Missionary Spam

[The Kingmaker]

The first few dozen turns played out perfectly normally, but then a couple of neighboring civs developed some organized religions, and all of a sudden my territory looks like this:

Missionaries. Missionaries as far as they eye can see, on every available, open hex.

Now I'm all for missionaries spreading the good word, but this was going from the sublime to the ridiculous. The natural infrastructure of a civilization should not grind to a halt because foreign missionaries are passing through the land. I had to wait until they all used up their charges on my cities before my builders could get to their assigned locations.

Why is this a thing? I can understand the no-stacking rule for military units that need lines of supply or foraging space, but for agent units?

The religion system may need an upgrade.

Please fix.

 

[Agent327]

Dale made a nice little Closed Borders mod for precisely this design flaw. Works like a charm.

 

[mcaswell64]

If it gets extreme, declare war. Kill the missionaries and make peace. The warmongering penalty will be small.

I usually keep a few Apostles around, especially those with the combat promotion (+20 I think), to deal with incoming missionaries.

 

[Agent327]

That will work if you actually have a religion (and enough Faith). Closing borders to religious units always works.

 

[The Kingmaker]

There needs to be greater variety. The constant slog and spam of apostles and missionaries gets tiresome.

There are dozens of different military units. But these two religious units are just ubiquitous right now.

 

[Arms Longfellow]

If you manage to survive the initial onslaught of missionaries/apostles, the escalating Faith costs eventually causes them to die out. I agree though that it's annoying and should be tweaked.

 

[Scaramanga]

For whatver reason religion was designed to create these vaccuums where religious units can rush in. Is it historical? Probably. And what do you mean there's a lack of variety in units? Sure the missionary is the basic grunt and inquisitors should never leave their "holy ground" but there is a unique unit for every apostle promotion (Orator, Translator, Martyr, etc).

 

[The Kingmaker]

Religions give us different kinds of buildings, why not different kinds of units?

Not every religion evangelizes the same way, if at all.

 

[Scaramanga]

Religions give us different kinds of buildings, why not different kinds of units?

Not every religion evangelizes the same way, if at all.

Right, so you have one unit, the Apostle, and then from there you can get nine other units:

Chaplain Apostle
Debater Apostle
Heathen Conversion Apostle
Indulgence Vendor Apostle
Martyr Apostle
Orator Apostle
Pilgrim Apostle
Proselytizer Apostle
Translator Apostle

It's like different classes of an RPG race except there are restrictions to how you choose the class. But you're not restricted to one class of apostle per religion so there's actually lots of variety. What's the point of founding a religion if you're not going to evangelize it?

 

[The Kingmaker]

I'm not saying not to evangelize, just that it seems very one-dimensional to me. The missionary/apostle game should be one facet of religion, not the end all.

Despite the variety of bonuses an apostle can get, they still mostly just get used for preaching and "bible-bashing" the other faiths. With lightning bolts.

 

[Jarms48]

Personally I think they should hard-cap missionaries/apostles (and inquisitors) to the amount of shrines/temples you have built. For example:

- If you have 3 shrines and 2 temples across your empire you can support up to 3 missionaries, 2 apostles and 2 inquisitors.

This would reduce the AI spam on religious units, and could allow buffing of passive religious spread as well.

 

[nzcamel]

Dale made a nice little Closed Borders mod for precisely this design flaw. Works like a charm.

You may as well remove the religious game as it is intended from VI with that mod.

I think that -as others have said- religious units should have their own layer like trade units. They shouldn't be able to block military units etc at all.

 

[The Kingmaker]

Personally I think they should hard-cap missionaries/apostles (and inquisitors) to the amount of shrines/temples you have built. For example:

- If you have 3 shrines and 2 temples across your empire you can support up to 3 missionaries, 2 apostles and 2 inquisitors.

This would reduce the AI spam on religious units, and could allow buffing of passive religious spread as well.

Makes sense to me.

 

[unpossible251]

Personally I think they should hard-cap missionaries/apostles (and inquisitors) to the amount of shrines/temples you have built. For example:

- If you have 3 shrines and 2 temples across your empire you can support up to 3 missionaries, 2 apostles and 2 inquisitors.

This would reduce the AI spam on religious units, and could allow buffing of passive religious spread as well.

Brilliant.

 

[Zuizgond]

Personally I think they should hard-cap missionaries/apostles (and inquisitors) to the amount of shrines/temples you have built. For example:

- If you have 3 shrines and 2 temples across your empire you can support up to 3 missionaries, 2 apostles and 2 inquisitors.

This would reduce the AI spam on religious units, and could allow buffing of passive religious spread as well.

Yes and holy sites should also generate passive spread, making their location more strategic. Cities spread should be weaker than holy sites.

 

[nzcamel]

Personally I think they should hard-cap missionaries/apostles (and inquisitors) to the amount of shrines/temples you have built. For example:

- If you have 3 shrines and 2 temples across your empire you can support up to 3 missionaries, 2 apostles and 2 inquisitors.

This would reduce the AI spam on religious units, and could allow buffing of passive religious spread as well.

I think your solution is too heavy handed. The religious game looks like it is intended to be a full on war from founding to finish. Your nation may be at peace officially; but a different contest is being fought away from the traditional battlefields.

 

[Jarms48]

I think your solution is too heavy handed. The religious game looks like it is intended to be a full on war from founding to finish. Your nation may be at peace officially; but a different contest is being fought away from the traditional battlefields.

If the intent of religious victory was full on war, then move the casus belli holy war to either theology or divine right. A religious victory should be a mixture of both domination and culture. Domination in the form of either sending missionaries / apostles, or conquering enemy cities with military force and eradicating their religious pressure with inquisitors. Whilst passive spreading should work similar to tourism, with trade routes, open borders, and declarations of friendships also increasing the rate of spread.

You could allow religious wonders the ability to increase religious unit caps, besides, if you're trying to win a religious victory surely you're building holy sites in the majority of your cities (thus increasing your cap)?

 

[Scaramanga]

Religious units are already capped by how much faith generation you get from the sites. They also can't heal without them so they are very strategic. Missionaries gonna missionary but there are ways to set up a religion so it spreads more passively (scripture, itinerant preachers). If it really bothers you attack all missionaries and pillage holy sites, at least the ones with shrines (this could make an interesting AI agenda for a leader who doesn't like religion spread to him or anyone who founds one).

 

[nzcamel]

If the intent of religious victory was full on war, then move the casus belli holy war to either theology or divine right. A religious victory should be a mixture of both domination and culture. Domination in the form of either sending missionaries / apostles, or conquering enemy cities with military force and eradicating their religious pressure with inquisitors. Whilst passive spreading should work similar to tourism, with trade routes, open borders, and declarations of friendships also increasing the rate of spread.

You could allow religious wonders the ability to increase religious unit caps, besides, if you're trying to win a religious victory surely you're building holy sites in the majority of your cities (thus increasing your cap)?

No, sorry, war...in the religious game. Not war in the political game. Yes, eventually politics and religion mix; but the "wars" I was referring to is between missionaries, inquisitors, and apostles. I use a heap of religious units - far more than I have Holy Sites and Temples (I keep most apostles and Inquisitors rather than use their last charge) and I would not be able to do that under your proposal. Religious conflict is big in VI. You're talking about limiting it down to the level of an espionage like feature...but you can't have that with a victory condition. Imagine trying to take the capital of every Civ if you were limited to one unit per encampment?

 

[Liufeng]

That will work if you actually have a religion (and enough Faith). Closing borders to religious units always works.

I don't think closing borders would be a good idea : religious victory would be nearly impossible to achieve ...