Policy Discussion: Piety

[Gazebo]

National Wonder for reformation belief, I think. Function is in, and it works, and is easier for us to balance than a tech. Also meshes with religious NWs requiring x # of followers to be built.

G

 

[Stalker0]

I like the concept of a NW for reformation, seems like an interesting idea.

 

[Funak]

Another go, because I can!

PIETY (probably) 0.7 still ancient era!

Opener: 2+ culture on shrines. +2 faith/turn in captial. Each additional policy in piety reduces the cost of buying things with faith by 4(or 5?)% (including great people)

1. 25% gold from temples. Traderoutes to and from your cities generate an extra 2 gold for both parties and your cities religion spreads twice as fast over traderoutes.

2. 100% less unhappiness from religious strife. During golden ages//WLtKD your cities generate an extra 5% all yields.

3. +2 faith from shrines and temples, 50% productionbonus when building temples, +5Faith and +5 Culture from The Grand Temple**

4. +5% Science in all cities, +1 global happiness for every religion present in a city.

5. Monasteries(1food/hammer/culture/happiness/scientist)* purchasable for faith

Finisher. Immediately enter a Golden Age every time a Great Prophet is born**, holysites gives +3 gold +3 culture. Can purchase Great prophets with faith.



Suggestions are welcome as always, numbers aren't set in stone, prereqs haven't even been considered, but they probably exists somewhere.

*Didn't really get a feel what people thought about Monasteries, I think someone said they were weak to the point of being not worth it and someone said they were overpowered. so I'll just keep them as they are for the moment.

**Could honestly be anything here the value could be percentual, scaling with pop, flat or a combination.

***Still totally fine with the Faith from specialists here, tell me what you prefer.


Currently Shrines provide +2 culture +2 faith and Temples +2 Faith 25% gold. I personally think that is a fine number of effects on them considering the they are the only buildings one could logically add bonuses to.

 

[skodkim]

Currently Shrines provide +2 culture +2 faith and Temples +2 Faith 25% gold. I personally think that is a fine number of effects on them considering the they are the only buildings one could logically add bonuses to.

I tend to agree. This way they have the posibility of becoming quite powerful if the policy is checked. In unmodded games I tend to build shrines early on to get pantheons/religions but I never bother with temples as they come to late for religion and are too expensive (2 gold maintenance for 2 faith). I don't even bother when I choose the religion where you can use faith to buy units.

Also I feel wee need to put more culture in the game somewhere.

\Skodkim

 

[mitsho]

I'm just not sure why the above is supposed to be a ancient era tree. There's only the opener and one policy (faith on shrines etc.) that's going to be of use in the beginning of the game. All the other effects require some sort of 'infrastructure': trade units, temples buildable, 5% need some base yield to have a visible effect.

I'd still say +5% to all yields is quite strong on its own. I'd rather have each policy only be good at one yield, but spread them around (also true for the monastery). Though I guess that's a design choice to be made. (I'm not sure I like the yields on WLTK-day though...). Also buffing Golden Ages that early means we'd need to give Brasilians something so that they don't have to push them off indefinitely, but that's a tertiary concern.

I'd like to have both faith on specialist and GA on prophets in the tree. I think they give a great synergy: More faith on specialist means more Prophets (-> more holy sites/Golden Ages).

All in all, I guess I should write that tree down cause I think we are quite close

 

[Funak]

I'm just not sure why the above is supposed to be a ancient era tree. There's only the opener and one policy (faith on shrines etc.) that's going to be of use in the beginning of the game. All the other effects require some sort of 'infrastructure': trade units, temples buildable, 5% need some base yield to have a visible effect.

You are correct about that being a concern, I'll have to think of something.

I'd still say +5% to all yields is quite strong on its own. I'd rather have each policy only be good at one yield, but spread them around (also true for the monastery). Though I guess that's a design choice to be made. (I'm not sure I like the yields on WLTK-day though...). Also buffing Golden Ages that early means we'd need to give Brasilians something so that they don't have to push them off indefinitely, but that's a tertiary concern.

You're correct about 5% yields being powerful but the requirement is pretty restrictive so it might work. Monastery could be more specialized, but I don't really see why it would need to be, monasteries did everything.
I don't really see a problem or synergy with this bonus and Brazil, their GA bonuses don't really affect these bonuses at all, the finisher however might.
Persia is more of a concern imo but not that badly really, golden ages are short after all.

I'd like to have both faith on specialist and GA on prophets in the tree. I think they give a great synergy: More faith on specialist means more Prophets (-> more holy sites/Golden Ages).

Where would it fit? That's the problem

All in all, I guess I should write that tree down cause I think we are quite close

Not close enough.

 

[mitsho]

Brazil would want their GA's to come in the late game unless we give them a 'early-bonus' as well, thus delaying the policies for the human player while the AI makes 'dumb' choices. I'm not sure how Persia is a problem, they can use the GA all the time. But do we make them a religious civ by putting the best GA bonuses into Piety? Something for the leader debates

However, my 'update' on your tree would look like this. And I do really think we are close

Piety Aim: Classical Era explanations
Opener Faith! Free Temple 2 Faith in capital 4% Cost reduction on buying w faith
Worship More Faith! 1 faith 1 culture on temple 1 faith on shrine 3 faith 3 culture on rel. National W. 2 nat. Wonders: 'Great Temple' + Sacred Plaza (+ rel. Pressure)?
Monasteries Use Faith! / Science req. Worship Build m. w faith 1 scientist slot 1 food 1 culture Food to help sustain scientist
Pilgrim Stations Culture / Gold 25% gold on temple TR generate 1 culture 1 gold in home city TR spread religion better just gold seems tacky, but works as well
Edict of Toleration Happy / War* req. OR no unhappy from rel. Strife +1 happy per religion in city A very strong focused happy policy, helps getting GA
Organized Religion GA / Production* Free Golden Age GA/WLTK prov +10% production focused wonder building' + instant use of the bonus
Finisher More Faith! / GA +1 faith per specialist gain GA-points on getting a Great Prophet more faith to get more GA to get Bonus
I'd rather buff holy sites through tech
Total per city 3 faith 3 culture 1 food 1 scientist slot 1 +25% gold *"warmonger side" (insta-GA and prod help get ouf of problems)

 

[Funak]

Adjusted a few things just because!

PIETY (probably) 0.8 still ancient era!

Opener: 2+ culture on shrines. Free temple in capital. Each additional policy in piety reduces the cost of buying things with faith by 4(or 5?)% (including great people)

1. 20% gold from temples. Traderoutes to and from your cities generate an extra 2 gold for both parties and your cities religion spreads twice as fast over traderoutes.

2. 100% less unhappiness from religious strife. During golden ages//WLtKD your cities generate an extra 5% all yields.

3. +2 faith from shrines and temples, 50% productionbonus when building temples, +5Faith and +5 Culture from The Grand Temple**

4. +5% Science in all cities, +1 global happiness for every religion present in a city.

5. Monasteries(1food/hammer/culture/happiness/scientist)* purchasable for faith

Finisher. Immediately enter a Golden Age every time a Great Prophet is born***, holysites gives +3 gold +3 culture. Can purchase Great prophets with faith.


Switched the free faith in the capital to a free temple, will make the rest of the policies feel more viable early on. Lowered gold% on temples (Should probably lower it some more)
Suggestions are welcome as always, numbers aren't set in stone, prereqs haven't even been considered, but they probably exists somewhere.

*Didn't really get a feel what people thought about Monasteries, I think someone said they were weak to the point of being not worth it and someone said they were overpowered. so I'll just keep them as they are for the moment.

**Could honestly be anything here the value could be percentual, scaling with pop, flat or a combination.

***Still totally fine with the Faith from specialists here, tell me what you prefer.


Currently Shrines provide +2 culture +2 faith and Temples +2 Faith 20% gold. I personally think that is a fine number of effects on them considering the they are the only buildings one could logically add bonuses to.

 

[Funak]

Looks fine, looks kinda like what I posted so I guess that's why ^^

-- Piety

Opener: Piety increases the Faith of empires. Adopting Piety gives you +2 Faith in your Capital. Shrines and Temples produce +1 Culture. Purchases made with Faith cost 4% less, with each additional policy unlocked in Piety reducing this by an additional 4%. Unlocks building the Great Mosque of Djenne. Adopting all Policies in the Piety tree causes Holy Sites to produce +3 Gold and +3 Culture, and all Specialists to produce +1 Faith.
Still not a fan of uneven numbers, if you feel the need to have an effect in the opener atleast make it 5% so it ends up at 30% instead of 29%

Organized Religion: Temples and Shrines produce +1 Faith. Build Temples and Shrines 50% faster, and the Grand Temple boosts city Culture by 20%.
Great

Trade Fairs: +15% Gold from Temples and Markets in a city if your majority Religion is present. Trade Routes generate +1 Gold, and your majority religion spreads 50% more quickly over Trade Routes.'
Wasn't the thing I suggested possible? The thing with incoming traderoutes giving both players more gold? Also I know this is overlapping completely with arabias UA, but that one is horrible and should probably be changed anyways.

Divine Right: Cities that follow your majority Religion generate +10% Production and +25% Faith. Border growth is doubled during Golden Ages.
Fine, might be a bit too much focus on keeping your religion in your cities (or the fact that it doesn't do anything before you form/get a religion)

Monasticism: Can purchase Monasteries with Faith (+2 Faith, +10% Food, +10% Science, 1 Scientist slot).
Probably too strong, but it might work.

Tolerance: Cities with a majority Religion also get the Pantheon belief bonus of the second most popular Religion. Reduces Unhappiness from Religious Strife by 50% in all Cities and an additional 50% in the Capital.'
Another one doing nothing without a religion in the cities, might be a problem


All in all you got some really strong scaling bonuses in here, lots of percentual values, if we follow that theme with the other trees it might work. Only real complaint being the reliance on actually having a religion for more than half the policies to do anything. and with it being a startingtree I'm just sure you'll have a religion before your 4th policychoice. But who knows, maybe? Also a general lack of happiness other than the religious strife one that normally would end up doing nothing because if you're pious you're probably going to have some decent pressure going on your own cities.

 

[Gazebo]

Looks fine, looks kinda like what I posted so I guess that's why ^^

-- Piety

Still not a fan of uneven numbers, if you feel the need to have an effect in the opener atleast make it 5% so it ends up at 30% instead of 29%

Trade Fairs: +15% Gold from Temples and Markets in a city if your majority Religion is present. Trade Routes generate +1 Gold, and your majority religion spreads 50% more quickly over Trade Routes.'
Wasn't the thing I suggested possible? The thing with incoming traderoutes giving both players more gold?

All in all you got some really strong scaling bonuses in here, lots of percentual values, if we follow that theme with the other trees it might work. Only real complaint being the reliance on actually having a religion for more than half the policies to do anything. and with it being a startingtree I'm just sure you'll have a religion before your 4th policychoice. But who knows, maybe? Also a general lack of happiness other than the religious strife one that normally would end up doing nothing because if you're pious you're probably going to have some decent pressure going on your own cities.

The final value for Faith purchase reduction is 24%. We could bump to 25% if that's annoying. There's no existing code for giving other players gold via trade route policies, so I just used what was there (for now).

Reliance on religion is, I feel, the core of the tree (in a good way). It doesn't force you to have founded a religion, but it does reward you for spreading whatever faith you have across your empire. Since the tree is faith-centric, this feels okay to me.

G

 

[Funak]

The final value for Faith purchase reduction is 24%. We could bump to 25% if that's annoying. There's no existing code for giving other players gold via trade route policies, so I just used what was there (for now).

Reliance on religion is, I feel, the core of the tree (in a good way). It doesn't force you to have founded a religion, but it does reward you for spreading whatever faith you have across your empire. Since the tree is faith-centric, this feels okay to me.

G

I just have no idea, I wrote 24 and 25 first and then I was like "wait 25 isn't dividable by 6, it got to be 30" Too tired to think properly.

I'm just saying that if half your policies require you to have a religion then they won't do anything before you get one (which necassary isn't that early, especially if the AI beat you to it) having a minor effect without religion and a major one with it would be better design, or just having fewer policies with complete reliance would work aswell.

About the traderoute code: wasn't anything from morocco or east india company usable? No idea how this works at all but I guess this is fine as a placeholder.

Edit: Just actually read through the tree without bleeding eyes and realized you have some pretty heavy bonuses, I mean they could be made work, don't get me wrong but damn some of they are really powerful. Assuming religion and monastery in all cities(which are actually pretty heavy pre-reqs anyways): You're going to end up with +30%gold +25%faith +10%food +10%science +10%production in all cities along with +20% culture in one city.

 

[mystikx21]

It would be trivial to make the opener 5% and the other 5 4% and there's the 25%.

I do not see the "requires religion" as a downside (although I don't quite understand why it's still an ancient era tree either).

 

[Gazebo]

I just have no idea, I wrote 24 and 25 first and then I was like "wait 25 isn't dividable by 6, it got to be 30" Too tired to think properly.

I'm just saying that if half your policies require you to have a religion then they won't do anything before you get one (which necassary isn't that early, especially if the AI beat you to it) having a minor effect without religion and a major one with it would be better design, or just having fewer policies with complete reliance would work aswell.

About the traderoute code: wasn't anything from morocco or east india company usable? No idea how this works at all but I guess this is fine as a placeholder.

Edit: Just actually read through the tree without bleeding eyes and realized you have some pretty heavy bonuses, I mean they could be made work, don't get me wrong but damn some of they are really powerful. Assuming religion and monastery in all cities(which are actually pretty heavy pre-reqs anyways): You're going to end up with +30%gold +25%faith +10%food +10%science +10%production in all cities along with +20% culture in one city.

The bonuses are strong, but you're also sacrificing access to the culture-heavy bonuses of Aesthetics, and the CS bonuses of Patronage. Plus, the faith investment means you are essentially paying twice for the monastery, and there's the risk of outsiders messing up your religious majority. So yeah, strong, but riskier and expensive.

Also, you can't mix and match code from traits, buildings and policies. They all function independently in the dll. If it isn't in the list of policy functions in the XML file, or listed in the CP, you can't do it.

Mystik,

I left it that way because I wanted to compare ancient starts with it v. the others just to test. It should, imo, be a classical branch.

G

 

[Funak]

I still think if you want piety as a classical era tree you're going to have to drop the focus on tradition, and make it viable for all starts just like liberty, choices are going to be limited enough even as it is.

Well I'm guessing you can fix that traderoute thing later on if you choose to so lets drop it for now, I clearly don't understand coding enough to make a point anyways, I just thought it was a nice idea.

 

[pandasnail]

Do any of y'all know if the two parts of the policy Syncretism (+2 science and +2 production from markets, caravansaries, and harbors in cities that follow your religion. Your religion spreads 50% more quickly over trade routes) applies to majority religion as well as the founded religion? The former I think would have to, but the trade route bonus could conceivably be founded only. (I've never gone Piety without founding myself)

 

[Funak]

Do any of y'all know if the two parts of the policy Syncretism (+2 science and +2 production from markets, caravansaries, and harbors in cities that follow your religion. Your religion spreads 50% more quickly over trade routes) applies to majority religion as well as the founded religion? The former I think would have to, but the trade route bonus could conceivably be founded only. (I've never gone Piety without founding myself)

I think if a traderoute from a city spreads that city's religion 50% faster. No idea if you actually need a majority religion for it to work however. The first part of syncretism (2 science 2 production) however actually needs you to have a majority religion to work in any city.

 

[pandasnail]

I think if a traderoute from a city spreads that city's religion 50% faster. No idea if you actually need a majority religion for it to work however. The first part of syncretism (2 science 2 production) however actually needs you to have a majority religion to work in any city.

Thanks!

 

[thecraftybee]

I've been playing a lot recently and the Piety tree overall feels rather weak to me compared to Aesthetics and Statecraft.

I was playing an Ethiopian game where I focused on massive border growth with bonuses from actual natural border growths and I planned to go down Piety. However, even though I was getting incredible bonuses from the actual growth, I didn't feel that having twice as many was necessary and was more of a win-more element. Outside of that strategy I would find the talent particularly weak.

The University of Sankore is also handy when I go for Great Person strategy when I get to go Tradition and go for lots of bonuses on GP use. However, like with the Ethiopian game I feel as though I have to go through a lot of weak talents to get this and that it is overall not worth it compared to the opportunity cost of the other Medieval trees.

Whilst I do miss not having the option of a 4th tree in Ancient eras, overall I like the way you have approached Piety with it being focused around Religion but not necessarily requiring you to be a Founder. To me it just lacks oomph and a little more focus.

To increase the overall power I would love to see the following (perhaps taking it a little bit too far).

Opener: Temples generate 5% Gold - together with the 15% from completing the tree gives a total of 20% instead of 15%. Minor buff which makes the opener worthwhile, especially to those that didn't found the religion your are exporting.


Also, I always tend to Found my religion in my Cap rahter than an outlying city, but is it possible to have the bonus to internal routes be amended so that you get it whether you send them to or from your Cap/Holy City? I tend to send a lot of internal trade routes to my cap, especially until the late game and I feel I waste this aspect of the Finisher bonus.
I'm not sure it is possible, but to add more flavour to tree I would love to see Monasteries added to the finisher of the tree and the final Talent pick be a choice between "Tolerance" and "Theocracy" where you can only pick one to finish the tree - the other gets greyed out.

Tolerance would give your cities the benefits of the Pantheon and Follower beliefs of the second biggest religion in a city.
Theocracy would increase the benefit of your Pantheon and Follower beliefs in your cities by 50% and some additional benefit.

My Tolerance/Theocracy idea would be extremely powerful and may need to be toned down even if it was codeable, but the tree needs a burst of power

Overall, one of the reasons that Piety suffers is because there is no actual Religious win condition so to me the tree feels somewhat nebulous and lacking direction.


Another side note, does anyone know why the Follower Beliefs that give yields per 2 followers have caps? To me, tall play is handicapped enough that these feel like an unnecessary penalty. Also, what difference does an extra hammer make when going from 30 pop followers to 32? The caps here seem inelegant to me.

 

[Stalker0]

I agree, its not that piety is wholly bad, I just find aesthetics, statecraft or heck just going through more of the opener trees to be very useful. Authority is actually a decent second tree to take for a 2nd wave of expansion and later warring.

 

[thecraftybee]

I agree, its not that piety is wholly bad, I just find aesthetics, statecraft or heck just going through more of the opener trees to be very useful. Authority is actually a decent second tree to take for a 2nd wave of expansion and later warring.

A much more succint way of what I wanted to say :> The tree is okay, but compared to the opportunity cost is just not worthwhile.