Seems hard to get a religion on Emperor

[GT_OKEZ]

You can get religion on Emperor if you invest enough into it. As someone said earlier being Russia and Japan helps with this A LOT (Spain is kind of screwed) or you can just play Saladin and not even worry about it.

I play Russia mostly and on Emp too and what I do is build 1 or 2 scouts and try like hell to find a natural wonder. As soon as I do that (even if I don't) I tech astrology. I chop out my Lavra and start building a shrine. In Civics I try to be line to political philosophy.

If I find a natural wonder I usually get a GrProphet, if I don't it's 50/50. But yes this is before settling anywhere else. Lavra >second settlement. I can see it being more difficult for other Civs with vanilla holy sites.

If it's a close race you can faith buy one. It gets cheaper the closer you get.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

If you want to have 100% chance for a religion you can simply tech astrology first, build holy site as soon as possible and build a project.

 

[Galbias]

Founding a religion on Emperor seems to be roughly as difficult as founding a religion in Civ5 Deity (ie very difficult, AIs have two cities to potentially build holy sites in) and unlike in Civ5, finding a Faith NW isn't going to help you.

 

[Mrdarklight]

Yeah, I've tried a few more times. The only way I can see to do it is to cripple the rest of your game by spending 20+ turns at the beginning building a holy site and a shrine. Even then it looks iffy.

I tried as China to build Stonehenge, since he can use builders to help Rush wonders. Still lost Stonehenge.

Buying your first great prophet with faith or money looks essentially impossible to me. By the time all of the religions are founded, I have saved up maybe 50% of the gold or faith to buy a great prophet.

 

[RealHuhn]

There's also a pantheon that gives you +1 great prophet point per holy site. Every bit counts.

But overall, I agree. Civs without any kind of faith boost should simply ignore religion (which I think is great). And even religious civs will have a hard time to catch up compared to a normal expansion strategy without religion.

 

[sresk]

I haven't played harder than emperor yet but scout, scout, scout, settler holy site, and then a second holy site in the second city will reliably get you a religion. The 3rd scout is only nessasary if you haven't found a natural wonder, if you do throw a builder in there.

Research astrology as the first tech and hope you find the wonder before you get halfway.

The +1 gpp per district is REALLY strong in my opinion (perhaps the strongest?) helps with the great prophet and is great in the late game for a cultural victory and getting great scientists.

 

[Mrdarklight]

I haven't played harder than emperor yet but scout, scout, scout, settler holy site, and then a second holy site in the second city will reliably get you a religion. The 3rd scout is only nessasary if you haven't found a natural wonder, if you do throw a builder in there.

Research astrology as the first tech and hope you find the wonder before you get halfway.

The +1 gpp per district is REALLY strong in my opinion (perhaps the strongest?) helps with the great prophet and is great in the late game for a cultural victory and getting great scientists.

Thanks for the advice. Tried it just like you said. Even set my wildcard policy to +2 GPP per turn. That lasted about 3 turns, then that option disappeared. There are only 5/6 religions founded, but now the GP slot says "All individuals of this type have already been earned."

What happens on Diety? All civs but you immediately start with a religion?

ETA: Did manage to get it by reloading several turns back and building the Holy Site Prayers.

Now building The Oracle. Seems like Oracle + Divine Spark should have me pumping out major GP's.

 

[Frank327]

Doing the prayers project a few times is a lot more efficient than building the oracle. Also chopping out the holy district in the second city and building it in the capital with divine spark gets you lots and lots of GPP.

 

[King Jason]

You can get religion on Deity you just need Prayers to do it.

Projects, folks - they're great.

 

[skallben]

So it can be done. The question is just at what alternate cost. What else could you have accomplished with the same amount of research, hammers and policies?

 

[Galbias]

Yeah, on higher difficulties it's just not worth the hammers that you need to put into Holy Sites and buildings early on.

Might be workable as Russia, Japan, or Arabia, but probably not anyone else. I think I'll be turning off religious victory in most of my games.

 

[spfun]

You can get a religion you just have to pay for it, I don't think its really worth it unless your playing a religious nation.

 

[CurtisManning]

Does the Mysticism rush as Greece work in Emperor ? Totally worked for me in King, got the second religion after Spain (Philip built Stonehedge), and I had to hard-search the civics for Foreign Trade (no second continent) and Mysticism (no Pantheon).

EDIT : I was Gorgo, so the culture per kill really helped rushing those civics btw.

 

[Paramecium]

Yeah, Im playing as Japan atm on Emperor and I wanted to get use of the half construction costs of HS. But yeah I have to agree, if you want to have an early Religion on Emperor+ you have to go straight for it. I teched at the same time for encampents to test them out and I had 2 cities with 2 HS online, plus 2 shrines and I needed to do HS-projects in both of them to get the LAST prophet, got lucky that Arabia isnt in the game. And yeah, the most usefull worship buildings are already away and I have the leader in Religion right next to me and I have to say, it is very tough to defend your religion, if you are not focused on the Religion Victory right from the start and go for it (mostly I just wanted to have that option). Luckly I had a good start with a lot of stone around and even marble and I got stone circles. But I had already to recruit missionaires as fast a possible and "hide" them from the AI, which came at me with 5 or 6 apostles at once, while I didnt even had a temple online.

I have to say, to play the Religion game on higher difficulties seems very hard to me. I already have seen a lot about the complains that beating Deity AI is too easy, but with conquering and then going for domination, science and culture(?). But how about a deity win with Religion? Can your really handle the early swarm and found your own Religion? I think that could be the hardest task at the current state of the game. At least without extermination of your contenders ...

 

[Ravellion]

Does the Mysticism rush as Greece work in Emperor ? Totally worked for me in King, got the second religion after Spain (Philip built Stonehedge), and I had to hard-search the civics for Foreign Trade (no second continent) and Mysticism (no Pantheon).

EDIT : I was Gorgo, so the culture per kill really helped rushing those civics btw.

Using revelation as your wildcard policy will certainly help. In fact, as you can already use the wildcard before you have your holy site, I think it is a significant advantage.

 

[Paramecium]

Using revelation as your wildcard policy will certainly help. In fact, as you can already use the wildcard before you have your holy site, I think it is a significant advantage.

I have to agree, that Greece's Wild Card slot is very good in getting your Religion. Everyone else who doesnt get stonehenge has to rush the 4card goverments and then mysticism or just build more then one HS (+ maybe shrines) and use the HS -projects, to have a chance to get a religion. Greece just dont have to focus that hard on it in the early game, which is a mayor advantage imo.

 

[Amrunril]

But overall, I agree. Civs without any kind of faith boost should simply ignore religion (which I think is great).

You can get a religion you just have to pay for it, I don't think its really worth it unless your playing a religious nation.

I think it's bad design for a mechanic to only be worthwhile for civs that have explicit bonuses to it, and there are usually more religions available in a game than there are religious civs. That isn't to say you should always go for a religion, of course. The decision needs to be made on a case by case basis, and the payoffs seem to be slightly smaller than in Civ V (unless you're pursuing a religious victory, which seems like it should be next to impossible against competent opposition). This is also an argument, though, that the AI shouldn't invest as heavily and consistently in religion. Instead, through some mix of prioritization and start bonuses, it does so more than in Civ V, with the result of driving up the human player's required investment to levels that should be the exception rather than the norm.

 

[Lyoncet]

I think it's bad design for a mechanic to only be worthwhile for civs that have explicit bonuses to it

I think it's more a problem with the AI's difficulty-based bonuses being so heavily frontloaded than a problem with the religion mechanic. Faith/Prophet generation mechanics in isolation are fine IMO.

 

[Iberian]

Can you do it? Yes. Should you? Nope. Not even close to ideal starting play.

I went for it in 1 game on King just to try it out. Even at the King level it isn't even close to worth it. I still got the settler out first because the 2nd city is necessary if you are going to be crippling your capital at the start. Also Prayer Project as others mentioned is key.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Not even close to ideal starting play.

Which is basically build a military unit and kill everything you see

Military kill religious units so military > religion

Everything else don't matter, why fear other civs then you simply kill them with your tanks against their spears