[NFP] Religious Victory Elimination Thread

[TCBB]

Gandhi/India [24]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [28]
Mansa Musa/Mali [Eliminated]. A worthy top 5, but he’s out.
Peter/Russia [38] (37+1) I similarly think he deserves to be a runaway. People overcomplicate the argument by getting bogged down with secondary debates (pantheons, terrain, etc), when really, it’s as simple as the Lavra. A half price district, producing more great prophet points, more faith, as well as free GWAMs for era score and culture. Lavra alone gives Peter top spot.
Saladin/Arabia [24]

 

[JhGf_123]

Gandhi/India [21] (24-3) Got to start chipping away at someone. What swings it for me is the flexibility of the other three. Japan and Russia only need to spend half the time making their holy sites, which frees up the other half to build settlers or infrastructure. And Arabia can afford to focus on these things first, because they have the safety net of a free prophet. But Gandhi must go straight for holy sites and must invest 100% cost into them. Like others have said, it’s only a minor negative, but at this point it’s what makes the difference.
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [28]
Peter/Russia [39] (38+1) Two Ls: lavra and land.
Saladin/Arabia [24]

 

[bengalryan9]

Gandhi/India [21] FWIW, I think he's the most fun to play of the four and you can get some crazy good Holy Sites (added culture, food, production, etc) from Dharma.
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [25] (28-3) Tough to vote down any of the four at this point, but personally I think I'll take Gandhi's super-missionaries and Saladin's science game over Hojo's bonuses.
Peter/Russia [39] He's like Korea in that his OP district basically defines him.
Saladin/Arabia [25] (24+1) In addition to all the obvious bonuses he has, he is likely to be the first of the remaining civs to reach every continent on the map. Science may take a back seat to faith and culture when chasing an RV but it does still have importance. I think he should be #2.

 

[Hans Castorp]

Gandhi/India [22] [21+1] Gandhi's extra missionary spread puts him ahead of Saladin in my book.
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [25]
Peter/Russia [39]
Saladin/Arabia [22] [25-3] Top four is respectable by an standards, but postponing building HS comes at a cost in choice of beliefs and in that those quicker off the mark already have a substantial advantage. Science is good - rapid faith and culture accumulation matter more.

 

[kryat]

Gandhi/India [22]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [22] (25-3)
Peter/Russia [39]
Saladin/Arabia [23] (22+1)

I’m voting this way because my top 4 (of remaining) is
1) Russia
2) Arabia
3) Ghandi
4) Japan

I think Arabia is stronger than Japan because Arabia gets faith for doing things you normally do. The Madrasa is a great source of faith and you save huge amounts of faith or production by being able to buy cheap T3 buildings as soon as you can get them. I think T3 buildings are more important than holy site adjacency (though I can see the case for the opposite).

The Last Prophet can encourage you to be lazy, but you don’t have to use it. Instead, it can act as a safeguard when playing against aggressive religious leaders who may beat you to founding religions on large maps at high difficulties (Particularly Russia, China, Greece, and Poland).

Getting science in foreign cities will not win you a science victory. But it will keep you from falling hopelessly behind. Although Japan can spam holy sites and theater squares and encampments, they really would like Germany’s ability to build more districts than population allows. So you have to choose: science, culture, or gold (or encampments I suppose), until you have the population to support more districts. Arabia just goes all in on science, preferring monuments as their primary culture source. Not being tempted by cheap culture or encampments, Arabia is also plausibly more likely to favor earlier commercial hubs, after holy sites and campuses, making them richer and have more outgoing trade routes for a touch more pressure.


Unrelated, I’d like to point out India’s missionaries aren’t 40% stronger (though everyone else’s are 40% weaker). India’s missionaries are 67% stronger.

 

[Francel]

As we near the end, please indulge me for a moment. Thank you so much to everyone who participated, and special thanks to the many people who provided thoughtful and articulate analyses throughout the thread. I personally learned a lot, and I'm sure others did too.

In order to showcase and celebrate our collective effort, I am making a tiermaker graphic. Please take a look and offer your input, if you're so inclined (It's in the Religious Victory "companion" thread, so we can post as often as we like, instead of every 24 hours).

Although the graphic needs to reflect the order in which civs were eliminated (ie, Tamar, eliminated before Jadwiga, couldn't be A tier and Jadwiga B tier), the cutoff points are open to your feedback.

I set the cutoffs tentatively as a starting point for discussion based partly on what I learned from the thread and my own perception of power spikes. Also, the s tier isn't final until we've finished voting.


Gandhi/India [22]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [19] (22-3) - I'm not sold on the idea their adjacency bonus is a huge difference maker. Half price is good, but there is still a district limit and someone has to be fourth. Someone could probably crunch some numbers, but it seems like Gandhi's 40% plus missionaries would make more of a difference. Also, I thought a good point someone made is that during the time before apostles are prevalent, cities are smaller and can be converted more easily. In general, the earlier something is the stronger it will be.
Peter/Russia [39]
Saladin/Arabia [24] (23+1) - The value of Last Prophet has been debated, but on the higher difficulties, I have been surprised even when trying to found a religion suddenly all the prophets are gone. The beginning of the game is most critical phase. With the flexibility, you can't miss out, even if you are compelled at the start to make settlers to suck up the best nearby land, or rush a war to incapacitate a neighbor. Even going last you can in my experience get a good follower belief. Finally, Russia is clearly a powerhouse in culture and religion (no problem with Russia #1), but Arabia is also a powerhouse for science and religion (relevant because they are less likely to be "colonized" by someone two eras ahead in tech). "Free" tier 3 buildings (with theocracy cost is 0) and the extra benefits are quite nice.

 

[_Malachite_]

Gandhi/India [19] (22-3)
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [19]
Peter/Russia [40] (39+1)
Saladin/Arabia [24]

If Chandragupta has already been eliminated, then Gandhi should follow. The only difference between them in the religious game is that Gandhi generates 25 more faith in a standard 8 civ game. I would've ideally wanted the two Indians to follow each other out, but a 2 spot difference is also fine. To be honest, it is quite difficult for me to decide whether Gandhi, Saladin or Hojo is better in a RV. They're all within the same tier of civs and I can't say that I particularly prefer one over the others. So I'm making my decision here solely on the basis that Gandhi should not be eliminated too far away from Chandragupta. Not the best reason, I know, but at this stage of the voting process we're only left with the crème de la crème.

On the other hand, up with the Lavra King.

 

[Josephias]

Gandhi/India [16] (19-3) Even if he deserved an upvote for his pluses in last post, now, going down to the remaining ones, he is the one to be downvoted now. While Ghandi has a very strong initial spread phase, to reach it he may struggle to get the Great Prophet allowing him to found a religion, and many others have already fallen because of that. Not to say he's now facing the three civs that we can say have a guaranteed prophet. Besides that, going too fast in religious spread may make you loose the initial benefit of Dharma, so it may seem counter-intuitive. Of course, if you are really playing for RV, you may care less of receiving other follower beliefs via Dharma. And if you are organized enough, you can still benefit of this perk, but it just does not fit with trying to explode your religion as fast as possible, negating other spreads.
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [20] (19+1) Let me get this straight: Lavras DO NOT produce more faith that a regular holy site (unless you consider Dance). They produce more Great Prophet Points, that is an strenght for Peter to grab the first Prophet and the first set of beliefs, and they produce GWAM points too, which is nice, but may lead to quite an overpopulation of great persons waiting for a venue to act. Considering this, Hojo's half price holy sites are just a bit below lavras, and considering half-priced theater squares may help with the GWAM points, they are nearly on par, except for getting that first prophet. Yes, you need population to build districts, but it is easier to grow when you do not have to work low-food tundra tiles for faith (besides, you get adjacencies from other cities's districts, as some posters commented above). Pedro may still have a bit of advantage, specially due to being the first to choose, but I don't feel it is as great as proposed by the point difference.
Peter/Russia [40]
Saladin/Arabia [24]

 

[Kwami]

Gandhi/India [16]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [21] (20 + 1) It's hard to do better than half-priced holy sites *and* theater squares, both with better than average adjacency bonuses.
Peter/Russia [40]
Saladin/Arabia [21] (24 - 3) Full-priced holy sites and theater squares and campuses. The extra faith from the madrassa is nice, but it's not in the primary district. Getting the last prophet isn't enough anymore.

 

[Jewelrunna]

Gandhi/India [16]

Hojo Tokimune/Japan [22] (21 + 1): I agree with @Josephias in his analysis, and I also stick by my last argument for Hojo. The TL;DR version of it is that in Religious Victories, you need three things: ability to ensure a Religion, Faith generation, and ability to spread it (better Theological Combat or more effective spreads). Hojo is a standout in all three of those abilities. Deserves to be a closer race with Peter...

Peter/Russia [37] (40 - 3): ...which is also why I'm voting against him. I usually don't do downvotes just to stop a runaway, but in this case, it should be a lot closer in my opinion. You have two really, really strong aspects of Russia's game: Faith Generation and the ability to get a Religion. The Lavra is probably the single most effective tool in any Religious Civ's kit: half-price, and gets you a quick Religion because of the extra Great Prophet point. But, it doesn't get you any extra faith besides that. Now, Russia also gets faith from Tundra tiles, and that also makes Dance of the Aurora particularly appealing. However, the problem is that you then have to settle Tundra, which has it's own set of problems. Again, Russia's Tundra is better than other Civ's Tundra, but it's still Tundra. I realize I'm nitpicking here, but compare that to Japan, who has three bonuses that are really good and are reliable, with no give & take (like with Russia needing Tundra). Well, Divine Wind not as reliable, but like I've said previously, I've found it to be much more useful than you might expect. Russia has two abilities that are consistently great, but is that better than three that are consistently good? I'll admit, maybe so, but I think it's a closer race than having one of the two at 22 points, and the other at 40. So I'm choosing to bring Russia down a peg, sue me.

Saladin/Arabia [21]

 

[enKage]

As we are close to the end.... some more observations from me.

And a question - what is connsidered a good religious finish date and how consistent given civs are with it.

I don't know if there is a database of fastest victories in certain conditions, so I just entered YT and searched for religious victories.
It occurs that pre 175 are fairly rare and make a big WOW there. And I don't see Peter there
I always thought RV is one of the fastest and only culture may be quicker (I basicaaly rarely go for a religion victory, my default is science/diplo), so I just ran 2 games in a row with a leader that "cannot comapre" to top faih generators, with no exploits like giving away cities.

The bottom one Terra mapscript, for extremely hard start and no citystates influence. Among "top RV civs" Saladin in game. All civs survived.
Basically I was shocked. OK, maybe it is because terra which keeps all civs close to each other?
So I ran the upper game, continents to enforce reaching cartography. This time Georgia, Mali, Russia, Indonesia in game, so I would rather expect big problems. The result was still far below t175. I killed Russia and mali, but Mali was unable to found religion, so somehow doesn't count - I just wanted their Sugubas. Others survived.

What connects these two games is the negation of base rule shown here, which is "strong adjecency, faith pantheon".
In both case my best base adjecncy was +1
First game +2 faith from mines pantheon for a total gain of +6
Second game +1hammer/faith on improved strategic res. with total of +2 early game rising to around +6 faith late game

This leads me again to obvious fact, that pantheons and adjecencies are highly overrated in this thread. I don't say it is meaningless, but highly overrated.

And here comes Peter, whose leading positions is supported only by adjecencies/ pantheon synergy. And a question for you - what is the reliable and very repeatable finish turn of Peter on different mapscripts, including those when you have to cross the ocean. I don't have these data to compare, except the fact I personally cannot go below t200 or so with my playstyle, while I can go sub150 with nonexisting adjecencies and pantheon.
Though I believe Peter can do amazing finish dates, I definitely doubt he can do it in most games. Even more, in most games he would fall into such huge early troubles (lower district limit / lower yields early / tundra barbs), that he cannot even compare to Gandhi / Hojo, who can handle every situation better (Gandhi missionaries rush + high population = more districts + productive cities+Varu/ Japan well balanced civ with significant district discounts).

Next aspect I would like to notice is beside gaining faith, ideal RV winner should have also the ability to DENY faith for AI, simply because deity AI has crazy faith generation. And among this 4 civs Peter is the worst at denying AI's faith, mainly because miltarly is far behind remaining three

I really respect potentially high Peter's faith, but for me it does not translate to RV. Instead it fantastic works with tourism victory (faithbuying in theatres and campuses) and I really see Peter 1-3 in tourism victory thread. In RV thread IMO he should't win.

And we have also Saladin left
Some people say worship building gives a lot for RV.
I disagree. In fast religion victory you don't waste apostles to develep religion, at least not early on, unless you need it for golden era. All you need among beliefs is holy order for -30% cost of them. And mahabodji for 2 more apostles, blocking resurection of dead religions.

Because last time I downvoted Sal, this is time for Peter. And because last time I upvoted Hojo, time for Gandhi.

Gandhi/India [17] 16+1
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [22]
Peter/Russia [34] 37-3
Saladin/Arabia [21]

 

[Drivingrevilo]

While I really do appreciate the effort you went into enKage, I just can’t agree with the conclusion. My two fastest religious victories were both as Peter: one pre-work ethic buff (142 turns), one post-work ethic buff (117 turns), both standard size, deity, continents. I would send screenshots, but I’m away from home atm. This also prevents me from double checking my other records, but I’m pretty sure second place was Gitarja at around 160 turns on Archipelago, and third place Gandhi at approx 170.

As TCBB said, I think it’s as simple as the Lavra. Thanks to the Lavra you can get a religion well before the Deity AI, you can start accumulating faith well before the Deity AI, you can have missionaries ready to tactically wipe out your closest religious rival the moment they found their religion, and it all snowballs from there. Lavra equals speed, and speed equals best RV. Someone made a good comparison to the board game Pandemic: the faster you wipe the diseases off the map, the easier your game is later on. Same for religion: the more religions you eliminate early, the fewer religions you have to fight with tedious apostle spam later on.

Now, Japan also gets fast holy sites: indeed, that’s the reason I rate him as probable 2nd place. But then you must bring in additional factors like the high potential of “Dance of the Aurora” (12 adjacency in most cities) or the free GWAMs, which you can either keep to push your culture towards Theocracy or sell to the AI for big bucks. Thanks to the Lavra arriving when it does, Peter should also have no problem founding his religion in the ancient era and, therefore, smashing that classical era golden age - which can often be the decisive factor in a ‘decent’ RV finish turning into an ‘amazing’ RV finish. Japan doesn’t have this as much.

It’s a combination of perfect conditions as Peter. All the other contenders, while extremely good, have at least one thing going against them. Gandhi doesn’t have any guarantee of a religion; Arabia does, but his best bonuses are connected with the tier 3 buildings and so come relatively late; and Japan doesn’t have early era score to guarantee classical golden age. I’ll downvote Arabia because I did Gandhi yesterday.

Gandhi/India [17]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [22]
Peter/Russia [35] (34+1)
Saladin/Arabia [18] (21-3)

 

[TCBB]

(Short and early post today as am busy later)

Gandhi/India [18] (17+1)
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [19] (22-3) Honestly, I began the thread thinking that Saladin was a dead cert for 2nd place, but then I thought Hojo, and now I can’t decide between the three. They’re all very good. Downvoting Japan gives it a nice symmetry.
Peter/Russia [35]
Saladin/Arabia [18]

Edit:

Minor point, 2 GPP per holy site turns into faith.

Forgot to say, this is indeed what I meant when I said yesterday that Lavras produce ‘more faith’. It’s only a small amount, but it all adds up.

 

[monikernemo]

Gandhi/India [18]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [19]
Peter/Russia [36] (35+1) Minor point, 2 GPP per holy site turns into faith. Work Ethic is a massive buff.
Saladin/Arabia [15] (18 - 3) Again, while Madrasa is great but too much infrastructure required.

 

[King William I]

Gandhi/India [18] - 3 = 15

Super missionaries is nice, but the others can get more faith from their kits in my experience

Hojo Tokimune/Japan [19]
Peter/Russia [36]
Saladin/Arabia [15] + 1 = 16

There are two civs that can focus purely on faith and not suffer in other areas. Russia is one, Arabia is the other.

 

[lotrmith]

Gandhi/India [15] India's kit is a mess in my opinion. Dharma encourages you to have lots of religions in your cities which is both random and directly competes with a religious victory attempt. Plus there aren't many follower beliefs that really enhance a religious victory anyways... Choral Music basically stands alone in that regard. Missionaries aren't very good in my opinion.


Hojo Tokimune/Japan [20] 19 + 1 Terrain independent. Better access to luxuries/gold/states to fund your districts and buildings. Likely a more central location makes spreading religion more efficient.


Peter/Russia [33] 36 - 3 Before anyone takes offense, rest assured Peter isn't in any position to lose. I think he's strong (he's my most played Civ) but he's not without drawbacks and I enjoy the discussion and challenging people to think beyond their perceptions.

So many arguments applied to other civs for downvotes apply directly to Russia:
- Terrain dependent: Many maps can give you little or no tundra to work with (ie ocean passages near the poles, etc).
- Tundra/Snow barbs are the worst barbs.
- Low food tundra tiles make for low pop cities with district caps and also thus suffering from low production.
- Previous eliminations on the UI often argued (correctly) that GWAMs often are limited to being glorified scouts.


Saladin/Arabia [16]

 

[Leucarum]

Gandhi/India [12] (15-3) Continuing to spread my downvotes among the weaker options as I think they are all about even.
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [20]
Peter/Russia [34] (33+1) Lavras are just that good...
Saladin/Arabia [16]

 

[bengalryan9]

The thing about taking game speed into account is that there are so many factors that can affect it. I'm not one to play for fast victories, but the quickest win I ever had was a religious victory where I founded the first religion and all three of the others were founded on the other continent, and by the time I discovered that continent one had completely wiped out the other two. That's not exactly typical.

Gandhi/India [12]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [17] (20-3) I think his bonuses pale compared to the others, personally. On a very minor note, I'd also point that he has the worst UU and UI of the three fighting for second place as well - you'll at least get SOME use from stepwells and madrasas in an RV, but you probably won't even reach the electronics factory, and both varus and mamluks are way better than samurai should you find yourself in a fight.
Peter/Russia [34]
Saladin/Arabia [17] (16+1) Free prophet, increased science the more you spread your religion, dirt cheap tier 3 holy site buildings (I would think you'll get to Theocracy) which increase all your yields in the city, and a university that grants faith. Saladin gets the edge in my book.

(unless you can get Mosques, which again, you need to actually race to found a Religion to get)

Do you, though? Seems to me like the AI will always take Meeting Houses, Gudwaras, Wats and Synagogues first. Mosques are easy to get if you want them.

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

My personal top 4 would be Russia, India, Arabia, and Japan.

Gandhi/India [12]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [14] (17-3) Almost 3 months ago, I tried going for an RV with him. The first half of the game was pretty smooth -- half priced holy sites are definitely what carries him here. But it eventually turned into a slow, grindfest where I finally found myself stuck trying to convert the other half of the civs on the far-flung part of the map. I was simply trying to convert too late. The AI was spamming apostles like it was the End of Days and they all slotted the +5 religious strength card. I ended up pivoting to a cultural victory to make it work. This is why I've been such an adamant proponent for Russia and India: speed is paramount for Victory.
Peter/Russia [34]
Saladin/Arabia [18] (17+1) There was a time when this guy had a good argument about being better than Peter. Back in the old days when religion was a challenge itself to get, the guaranteed prophet was amazing. Even if it doesn't carry much weight anymore, free T3 buildings at Theocracy and 10% sci/culture/faith are probably his stellar abilities now. I think he just edges by Japan.

 

[Jewelrunna]

Gandhi/India [12]
Hojo Tokimune/Japan [15] (14 + 1)
Peter/Russia [34]
Saladin/Arabia [15] (18 - 3)

While it may be true that Hojo has the fewest uniques that direct orient him towards a Religious Victory, but hey, quality over quantity. Hojo reliably gets great adjacencies on Holy Sites, builds them faster, and gets extra combat strength on his units. Boom, hits all three important marks within three abilities. So I don't really care that the Samurai isn't an amazing unique unit because I'm not trying to go to war; I don't really care that the Electronics Factory isn't going to help me in a Religious Victory, because all I need is within two abilities. And if we're really stretching the capabilities of Hojo, the fact that he also gets cheaper Theater Squares makes it easier to push for those important Religious Civics. The more I'm thinking about it, the more I'm actually inclined to think that I would personally rank Hojo #1 in a RV. I think he's that good at it.

Saladin, on the other hand, I feel the need to push back on. The free Prophet is handy, but let's be honest here folks: if you're going for a Religious Victory, you're beelining Holy Sites and Prophets to get your pick of Beliefs. When I'm playing a Religious game on a Civ that's not Saladin, I usually can get my Prophet within the second to fourth pick of the Religious draft; rarely if I'm pacing my game well am I gonna be hard pressed to get a Religion. With Saladin's free Prophet, it is nice to know that it's guaranteed to arrive, and that in theory I can build other things without feeling like I have to race to the GP. But in practice, I'm still going to need to build Holy Sites to found a Religion, and I still want the pick of Beliefs. So in practice, I find it to be less good than you'd think. And with all the other Civs remaining, I find it hard to pick Arabia over the other three. The extra faith from Madrasas is good, and the dirt-cheap Faith Buildings are also good, but that means that all Arabia gives you besides the GP is lots of Faith generation (unless you can get Mosques, which again, you need to actually race to found a Religion to get). And honestly, Gandhi and Peter have him beat in that department, and I'd again take Hojo over him for the diversity of bonuses he offers. My honest impression of Saladin is that he's a phenomenal Science Victory Civ that can use Religion to shoot for that victory type in an unorthodox manner. But in a straight up Religious game? I'll take the three we have remaining over him.

Even though I actually think Hojo is #1, and at the very least Peter should be closer to the other Civs, I realize I'm picking a losing battle here. I supposed it's still deserved, he's great at the victory condition. GGs Русские, let's see how the rest of top four shakes out.