While there is some discussion about how to display religious requirements for wonders in the Questions about wonders thread, I'd like to suggest/request an overhaul of these religious requirements.
As it stands, most wonders in the early to mid game require a state religion. This, I believe, is intended to make the wonders appear in the areas they were actually built, and also provide coherence: if a wonder is a Christian church, it makes no sense to build it in a place where there are no Christians. There is also the advantage that civs belonging to different cultural spheres provide a different game experience.
But there are unfortunate consequences:
- Often, there is very little competition for wonders. We lose the classic feeling of needing to race the construction of a useful wonder to get its effects.
- In the extreme case of this, some religions are restricted to very few civilizations: Zoroastrianism (Persia), Confucianism and Taoism (China and rarely Korea, and functionally identical for wonders), Hinduism (India, Tamils, rarely some SE Asian civs). This means that the wonders associated with these religions are almost like additional, guaranteed unique powers for these civilizations.
- Religions are unequal in wonder availability, so sometimes you might be tempted to switch just to build more wonders (or a specific wonder that you want), even though it doesn't really make sense otherwise (because of diplomacy, religious unity, roleplaying, etc.).
- Some wonders rarely get built because no civ is around with the appropriate religion (e.g., Zoroastrian wonders if Persia has collapsed, Bamiyan Buddhas if no Buddhist civ is in central Asia).
- Some wonders require that a religion be present in the city, regardless of the state religion (Jewish wonders are like this). Some have a state religion requirement and a city religion requirement. It is often difficult to communicate this information, and it also feels arbitrary.
- There are also coherence issues:
- If you have a minority religion in a city, you can order the city to build temples, monasteries or cathedrals of that religion. But why not a wonder?
- While some wonders are actual religious buildings, many are not. Why couldn't a non-Protestant civ create the Amsterdam Bourse?
- In the late game, most wonders have no religious or regional requirements and we seem fine with this. We can say it is because the modern world is more globalized, but why the double standard?
- Except for corn and rice, which are used for the regionalization of a few pagan wonders, no wonder has a resource requirement, even though some were clearly made of a particular resource (marble, stone, gold, etc.). Instead, the use of the resource is represented through construction speed bonuses. Why are religious requirements more stringent than resource requirements?
All in all, I think the system has more drawbacks that advantages. However, I don't recommend getting rid of it altogether: seeing the wonders in the correct regions most of the time is important.
What I think is this: we should remove all
state religion requirements (some exceptions may apply, but I can't think of any), and replace them all with
city religion requirements.
Since religions spread in a broadly historical fashion, this would still ensure that wonders are built mostly in the correct regions. It would simplify the communication of religious requirements in the pedia. It would be more in line with the requirements for regular religious buildings. And it would allow e.g. Greece to build the Great Mausoleum when it captures a Zoroastrian city without converting (and losing its capacity to build pagan wonders).
There is still some value in having a link between state religion and wonders. After all, it is more plausible for a polity to build a great tribute to Buddha or Christ when its government is Buddhist or Christian. So why not use the same system as for resources? Wonders that are actually religiously themed (temples, tombs, religious schools, religious monuments) could have a 25% or 50% speed construction bonus when you have the appropriate state religion (base costs would need to be adjusted to take this into account). Then there would still be an incentive to convert in some cases.
I'm not sure what to do with pagan wonders. They could be available to all but have a speed bonus when you don't have a state religion, or become unavailable when you convert, as is the case now.
in all cities), and would help inspire either a Great Engineer or Great Prophet.
