Nine Ideas

[Lachlan]

It surprises me that I confused anything to do with Taoism because I am very sympathetic towards that belief system (as little as I know about it), but if you say what you say I am inclined to believe you without further research.

Blasphemous can you think that we should add Greco-Roman Polytheism, Egyptian Polytheism, Meso-South American Polytheism and other religions ?

Because i'm very agree with yoursidea on the possible religious system

 

[Blasphemous]

Blasphemous can you think that we should add Greco-Roman Polytheism, Egyptian Polytheism, Meso-South American Polytheism and other religions ?

Because i'm very agree with yoursidea on the possible religious system

No, and I have said so rather more eloquently in this forum on occasion. In short:
polytheism as a religion is more like one loose belief system than a collection of distinct belief systems. The distinction between one mythology and another is not significant enough to be represented in distinct religions in-game. I once supported inclusion of "Polytheism" as a single, special religion, with some special rules, to fill certain holes in gameplay, but at the end of the day the same effect can be achieved by adding one building (Pagan Altar or somesuch) and one diplo hit ("I find your lack of faith disturbing".) The religions system is exclusively for distinct and organized belief systems.

 

[Tom Veil]

I generally support Blas. I will support him even more if he can remind me who in Star Wars says "I find your lack of faith disturbing," and why.

 

[Blasphemous]

Darth Vader, because an officer tells him to shut up about the force and calls it a dead religion or something.
Here, I found a script of the movie:

MOTTI: Any attack made by the Rebels against this station would be a
useless gesture, no matter what technical data they've obtained. This
station is now the ultimate power in the universe. I suggest we use
it!

VADER: Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've
constructed. The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to
the power of the Force.

MOTTI: Don't try to frighten us with your sorcerer's ways, Lord Vader.
Your sad devotion to that ancient religion has not helped you conjure
up the stolen data tapes, or given you clairvoyance enough to find the
Rebel's hidden fort...

Suddenly Motti chokes and starts to turn blue under Vader's
spell.

VADER: I find your lack of faith disturbing.

TARKIN: Enough of this! Vader, release him!

VADER: As you wish.

 

[kairob]

I think each civ should have a "civ specific" religion that only stays in thier borders and the other religions could be "multi civ" religions. That way the traditional "pagan" religions will be pretty dominant early on but civs will start to swap to later religions for diplo bonuses and if they have a higher wieghting. Other than that difference they should be pretty much the same, I think the inclusion of this and a % chance of non-state religions being removed would do a lot to improve historical accuracy and gameplay.

If you wanted I could include a list of traditional religions for each civ....

 

[Blasphemous]

kairob, the idea is nice but it's very non-historical. Religions have never really conformed to political borders.

 

[kairob]

True, however older religions were very cultural specific and were constrained by cultural barriers, even if they were just the cultural version of the same religion. So in this they would stay within thier "cultural" boarder not a political one. If its possible to code it could even be so that it only spreads into a city with X% of its nationality, in this way the celtic barbarian cities would accept roman paganism only once the populations had been assimulated into roman culture.

 

[holy king]

I do not understand what your saying after that, could you please rephase?

sorry, was trying to say one would need that modifier to prevent a protestant civ join an arab one in a war against catholics

 

[pinktilapia]

No, and I have said so rather more eloquently in this forum on occasion. In short:
polytheism as a religion is more like one loose belief system than a collection of distinct belief systems. The distinction between one mythology and another is not significant enough to be represented in distinct religions in-game. I once supported inclusion of "Polytheism" as a single, special religion, with some special rules, to fill certain holes in gameplay, but at the end of the day the same effect can be achieved by adding one building (Pagan Altar or somesuch) and one diplo hit ("I find your lack of faith disturbing".) The religions system is exclusively for distinct and organized belief systems.

Ah hum. But well, hindouism is a polytheist religion. If it's there, I really don't see why we should not have the greek pantheon...

 

[Blasphemous]

True, however older religions were very cultural specific and were constrained by cultural barriers, even if they were just the cultural version of the same religion. So in this they would stay within thier "cultural" boarder not a political one. If its possible to code it could even be so that it only spreads into a city with X% of its nationality, in this way the celtic barbarian cities would accept roman paganism only once the populations had been assimulated into roman culture.

But the cultural/political border in the game does not represent the entire scope of that nation's culture. Remember, cities in cIV have foreign culture sometimes. Attaching a religion to one nation's borders is just too rigid to be realistic. And I don't completely see the point of it anyhow.

Ah hum. But well, hindouism is a polytheist religion. If it's there, I really don't see why we should not have the greek pantheon...

You're obviously not serious about that, but I'll bite.
Hinduism is an organized belief system, followed by millions over great expanses of space and time. It is seemingly polytheistic, but it has some very important underlying themes of unity and monotheism. The whole idea in Hinduism (as I understand it) is that everything is one and whole, and that though the god takes many forms it is one god.
The Greek Mythology is a set of stories with great cultural-religious significance. It is not, however, a coherent system of beliefs; furthermore, whatever underlying system of beliefs you can get out of it is not much different to that you would find beneath the Egyptian Mythology or the Norse Mythology (and the Roman Mythology goes without saying.)
There is a huge difference between Hinduism and Greek Mythology. They aren't even in the same category.

 

[kairob]

Then as I suggested dont link it to borders like it to the cultural presence and it would IMHO be historical as those religions did tend to stay in thier cultural sphere. The point would be more accuracy and gameplay as civs like the aztects, vikings, rome, greace etc.. can have a religion before the main ones hit, it will also cause a the conflict in europe that it historically did due to the negative modifiers.

 

[Tom Veil]

It's not accurate to say "that though the god takes many forms it is one god" in Hinduism. There is one Divine, but many gods. OK, so I'm nitpicking.
Regardless.
I agree that hinduism is much more sophisticated than any other polytheist religion. The main reason, though, is that it was given a chance. Greek Religion was on its way to an incredible flowering whne Christianity and Gnosticism teamed up to snuff it out. I suspect that any other highly developed society could have developed their own complex polytheistic religions if more attractive monotheist and nontheist religions hadn't pushed them aside. The "big" question is whether that happened for nontheological reasons, or whether polytheism is somehow less fit. And that's a question that none of us mortals are equipped to answer.

 

[Lachlan]

As result we should include Mediteranean Polytheism or Mesopotamian Polytheism You should read "ROMA AETERNA" of Robert Silverberg ... A book science-fiction author ...

 

[Phallus]

Though Hindu philosophy places heavy emphasis on the concept of Brahman (a concept which must have existed during the time of Greek polytheism), Hinduism can trace its origins back to both Dravidian (such as the shiva linga) and Indo-European (the Hindu trinity and the 'hero-worship' background of Krishna) beliefs and it wouldn't surprise me if ordinary Hindus in the ancient world considered themselves polytheists.

There is a huge difference between Hinduism and Greek Mythology. They aren't even in the same category.

You're right. They are extremely different but they were to a certain extent very compatible, as the odd columned stupa with decorations of the Buddha being propped up by Atlas would surely tell you if only they hadn't been destroyed.

Here's a different example.

 

[Blasphemous]

Then as I suggested dont link it to borders like it to the cultural presence and it would IMHO be historical as those religions did tend to stay in thier cultural sphere. The point would be more accuracy and gameplay as civs like the aztects, vikings, rome, greace etc.. can have a religion before the main ones hit, it will also cause a the conflict in europe that it historically did due to the negative modifiers.

Okay, I will ask you a question rather than refuting the answer before you even write it: what exactly does the mod gain by adding this feature, and is this feature necessarily the most efficient way to gain the same gains while staying realistic?
Think on it hard before you answer.

 

[kairob]

I am not a fan of word games and even if you win the argument it wouldnt make you right as the ability to win an argument is very different to the accuracy of your beliefs.

But ok, I THINK it would be a benifit historically and gameplay wise, I think it would help those countries devolope culture, help builder players, help european conflict, give another reason for scandanavia to invade britain, more accuratly reprisent different cultures and beliefs, stop japan and china having the same religion all the time causing more conflict between them and spice things up a bit in the middle east. Oh and I think it would be good for new world civs.

 

[Blasphemous]

This is not about word games or winning an argument. This is about the important things to notice when developing any game or mod.
Now, still before I answer, how will these religions be founded? How will they spread?

 

[kairob]

They could be founded in any number of ways;
#Tied to a tech
#on founding
#on turn X
#on x turns after founding

They could spread similar to the current ones but the more culture the is the higher the % of it spreading.

By the way I dont know if this is even possible but ok

 

[Vishaing]

I have an idea for how we could keep relgions from being adopted too early. How about we make Paganism require no State Religion like Free Religion? That will keep civs from having a state religion until they get Organize Religion (Not sure where that is in the tech tree off hand) and should help stop the spread of religions early on. Then the inclusion of a 'pagan temple' like has been suggested before, can represent the many different pagan religions effects while not needing to expand the game with dozens of religions.

Perhaps once we have a Warlord's Version we could give each of the civs that had a pagan religion their own unique building of the pagan religion which can provide some benefits, i.e. the greeks might build an 'Akropolis' instad of 'Pagan Temple'

Also, I would say the buildings should, instead of being converted to 'proper' temples when a new religion enters the city, simply obselete at a tech like the one which gives organized religion, or theology, or something along those lines.

 

[Blasphemous]

kairob, Vishaing has already pretty much illustrated what I think must be done (except I think a "I find your lack of faith disturbing" diplo hit is imperative), but I'd like to explain to you why I think your idea goes against the key considerations of mod design:
1. There is no huge problem right now. The places where the problem you wish to fix is unbalancing are few and isolated - there is no basic design flaw to fix (and only basic design flaws or things approaching that status warrant a major systems rehaul).
2. Most of the problem can be fixed with less work and less change to the game. Adding a Pagan Temple early on and making Paganism require no state religion would create more variation in choice of religion and give civs culture early on. Adding the diplo hit I keep mentioning would make the Europeans hate the Mesoamericans until the latter adopt a world religion (which will be Europe's major religion more often than not) and it would create a lot of necessary tension between state-religion civs and Free Religion civs in the late game.
The only part of the problem you illustrate that is still left unsolved is that of representation - representing and differentiating the cultures of the different civilization, and that problem is basically already covered by the culture system. Making the religions each tie themselves to one culture would just be a different way to represent the already-existing culture system. It would be redundant.

@Vishaing: Great thinking as always (on the non-state Paganism and obsoleting Altars). You never cease to surprise me with extremely efficient, well-integrating ideas of implementing features and solutions to problems.