping ocean (before astronomy), but I am pretty sure it can spread (obviously on its own) while you have closed borders.
Map with lots of rivers are probably asking for trouble...
Jabah
PS Epic might be easier indeed as we have to do some cleaning before ending the game.
Kylearan
compound eye
Hi,
Regarding Theology and Theocracy, we can't do much to speed that one up either way, and have to wait for an AI to research it first. Only if we want Christianity to be our religion can it be sped up, but I find that way too risky.
I've seen my shrine-empowered Hinduism jump to the capital city of an AI in the middle of another continent before Astronomy, by the way. In fact, because it had jumped to the other continent, contact between that civ and me was established! No idea how exactly that did happen.
-Kylearan
I don't think we will have to wait long for Monotheism to be researched by somebody else; Judaism falls rather quickly in my experience. But see my alternative plan if we'll find that too risky.Jabah said:
Regarding Theology and Theocracy, we can't do much to speed that one up either way, and have to wait for an AI to research it first. Only if we want Christianity to be our religion can it be sped up, but I find that way too risky.
I've seen my shrine-empowered Hinduism jump to the capital city of an AI in the middle of another continent before Astronomy, by the way. In fact, because it had jumped to the other continent, contact between that civ and me was established! No idea how exactly that did happen.
-Kylearan
I'm playing Great Plains in LotR22 right now, so I don't want two of the same. I also want a wrapping world for this game, so we have a bit of flexibility on movement direction. We might need to hit in different directions and I want to be able to go around, instead of just across, to do it.
Pangea sounds fine to me.
If everybody's OK with Epic, I'll do that. It'll make the game longer, but more of a good thing is still good, right? Probably 40-20-20-20-20 for the first round (and then 10/player after that). Those first 100 turns aren't always that exciting. Important, yes, but not necessarily exciting or time-consuming.
Yes, it can, but only to cities that have no religion already. Once we put TOTR into a city, it won't acquire a second religion "naturally". A second religion would have to come via missionary. THAT we can avoid with closed borders.
I agree with Kylearan that waiting for Christianity is too long. His plan on founding Judaism is quite interesting, but I think we'll have plenty of beakers required for worker techs, metals, etc. Judaism usually falls fairly quickly and I think getting Agriculture and/or Mining and/or Animal Husbandry and/or Archery (depends on what (or who) is near us!) in the meantime will be fine. We'll just have to be really careful about Open Borders and to be certain to send missionaries with our new city defenders (the settlers can follow a bit later in time, since they move faster).
Act of God, obviously!
Oh, BTW, Monty Python "Spanish Inquisition" jokes/comments are highly encouraged. I'd start if I could come up with any good ones.
Arathorn
Pangea sounds fine to me.
If everybody's OK with Epic, I'll do that. It'll make the game longer, but more of a good thing is still good, right? Probably 40-20-20-20-20 for the first round (and then 10/player after that). Those first 100 turns aren't always that exciting. Important, yes, but not necessarily exciting or time-consuming.
Yes, it can, but only to cities that have no religion already. Once we put TOTR into a city, it won't acquire a second religion "naturally". A second religion would have to come via missionary. THAT we can avoid with closed borders.
I agree with Kylearan that waiting for Christianity is too long. His plan on founding Judaism is quite interesting, but I think we'll have plenty of beakers required for worker techs, metals, etc. Judaism usually falls fairly quickly and I think getting Agriculture and/or Mining and/or Animal Husbandry and/or Archery (depends on what (or who) is near us!) in the meantime will be fine. We'll just have to be really careful about Open Borders and to be certain to send missionaries with our new city defenders (the settlers can follow a bit later in time, since they move faster).
Act of God, obviously!
Oh, BTW, Monty Python "Spanish Inquisition" jokes/comments are highly encouraged. I'd start if I could come up with any good ones.
Arathorn
ChrTh
Happy Yule!
lurker's comment:
Well, since I'll be watching closely ... FETCH THE COMFY CHAIR! ... ah, thank you that's much better. 
Well, since I'll be watching closely ... FETCH THE COMFY CHAIR!
... ah, thank you that's much better. Similar threads
