Pantheon balance

[Strec]

Well, Godking provides 1 faith per turn for every 6 followers, you calculated how many followers you would need to get 400 faith in one turn .
Same goes with Ancestor worship.

Godking give 1 faith for 4 citizen I indicate you need 400 citizen. You are right, if you count 2 shrines it's less, maybe 150 citizens? 100? Even at 100 citizens, how many turns? Maybe I would indicate undoable, but by Funak

It also feels really weird to assume that you'll get more tiles affected by purified water than by either of the resource based ones

You forget tiles are Lakes, Marsh or Oasis. I often have 6 tiles of lakes and marsh together. We will say you are right, It's rare to have 6 Lakes or 6 Marshes or 6 Oasis.

Honestly, the whole thing feels a little bit weird. I mean you somehow assumes it takes 230 turns to get to 400 faith with fertility rites (providing 4 faith per turn).

Arf, I did a mistake! Give the whip please!!! It's a typo, it's 130 (30 + 100). Ha? It doesn't change things? Sorry, I would have help

3) the Sacred Path pantheon is really strong right now. Playing a hotseat game now, picked up the pantheon when I had 2 cities and it immediately gave me +8 faith and +4-5 culture. 4 faith/city is not that impressive, I know, but this pantheon doesn't require improvements. This meant religion after exactly 45 turns (that is, had I not settled any more cities). It took me longer to get a pantheon than to get a religion.

So I assume you got the religion near turn 90? It's more precise than my aproximation, no problem. It seems correct because it's very dependant of the starting area.

edit: I'm trying for personal use (or public, code is free) some pantheon adding based on a gameplay idea.

I make variants of the resources based pantheons with +2 faith and +1 of another yield (gold, production, ....) placed on temple : if you want a religion and have it you will surely build temples and the followers, guided by a priest in the temple will increase the yield.

For example :
Productive tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 production on temple
Rich tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 gold on temple
Feeding tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 food on temple
...

 

[Funak]

Godking give 1 faith for 4 citizen I indicate you need 400 citizen. You are right, if you count 2 shrines it's less, maybe 150 citizens? 100? Even at 100 citizens, how many turns? Maybe I would indicate undoable, but by Funak

I still can't tell if you're trolling me of if you can't count.
If you get 1 faith per 4 citizens, to get 400 faith in 80 turns would require an average of 20 citizens in your cities during that 80 turn period. If we average that out with some basic population-growth, let's keep it low, maybe one growth per 5 turns that shrinks down to a starting population of about 16 citizens, and this is not counting any faith from shrines. Adding shrines to that and you need a starting population of about 10 citizens.
I'm not saying it is amazing by any means, but it is a powerful scaling effect.

You forget tiles are Lakes, Marsh or Oasis. I often have 6 tiles of lakes and marsh together. We will say you are right, It's rare to have 6 Lakes or 6 Marshes or 6 Oasis.

You must be amazing at playing the netherlands, because I can never find my than 2 lakes/marshes within expandable range of my starting location.

Arf, I did a mistake! Give the whip please!!! It's a typo, it's 130 (30 + 100). Ha? It doesn't change things? Sorry, I would have help

Your math still makes no sense, and also if you were going for this strategy you would naturally settle more cities as you have no need to spam improvements. It also leaves you open to work better tiles than those 2 faith goldmines that you're forced to work when going for earthmother. Not to mention the extra growth and food is a decent enough longterm effect.

I make variants of the resources based pantheons with +2 faith and +1 of another yield (gold, production, ....) placed on temple : if you want a religion and have it you will surely build temples and the followers, guided by a priest in the temple will increase the yield.

For example :
Productive tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 production on temple
Rich tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 gold on temple
Feeding tradition : +2 faith on plantations, +1 food on temple

This sounds really boring to be honest, the current pantheons are fun because they are each pretty unique, just cloning them would ruin that.

 

[Strec]

I still can't tell if you're trolling me of if you can't count.
If you get 1 faith per 4 citizens, to get 400 faith in 80 turns would require an average of 20 citizens in your cities during that 80 turn period. If we average that out with some basic population-growth, let's keep it low, maybe one growth per 5 turns that shrinks down to a starting population of about 16 citizens, and this is not counting any faith from shrines. Adding shrines to that and you need a starting population of about 10 citizens.
I'm not saying it is amazing by any means, but it is a powerful scaling effect.

To match your maths :

• You have instant shrine and instant settler in you first town (and in the second)?
• You count the pops growing before shrines and settle builds?
• Perhaps you can have a pop grow every 5 turn but I can't, I've difficulty to grown while I build (very early) settler (and even while buildind shrine, but less)

I'm not trolling.

You must be amazing at playing the netherlands, because I can never find my than 2 lakes/marshes within expandable range of my starting location.

It's not the first time I remark we may not use the same maps (without trolling). On mines I often start in marshes/jungle (there are a lot of jungles) and lakes (but not often in desert).

Your math still makes no sense, and also if you were going for this strategy you would naturally settle more cities as you have no need to spam improvements. It also leaves you open to work better tiles than those 2 faith goldmines that you're forced to work when going for earthmother. Not to mention the extra growth and food is a decent enough longterm effect.

What to say? For sure.

This sounds really boring to be honest, the current pantheons are fun because they are each pretty unique, just cloning them would ruin that.

I agree. I would prefer have more varied pantheons too, if they permit to get a religion.

 

[Funak]

To match your maths :

• You have instant shrine and instant settler in you first town (and in the second)?
• You count the pops growing before shrines and settle builds?
• Perhaps you can have a pop grow every 5 turn but I can't, I've difficulty to grown while I build (very early) settler (and even while buildind shrine, but less)

I'm not trolling.

I'm counting turns from the turn you get the pantheon(honestly counting anything before that just makes no sense), at which point I assume you have two cities, one most likely with a shrine and the other one close to getting one.
One pop-growth every 5 turns in either of the cities is pretty pessimistic in the first place, using tradition you could probably get a pop every 4 turns in just your capital especially if you have decent bonus-resources nearby. Realistically you would probably have more cities, more shrines and so on.

Again I'm not saying that this pantheon generates as much faith as Earthmother, with 3 nearby mines, you would need a population of 24 just to match the faith-income of the mines. However Ancestor worship continues to scale well into the game and also strengthens your early policy-gain by a big deal.

God King being even more amazing late-game, providing 4 yields per 6 followers, comparing pretty well to the followerbeliefs that provide 3 yields per 6 followers.

These are pantheons you can go for if your civ of choice already have a pretty strong religious bonus, think Byzantine (who doesn't really care about faith income), Maya(if the UI starts being useful), Ethiopia(assuming you expand enough to secure a religion with your UB) or anyone managing to build the Stonehenge.

 

[Strec]

30 turns is the average to build a shrine and get a pantheon, with a not advantaged civ.

I nothing make sense for you I can only hope this is not the case for others readers (if there are anymore...)

Each time I speak statistic, average and generally you respond with specific case, I can't argue more we never speak of the same subject so I'll consolidate my thoughts and apply consequences. Sorry.

 

[hokath]

Strec I'm not sure what you're on about. Manifestly it takes less than 400 citizens to get a religion with ancestor worship.

Now if at turn 30 you have just got you second city and pantheon - one shrine.

I'm assuming about 6 pop in capital (and 1 pop in second city) at this point. I'm assuming faith gains are always rounded down (not sure if true). Clearly this pantheon is geared for population growth strategy so it makes sense to be tradition.

1pop/5turns empire wide and a shrine as first build in second city.
Losing 8 turns of growth to build a third city at about turn 50, then that gets a shrine 10 turns later and reduces the time between pop growths to 4turns.

You get the following graph for accumulated faith.
There is the faith policy in tradition, but I'm not sure when would be normal.
Clearly if you want a religion at turn 80 you will need a)stonehendge b)religiousCS or c)uniquebuilding or improvement.

 

[Strec]

Ok, perhaps I did mistakes with some pantheons, I can agree with that but was I wanted to show was the difference between the resource oriented pantheons and the others.

We can say that resource oriented pantheons are very powerful at starting and less and less performant as the game advance.

Some others seems more and more performant as the game advance but so powerless at start that you will never grab a religion with them, so ...

Let's be extreme and invent a pantheon giving 1 faith for every 10 turns and 1 free policy every 10 turns after your religion is ehanced. Will you try it?

That was the first problem. I like to the various pantheons but it will be better if we can use them

I agree that religious civs must have an advantage but if you get, for a standard map (there are 8 civs and 4 religions), a classical case with 1 religious civ and an other getting Stonehenge you have 2 possibilities to compete with other civs.

The second problem is that this possibility is pure luck. You can't have THE (sometimes one of the 2) pantheon corresponding with your ressources you are out.

So making a few variations of resource based pantheons can introduce more equity in this area of playing.

 

[callmewoof]

Ok, perhaps I did mistakes with some pantheons, I can agree with that but was I wanted to show was the difference between the resource oriented pantheons and the others.

We can say that resource oriented pantheons are very powerful at starting and less and less performant as the game advance.

Some others seems more and more performant as the game advance but so powerless at start that you will never grab a religion with them, so ...

Let's be extreme and invent a pantheon giving 1 faith for every 10 turns and 1 free policy every 10 turns after your religion is ehanced. Will you try it?

That was the first problem. I like to the various pantheons but it will be better if we can use them

I agree that religious civs must have an advantage but if you get, for a standard map (there are 8 civs and 4 religions), a classical case with 1 religious civ and an other getting Stonehenge you have 2 possibilities to compete with other civs.

The second problem is that this possibility is pure luck. You can't have THE (sometimes one of the 2) pantheon corresponding with your ressources you are out.

So making a few variations of resource based pantheons can introduce more equity in this area of playing.

I think that there should be some Pantheons that are better than others. It rewards those who rush a religion, get good RNG (natural wonders, etc), or have a religion-oriented civ.

If everything was perfectly balanced, it sounds nice on paper, but then it wouldn't matter who you played or what you did, because everything was equally perfect for you. I think succeeding at Civ (or any 4X game) is 20% planning and 80% adapting that plan.

And yes, RNG plays a big role. But then again, it plays a role whether you start next to 3 salts and have a godly start, or whether you get to suffer from tundra furs. It also determines if you start next to Venice or Shaka. Religion is just another part of the randomness.

Honestly, you are right, you can't always get a religion, even if you rush the heck out of it. That's on purpose though. It's the same reason why you can get beaten out of a World Wonder with 1 turn left to finish it. Make it 100% reliable for any player who wants it, and it becomes meta. Vanilla game, you have almost a 100% mapped out perfect research path, with a near perfect build order, etc. Thank god CP changes that.

Aim for the stars, settle for the heavens /rant

 

[Apostremo]

Do you guys think godking is balanced? I feel it's way too good. So obviously it's worse at the beginning so it's harder to get a religion, which you need to not lose it. Maybe it's balanced around that it's very hard to get a religion. But if manage to get a religion, it suddenly gets the power of a additional belief way better than any pantheon. Lol even better than comparable beliefs:

God-King: 1 Yield per 1.5 follower, no limits
Other Beliefs: 1 Yield per 2 follower, limited to 15

And don't forget some civs are more or less have a easy way to get a religion (like byz.) or you could have Mt.Sinai and take it then or something.

 

[Funak]

Do you guys think godking is balanced? I feel it's way too good. So obviously it's worse at the beginning so it's harder to get a religion, which you need to not lose it. Maybe it's balanced around that it's very hard to get a religion. But if manage to get a religion, it suddenly gets the power of a additional belief way better than any pantheon. Lol even better than comparable beliefs:

God-King: 1 Yield per 1.5 follower, no limits
Other Beliefs: 1 Yield per 2 follower, limited to 15

And don't forget some civs are more or less have a easy way to get a religion (like byz.) or you could have Mt.Sinai and take it then or something.

Honestly, it is really hard to make God-King work. Faith-heavy pantheon is pretty much mandatory for getting a religion. It is a nice thing to have there, for sure, but I don't think it is overpowered. I mean when was the last time you saw someone found a religion with the God-king pantheon?

Also, the yields provided by God-king are pretty weak, I mean science, gold, faith are all yields that suffer from crazy inflation around mid to late game.

 

[Apostremo]

Honestly, it is really hard to make God-King work. Faith-heavy pantheon is pretty much mandatory for getting a religion. It is a nice thing to have there, for sure, but I don't think it is overpowered. I mean when was the last time you saw someone found a religion with the God-king pantheon?

The problem is that you can take it only in cases where you have other sources of faith. It's like saying vanilla desert folklore is bad because deserts are rare. But if you have deserts... ?

 

[Strec]

Honestly, you are right, you can't always get a religion, even if you rush the heck out of it.

No problem with that, I agree concerning having the religion. It's a long time (compared to pantheon) and if you can focus any to get the needed faith, your fault.

But the subject is getting a pantheon, 35 turns? Maybe 50? If you are not lucky (here the skill or experience play very less) you can not even TRY to grab a religion

 

[callmewoof]

No problem with that, I agree concerning having the religion. It's a long time (compared to pantheon) and if you can focus any to get the needed faith, your fault.

But the subject is getting a pantheon, 35 turns? Maybe 50? If you are not lucky (here the skill or experience play very less) you can not even TRY to grab a religion

Oops, you're right. Pantheon =/= Religion.

 

[Funak]

The problem is that you can take it only in cases where you have other sources of faith. It's like saying vanilla desert folklore is bad because deserts are rare. But if you have deserts... ?

Again, have you actually seen someone founding a religion with it? If it isn't actually used it probably isn't overpowered, right?

Also, being a belief, it's not like you get to keep it yourself, when you spread your religion all other civs will benefit from it as well.


Also I find it kinda interesting that you're complaining about God-kings 4 yields per 6 pop, when the celts have a pantheon giving 4 yields per 3 pop

 

[Daya]

An approach to increase the playability of weak pantheons (god king etc.) would be to add some new scattered terrain-features / resources which actually yield faith (like some exce features).
I played with Exce for while in the past which for example had occasional "Lotus"-tiles on lakes (usual yields +1 faith) and several other possible sources (tribes).
I really enjoyed not having to go shrine first all the time and could actually think about grabbing more long-term oriented / less early-faith pantheons (if I got really lucky with my lands of course).
I guess if you're lands would allow it, you could even get a religion with god-king now and then

 

[Funak]

An approach to increase the playability of weak pantheons (god king etc.) would be to add some new scattered terrain-features / resources which actually yield faith (like some exce features).
I played with Exce for while in the past which for example had occasional "Lotus"-tiles on lakes (usual yields +1 faith) and several other possible sources (tribes).
I really enjoyed not having to go shrine first all the time and could actually think about grabbing more long-term oriented / less early-faith pantheons (if I got really lucky with my lands of course).
I guess if you're lands would allow it, you could even get a religion with god-king now and then

Or, people who like those things could just play with Exce enabled?
I mean it does strive to be compatible, atleast last time I checked.

 

[Strec]

As I'm testing heavily Authority I've tested God of War, thinking it's the natural pantheon for conquerors.

So, I try to be precise and advantaging to avoid some cristicism.

Considering :
You have 100 turns to grab a religion (in my games it's 80-90 turns so...)

• At turn 10 you one city with shrine
• At turn 40 you have a second town with a shrine
• At turn 40 you get God Of War
• At turn 40 you have an army to search and kill the barbarians

I think it's difficult to have all that but maybe ...

So from turn 10 to 40 you gain 1 faith from shrine so 40 faith
From 40 to 100 you gain 2 faith from shrines so 120 faith

So at turn 100 you have 160 faith from passive income and need 240 faith from any kills to get a prophet.

As I've seen you gain 5 faith per kill, so in 60 turns you must have done 48 kill (240/5) so 1 kill evry 1.25 turns (60/48).

Even with 10 faith per kill you need 24 kills (240/10) so one kill every 2.5 turn. Perhaps is it doable but it must be difficult.

So conclusion, having a religion is as easy as being competitive with Authority and we can say the two are really done to go together

 

[scientic]

I completely agree with the points about God of the Sea. +1 Faith per Fishing Boats is absolutely awful, especially when you consider the tundra Pantheon (the name escapes me as I type this...) which gives +2 Faith, +1 Culture, AND +1 Production. The +2 Food for coastal cities doesn't offset this well enough at all.

Perhaps a +2 Faith and +1 Food for Fishing Boats might be better?

Also, during my last game it occurred to me that there is no Pantheon available if you're settling on or near Snow and Ice. Maybe something along the lines of +1 Faith for every 2 Snow tiles, and +1 Culture for every 2 Ice tiles near a city?

 

[Funak]

I completely agree with the points about God of the Sea. +1 Faith per Fishing Boats is absolutely awful, especially when you consider the tundra Pantheon (the name escapes me as I type this...) which gives +2 Faith, +1 Culture, AND +1 Production. The +2 Food for coastal cities doesn't offset this well enough at all.

Perhaps a +2 Faith and +1 Food for Fishing Boats might be better?

Also, during my last game it occurred to me that there is no Pantheon available if you're settling on or near Snow and Ice. Maybe something along the lines of +1 Faith for every 2 Snow tiles, and +1 Culture for every 2 Ice tiles near a city?

+2 food in every coastal city is a pretty powerful effect, easily comparable to +2 culture from markets(oral tradition), +2 production from monuments(earth mother) or +2 culture from granaries (Sun King). However the bonus kinda needs to increase to +2 faith per fishing boat/atoll, because fishingboats are even harder to get up than plantations, mines or farms.
Sure I mean I've seen cities with 6 water resources in workable range, that's a massive 12 faith, pretty powerful. But I've also seen cities with 4 or 5 tiles of wheat within workable range providing just as much faith.

 

[Strec]

+2 food in every coastal city is a pretty powerful effect

I rarely see coastal cities lacking food but often coastal cities lacking production so the effect is not so powerful if you already have plenty of food, because of the hunapinness when towns grow to quick.