Rationalism vs. Piety

[WeaselSlapper]

Aside from a culture win I'm finding a hard time justifying a reason to take piety over rationalism, even in a large puppet empire.

Yes piety gives and extra 1-2 happiness per puppet and the extra gold and happiness from temples means you will probably end up with a lot more culture, but I think the +1 science per trading post can more than make up for the extra science you would get from the extra population. The only exception to this I can think of is if you have HG and NC and you direct all the excess population to your capital.

Is there ever any reason besides going for a culture victory to go for piety?

 

[Monthar]

Plus there is the rationalism policy that boost happiness from science buildings.

 

[apocalypse105]

Yes there is if you want to go autocracy or order you maybe want to go for piety so you actualy have culture to fill those late policies in!!!!!!

If you have only 3 cities and the rest puppets you will likly will get a lot of social policies because you picked piety and reduce the cost..

So you can eather get patronage and then order or going all out autocracy

 

[chazzycat]

if you have your heart set on going wide for some reason (i frequently do), +2 happy per city can make or break the early game. I wouldn't go past the first 2 policies other than a culture game though. And yes, you're generally better off with rationalism/RA power.

 

[snarzberry]

If city selling was made more difficult then piety would spike in power against rationalism. With rationalism you get a really large science boost but against piety you miss out on a lot of happiness and some extra social policies. Happiness can be controlled in domination games by the wholesale selling of conquered cities, which I'd like to see changed up. Selling lots of conquered cities goes against what domination victories are all about and is a result of our weird 'be the last holding your capital' domination victory condition.

piety -> autocracy seems a pretty good way to play, but rationalism just provides you with so much extra science it's hard to argue against it being the most powerful tree.

 

[vonbach]

I always go with piety. I usually don't have any troubles with science but piety gives a nice
boost to happiness and culture. Besides with enough happiness you get golden ages.

 

[joncnunn]

Yes there is if you want to go autocracy or order you maybe want to go for piety so you actualy have culture to fill those late policies in!!!!!!

That was indeed my one use for Piety in my previous game in which I decided to go autocracy just for the "Diplomacy by Other Means" achievement. (I played Monty; first choosing Honor, then Piety, and last Autocracy)

 

[drubell]

I've been playing Liberty -> Piety for massive empires but I'm considering Liberty -> Honor instead (opening Honor first for the barb culture of course) just for the right side of the tree. Garrisons will pick up the culture and happiness that you'd normally get from building temples and puppets will also make walls/castles for more happiness. Then I can go for Rationalism with no worries about my happiness or culture suffering.

 

[Tiber4321]

As somewhat of a newcomer to Civ 5 (currently playing at King), I've been weighing the merits of piety vs rationalism quite a bit. I've been been trying to max out my great scientist production and going with piety lately. This seems to work great, but in the mid to late game you start to realize other AIs have techs you don't. I'm starting to realize that if I go the piety route, despite all the winfalls of happiness and gold, I WILL fall behind in science.

Good advice on this thread about the merits of rationalism.

 

[Monthar]

The only difference in the amount of happiness possible between Piety and Rationalism is the number of monasteries vs the number of observatories. To have the observatories the city must be built next to the mounts, while monasteries only need the wine/incense in any of the 3 rings. Depending on the map, you could have just as many observatories as you have monasteries. If all the wine and incense tiles are clustered close together you could end up with more observatories than monasteries.

 

[black213]

Most of the time I pick Piety, except if I'm going for a science victory.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

The only difference in the amount of happiness possible between Piety and Rationalism is the number of monasteries vs the number of observatories. To have the observatories the city must be built next to the mounts, while monasteries only need the wine/incense in any of the 3 rings. Depending on the map, you could have just as many observatories as you have monasteries. If all the wine and incense tiles are clustered close together you could end up with more observatories than monasteries.

for a long time i thought the monastery bonus was +2 culture PER wine/incense. i did a bunch of restarts to get a huge wine (3+ wines) start, built my empire up then learned otherwise. was a big bummer. i never did get an incense and wine start that was within the same city. it was either one or the other every time. i was really hoping to make monasteries abusive, haha.

 

[chazzycat]

The only difference in the amount of happiness possible between Piety and Rationalism is the number of monasteries vs the number of observatories. To have the observatories the city must be built next to the mounts, while monasteries only need the wine/incense in any of the 3 rings. Depending on the map, you could have just as many observatories as you have monasteries. If all the wine and incense tiles are clustered close together you could end up with more observatories than monasteries.

"happiness possible" is not really what matters. It's WHEN you can get that happiness. Consider...

- piety comes 1 whole age earlier
- the good happiness policy is the obvious 2nd choice in piety, while with rationalism the left side is generally more important, and so the happiness policy is out of the way.
- monuments and temples are much earlier in the tech tree, and much cheaper to build than universities/public schools
- monuments/temples will be built even faster because of the first piety policy, and no such synergy exists for rationalism buildings
- culture buildings are higher than science buildings in the priority order for puppet cities to build

Rationalism is a great tree but for different reasons.

 

[Buccaneer]

Coincidentally, I just had to make that decision a few minutes ago. Even though I am doing very well on science in a conquest-type game (and had finished Liberty and Patronage), my next policy had to be Piety or Rationalism. I thought long and hard and had to go with Piety simply because I need Organized Religion. I love having to make choices like this and wish there were more either/or choices.

 

[Monthar]

@ chazzycat
Yes, but if you've timed everything right, you can start Rationalism as the first policy after finishing Liberty. Then the happiness policy could be the 2nd policy you take before going down the left side if happiness is that much of an issue.

However, if your goal is something like the stealth bomber slingshot before you start taking puppets, you can complete the left side, then grab the happiness policy.

In any case, no matter when you take the happiness policy in Rationalism, any puppets you have will try to prioritize getting the universities, public schools and observatories built just because of the bonus happiness. So those buildings will come in after the merchant buildings, unless your civ is unhappy, then they'll get built before the merchant buildings if they're the only happiness building or if it's the cheapest happiness building the puppet can build.

 

[Tiber4321]

@ Monthar, I don't know a fraction about this game compared to you. But, I'm immersing myself into the game recently. Piety, in my games, provides an early explosion in happiness and "golden age" related gold. It seems to me that piety provides you early game dominance, but hurts you in the later times, because you fall behind in science.

It seems to me that if you can turn the early dominance piety offers into incredibly strong positions, then piety is worth it. If not, then rationalism should have been the way to go. I'm starting to think rationalism is the winning strategy when the late game is considered. I've won 2 games at King with piety, but I've lost 2 in a row by falling behind in science, despite having large score leads. Siam just kicked my ass ((.

 

[chazzycat]

@ chazzycat
Yes, but if you've timed everything right, you can start Rationalism as the first policy after finishing Liberty. Then the happiness policy could be the 2nd policy you take before going down the left side if happiness is that much of an issue.

And you'll get at MOST +1 happiness per city from that. Only universities would be possible at that point, since you just entered the renaissance and public schools are still off in the distance. And honestly the odds of all universities being completed by then are low.

However, if your goal is something like the stealth bomber slingshot before you start taking puppets, you can complete the left side, then grab the happiness policy.

Sure you could do that, but the fact remains the happiness comes much later than it would under piety.

In any case, no matter when you take the happiness policy in Rationalism, any puppets you have will try to prioritize getting the universities, public schools and observatories built just because of the bonus happiness. So those buildings will come in after the merchant buildings, unless your civ is unhappy, then they'll get built before the merchant buildings if they're the only happiness building or if it's the cheapest happiness building the puppet can build.

That is a good point, but the same is true for piety. And the fact remains that there is a huge difference in the hammer costs for those buildings.

Look I'm not knocking rationalism, it's great. But if your goal is to improve happiness in a wide empire early in the game, piety is superior in that specific goal.

 

[Resonance]

So essentially, piety solves a mid-game happiness and gold problem but does so at the price of slower science. If you can afford to pay that price, for example because you can keep up or even outpace AI teching without rationalism, piety is a good choice.
But definitely not the only one. And if you cannot keep up with the AI, artillery, planes and nukes will come to hurt you later.

The science problem only becomes one in late game, so if you are able to break all AIs until late renaissance this does not matter. But I find that impossible to do on deity unless I play mongols.

 

[Hammer Rabbi]

i think rationalism is an 'always' solid strategy for pretty much any VC. piety is very good but it's much more situational assuming that certain VCs are desired or certain civs are being played. imo, only the best players know how to be uber-efficient without rationalism. and even then they probably settled for just the Porcelain Tower and still signed a bunch of RAs.

 

[Buccaneer]

i think rationalism is an 'always' solid strategy for pretty much any VC. piety is very good but it's much more situational assuming that certain VCs are desired or certain civs are being played. imo, only the best players know how to be uber-efficient without rationalism. and even then they probably settled for just the Porcelain Tower and still signed a bunch of RAs.

Or to really maximize research buildings and scientists, along the GP multipliers. I'm having my best science game ever (as Arabia) even though I focused on a thorough conquest of two continents. High science rate and lots of GS - all without a single RA or Rationalism.