Justice1337
Sofa King
So kind of late with G&K winding down and all, but I was going through the historic belief comparison threads and it got me thinking. A raw comparison really isn't nuanced enough. The assumption is going to be a magical christmas land of Faith per Turn where I somehow have enough for Pagodas in each city, missionary spam for Tithe, and I'm still tall enough through all this FPT for Religious Community. In reality, that's probably a bad religion because it's trying to do too much. I think most people understand that you can't do something like two Religious buildings, but I don't find enough analysis centered around what your FPT conditions are like. So, I see the following categories of Faith budget and faith dumps:
1) Absurd FPT // Multiple Faith Dumps
Ok, here we have the magical christmas land. Ethiopia/Maya, Large Map, Desert Folklore, Piety. Here, you can do anything you want. Pagodas, Holy Warriors, Holy Order if you want, with Tithe as a Founder and just go as wide as you want. Otherwise, see below.
2) Good FPT // Faith Dump
The basic religion game's religion. You have budget for both a faith dump and a little bit of spread. Your one faith dump is usually a good one. Pagodas seem most popular, but more specific VC's want specific things like Cathedrals in Cultural or Holy Warriors in Dom. You also have enough faith for modest Religion spread, but since your budget isn't limitless, you lean on passive spread a bit and benefit from a head start. Itinerate Preachers and Religious Texts are popular, and the opening choice of Prophet > Missionary > Prophet is a good one. You can modestly support a good, spread-dependant Founder belief like Tithe, World Church, or Ceremonial Burial.
As you can see, a lot of religion analysis takes place here. This is more or less the baseline assumption for a religion game, and so enough has been said about it.
3) Good FPT // No Faith Dump
This is the religion to get lots of benefits up front. Because your FPT is good you're usually here because you turned down a faith dump, not because you were beaten to one, and so you most often have plans for this Religion.
This is where you want to go when you have a powerful Founder Belief that you want to spread as quickly and effectively as possible. The trinity of Tithe, World Church and Ceremonial Burial often make an appearance here, but there are games where you prefer other Founder beliefs that are usually much too contingent for religions with faith dumps. Maybe Initiation Rites, Church Property, or Peace Loving. But your founder is your main action here. You prefer static followers like Asceticism, Religious Community, Swords into Plowshares, Feed the World. Wide empires often find themselves here, because the costs of Faith purchansing Religious buildings is very high for 10+ cities. Accordingly, static happiness beliefs like Asceticism are often ideal here. If you are significantly leading world FPT here, you may actually want to pick an Enhancer other than IP/RT, specifically Holy Order or Missionary Zeal instead. Your fpt will mostly go to missionaries, and early overlap is often even better than late passive spread.
The other option for this Religion is to use GP as a de facto faith dump. This is rare, but think of a Piety-charged Cultural game with multiple Holy Sites into Industrial Great Artists. Or Persia with a rolling Golden Age from Freedom GA's. This may play like an ordinary faith dump, as above, and so the standard passive IP/RT Enhancer beliefs come in. Messiah may be a good choice for Piety games though.
4) Poor FPT // Faith Dump
This is either a religion that focuses on limited benefits for a small empire, or a religion for when things go wrong.
As for small empires, a good example is a Cultural Cathedrals game. I see the two ideal followers there being Cathedrals and Religious Community. This religion specifically is somewhat more explored. Of instructive worth here, you can feel free to take an otherwise undervalued, non-faith generating pantheon like Sacred Path, Sacred Waters, Monument to the Gods, Ancestor Worship, or others. And in cultural games specifically, you can rely on the Piety tree and the Grand Temple instead of aggressive spread to keep your core pressurized. In these religions also, you can feel free to take less spread-dependant founders like Initiation Rites or Papal Primacy. The reason this works is because the Faith Dump doesn't demand very much faith, because the empire is small.
The other type of religion in this category is religion for when things go wrong. Sometimes your FPT is good, but because of difficulty or neighbors, you're looking at the prospects of very high costs and little benefit if you want to spread it. Imagine Ethiopia as a neighbor who is spreading into your borders a religion with Pagodas or other attractive beliefs. If you spread yours anyway, you have to spend much more faith than normal, without as much benefit. But if you neglect spread and pick a faith dump instead, you find yourself here.
This religion wants to focus on beliefs that retain most of their effect even when the religion is found in only one city. The perfect example is Holy Warriors. You can buy units with faith in any city, so you only need one. Other possible Faith dumps would include Missionaries for Founder beliefs like those like Interfaith Dialogue and Initiation Rites, which still function mostly at a lot of benefit when you eventually lose the spread war. Otherwise, you are particularly well off when a neighbor's religion gives you a per-city faith dump like a religious building, or you can save for Great People. This is a religion that might be ok without ever being enhanced, so the decision to pursue a second prophet should be made carefully. For secondary Follower beliefs though, Divine Inspiration and Religious Art are not overly impressive themselves, but they are at their best here because they tend to function in Capital cities only. And about the only working Enhancers would be the combat related ones, or Reliquary.
5) Poor FPT // No Faith Dump
This is the religion of static bonuses. You can end up here when you don't focus religion at a very high priority, you open a Faith goody hut or Religious CS, and then decide that it's worth a bit of investment to get a Prophet. You can also find yourself here when you're planning on religion initally, but you're beaten to an ideal faith generating belief and find your empire too small for many religious buildings.
The strategy here is to focus on static bonuses of raw outputs, preferrably not tied to religious buldings. Religious Community and Swords to Plowshares are examples of Follower beliefs that give direct benefits out of the religion system, without having to build additional Temples and Shrines. Otherwise if you've already built them, Asceticism, Religious Center and Feed the World give good flat benefits that require no faith investment.
6) No Religion
Of course, the last possibility is that of No Religion. The strategy is uncomplicated here. You look at each religion from your neighbors, then decide whether it's worth it to conquer one of their cities for a missionary, or if it's better to wait with your fingers crossed and hope it spreads passively to your land.
1) Absurd FPT // Multiple Faith Dumps
Ok, here we have the magical christmas land. Ethiopia/Maya, Large Map, Desert Folklore, Piety. Here, you can do anything you want. Pagodas, Holy Warriors, Holy Order if you want, with Tithe as a Founder and just go as wide as you want. Otherwise, see below.
2) Good FPT // Faith Dump
The basic religion game's religion. You have budget for both a faith dump and a little bit of spread. Your one faith dump is usually a good one. Pagodas seem most popular, but more specific VC's want specific things like Cathedrals in Cultural or Holy Warriors in Dom. You also have enough faith for modest Religion spread, but since your budget isn't limitless, you lean on passive spread a bit and benefit from a head start. Itinerate Preachers and Religious Texts are popular, and the opening choice of Prophet > Missionary > Prophet is a good one. You can modestly support a good, spread-dependant Founder belief like Tithe, World Church, or Ceremonial Burial.
As you can see, a lot of religion analysis takes place here. This is more or less the baseline assumption for a religion game, and so enough has been said about it.
3) Good FPT // No Faith Dump
This is the religion to get lots of benefits up front. Because your FPT is good you're usually here because you turned down a faith dump, not because you were beaten to one, and so you most often have plans for this Religion.
This is where you want to go when you have a powerful Founder Belief that you want to spread as quickly and effectively as possible. The trinity of Tithe, World Church and Ceremonial Burial often make an appearance here, but there are games where you prefer other Founder beliefs that are usually much too contingent for religions with faith dumps. Maybe Initiation Rites, Church Property, or Peace Loving. But your founder is your main action here. You prefer static followers like Asceticism, Religious Community, Swords into Plowshares, Feed the World. Wide empires often find themselves here, because the costs of Faith purchansing Religious buildings is very high for 10+ cities. Accordingly, static happiness beliefs like Asceticism are often ideal here. If you are significantly leading world FPT here, you may actually want to pick an Enhancer other than IP/RT, specifically Holy Order or Missionary Zeal instead. Your fpt will mostly go to missionaries, and early overlap is often even better than late passive spread.
The other option for this Religion is to use GP as a de facto faith dump. This is rare, but think of a Piety-charged Cultural game with multiple Holy Sites into Industrial Great Artists. Or Persia with a rolling Golden Age from Freedom GA's. This may play like an ordinary faith dump, as above, and so the standard passive IP/RT Enhancer beliefs come in. Messiah may be a good choice for Piety games though.
4) Poor FPT // Faith Dump
This is either a religion that focuses on limited benefits for a small empire, or a religion for when things go wrong.
As for small empires, a good example is a Cultural Cathedrals game. I see the two ideal followers there being Cathedrals and Religious Community. This religion specifically is somewhat more explored. Of instructive worth here, you can feel free to take an otherwise undervalued, non-faith generating pantheon like Sacred Path, Sacred Waters, Monument to the Gods, Ancestor Worship, or others. And in cultural games specifically, you can rely on the Piety tree and the Grand Temple instead of aggressive spread to keep your core pressurized. In these religions also, you can feel free to take less spread-dependant founders like Initiation Rites or Papal Primacy. The reason this works is because the Faith Dump doesn't demand very much faith, because the empire is small.
The other type of religion in this category is religion for when things go wrong. Sometimes your FPT is good, but because of difficulty or neighbors, you're looking at the prospects of very high costs and little benefit if you want to spread it. Imagine Ethiopia as a neighbor who is spreading into your borders a religion with Pagodas or other attractive beliefs. If you spread yours anyway, you have to spend much more faith than normal, without as much benefit. But if you neglect spread and pick a faith dump instead, you find yourself here.
This religion wants to focus on beliefs that retain most of their effect even when the religion is found in only one city. The perfect example is Holy Warriors. You can buy units with faith in any city, so you only need one. Other possible Faith dumps would include Missionaries for Founder beliefs like those like Interfaith Dialogue and Initiation Rites, which still function mostly at a lot of benefit when you eventually lose the spread war. Otherwise, you are particularly well off when a neighbor's religion gives you a per-city faith dump like a religious building, or you can save for Great People. This is a religion that might be ok without ever being enhanced, so the decision to pursue a second prophet should be made carefully. For secondary Follower beliefs though, Divine Inspiration and Religious Art are not overly impressive themselves, but they are at their best here because they tend to function in Capital cities only. And about the only working Enhancers would be the combat related ones, or Reliquary.
5) Poor FPT // No Faith Dump
This is the religion of static bonuses. You can end up here when you don't focus religion at a very high priority, you open a Faith goody hut or Religious CS, and then decide that it's worth a bit of investment to get a Prophet. You can also find yourself here when you're planning on religion initally, but you're beaten to an ideal faith generating belief and find your empire too small for many religious buildings.
The strategy here is to focus on static bonuses of raw outputs, preferrably not tied to religious buldings. Religious Community and Swords to Plowshares are examples of Follower beliefs that give direct benefits out of the religion system, without having to build additional Temples and Shrines. Otherwise if you've already built them, Asceticism, Religious Center and Feed the World give good flat benefits that require no faith investment.
6) No Religion
Of course, the last possibility is that of No Religion. The strategy is uncomplicated here. You look at each religion from your neighbors, then decide whether it's worth it to conquer one of their cities for a missionary, or if it's better to wait with your fingers crossed and hope it spreads passively to your land.
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