Religious buildings or missionaries first?

[Artifex1]

Do you buy the catherdrals, pagodas and mosque first or churn out missionaries first?

 

[reddishrecue]

Religions buildings first and then the missionaries is how I ended up doing.

 

[phillipwyllie]

Missionaries first

 

[Fluffball]

Depends a lot on your religion. If you gain an advantage by the size of the religion and therefore spreading it as much as possible then missionaries until it is well established as it becomes increasingly harder to convert once other religions start spreading.
Hopefully by that time general pressure will be able to do most of the work then.

If your religion is more empire personal then buildings first.

 

[Browd]

Agree with Fluffball, but that still usually means at least 1 Missionary in all cases (typically before enhancing).

 

[ToothedBomb]

(typically before enhancing).

Really? I never do that. I'm scared all decent tenets will be taken by the time I can earn enough faith to get a missionary and a second prophet.

I find getting a lot of faith buildings early on has this snowball effect where you can get insane amounts of faith very quickly. I usually try to build the Great Mosque and/or Borobudur so I can spread my religion without too much effort, and still get the happiness and faith from the faith buildings.

 

[ArguCa]

Actually using missionaries first to spread your religion to civ which don't have own religion is quite good. They defend your religion more than you do. In my current Venice campaign, Russia proposed my religion to be world religion in World Congress.

 

[Stellarnight]

I usually go missionaries first. Spreading religion early is a snowball effect since each converted city produces its own pressure which generally means more followers. If i purchase my pagodas/mosques/church first, i gain some benefit from the building but the AI would have started actively or passively pressuring my cities. The building benefits are miniscule when compared to getting a good religious base of converted cities

 

[Hemul]

I only go for buildings first if I get a double natural wonder supercheese start with Spain

 

[tat501]

Generally - missionaries first. Get it spreading like wildfire. Unless I've taken itinerant preachers or religious texts and its the first religion on the board OR I've got an unhappiness penalty that can quickly be erased by a pagoda being built.

Just to be clear - this is ALWAYS after enhancing. I always enhance first before I do any of these things.

 

[joncnunn]

Mine:

Neither: Enhance religion first before anything else (unless you went Piety and so are going to get a free great prophet to enhance anyway)
Because if you don't some AI is going to pick as its first follower the belief you want as your second one.

And then by default its religious buildings. Because I'd always pick RT enhancer when picking religious buildings so passive spread will be plenty.

Note that there's no point at all in trying to convert the world; the AIs will just spam their missionaries and GP and reconvert anyway. All you really want is your own cities to be in your religion and also to keep them from flipping so it's not missonaries you'll need but instead Inquisitors to park near your cities to keep the AI from flipping them.

 

[danaphanous]

I'll sometimes build a missionary first if I'm counting on Hagia Sophia or finishing piety to trigger my last prophet. If so you're wasting your time waiting, better to start spreading as soon as possible to get the bonuses at least to the rest of your own cities. Lately I've been getting enough faith this is too long to wait though, and in this case I save it all for that 2nd prophet to get the most options on beliefs. I never build the buildings before either enhancing or missionaries though UNLESS I get borobadur because that gives me all the missionaries I need in the short-term.

 

[shaglio]

I'll sometimes build a missionary first if I'm counting on Hagia Sophia or finishing piety to trigger my last prophet. If so you're wasting your time waiting, better to start spreading as soon as possible to get the bonuses at least to the rest of your own cities. Lately I've been getting enough faith this is too long to wait though, and in this case I save it all for that 2nd prophet to get the most options on beliefs. I never build the buildings before either enhancing or missionaries though UNLESS I get borobadur because that gives me all the missionaries I need in the short-term.

This brings up another question: If you're using the Hagia Sophia or Piety closer for the 2nd enhancement, is it better to start building Missionaries or wait for the 2nd (300 faith) Great Prophet for a 4-conversion unit that doesn't suffer Attrition, rather than the 2-conversion, Affliction-susceptible Missionary?

 

[danaphanous]

This brings up another question: If you're using the Hagia Sophia or Piety closer for the 2nd enhancement, is it better to start building Missionaries or wait for the 2nd (300 faith) Great Prophet for a 4-conversion unit that doesn't suffer Attrition, rather than the 2-conversion, Affliction-susceptible Missionary?

A valid question. I find missionaries are fine when I am first spreading within my own empire which is what I'm doing at this first stage.

I find:

- one missionary action is enough to make one of my own cities convert at this stage
- you can purchase the missionary way before the prophet

Therefore, I'd always assumed the missionary was better as it starts your religious pressure snowballing sooner. The action isn't as strong but all that matters at this stage is getting the conversion of the city (half population) it quickly becomes fully religious with several nearby cities exerting your pressure. Your question though made me think: I would guess if your faith gen was good enough you might get your pressure out faster by using a prophet. I actually, typically get a 3rd prophet to get nearby non-religious capitals as missionaries often don't cut it and get attrition. However, with borobadur I may instead plop the prophet down, especially going Piety because I get 3 gold and 3 culture, 8 faith from the GP tile. That adds up really quickly. I'd love to hear Browd's view on it.

 

[Browd]

For cities with no religion a prophet is no stronger than a missionary.

 

[Antarion]

Religion as always mentioned is very situational. An Easy help is Check what Religion did pick. If u got tithe with Pagodas i Prefer Building First. Ceremonial burial, Church property oder initial rites with Shrines or tempels improved i Would surely take a missionary First and spread it to the biggest bearbeiten City which is usually a City State or Enemy Capital.



Gesendet von meinem iPhone mit Tapatalk

 

[kaspergm]

Actually using missionaries first to spread your religion to civ which don't have own religion is quite good. They defend your religion more than you do. In my current Venice campaign, Russia proposed my religion to be world religion in World Congress.

This is only partially true. I find the game sort of missed the balance of this, because:

1. There are many religions compared to number of civs (half + 1) which means chance is high that a civ that haven't gotten your religion will get their own later.
2. A civ that has "happily addopted your religion" will still found their own religion given the chance.

I can see why #2 makes sense, but it's a bit of a downer for gameplay, because it means early agressive spread is more likely than not to be a waste of effort. Particularly because any belief that grants faith wich you spread to them will only help them found their own religion faster. This has a negative synergy effect with your incentive to spread your own religion fast.

For that reason, I almost always enhance first, then spread locally, then buy religious buildings, and only then spread externally, so far that all religions are founded and some neighbor didn't get to found. Obviously getting Borobudur is an exception.

I do feel game would be more balance and more fun if founding a religion was less essential (this could be accomplished by granting founder rights if your conquer holy city) and if civs, at least civs not very partial towards religion, would skip founding if they have "happily adopted a religion".

 

[chazzycat]

usually it's 1 missionary before enhancing for me. 3 cities is much more effective at spreading religion than 1, you just get a lot more pressure from the overlapping cities. And I almost always have a religion that benefits from spreading.

 

[reddishrecue]

Does this question think that the religion is already enhanced? If it doesn't then I would enhance first and then purchase the buildings in the capital. Afterwards buy the missionaries or the inquisitors.

 

[GoStu]

I generally wait until I've got my enhancing prophet before buying anything. That missionary or building seriously delays getting a second follower belief and your enhancer belief. I also play on large/huge maps, therefore the bottom of the barrel for beliefs is pretty low indeed. I don't want to be the guy stuck with Religious Art.

After that long though, enough other players have a religion that the wildfire effect of a vet early missionary is gone. Frankly, I've never seen the 'wildfire' except from Borobudur. Three cities is more pressure than one by a good margin, but it's nothing compared to whoever gets Borobudur.

Therefore, my first purchase is generally a pagoda (if I got them).