If I may, I'd like to take another round to communally look at our Pantheons and tweak them, aiming for perfection. Some discussion has been going on in the "Balance - Religion and Faith" thread, however Pantheons deserve their own. I'm calling this "Second Edition" because it's following-up on a thread that existed something like 8 months ago.
What I'm going to do is break up the Pantheons as we know them into thematic groups, that way we can compare them within their groups and against one another. Secondly, I'm going to offer a "Faith counter" of sorts - it is as close as I can get to what each Pantheon is offering in terms of Faith for the early-game moving towards getting a Religion, and what each Pantheon offers after the founding of Religions for the rest of the game as a whole. With these notes marked, I'll offer my ideas for tweaks within the context that makes sense both in short-term and long-term themes; bearing in mind that I'm not merely accounting for Faith, but for any other yields a Pantheon is offering. I will admit that I'm being reserved in my estimates - but my reservedness is global, so if my estimates are generally low, at least they're low on an equal plane (admitting my bias in the data - invitation to PLEASE OFFER CORRECTION).
I'll also be pulling from various ideas and comments I've seen in the other thread and making notes where appropriate. The "Baseline" that I am assuming for Faith generation will be the "resource Pantheons" - I'll be comparing everything else generally against those.
And thus we go.
For reference, here are the "Faith points" I'm using to weigh some strengths/weaknesses of some Pantheons.
PF (Pocket Faith) - About how much Faith one can realistically expect around turn 50 assuming normal circumstances (points to how much "oumph" the Pantheon has towards generating a Religion - I'm assuming 2 or 3 cities even though theoretically you could certainly have more, and that the player is being somewhat intentional of aiming for more of a particular resource if that's what he wants for more Faith generation).
Keep in mind that I'm NOT including Shrines in the calculation - it's strictly what the Pantheon can provide. That said, if there's a building the Pantheon offers that provides Faith, I may or may not include it, because if you want to dive for a Religion, building a Shrine in your expansions could offer you more than a building related to your Pantheon (thus, a waste of time for calculating Religion purposes).
CF (Constant Faith) - Roughly how much Faith per city on average you might be getting out of this in the long term.
SECTION I - RESOURCE PANTHEONS
As pointed out in the other thread (Moi Magnus), these Pantheons generally have no scalers for Faith, and so while they can be decent at the beginning, their usefulness from a Religious perspective sort of takes a gradual dive. I have a suggestion for a small scaling idea that would keep these balanced in terms of Religion early-on and strengthen them later, but we'll get to that at each one.
Earth Mother
+1 Faith and +1 Gold from Mines on improved resources, and +2 Production from Monuments.
PF - 4
CF - 2
Commentary: If there's an issue with this Pantheon, it's that some Mines aren't exactly practical to use right at the beginning, as they don't give Food - thus you'll be sacrificing precious growth of your city in order to gain the Faith/other bonuses from this Pantheon.
Thought: It occurs to me that a really boring +1 Food in every city would help mitigate the aforementioned problem, but it's not entirely out of place as food comes from the Earth.
Suggestion: If the Faith of this Pantheon was buffed to 2 at the Medieval Age, it would stand its ground a little better for the remainder of the game. Alternatively, we could pick a Medieval-Aged building to offer +2 Faith.
God of Craftsmen
+1 Faith and +1 Gold from Quarries and Stone Works, and +2 Production in cities with a Specialist.
PF - 4
CF - 3
Commentary: I couldn't help but notice that this Pantheon is effectively identical to Earth Mother in terms of its yields, which is pretty boring. This also means that it suffers from exactly the same problem as the other one, so my general ideas wouldn't be any different. However, it could be interesting to swap some of the yields for other things - as Craftsmanship often has Culture tied to it somehow. The bonus on the Stone Works makes up for the fact that it takes longer to research - I think?
Thought: Perhaps we could swap the Gold from either the Quarry or the Stone Works to Culture instead.
Suggestion: Buff the Faith of the Pantheon to 2 at Medieval so it keeps up with things. Alternatively, we could pick a Medieval-Aged building to offer +2 Faith.
God of the Open Sky
+1 Culture for every 3 featureless Plains or Grassland tiles (without hills or features) worked by a City; +1 Faith and +1 Gold from Pastures.
PF - 5
CF - 3/4
Commentary: Whereas this Pantheon's side-bonus (culture from featureless Plains/Grassland) used to be unreasonably strong before, the fact that the tiles need to be WORKED now makes this part of the Pantheon effectively useless. Think of it: if I actually have Pastures to build or really any other resource to work, why would I be working the featureless Plains or Grasslands? I have to assume that the early-game culture output of this Pantheon is going to be roughly 0. On the other hand, we like to be kind to Goddess of Nature because Mountains provide nothing and are unworkable - but the truth of the matter is that nothing save the most enormous cities ever work all their tiles anyways, so building a city in the middle of a Mountain range really doesn't cost you anything. Consequently, it doesn't really make sense to me that God of the Open Sky should be penalized because Grasslands/Plains are useful, since they'll never all be worked, either. If we're talking about truly featureless tiles with NOTHING on them - I can't help but wonder if just planting a Culture on every single Grassland/Plains tile wouldn't be okay, but only if it is WORKED (working only the boring tiles for culture). It's a thought. In any case, I generally assume that this Pantheon is stronger than others in the Faith department as Sheep/Horses/Cattle tend to show up more often than other things and don't take away from your food when using them.
Thought: Buff secondary Culture ability as per working tiles: 1:1 even seems not too bad (you can't work them ALL and the Pastures, too).
Suggestion: Give the Stables a +2 Faith bonus as a scaler for the Medieval Era.
God of the Sea
+1 Faith and +1 Production from Fishing Boats and Atolls; +3 Food in coastal Cities.
PF - 4/5
CF - 2/3
Commentary: Moi Magnus pointed out that you need to reveal Fish before knowing the full extent of the usefulness of this Pantheon, and Funak pointed out that you'd probably aim for it if you had decent access to Crabs/Whales. However, I think that if the player has enough of the resource he needs (whatever you constitute as "enough"), it's pretty solid as it offers the things you want most early in the game: Food and Production. Can't complain!
Suggestion: Add +2 Faith to the Harbor for scaling effect.
God of the Stars and Sky
+2 Faith, +2 Production, and +2 Culture from Tundra tiles with improved resources.
PF - 8/10
CF - 4/6
Commentary: As most have pointed out, this Pantheon takes a bad start in Tundra and makes it not bad. The issue however is with the Faith generation, which seems like a bit overkill as it's TOO reliable - double the Faith generation as any of the neighbors is actually quite alot. I have an alternative that could be worthwhile, though.
Suggestion 1: Instead of the above, the Pantheon could read, "+1 Faith from all Tundra tiles; +2 Production and +2 Culture from Tundra tiles with improved resources." This would enable the same flexibility of usefulness out of the improved resources without catapulting the player to a Religion, while on the other hand letting the player dab into small Faith bonuses here and there through other relevant Tundra tiles (Forests and Hills).
Suggestion 2: The scaler for this Pantheon could simply be that an additional +1 Faith is added to the improved resources in the Medieval Era.
Goddess of Festivals
+2 Faith, +2 Culture and +2 Gold for every unique Luxury Resource you control.
PF - 6
CF - N/A
Commentary: My presumption is that this Pantheon does NOT include resources traded in or acquired from City-States, but I could be wrong. Either way, however, the bonus is decent now since the upgrade and naturally scales as you gain more territory, so I don't really see a need at the moment to modify this. A note that I made the CF "not applicable" because whereas you can average out 1-3 Mines near any given city, this kind of calculation just won't work, here.
Goddess of Purity
+1 Faith and +1 Food from Oases, Lakes, and Marshes; +1 Happiness from Cities on rivers.
PF - 4/5
CF - N/A
Commentary: If you have a good Lake start, then this will net some decent starting Faith and make your city grow quickly. However, I don't find Lakes to be as reliable as other "resource" types, nor Oases, nor Marshes, so I'd tend to thing that the Faith benefits will fall off in the long run, even though the Happiness will be a boon throughout the game.
Suggestion: Perhaps +1 or +2 Faith from Baths would be a nice touch for later-game development.
Goddess of Springtime
+1 Faith and +1 Culture from Plantations, and +2 Gold from Markets.
PF - 3/4
CF - 2
Commentary: Definitely a weaker Pantheon in my opinion from the Faith perspective, as the tech isn't immediately accessible, and one often needs to cut down trees/jungle to access some of the resources you want to improve.
Suggestion: Is it possible to give the chopping wood ability to Workers simply from taking this Pantheon? If not, oh, well...anyways, we could give +2 Faith to Gardens here for scaling purposes.
Goddess of the Hunt
+1 Faith, +1 Food and +1 Culture from Camps.
PF - 5
CF - 2
Commentary: My experience with Camps is that they tend to be more rare than other resource types, but when they do show up, there's lots of them. And the bonus offered here is pretty solid and useful. I can't see any reason to change it.
Thought: I can't help but wonder, however, what a synthesis between Goddess of Renewal and Goddess of the Hunt would look like. That is, dump one of the bonuses from the Camp and leave it to the other "half" of the Pantheon: they're both mostly Forest-dependent, so it could work nicely.
Suggestion: For a scaler...I don't know what, but something that adds Faith somewhere.
(suggest something and I'll edit the post)
Spirit of the Desert
+2 Faith, +2 Food and +2 Gold from Desert tiles with Improved resources.
PF - 8/10
CF - 6
Commentary: Much like the Tundra Pantheon, this transforms a bad start into a good start - but the Faith boon is a bit overkill, I think.
Suggestion: Like Tundra, switch the Pantheon to "+1 Faith on all Desert tiles; +2 Food and +2 Gold from Desert tiles with Improved resources." Again, this could be offered an additional +1 Faith on the improved resource tiles when we hit Medieval Era for scaling. I think this would be weaker than the Tundra version, though (as Desert tiles tend to be less interesting), but not *that* much weaker.
God of the Sun
+2 Food, +1 Gold from Granaries. +1 Faith and +2 Culture from Farms on Wheat.
PF - 3
CF - 2
Commentary: This Pantheon is at one and the same time really awesome, and really difficult to assess: you'll get amazing yields from your Granaries and for whatever Wheat you have around, yet Wheat isn't common everywhere, so it can certainly scale down with time. The immense Culture that can come from it in a good spot is a real boon, making me think the Gold on the Granaries is probably unnecessary. In any case, it could probably use a scaler for later on in the game.
Suggestion: Faith yield on Wheat buffed to 2 in the Medieval Age. Actually, the +1 Gold on Granaries could be initially removed, but then recovered at the Medieval Age, and this seems okay.
SECTION II - SORT OF RESOURCE PANTHEONS
These are basically the left-over Pantheons that more or less follow the same set of rules as what I've called the "resource Pantheons," without actually having a real resource attached to them. I think that their main characteristic is that we haven't figured out how to balance them well, yet...
Goddess of Nature
+1 Faith and +1 Culture for every 2 Mountains within 3 tiles of a City, and Natural Wonders gain +3 Faith and +2 Culture.
PF - 3-16
CF - 3
Commentary: Reality is that Mountains aren't everywhere, and neither are Natural Wonders. Actually, the bonus for the Natural Wonder, when you think of it, isn't *that* impressive - it'll be overshadowed by most Resource Pantheons soon enough as improvements get built, and you can't just go and find Natural Wonders anywhere. The bonus for the Natural Wonder is that you get it instantly, and so it's a useful jump. This may or may not be enough to get you a Religion.
In reality, where I think the real power in this Pantheon is lies in the Mountains bonus: as I mentioned earlier, since not all tiles are worked by any city anyways, it doesn't really matter if there are a bunch of Mountains around (and should you start with many Mountains in your initial city radius, the bonus Culture will expand you to new usable tiles soon enough). So a good plot in the middle of the Mountains can easily and instantly snatch you 3 to 5 Culture/Faith each. And as far as I can tell, the same Mountain can function for more than one city at once - so all you need to do is settle a couple of cities, and you can be generating 15 Faith effortlessly from this Pantheon. Suffice it to say, I'm confident to submit that the present form of this half of the Pantheon is overpowered.
Suggestion: Drop the Faith/Culture generation for Mountains back down to 1 for 3. Even this may not be enough, but baby steps. I don't think scaling is required, here.
Goddess of Renewal
+1 Faith and +1 Culture for every 2 Jungle or 2 Forest tiles worked by a City; +1 Science and +1 Faith from Herbalists.
PF - Incalculable
CF - At least 1
Commentary: The issue with the former automatic version of this Pantheon is that most found it too strong. The issue with the present version of it is that it seems pretty evidently too weak. You pretty much need a Forest/Jungle without resources in it for this to be useful, because any resources in the forest save Deer/Truffles will cut down your Forest/Jungle (thus less relevant tiles to work); otherwise, if you have lots of Deer/Truffles in your vicinity, I'm wondering why you aren't just going with Goddess of the Hunt. So yeah, the issue here is that this IN THEORY looks pretty solid, but in reality one ends up chopping down half the trees one wants to use in order to access the resources that are there. Not very helpful!
Suggestion 1: My first honest suggestion is a merger with Goddess of the Hunt. Yes, I know - it means that there won't be 2 forest-related Pantheons, and that's boring. Maybe so. But it'll make sense. And I hope to tackle some of the more generic Pantheons so it's not like you'll be SOL if you're in the middle of a forest. If Camps were generating Faith/Gold, and Jungles/Forests were generating Culture, with the Herbalist as a side-bonus, this could be interesting.
Suggestion 2: Workshop could provide Faith scaling by offering an additional +2 Faith. Now I wonder: Could we go back to the old passive way of calculating the Faith/Culture from Forests/Jungles, BUT with a condition? Instead of "within 3 tiles of a city," make the condition to be, "within the city's borders." That way, it's not a huge automatic bonus, but instead is gained gradually through gaining tiles. I feel like this would be a better solution if it is possible.
SECTION III - SCALERS
Scalers are all the Pantheons that intrinsically generate more and more Faith as the game progresses, and consequently don't need anything to scale for them because their long-term Faith generation will naturally be massive. I consider as a consequence, however, that if there are long-term benefits, then some of the short-term benefits (namely, non-Faith yields) need to be less pronounced, as they tend to be here: whereas in Resource Pantheons, you will have a Faith and a Culture or a Faith and a Gold per tile; any Culture/Gold in these Pantheons tends to be associated with a single building, a single bonus per city, and that's all you get: the focus is on Faith generation. The challenge is making it fair enough in the early game so all the Pantheons don't end up being niche picks for individual Civilizations.
Ancestor Worship
+1 Faith for every 4 Citizens in a city; +1 Culture and +1 Faith from Councils.
PF - 4
CF - N/A
Commentary: My instinct here tells me that there's something wrong, especially when you put it into relation with other Pantheons. God-King, for example, offers 4 yields for every 6 population; whereas Ancestor Worship is offering 1.5 yields for every 6 population. I'd suggest that Ancestor Worship isn't quite holding up its end of the deal, and isn't really distinctive enough - for example, whereas God-King could be a generic yield Pantheon, Ancestor Worship has the opportunity to be a Faith muscle Pantheon. It's also not like you're going to get anything but your Capital (if that) up to 8 population by the time Religions show up - not to mention that if you want to push the Faith bonuses of having enough Citizens, you either need to stand by till 4 population in your Capital before making a Settler, or just not having Faith in the Capital while making Settlers. Either way, you lose out. I think that a buff is warranted here - but I am wary of the possibility of overpoweredness on account of the Council's presence.
Suggestion: Let's bring Ancestor Worship back down to 1 Faith per 3 Citizens in a city - it will be more potent for the early game without being overwhelming, and be very worthy for its sheer power later on, strictly in Faith. If we're worried about its being too strong early on, my suggestion would be to eliminate the Council's bonus to Faith, to Culture, or to just wipe out that aspect of the Pantheon altogether to leave it as a super-Faith generating Pantheon.
God of Commerce
+1 Faith for every 20 Gold produced by owned cities; +2 Faith and +2 Gold in Cities with a City Connection.
PF - 3/5
CF - N/A
Commentary: The question I have to ask (since this is one I haven't tested) is whether the Gold produced for Faith is coming from total GPT, or GPT BEFORE expenses. If it's the former, I'm worried this is too weak. If it's the latter, then I'd say it's fine and nothing needs to be done to it. A Merchant would do well with this.
God of the Expanse
+25% faster border growth, and gain 20 Faith every time a city expands its borders. Bonus scales with Gamespeed.
PF - I have no idea.
CF - I have no idea.
Commentary: A while ago, I posted a game review in the game review thread in the other forum that explained what happens when this Pantheon scales by Era, and consequently why that should never be allowed in the future. Let's just say that with the old, more expensive Great Prophet prices, I was easily affording them into the 25000's of Faith and wasn't putting up much of a sweat. However, I haven't really tested it since then, and am at a loss to give an analysis, because so many things can so easily affect Border Growth (well, Culture...). But to keep up with the other Pantheons at the current Faith yield, we'd be talking about a border expansion every 5 turns, which seems rather extreme. So my instinct tells me that it needs a buff, but I don't know how much...
Suggestion: Actually, if I was going to buff it, I'd even be inclined to say to make the Border Growth modifier something much higher like 100%, and let that run the show. Could be a fun side-bonus to run. But anyways, like I said - needs a buff of some kind.
God of War
+50% increase in City Ranged Combat Strength, and gain Faith if you win a battle.
PF - Indeterminable.
CF - Indeterminable.
Commentary: I recall pushing for this to be strengthened, as once upon a time it was rather awful to depend on it and really you could never get a Religion out of it, even if it was fun in theory. However now, I'd say it's a bit too strong (and I know this from experience, as it's a favorite of mine). The Faith from kills naturally scales so well with unit power growth and number of cities, that especially in the late game, I'd consider it one of the most reliable sources of Faith there is. It doesn't need a BIG nerf, but a nerf nonetheless.
Suggestion 1: First off, let's move the +50% increase in City Ranged Combat Strength over to the Goddess of Defence - God of War just doesn't need it, and it fits better with Goddess of Defence. God of War will be generating so much Faith and this is its specialty; let's let the defensive Goddess enjoy blowing stuff up with her cities.
Suggestion 2: From the current value of how Faith is generated on kills, I'd say that a 5-10% reduction is warranted, but really I think 5% would be enough. Between this and the removal of the City Ranged Combat Strength bonus, I'm inclined to believe that it would be right on.
God-King
+1 Culture, +1 Faith, +1 Gold, and +1 Science for every 6 Followers.
PF - 2
CF - N/A
Commentary: I see lots of discussion about whether this is really useless or really powerful, and I guess when you think about it, they're both totally true assessments. What it really comes down to, though, is that you're not really going to get a Religion from this Pantheon without a ton of help from external stuff. What this makes me think of, though, is that if this Pantheon is depending on externals to gain a Religion, anyways, why not make that the theme? As follows...
Suggestion: I seem to recall that we once had another Pantheon around that seems to no longer be around, that gave only NON-FAITH yields whenever a Border Expansion occurred (correct me if I'm wrong). How about we run with this? Let's dump the Faith aspect from the "every 6 Followers" and keep the rest, while adding a bunch of non-Faith yields every time you have a Border Expansion. Thus, this Pantheon will never actually yield any Faith and be in its own unique department whereby it just offers the believer some crazy good yields that are of benefit directly to the Empire. I think it would be a very fun alternative.
Goddess of Love
Gain 10 Faith and 10 Golden Age Points every time a Citizen is born. Bonus scales with Era and Gamespeed.
PF - 2/3
CF - N/A
Commentary: Realistically, I need to assume a population point every 10 turns or so in the early game (barring some amazing circumstances), which puts this at about 1 Faith per turn per city, which is one of the worst yields of any Pantheon out there. It might be able to manage in competition later on, but yeah...this needs a buff.
Suggestion: Boost the Faith per Citizen born to either 20 or 25. The Golden Age Points could stay the same or increase, but I don't think putting them at 15 would be a bad choice.
Goddess of Wisdom
+1 Faith for every 10 Science per turn. +1 Science and +1 Faith in every City.
PF - 4
CF - N/A
Commentary: I'd say that early-game Faith generation for this Pantheon ultimately depends on making expansions, which isn't a bad thing. After that, I imagine it would hold its own pretty well where science is concerned. One must ask how this stacks up against God of Commerce - if God of Commerce is based on income before expenses, then I'd say they're pretty even, and essentially no change is needed apart from minor ones. Need to test myself some more.
SECTION IV - THE ODDBALLS
These are the Pantheons that fit absolutely nowhere else, play by their own rules, and for the most part depend on particular buildings for Faith generation, which can be weird because you need the right techs and lots of production to make things work at times. They can be both fun, but stupid...
God of All Creation
+3 Faith in Capital; +1 Culture and +1 Happiness for every Pantheon ever founded (including this one).
PF - 3
CF - N/A
Commentary: Most that I've read have been saying that this Pantheon is overpowered - and overall, I'm inclined to agree: it's early-game benefits are immensely powerful and undeniable. However, its peculiarity is that it has a swift decline and crash shortly after the early game...but it may not matter, as you may have won the game by then (slight exaggeration). I will agree that it needs to be curbed somehow, but none of our current attempts have really solved the problem of either not making it strong too early or making it a miserable failure later on: furthermore, it often robs someone of a Religion slot.
Suggestion 1: I'm not the first to suggest this (re: Funak), and I won't be the last: but I'm inclined to just say delete it. But that may be a bit harsh.
Suggestion 2: We can keep this Pantheon being the magical Pantheon that gives instant great bonuses, while still having it not be too powerful early on and not crash as badly later. Here's my idea.
First off, we need to stop tying it to other people's Pantheons...
+1 Faith, +2 Culture, and +3 Happiness in Capital; an additional +1 Faith, +2 Culture, and +1 Happiness per Era reached.
Translation: This means that when you take the Pantheon, you immediately have +2 Faith, +4 Culture, and +4 Happiness; when you reach Classical, it will be +3 Faith, +6 Culture, and +5 Happiness, and so on. This seems more reasonable, and if it needs to be adjusted, I'd think it would even need to be a tad stronger - but it won't be game-breaking anymore I don't think. Rather than being a pick that's always awesome all the time, it's a real meaningful choice as the "crap, someone else took my Pantheon..." backup choice for anything.
Goddess of Beauty
+3 Faith and +1 Culture from World Wonders. +15% Production of Pre-Renaissance Wonders.
PF - 3 or 6 (but most likely 3)
CF - Reasonable.
Commentary: An early Wonder will get you decent Faith generation out of this, but it quite frankly won't be any better than the Faith generation any other standard Pantheon would be getting you. And the Culture is certainly absolutely worse. The bonus is that 15% boost to Pre-Renaissance Wonders, so we can really make use of them as much as possible - and if the Pantheon is kept thru the game, the Faith bonuses from it would be decent enough, I think. Though maybe a small boost is worthwhile.
Suggestion: Add +1 Gold per Wonder. Not huge, but seems reasonable.
Goddess of Fertility
+1 Food and +1 Faith from Shrines and Wells, and 15% faster Growth Rate.
PF - 4
CF - 2
Commentary: Decent boost that one can't complain about, and it offers a Faith benefit to a building you already have and certainly a different building you want. The Faith generation kind of trails off really fast, though, and maybe there's something we can do about that.
Suggestion 1: Moi Magnus offered that we add Water Mills to the list, and I don't see why not. This will keep the numbers balanced between River and non-River cities.
Suggestion 2: For scaling purposes, I would add the Aqueduct and maybe one other similar building later in the game, but nothing further.
Goddess of Protection
+10 HP healed per turn in friendly territory; +1 Faith and +1 Culture from Palace, Walls and Barracks.
PF - 3?
CF - 2
Commentary: Last one! I'll be honest, I don't understand this Pantheon. I guess it's not bad. But it's really not good, either. You can't really depend on its Faith generation very much, but I guess it gives extra Culture. The bonus hit points is good for healing - but if you wanted to war, I'd just go with God of War. This Pantheon is just strange. It needs something.
Suggestion 1: I've previously suggested that the +50% Ranged Combat City Strength be moved from God of War to here, which suits the theme pretty well.
Suggestion 2: The Armory and Military Academy (or something to that extent) would make for good scalers.
Suggestion 3: I'm tempted to say to boost the healing to 15, but maybe not necessary. What do I know. ^_^
CONCLUSION
To recap, what I'm aiming for here is a list of Pantheons that are not generic and all the same, but that generally speaking all have a meaningful shot at a Religion, and in some way retain their meaning in a more-or-less even way as the game progresses. This includes some Pantheons that give various yields through Improvements or Buildings, some Pantheons that strictly offer Faith, and others that offer no Faith whatsoever. While there's always going to be the "dummy" Pantheons, I'd like to think that even the ones that tend to be cast aside can be intentional and poignant selections for a good host of Civilizations in an attempt to do well.
Let the discussion begin!
What I'm going to do is break up the Pantheons as we know them into thematic groups, that way we can compare them within their groups and against one another. Secondly, I'm going to offer a "Faith counter" of sorts - it is as close as I can get to what each Pantheon is offering in terms of Faith for the early-game moving towards getting a Religion, and what each Pantheon offers after the founding of Religions for the rest of the game as a whole. With these notes marked, I'll offer my ideas for tweaks within the context that makes sense both in short-term and long-term themes; bearing in mind that I'm not merely accounting for Faith, but for any other yields a Pantheon is offering. I will admit that I'm being reserved in my estimates - but my reservedness is global, so if my estimates are generally low, at least they're low on an equal plane (admitting my bias in the data - invitation to PLEASE OFFER CORRECTION).
I'll also be pulling from various ideas and comments I've seen in the other thread and making notes where appropriate. The "Baseline" that I am assuming for Faith generation will be the "resource Pantheons" - I'll be comparing everything else generally against those.
And thus we go.
For reference, here are the "Faith points" I'm using to weigh some strengths/weaknesses of some Pantheons.
PF (Pocket Faith) - About how much Faith one can realistically expect around turn 50 assuming normal circumstances (points to how much "oumph" the Pantheon has towards generating a Religion - I'm assuming 2 or 3 cities even though theoretically you could certainly have more, and that the player is being somewhat intentional of aiming for more of a particular resource if that's what he wants for more Faith generation).
Keep in mind that I'm NOT including Shrines in the calculation - it's strictly what the Pantheon can provide. That said, if there's a building the Pantheon offers that provides Faith, I may or may not include it, because if you want to dive for a Religion, building a Shrine in your expansions could offer you more than a building related to your Pantheon (thus, a waste of time for calculating Religion purposes).
CF (Constant Faith) - Roughly how much Faith per city on average you might be getting out of this in the long term.
SECTION I - RESOURCE PANTHEONS
As pointed out in the other thread (Moi Magnus), these Pantheons generally have no scalers for Faith, and so while they can be decent at the beginning, their usefulness from a Religious perspective sort of takes a gradual dive. I have a suggestion for a small scaling idea that would keep these balanced in terms of Religion early-on and strengthen them later, but we'll get to that at each one.
Earth Mother
+1 Faith and +1 Gold from Mines on improved resources, and +2 Production from Monuments.
PF - 4
CF - 2
Commentary: If there's an issue with this Pantheon, it's that some Mines aren't exactly practical to use right at the beginning, as they don't give Food - thus you'll be sacrificing precious growth of your city in order to gain the Faith/other bonuses from this Pantheon.
Thought: It occurs to me that a really boring +1 Food in every city would help mitigate the aforementioned problem, but it's not entirely out of place as food comes from the Earth.
Suggestion: If the Faith of this Pantheon was buffed to 2 at the Medieval Age, it would stand its ground a little better for the remainder of the game. Alternatively, we could pick a Medieval-Aged building to offer +2 Faith.
God of Craftsmen
+1 Faith and +1 Gold from Quarries and Stone Works, and +2 Production in cities with a Specialist.
PF - 4
CF - 3
Commentary: I couldn't help but notice that this Pantheon is effectively identical to Earth Mother in terms of its yields, which is pretty boring. This also means that it suffers from exactly the same problem as the other one, so my general ideas wouldn't be any different. However, it could be interesting to swap some of the yields for other things - as Craftsmanship often has Culture tied to it somehow. The bonus on the Stone Works makes up for the fact that it takes longer to research - I think?
Thought: Perhaps we could swap the Gold from either the Quarry or the Stone Works to Culture instead.
Suggestion: Buff the Faith of the Pantheon to 2 at Medieval so it keeps up with things. Alternatively, we could pick a Medieval-Aged building to offer +2 Faith.
God of the Open Sky
+1 Culture for every 3 featureless Plains or Grassland tiles (without hills or features) worked by a City; +1 Faith and +1 Gold from Pastures.
PF - 5
CF - 3/4
Commentary: Whereas this Pantheon's side-bonus (culture from featureless Plains/Grassland) used to be unreasonably strong before, the fact that the tiles need to be WORKED now makes this part of the Pantheon effectively useless. Think of it: if I actually have Pastures to build or really any other resource to work, why would I be working the featureless Plains or Grasslands? I have to assume that the early-game culture output of this Pantheon is going to be roughly 0. On the other hand, we like to be kind to Goddess of Nature because Mountains provide nothing and are unworkable - but the truth of the matter is that nothing save the most enormous cities ever work all their tiles anyways, so building a city in the middle of a Mountain range really doesn't cost you anything. Consequently, it doesn't really make sense to me that God of the Open Sky should be penalized because Grasslands/Plains are useful, since they'll never all be worked, either. If we're talking about truly featureless tiles with NOTHING on them - I can't help but wonder if just planting a Culture on every single Grassland/Plains tile wouldn't be okay, but only if it is WORKED (working only the boring tiles for culture). It's a thought. In any case, I generally assume that this Pantheon is stronger than others in the Faith department as Sheep/Horses/Cattle tend to show up more often than other things and don't take away from your food when using them.
Thought: Buff secondary Culture ability as per working tiles: 1:1 even seems not too bad (you can't work them ALL and the Pastures, too).
Suggestion: Give the Stables a +2 Faith bonus as a scaler for the Medieval Era.
God of the Sea
+1 Faith and +1 Production from Fishing Boats and Atolls; +3 Food in coastal Cities.
PF - 4/5
CF - 2/3
Commentary: Moi Magnus pointed out that you need to reveal Fish before knowing the full extent of the usefulness of this Pantheon, and Funak pointed out that you'd probably aim for it if you had decent access to Crabs/Whales. However, I think that if the player has enough of the resource he needs (whatever you constitute as "enough"), it's pretty solid as it offers the things you want most early in the game: Food and Production. Can't complain!
Suggestion: Add +2 Faith to the Harbor for scaling effect.
God of the Stars and Sky
+2 Faith, +2 Production, and +2 Culture from Tundra tiles with improved resources.
PF - 8/10
CF - 4/6
Commentary: As most have pointed out, this Pantheon takes a bad start in Tundra and makes it not bad. The issue however is with the Faith generation, which seems like a bit overkill as it's TOO reliable - double the Faith generation as any of the neighbors is actually quite alot. I have an alternative that could be worthwhile, though.
Suggestion 1: Instead of the above, the Pantheon could read, "+1 Faith from all Tundra tiles; +2 Production and +2 Culture from Tundra tiles with improved resources." This would enable the same flexibility of usefulness out of the improved resources without catapulting the player to a Religion, while on the other hand letting the player dab into small Faith bonuses here and there through other relevant Tundra tiles (Forests and Hills).
Suggestion 2: The scaler for this Pantheon could simply be that an additional +1 Faith is added to the improved resources in the Medieval Era.
Goddess of Festivals
+2 Faith, +2 Culture and +2 Gold for every unique Luxury Resource you control.
PF - 6
CF - N/A
Commentary: My presumption is that this Pantheon does NOT include resources traded in or acquired from City-States, but I could be wrong. Either way, however, the bonus is decent now since the upgrade and naturally scales as you gain more territory, so I don't really see a need at the moment to modify this. A note that I made the CF "not applicable" because whereas you can average out 1-3 Mines near any given city, this kind of calculation just won't work, here.
Goddess of Purity
+1 Faith and +1 Food from Oases, Lakes, and Marshes; +1 Happiness from Cities on rivers.
PF - 4/5
CF - N/A
Commentary: If you have a good Lake start, then this will net some decent starting Faith and make your city grow quickly. However, I don't find Lakes to be as reliable as other "resource" types, nor Oases, nor Marshes, so I'd tend to thing that the Faith benefits will fall off in the long run, even though the Happiness will be a boon throughout the game.
Suggestion: Perhaps +1 or +2 Faith from Baths would be a nice touch for later-game development.
Goddess of Springtime
+1 Faith and +1 Culture from Plantations, and +2 Gold from Markets.
PF - 3/4
CF - 2
Commentary: Definitely a weaker Pantheon in my opinion from the Faith perspective, as the tech isn't immediately accessible, and one often needs to cut down trees/jungle to access some of the resources you want to improve.
Suggestion: Is it possible to give the chopping wood ability to Workers simply from taking this Pantheon? If not, oh, well...anyways, we could give +2 Faith to Gardens here for scaling purposes.
Goddess of the Hunt
+1 Faith, +1 Food and +1 Culture from Camps.
PF - 5
CF - 2
Commentary: My experience with Camps is that they tend to be more rare than other resource types, but when they do show up, there's lots of them. And the bonus offered here is pretty solid and useful. I can't see any reason to change it.
Thought: I can't help but wonder, however, what a synthesis between Goddess of Renewal and Goddess of the Hunt would look like. That is, dump one of the bonuses from the Camp and leave it to the other "half" of the Pantheon: they're both mostly Forest-dependent, so it could work nicely.
Suggestion: For a scaler...I don't know what, but something that adds Faith somewhere.
(suggest something and I'll edit the post)Spirit of the Desert
+2 Faith, +2 Food and +2 Gold from Desert tiles with Improved resources.
PF - 8/10
CF - 6
Commentary: Much like the Tundra Pantheon, this transforms a bad start into a good start - but the Faith boon is a bit overkill, I think.
Suggestion: Like Tundra, switch the Pantheon to "+1 Faith on all Desert tiles; +2 Food and +2 Gold from Desert tiles with Improved resources." Again, this could be offered an additional +1 Faith on the improved resource tiles when we hit Medieval Era for scaling. I think this would be weaker than the Tundra version, though (as Desert tiles tend to be less interesting), but not *that* much weaker.
God of the Sun
+2 Food, +1 Gold from Granaries. +1 Faith and +2 Culture from Farms on Wheat.
PF - 3
CF - 2
Commentary: This Pantheon is at one and the same time really awesome, and really difficult to assess: you'll get amazing yields from your Granaries and for whatever Wheat you have around, yet Wheat isn't common everywhere, so it can certainly scale down with time. The immense Culture that can come from it in a good spot is a real boon, making me think the Gold on the Granaries is probably unnecessary. In any case, it could probably use a scaler for later on in the game.
Suggestion: Faith yield on Wheat buffed to 2 in the Medieval Age. Actually, the +1 Gold on Granaries could be initially removed, but then recovered at the Medieval Age, and this seems okay.
SECTION II - SORT OF RESOURCE PANTHEONS
These are basically the left-over Pantheons that more or less follow the same set of rules as what I've called the "resource Pantheons," without actually having a real resource attached to them. I think that their main characteristic is that we haven't figured out how to balance them well, yet...
Goddess of Nature
+1 Faith and +1 Culture for every 2 Mountains within 3 tiles of a City, and Natural Wonders gain +3 Faith and +2 Culture.
PF - 3-16
CF - 3
Commentary: Reality is that Mountains aren't everywhere, and neither are Natural Wonders. Actually, the bonus for the Natural Wonder, when you think of it, isn't *that* impressive - it'll be overshadowed by most Resource Pantheons soon enough as improvements get built, and you can't just go and find Natural Wonders anywhere. The bonus for the Natural Wonder is that you get it instantly, and so it's a useful jump. This may or may not be enough to get you a Religion.
In reality, where I think the real power in this Pantheon is lies in the Mountains bonus: as I mentioned earlier, since not all tiles are worked by any city anyways, it doesn't really matter if there are a bunch of Mountains around (and should you start with many Mountains in your initial city radius, the bonus Culture will expand you to new usable tiles soon enough). So a good plot in the middle of the Mountains can easily and instantly snatch you 3 to 5 Culture/Faith each. And as far as I can tell, the same Mountain can function for more than one city at once - so all you need to do is settle a couple of cities, and you can be generating 15 Faith effortlessly from this Pantheon. Suffice it to say, I'm confident to submit that the present form of this half of the Pantheon is overpowered.
Suggestion: Drop the Faith/Culture generation for Mountains back down to 1 for 3. Even this may not be enough, but baby steps. I don't think scaling is required, here.
Goddess of Renewal
+1 Faith and +1 Culture for every 2 Jungle or 2 Forest tiles worked by a City; +1 Science and +1 Faith from Herbalists.
PF - Incalculable
CF - At least 1
Commentary: The issue with the former automatic version of this Pantheon is that most found it too strong. The issue with the present version of it is that it seems pretty evidently too weak. You pretty much need a Forest/Jungle without resources in it for this to be useful, because any resources in the forest save Deer/Truffles will cut down your Forest/Jungle (thus less relevant tiles to work); otherwise, if you have lots of Deer/Truffles in your vicinity, I'm wondering why you aren't just going with Goddess of the Hunt. So yeah, the issue here is that this IN THEORY looks pretty solid, but in reality one ends up chopping down half the trees one wants to use in order to access the resources that are there. Not very helpful!
Suggestion 1: My first honest suggestion is a merger with Goddess of the Hunt. Yes, I know - it means that there won't be 2 forest-related Pantheons, and that's boring. Maybe so. But it'll make sense. And I hope to tackle some of the more generic Pantheons so it's not like you'll be SOL if you're in the middle of a forest. If Camps were generating Faith/Gold, and Jungles/Forests were generating Culture, with the Herbalist as a side-bonus, this could be interesting.
Suggestion 2: Workshop could provide Faith scaling by offering an additional +2 Faith. Now I wonder: Could we go back to the old passive way of calculating the Faith/Culture from Forests/Jungles, BUT with a condition? Instead of "within 3 tiles of a city," make the condition to be, "within the city's borders." That way, it's not a huge automatic bonus, but instead is gained gradually through gaining tiles. I feel like this would be a better solution if it is possible.
SECTION III - SCALERS
Scalers are all the Pantheons that intrinsically generate more and more Faith as the game progresses, and consequently don't need anything to scale for them because their long-term Faith generation will naturally be massive. I consider as a consequence, however, that if there are long-term benefits, then some of the short-term benefits (namely, non-Faith yields) need to be less pronounced, as they tend to be here: whereas in Resource Pantheons, you will have a Faith and a Culture or a Faith and a Gold per tile; any Culture/Gold in these Pantheons tends to be associated with a single building, a single bonus per city, and that's all you get: the focus is on Faith generation. The challenge is making it fair enough in the early game so all the Pantheons don't end up being niche picks for individual Civilizations.
Ancestor Worship
+1 Faith for every 4 Citizens in a city; +1 Culture and +1 Faith from Councils.
PF - 4
CF - N/A
Commentary: My instinct here tells me that there's something wrong, especially when you put it into relation with other Pantheons. God-King, for example, offers 4 yields for every 6 population; whereas Ancestor Worship is offering 1.5 yields for every 6 population. I'd suggest that Ancestor Worship isn't quite holding up its end of the deal, and isn't really distinctive enough - for example, whereas God-King could be a generic yield Pantheon, Ancestor Worship has the opportunity to be a Faith muscle Pantheon. It's also not like you're going to get anything but your Capital (if that) up to 8 population by the time Religions show up - not to mention that if you want to push the Faith bonuses of having enough Citizens, you either need to stand by till 4 population in your Capital before making a Settler, or just not having Faith in the Capital while making Settlers. Either way, you lose out. I think that a buff is warranted here - but I am wary of the possibility of overpoweredness on account of the Council's presence.
Suggestion: Let's bring Ancestor Worship back down to 1 Faith per 3 Citizens in a city - it will be more potent for the early game without being overwhelming, and be very worthy for its sheer power later on, strictly in Faith. If we're worried about its being too strong early on, my suggestion would be to eliminate the Council's bonus to Faith, to Culture, or to just wipe out that aspect of the Pantheon altogether to leave it as a super-Faith generating Pantheon.
God of Commerce
+1 Faith for every 20 Gold produced by owned cities; +2 Faith and +2 Gold in Cities with a City Connection.
PF - 3/5
CF - N/A
Commentary: The question I have to ask (since this is one I haven't tested) is whether the Gold produced for Faith is coming from total GPT, or GPT BEFORE expenses. If it's the former, I'm worried this is too weak. If it's the latter, then I'd say it's fine and nothing needs to be done to it. A Merchant would do well with this.
God of the Expanse
+25% faster border growth, and gain 20 Faith every time a city expands its borders. Bonus scales with Gamespeed.
PF - I have no idea.
CF - I have no idea.
Commentary: A while ago, I posted a game review in the game review thread in the other forum that explained what happens when this Pantheon scales by Era, and consequently why that should never be allowed in the future. Let's just say that with the old, more expensive Great Prophet prices, I was easily affording them into the 25000's of Faith and wasn't putting up much of a sweat. However, I haven't really tested it since then, and am at a loss to give an analysis, because so many things can so easily affect Border Growth (well, Culture...). But to keep up with the other Pantheons at the current Faith yield, we'd be talking about a border expansion every 5 turns, which seems rather extreme. So my instinct tells me that it needs a buff, but I don't know how much...
Suggestion: Actually, if I was going to buff it, I'd even be inclined to say to make the Border Growth modifier something much higher like 100%, and let that run the show. Could be a fun side-bonus to run. But anyways, like I said - needs a buff of some kind.
God of War
+50% increase in City Ranged Combat Strength, and gain Faith if you win a battle.
PF - Indeterminable.
CF - Indeterminable.
Commentary: I recall pushing for this to be strengthened, as once upon a time it was rather awful to depend on it and really you could never get a Religion out of it, even if it was fun in theory. However now, I'd say it's a bit too strong (and I know this from experience, as it's a favorite of mine). The Faith from kills naturally scales so well with unit power growth and number of cities, that especially in the late game, I'd consider it one of the most reliable sources of Faith there is. It doesn't need a BIG nerf, but a nerf nonetheless.
Suggestion 1: First off, let's move the +50% increase in City Ranged Combat Strength over to the Goddess of Defence - God of War just doesn't need it, and it fits better with Goddess of Defence. God of War will be generating so much Faith and this is its specialty; let's let the defensive Goddess enjoy blowing stuff up with her cities.
Suggestion 2: From the current value of how Faith is generated on kills, I'd say that a 5-10% reduction is warranted, but really I think 5% would be enough. Between this and the removal of the City Ranged Combat Strength bonus, I'm inclined to believe that it would be right on.
God-King
+1 Culture, +1 Faith, +1 Gold, and +1 Science for every 6 Followers.
PF - 2
CF - N/A
Commentary: I see lots of discussion about whether this is really useless or really powerful, and I guess when you think about it, they're both totally true assessments. What it really comes down to, though, is that you're not really going to get a Religion from this Pantheon without a ton of help from external stuff. What this makes me think of, though, is that if this Pantheon is depending on externals to gain a Religion, anyways, why not make that the theme? As follows...
Suggestion: I seem to recall that we once had another Pantheon around that seems to no longer be around, that gave only NON-FAITH yields whenever a Border Expansion occurred (correct me if I'm wrong). How about we run with this? Let's dump the Faith aspect from the "every 6 Followers" and keep the rest, while adding a bunch of non-Faith yields every time you have a Border Expansion. Thus, this Pantheon will never actually yield any Faith and be in its own unique department whereby it just offers the believer some crazy good yields that are of benefit directly to the Empire. I think it would be a very fun alternative.
Goddess of Love
Gain 10 Faith and 10 Golden Age Points every time a Citizen is born. Bonus scales with Era and Gamespeed.
PF - 2/3
CF - N/A
Commentary: Realistically, I need to assume a population point every 10 turns or so in the early game (barring some amazing circumstances), which puts this at about 1 Faith per turn per city, which is one of the worst yields of any Pantheon out there. It might be able to manage in competition later on, but yeah...this needs a buff.
Suggestion: Boost the Faith per Citizen born to either 20 or 25. The Golden Age Points could stay the same or increase, but I don't think putting them at 15 would be a bad choice.
Goddess of Wisdom
+1 Faith for every 10 Science per turn. +1 Science and +1 Faith in every City.
PF - 4
CF - N/A
Commentary: I'd say that early-game Faith generation for this Pantheon ultimately depends on making expansions, which isn't a bad thing. After that, I imagine it would hold its own pretty well where science is concerned. One must ask how this stacks up against God of Commerce - if God of Commerce is based on income before expenses, then I'd say they're pretty even, and essentially no change is needed apart from minor ones. Need to test myself some more.
SECTION IV - THE ODDBALLS
These are the Pantheons that fit absolutely nowhere else, play by their own rules, and for the most part depend on particular buildings for Faith generation, which can be weird because you need the right techs and lots of production to make things work at times. They can be both fun, but stupid...
God of All Creation
+3 Faith in Capital; +1 Culture and +1 Happiness for every Pantheon ever founded (including this one).
PF - 3
CF - N/A
Commentary: Most that I've read have been saying that this Pantheon is overpowered - and overall, I'm inclined to agree: it's early-game benefits are immensely powerful and undeniable. However, its peculiarity is that it has a swift decline and crash shortly after the early game...but it may not matter, as you may have won the game by then (slight exaggeration). I will agree that it needs to be curbed somehow, but none of our current attempts have really solved the problem of either not making it strong too early or making it a miserable failure later on: furthermore, it often robs someone of a Religion slot.
Suggestion 1: I'm not the first to suggest this (re: Funak), and I won't be the last: but I'm inclined to just say delete it. But that may be a bit harsh.
Suggestion 2: We can keep this Pantheon being the magical Pantheon that gives instant great bonuses, while still having it not be too powerful early on and not crash as badly later. Here's my idea.
First off, we need to stop tying it to other people's Pantheons...
+1 Faith, +2 Culture, and +3 Happiness in Capital; an additional +1 Faith, +2 Culture, and +1 Happiness per Era reached.
Translation: This means that when you take the Pantheon, you immediately have +2 Faith, +4 Culture, and +4 Happiness; when you reach Classical, it will be +3 Faith, +6 Culture, and +5 Happiness, and so on. This seems more reasonable, and if it needs to be adjusted, I'd think it would even need to be a tad stronger - but it won't be game-breaking anymore I don't think. Rather than being a pick that's always awesome all the time, it's a real meaningful choice as the "crap, someone else took my Pantheon..." backup choice for anything.
Goddess of Beauty
+3 Faith and +1 Culture from World Wonders. +15% Production of Pre-Renaissance Wonders.
PF - 3 or 6 (but most likely 3)
CF - Reasonable.
Commentary: An early Wonder will get you decent Faith generation out of this, but it quite frankly won't be any better than the Faith generation any other standard Pantheon would be getting you. And the Culture is certainly absolutely worse. The bonus is that 15% boost to Pre-Renaissance Wonders, so we can really make use of them as much as possible - and if the Pantheon is kept thru the game, the Faith bonuses from it would be decent enough, I think. Though maybe a small boost is worthwhile.
Suggestion: Add +1 Gold per Wonder. Not huge, but seems reasonable.
Goddess of Fertility
+1 Food and +1 Faith from Shrines and Wells, and 15% faster Growth Rate.
PF - 4
CF - 2
Commentary: Decent boost that one can't complain about, and it offers a Faith benefit to a building you already have and certainly a different building you want. The Faith generation kind of trails off really fast, though, and maybe there's something we can do about that.
Suggestion 1: Moi Magnus offered that we add Water Mills to the list, and I don't see why not. This will keep the numbers balanced between River and non-River cities.
Suggestion 2: For scaling purposes, I would add the Aqueduct and maybe one other similar building later in the game, but nothing further.
Goddess of Protection
+10 HP healed per turn in friendly territory; +1 Faith and +1 Culture from Palace, Walls and Barracks.
PF - 3?
CF - 2
Commentary: Last one! I'll be honest, I don't understand this Pantheon. I guess it's not bad. But it's really not good, either. You can't really depend on its Faith generation very much, but I guess it gives extra Culture. The bonus hit points is good for healing - but if you wanted to war, I'd just go with God of War. This Pantheon is just strange. It needs something.
Suggestion 1: I've previously suggested that the +50% Ranged Combat City Strength be moved from God of War to here, which suits the theme pretty well.
Suggestion 2: The Armory and Military Academy (or something to that extent) would make for good scalers.
Suggestion 3: I'm tempted to say to boost the healing to 15, but maybe not necessary. What do I know. ^_^
CONCLUSION
To recap, what I'm aiming for here is a list of Pantheons that are not generic and all the same, but that generally speaking all have a meaningful shot at a Religion, and in some way retain their meaning in a more-or-less even way as the game progresses. This includes some Pantheons that give various yields through Improvements or Buildings, some Pantheons that strictly offer Faith, and others that offer no Faith whatsoever. While there's always going to be the "dummy" Pantheons, I'd like to think that even the ones that tend to be cast aside can be intentional and poignant selections for a good host of Civilizations in an attempt to do well.
Let the discussion begin!
