[R&F] Magnus chop to get GP in Deity

[EEE_BOY]

In Vanilla, getting a GP in deity early enough for a religion usually requires a lot of tradeoff in terms of early expansion, early tech path detour to Astrology, no early war, and high district cost investment if not Russia/Japan/Arab, and not always guarantee a GP. Some civs that have some religious perks (Spain, Poland, Khmer, Indonesia, etc) can really benefit from a religion.

In R&F, it was mentioned that the algorithm has changed to limit the number of civs per game setup to go religion, so that the player can have a chance of getting a GP (still needs proven).

With Magnus chop capability, there may be a way of getting a GP in deity without significant early game tradeoff, tech detour or district investment:
1. capital build order: scout —> builder —> settler —> units (monument if no alternative culture source) —> builder/settler/monument/trader
2. civic path: +1 faith in capital —> 50%melee/range —> trader capacity —> 50%settler —> unit maintenance -1 —> new government
3. tech path: pasture/mine —> archery —> mansory if stone —> Astrology
4. 2nd/3rd city: units

Found capital or 2nd/3rd city in a location where there would be at least 3 trees/stones and good adjacency bonus for a Holy Site depending on patheon selection.

Timing your builder/tech/civic/ plus 5 turns of Magnus assignment correctly to chop the Holy Site, Shine and 2 Prayer district projects. Should be very close to 60 GP points. Usually Stonehenge will be taken at this point. Use overflow to finish the 2nd Prayer district project.

This allows all inspirations for early civics and possible eureka for Astrology. It also allows defending barbs or early warmongering or settler expansion (before and after grabbing religion) as usual in the capital. In some case a 3rd prayer project may be needed. (All GP points seem to be capped at 60 at the moment, may be a bug or feature that I didn’t remember in Vanilla?)

I tried this unintentionally in a standard speed standard size deity play as China (desert folk lore too tempting ). Let’s test it more so we can enjoy religion play in deity for fun and prophet (profit)!

 

[EditorRex]

I haven't tried a deity game on R&F yet, having wanted to get acclimated before going for the "tough" setting, but I have played games on Prince and King with good results, and in both cases was able to found a religion without especially trying. This very well might not work on deity. But my suspicion is that several of the adjustments made in R&F add up to not needing the exploit with Magnus -- you might be better off chopping for something else if you enjoy a chopping strategy and assuming you got a start with sufficient forest to make it a sound strategy. I do see that you are discussing an all around Religion-based strategy, so perhaps the edge of an early start is worth it if that's your goal. If you just want to have a religion but expect to play some other strategy, then it makes less sense. Regarding the benefits of having a religion versus not, I have had some nice experiment with the Monumentality dedication, which allows the purchase of Civilian units with faith. Very handy if you have excess faith an no need or interest for theological strife. There are also now Causus Belli and Civic advantages that favor having a religion even if you are not playing for a religious victory. (Personally, since Civ I I have always felt that there is the real victory of Domination or Conquest or whatever it's called in an given edition of the game, and then there are the cheese victories in science, diplomacy, religion, culture, score or whatever. But not everyone has the same approach to the game.)

Besides the algorithm change that makes AI Civs less likely to go for religions early, there may be some other subtle changes that move this along. One of these is that R&F has added several natural wonders, and I've found myself getting the resulting early Eureka for Astrology in both my R&F games, which I found I didn't get that frequently in past Vanilla games. This could be just coincidence -- I'm not sure whether the number of Natural Wonders on a given map has also gone up.

 

[kb27787]

The problem is to get Magnus you need state workforce... Unless you have lots of culture CS in my exp it will never be in time for the first GP... You need monuments or some ways of getting culture.

 

[EEE_BOY]

What about getting all the inspirations up to early empire to get Magnus?

 

[EditorRex]

The problem is to get Magnus you need state workforce... Unless you have lots of culture CS in my exp it will never be in time for the first GP... You need monuments or some ways of getting culture.

I think that's partially where the new algorithm may play in. Also, as EEE_Boy said, if you use the Inspirations, it's not that difficult to get Magnus pretty early. Had at least one R&F game in which Goody Huts got me most of the way there. That specifically requires luck, but those Inspirations are achievable pretty quick with a reasonable focus.

 

[kb27787]

What about getting all the inspirations up to early empire to get Magnus?

Well... You dont need early empire to get magnus... You need state workforce which requires you to get a district.... Which means you need one holy site to already be up before magnus comes... So Magnus cannot help you with chopping the first holy site.... Unless you were able to get that eureka through conquering or goody huts

 

[Lily_Lancer]

Why not chop for troops and Pyramid. Why do you want a prophet when the most useful belief (Papal Primacy) is no longer there?

 

[SharTeel]

Why not chop for troops and Pyramid. Why do you want a prophet when the most useful belief (Papal Primacy) is no longer there?

Maybe he wants to go for religious win? Maybe he likes having a religion even on deity? Not everything in this game is about speedrunning a science victory

 

[EEE_BOY]

Yeah, just want more flexibility in terms of game play, sometimes rolling in a religious civ as random leader, sometimes map generated good terrain and picked up a suitable patheon for that type of terrain (desert folklore e.g.).

This strategy of using Magnus to chop 2 Prayer projects can be flexible in many situations. if AIs are going religion crazy early, there is no cost to not going religion, because I haven’t made any commitment to build Holy Site at all before I get to Early Empire. The game play is still in the ‘normal’ track and I can chop a Campus/Pyramid instead like you said. But if a religion is still likely when after getting Early Empire, it will happen in less than about 5 turns, so the risk of losing a religion race is low.

No need for super capital start, just any other city spot with three chops. So it’s good investment.

 

[EEE_BOY]

I tested one more game with Khmer with very early God of Harvest. However very low culture to start with, so I immediately built a monument after the second settler, and two builders after monument.

Grabbed the last religion and took the beliefs that tripped relics output, and no pressure loss after losing theological combat.

However the Prasat UB seems to be bugged atm. Still I have stuck 3000 faith to faith buy UU ready to expand. Very fun game