Rate the Pantheons

[Inhalaattori]

Goddess of the Harvest is always extremely good. Even without Magnus it would be good - with him its usually clearly the best option. Earth Goddess can be totally crazy with Civs like Persia. This is because their UI gives +2 appeal to all surrounding tiles. With Persia practically every land tile will give you +1 faith.

 

[The Highwayman]

Since this thread has been resurrected for R&F, I may as well chime in.

If it's there, it's mine because it's god tier:
Goddess of the Harvest - No description needed.

Good:
Earth Goddess - Always gone before the GoH, but could be situationally better with the right map. Just not on the maps I tend to play. Still, Faith gen is much more useful in R&F and this fits the bill.
God of the Forge - The spawn system in this game is utter garbage. Sometimes you have to make room. Some classical era rush civs, such as Macedon and Scythia, could use this more often than others.
Divine Spark - The default pick. Feels kind of bad running God King to find this is the only useful pantheon left, but a solid choice for all civs nonetheless. Campuses and Theater Squares are the best districts overall and monopolizing their respective GPs are a path to success. Could help get that elusive religion on high difficulties too.

Situational:
Dance of the Aurora - If you're Russia and the map generator stays true to the bias, consider this the pick. So powerful it makes that one scientist that gives science equal to Holy site adjacency incredible. Not Russia? Pass.
God of the Open Sky - Lots of pastures will dictate how good this is. Can really jump start your culture when you need it most. In some games this is really powerful overall, just gotta read the map to make the most of it.
Oral Tradition - Replace "pastures" with "whatever this buffs" in the above description.

I like the idea but...:
God of the Sea - I've never had the sea resources to justify this, but it could be useful I suppose. Sometimes you gotta take what you can get. Naval domination on an archipelago? Maybe.
Lady of the Reeds and Marshes - I'd love to roll a map where there is an intricate intersection of rivers with flood plains containing wheat and I'm Egypt and there's marsh I don't want to clear the marsh and there's also an awesome Petra location and a balance of hills and chops and I just woke up from my dream.

Everything else:
They range from zero impact to "if this is truly the best choice your roll sucked".

Honorable mention and question for all: Do you get faith from combat victories near anyone's Holy Site when choosing God of War, or just your own? That would make this a useful backup pantheon if going for a classical and/or medieval rush.

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

God of War gives you faith for any kill within 8 hexes of ANY holy site! Considering how often the AI makes holy sites, and how great 8 range is, it can be pretty helpful.

 

[Boyan_Sun]

Here is an evaluation written by an expert player who can win SV before Christ peacefully in latest version.

Bug Tier:
Goddess of the Harvest - fastest victories always use this, see Gotm or some other videos.

Very Good:
God of the Forge - best for conquest, also extremely useful in peaceful play if use overflow.
Divine Spark - +100% GPP in early game, stable and useful

Good:
Goddess of the Open Sky - early culture really helps a lot; can provide tourism in late game
Oral Tradition - same reason, but less than pastures
City Patron Goddess - due to an R&F bug, that +25% prod will apply twice, one for city yield and one for speed production, multiplication

Should be better, but very contradictory because of R&F expansion:
Earth Goddess - best work tiles are often mines; forests always be removed if want efficiency
Stone Circles - same reason, stones should be better to harvest than to develop
Other pantheons which provide production bonus - productions that citizen provides is irrelevant if comparing to chop production

Situational good:
All pantheons provide adjacent bonus to Holy Site - religious victory specified, or some fancy games like OCC

Effect too small:
Other pantheons provide faith - only for religious victory, or some condition easy to kill units
Religious Settlements - still very low speed
Monument to the Gods - small bonus, even era limited, and that +15% has no bug.
River Goddess - contradictory design, why need Holy Site?

Hurt by low population/food value of civ6 mechanism:
Goddess of Festivals, Goddess of the Hunt, Fertility Rites - Too bad in Vanilla, a little bit better in R&F, but still pretty bad choices

 

[Scaramanga]

LOL because Desert Folklore was insanely overpowered in Civ V when every single desert tile got +1 faith. Which made it awesome for your Petra city, and even for floodplains and oases.

The reason I don't like Sacred Path / Desert Folkore / Dance of the Aurora is that it is dependent on your cities having lots of Holy Sites. Same thing with River Goddess, God of Healing, and God of War. I prefer pantheons that will benefit most of my cities, even ones without Holy Sites.

Those are better choices for Civs that want to build lots of holy sites (like Russia or Khmer). And for terrain-specific civs (Russia with Dance of the Aurora or Brazil with Sacred Path).

God of War doesn't require you to build holy sites. It says a holy site so you can be killing units in their own territory and racking up faith.

 

[The Highwayman]

God of War sounds like a viable alternative since the AI thinks simply building Holy Sites is a win condition. I'll have to check it out next time Harvest is gone. If Harvest eventually gets nerfed, a lot of these pantheons need buffs because many of them are useless. In fact I would much rather they buff the low than nerf the high.

 

[row2infinity]

I always do God King to get Divine Spark and then don't bother to try to get a religion. I usually play on Immortal, trying to play on Diety, and working for a religion slows me down way too much early game. But Divine Spark is still super useful.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I'll have to check it out next time Harvest is gone.

You're not required by law to pick it, you know.

 

[Halcyan2]

God of War sounds like a viable alternative since the AI thinks simply building Holy Sites is a win condition. I'll have to check it out next time Harvest is gone. If Harvest eventually gets nerfed, a lot of these pantheons need buffs because many of them are useless. In fact I would much rather they buff the low than nerf the high.

I remember back in Civ V when some of us wanted the weaker pantheons to be buffed. Some people argued that the pantheons and religious beliefs *should* be unbalanced, in order to incentivize and reward those who prioritize faith and get them first....

 

[AmazonQueen]

I remember back in Civ V when some of us wanted the weaker pantheons to be buffed. Some people argued that the pantheons and religious beliefs *should* be unbalanced, in order to incentivize and reward those who prioritize faith and get them first....

Trouble is theres not actually much you can do to prioritize faith to get the best pantheon.
Play Indonesia and settle on a faith luxury and you will still be beaten to Earth Goddess by a civ that finds a relic in their first goodie hut.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Exactly, right now it's not even a choice. You either get it or you don't.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Trouble is theres not actually much you can do to prioritize faith to get the best pantheon.
Play Indonesia and settle on a faith luxury and you will still be beaten to Earth Goddess by a civ that finds a relic in their first goodie hut.

Your main choice is whether to run God King. Doing so bumps you up the ranks of when you get your pantheon, but is far from enough on its own to get the first couple of pantheons. Secondarily, invest in an early Scout to improve your odds, but still with no guarantee.

As a game design choice, Civ 6 currently emphasizes the map when it comes to pantheons. Having a faith producing luxury or being the first to discover a religious city state flags the opportunity to get an early pantheon, while not having those things says you probably won't. That could be changed, however, by a goody hut faith bonus, i.e. improving your pantheon pick is one possible reward for building an early Scout.

In the absence of that randomness, player choice could potentially guarantee an early pantheon pick, but only if the AI is coded to allow the player that ability. Sort of like how the development team needed to change the AI coding in one of the patches so that some leaders don't prioritize getting an early religion, prior to which the human could never get a religion on Deity.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Your main choice is whether to run God King. Doing so bumps you up the ranks of when you get your pantheon, but is far from enough on its own to get the first couple of pantheons. Secondarily, invest in an early Scout to improve your odds, but still with no guarantee.

As a game design choice, Civ 6 currently emphasizes the map when it comes to pantheons. Having a faith producing luxury or being the first to discover a religious city state flags the opportunity to get an early pantheon, while not having those things says you probably won't. That could be changed, however, by a goody hut faith bonus, i.e. improving your pantheon pick is one possible reward for building an early Scout.

In the absence of that randomness, player choice could potentially guarantee an early pantheon pick, but only if the AI is coded to allow the player that ability. Sort of like how the development team needed to change the AI coding in one of the patches so that some leaders don't prioritize getting an early religion, prior to which the human could never get a religion on Deity.

I do those things but basically its down to RNG.
In Civ V you had to build shrines etc to even get a pantheon which meant that it was down to a decision on your part like it is to go for a religion in Civ VI.
Personally I don't think relics should be a goodie hut reward or if they are it shouldn't be on the early turns. You can't get faith from a goodie hut for the 1st 20 turns so why a much more rewarding (in the long run) relic?

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I do those things but basically its down to RNG.
In Civ V you had to build shrines etc to even get a pantheon which meant that it was down to a decision on your part like it is to go for a religion in Civ VI.
Personally I don't think relics should be a goodie hut reward or if they are it shouldn't be on the early turns. You can't get faith from a goodie hut for the 1st 20 turns so why a much more rewarding (in the long run) relic?

Yes, exactly. And I think the game design decision amounts to:
(1) make success random, with certain actions improving your odds but none of them guaranteeing it; or
(2) make success something the human player can guarantee, in which case you need to purposefully code some of the AI civs to not do those same things or else on Immortal/Deity they will always beat the human player to a pantheon.

The Relic is, indeed, a super powerful early find. I assume part of the reason it exists is to make building an early Scout a more competitive choice vis-à-vis an early Builder. But there, too, you get into that same sort of design decision. An early Scout is possibly a great investment but possibly not, depending on what it finds, while with the early Builder you know what you're going to get.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Yes, exactly. And I think the game design decision amounts to:
(1) make success random, with certain actions improving your odds but none of them guaranteeing it; or
(2) make success something the human player can guarantee, in which case you need to purposefully code some of the AI civs to not do those same things or else on Immortal/Deity they will always beat the human player to a pantheon.

The Relic is, indeed, a super powerful early find. I assume part of the reason it exists is to make building an early Scout a more competitive choice vis-à-vis an early Builder. But there, too, you get into that same sort of design decision. An early Scout is possibly a great investment but possibly not, depending on what it finds, while with the early Builder you know what you're going to get.

I'd rather not have totally guaranteed success, but at the same time the relic is too strong yeah. It reminds me of finding an early Cibola in CivV (though not that drastic). I would like the Pantheons to be more even in general, where maybe one of them is still way better for a player in a given situation.

 

[Archon_Wing]

They could make founding a pantheon to be a requirement for popping a relic.That would urge getting a pantheon more sooner.

 

[playshogi]

Playing Russia, I founded my capital on tundra and worked a sheep hill tile from turn 1, so I found it ironic that when I could pick a pantheon on turn 13, I popped a hut that gave me a relic. So, now I have a choice of Earth Goddess or Harvest Goddess (among others). What to pick?

 

[Bitterman]

• Religious Idols: Ehh sounds super weak to me, don't know why I'd ever pick this

I got massive faith output with this in one of my last games as Gandhi. The bonus is actually +2 if I recall well not +1 like in the description. Lots of amber, gypsum, copper and occasionals diamants. I got so much faith that I was able to flood everyone with early missionaries and even end one religion this way before it flourished.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

The bonus is actually +2 if I recall well not +1 like in the description.

LOL That wouldn't shock me.

I feel like we need a manual that can be distributed to all civ players, especially the new ones, with every entry following the format: "When the UI says X, it really means Y."

 

[Leathaface]

I found Divine Spark to be the best pantheon, it is powerful. Though when playing as Indonesia I go Earth Goddess since you can faith buy Jongs, plus all that faith is powerful if you get Monumentality. I don't get earth Goddess when not playing as Indonesia, so I don't get to pick it normally. (unless I get an early relic)

I find God of the Forge useful when playing as Nubia or Macedon, that 25% bonus is sweet. Though i'm not really a warmonger, I like to play peaceful, so I normally wouldn't pick God of the Forge. Though if i'm stuck in a corner of a map and another Civ forward settled me hard, I would go to war to get a bigger empire.

I don't think i'll ever pick pantheons such as River Goddess, Religious Idols or God of Craftsmen. They are not powerful enough, plus Divine Spark is almost always available to pick.