Religious Victory is too difficult and unrewarding

[GrayingGamer]

I hope in the next Civ that religion goes back to being a support system rather than a unit-supported win condition. It definitely has a place in Civ, but I don't enjoy the whole "alternate war layer" that it currently is.

 

[aldousmuni]

(RANT) Perhaps i am just not that good at the game or something (only won on prince difficulty with culture and science victories). But religion seemed like a great idea with horrible implementation, I am suppose to pump out a ton of missionaries and apostles and then send them everywhere converting everything in sight...but for some reason the AI just happens to have an apostle in the right place at the right time and obliterates my missionaries in 2 turns.

It's not fun for me to spend turns constantly clicking apostles, then click on map, then search for cities...then send them to cities...and then after theyre done converting they are instantly reverted back to something else. What am i missing here? I feel like no matter what i can't beat the AI because i am not fast enough or something. Do I have to go to war with them to make them stop?

it doesn't convert a lot of cities, but it does seem to allow your religion to take hold and remain in a civ. Although I'd be curious if anyone's ever done some type of cost/benefit analysis for taking this belief.

 

[TomKQT]

and lets you have only one debater (+20 combat strength) at a time.

Does it really work this way? I though I was just unlucky all the time

EDIT: Nope, you can have multiple at the same time, just verified this personally...

 

[Datian]

If you put emphasis on religious combat, some civs are surprisingly good.
Scythia has the combat bonuses (+5 against wounded units, heal on kill)
Aztecs have the luxury davantage.
France and Mongolia enjoy the diplomacy modifiées.

 

[Aurelesk]

I want to add something more: religious pressure. Yes, it is underwhelming, but there is some nice mechanics to it:
• Converted city exerts +1 pressure.
• Converted city with holy site exerts +2 pressure.
• Holy city exerts +4 pressure.
• Moksha starting promotion double your pressure.
• Running the "Holy Site Prayers" double your pressure.
• Trade route exerts +1 pressure to the target city.
• Scripture (enhancer beliefs) increase by 25% your pressure, 50% with the 'printing press' technology.
• Itinerant preachers (enhancer beliefs) increase pressure 3 tiles farther.
• Jerusalem suzerain bonus allow converted city with holy site to exerts pressure as holy city.

If I get this right, running the "holy site prayers" project in the holy site and Moksha as governors allow to exerts +12 pressure 10 tiles away? If this is done early enough, this can spread religion really fast and far? Pressure can gone up to +13~14 with scripture belief, or 13 tiles away with itinerant preachers. This can be a early push.

Or you know: have the "religious colonization" belief, abuse the Settler pantheon bug, and then trade all your city away: now your religion is at least 50% of the cities of every civilization!

 

[seankhan]

(RANT) Perhaps i am just not that good at the game or something (only won on prince difficulty with culture and science victories). But religion seemed like a great idea with horrible implementation, I am suppose to pump out a ton of missionaries and apostles and then send them everywhere converting everything in sight...but for some reason the AI just happens to have an apostle in the right place at the right time and obliterates my missionaries in 2 turns.

It's not fun for me to spend turns constantly clicking apostles, then click on map, then search for cities...then send them to cities...and then after theyre done converting they are instantly reverted back to something else. What am i missing here? I feel like no matter what i can't beat the AI because i am not fast enough or something. Do I have to go to war with them to make them stop?

by pure accident i have a religion victory(emperor) by building all my cities at minimum distance apart,(6 armed snowflake map).with the 30% distance bonus active, the game ended in 130 odd turns without me even trying to get a religion victory.maybe try the minimum distance strat and see if it works.

 

[DJ_Tanner]

My problem (and possibly yours too) is that religious war feels far more like war. I like science and culture VCs and like to play peaceful and build. However, when you got for a RV even though its technically a peaceful VC, you need to behave like a warmonger. A coordinated attack to eliminate one rival religion at a time.

So while there are lot of good advice here about how to be better at RV, it still might not be up your alley as a playstyle. Because, for me, even though I understand how to be effective at RV I don't ever really enjoy those games as much.

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

• Scripture (enhancer beliefs) increase by 25% your pressure, 50% with the 'printing press' technology.
• Itinerant preachers (enhancer beliefs) increase pressure 3 tiles farther.

One thing I've wondered is if Scripture and Itinerant Preachers also apply to foreign cities following your religion? Or do those effects only work in your own cities?

 

[Abaxial]

One thing I've wondered is if Scripture and Itinerant Preachers also apply to foreign cities following your religion? Or do those effects only work in your own cities?

Foreign cities. Itinerant preachers is especially useful. You can find that your religion has spread to cities you haven't even discovered in a sort of snowball effect. I think it is a key belief for RV.

 

[James_Champagne]

I don't think I've ever even gone for the religious victory. Yet for whatever reason I do always try to get my civ a religion and while I do make some effort at spreading it, at the same time I'm not interested in dominating the world with it. I guess you could say that I just like having a religion around for roleplaying purposes, or just because I find the subject of religions interesting...

 

[steveg700]

(RANT) Perhaps i am just not that good at the game or something (only won on prince difficulty with culture and science victories). But religion seemed like a great idea with horrible implementation, I am suppose to pump out a ton of missionaries and apostles and then send them everywhere converting everything in sight...but for some reason the AI just happens to have an apostle in the right place at the right time and obliterates my missionaries in 2 turns.

It's not fun for me to spend turns constantly clicking apostles, then click on map, then search for cities...then send them to cities...and then after theyre done converting they are instantly reverted back to something else. What am i missing here? I feel like no matter what i can't beat the AI because i am not fast enough or something. Do I have to go to war with them to make them stop?

mm-kay, is everyone else done trying to provide RV with unmerited vindication?

There's been lots of very sound advice offered, that the OP's author should heed, but overall it's a pretty shallow playbook, that's for sure. There are strats for early-rush victories, like domination. But for a lot of folks, having a cheap-shot crib-murdering, chicken-hawking win isn't really that much more satisfying than a spam-fest slog.

And really, if you don't crib-murder other religions, then there's little reason you should be able to keep them flipped. A civ can always shelter their units in a city or encampment. Put a holy site next to one of those and heal in safety. The RV is largely winnable because the AI doesn't use these tactics and will quite blithely have a unit leave that safety to be summarily annihilated by a debater who would otherwise be standing helplessly at the gates tapping his foot. The design sets itself up to be solvable, so it's not a competition that the player should actually lose.

Like a lot of things in Civ VI, it would be nice to see an emphasis over quantity, where one is supposed to build up resources and work in well-managed waves. Reach milestones where you you level and get better than the other guy. I would like to see ways to improve religious units through something akin to XP, some tactics for recharging them. Fewer religious units, but the ones you got you can improve and have some strats for outmaneuvering.

 

[Bliss]

My main problem with religion is that most of the the beliefs availabe can't be felt right away. They are not short-term, except for very few and this is crucial in a game which values snowballing so much. This makes the massive religious game indeed unrewarding. When you mass military and invade a city, well thats a city. When you mass religious units and convert a city... well that is what? 2 gold? 1 culture?

Holy Sites and the religious game are unorganic. They feel off from the rest of the game because its value is too abstract, except for the Pantheon, of course.

Edit: I'll give a discount to the devs in the sense that... religion and its perks are kind of "abstract" in real life as well.

 

[Bliss]

Following my previous post, by the way, my own solution to it would be to simply buff like CRAZY everything related to religion, like, multiply the bonuses by 2 or 3, give Holy Sites bonuses just like Government Plaza with Autocrazy (+1 to all yields) and much more, but also giving 50% of all these bonuses to other civilizations following the religion

 

[Victoria]

simply buff like CRAZY

Which will probably break like crazy.
The issue with RV for many is not that you do not get enough. More that it is. Simplistic with no challenge.

 

[Abaxial]

By and large, it's much easier to send a squad of apostles sauntering through a rival empire than sending musketmen. Don't forget that one can work religious and military together. Convert what you can convert and conquer the ones you can't.

I might add that missionaries make excellent recon units, as they ignore international borders.

 

[Bliss]

Which will probably break like crazy.
The issue with RV for many is not that you do not get enough. More that it is. Simplistic with no challenge.

The balance adjustment to not break it would be to give all the non-owners 50% of the follower belief and enhancer, so you actually might become interested in the religious game even if you didn't found a religion.
And I'm aware that the major complaint is related to the way RV develops, however, I agree with the OP, this is partially due to the fact that it is also unrewarding. And why is unrewarding? What do you get for putting effort into converting a city (and sometimes it is a lot of effort!)? Negligible bonuses. As I said, when you are military taking a city, that is huge. But when you finally managed to "convert half of a civilization" you get... well it is not about the bonuses, it is about the victory.

If the religious game turned into a legit way for bonuses, all civilizations would take part into it and, ideally, human players and AI would have much more reasons to Declare War and "Condemn Heresy" more often, turning the RV less "simplistic" because it would be much more related to diplomacy and war.

The religious game can't be solely about the RV, just like Science Victory also buffs the military and all yields of a civilization, Culture Victory and Diplomatic Victory also buffs the civic tree of a civilization, and Domination, that buffs everything about your civ (in a more unfocused way).

 

[Abaxial]

Well, +2 gold per converted city is not too dusty.

 

[Bliss]

Well, +2 gold per converted city is not too dusty.

It is when you don't need to fight for them... however, the AI is very decent at spamming religious units and fighting the religious game.

 

[teakbois]

I have limited experience with RV, but it seems like you get all your tools extremely early on. Other than the T2 government and a couple of nice to have wonders that come before it, theres really nothing new after apostles. Its like doing domination with only swordsmen.