Understanding Enhancer beliefs

[Pazyryk]

There have been a few threads puzzling over pantheon beliefs. (The resolution, which I have seen myself several times, is that a pantheon belief is "absorbed" by whatever religion is founded in that civ, and then simply becomes a belief of that religion as it spreads -- essentially they become follower beliefs).

However, I don't yet understand the enhancer beliefs. There effects are not (usually) tied to a city like follower. What enhancer are you going to get if you have three cities each with a different dominant religion? For follower belief (or pantheon), the answer is that each city will get the benefit of the religion in the city. But enhancers are often tied to units ... so which of the 3 religion's enhancer belief would apply to my unit if religion 1 had Defender of the Faith but religion 2 and 3 did not?

I have my own theory that enhancers are not tied to any specific city, but rather to a civilization's dominant religion. I have no evidence for this. (Aren't diplo modifiers tied to dominant religion? obviously they can't be tied to specific cities...)

 

[meteo63]

There have been a few threads puzzling over pantheon beliefs. (The resolution, which I have seen myself several times, is that a pantheon belief is "absorbed" by whatever religion is founded in that civ, and then simply becomes a belief of that religion as it spreads -- essentially they become follower beliefs).

Wait, is that actually true? I actually thought that pantheon beliefs only applied to cities that you settled before you founded a religion and that after you make a religion the pantheon beliefs remain in those cities but new cities do not have the pantheon beliefs. Does that mean that the +2 science of messengers of the gods, for example, remains throughout the game, even for new cities created after your religion is founded? If so, that makes it so much more powerful with a wide empire like the Mayans.

 

[MisterSaturnine]

Wait, is that actually true? I actually thought that pantheon beliefs only applied to cities that you settled before you founded a religion and that after you make a religion the pantheon beliefs remain in those cities but new cities do not have the pantheon beliefs. Does that mean that the +2 science of messengers of the gods, for example, remains throughout the game, even for new cities created after your religion is founded? If so, that makes it so much more powerful with a wide empire like the Mayans.

It is indeed true. Your religion builds upon your pantheon. Once you found a religion, your pantheon no longer spreads automatically when you found a new city, but if your religion infects it, it will gain the benefits of your pantheon belief as well.

A little quirk I found recently - if you found a pantheon but never found a religion, your new cities will still automatically follow your pantheon when settled, no matter how late in the game.

 

[Tachii]

Aren't enhancers just religion-specific? For example, if Confucianism have the defender enhancer, the city its in will give you 20% to your units. Conversely, if it was the war enhancer, then all of the foreign cities will give 20% to your units. If it was something like religious texts or that iterant preacher (or whatever it was called) enhancer, then it will spread that religion to other cities with that rate.

 

[Pazyryk]

Give to who? That's the question. If I have 3 religions in my civilization, which one's enhancer applies to my units?

Yes, all beliefs are attached to a religion. I can tell this from some modding effort:

> for i,v in ipairs(Game.GetBeliefsInReligion(11)) do print(i, GameInfo.Beliefs[v].Type) end
 ActionInfoPanel: 1	BELIEF_GOD_SEA
 ActionInfoPanel: 2	BELIEF_CEREMONIAL_BURIAL
 ActionInfoPanel: 3	BELIEF_ASCETISM
 ActionInfoPanel: 4	BELIEF_RELIGIOUS_CENTER
 ActionInfoPanel: 5	BELIEF_RELIGIOUS_TEXTS

Translation: Zorasterism has 5 beliefs, including God of Sea (a pantheon) and Religious Text (an enhansor). (This is from late in a game where I had fully enhanced this religion.)

The enhancers that work at the city level are easy to understand. These probably give the enhancer of the dominant religion (in the city) to the city. What's hard to understand are the others, specifically if you have a mix of religions in your cities:

Defender of the Faith: What specific units get the effect? Units that originated in a city with this religion? Units of a civ with this dominant religion? Something else?
Just War: see above
Reliquary: Do I get this benifit if I have one city of this religion? Does the great person have to originate in a city of this religion? ...?

 

[Peacemongerer]

Defender of the Faith affects units of the founding civilization and only works near cities in its Empire of its religion. The combat must occur within a tile radius (I believe 3 or 4 tiles) of a city of the correct religion to get the bonus or a ranged unit must be firing from within that radius to get the bonus.

Just War works similarly, and also only benefits the founder, except it occurs when near enemy cities of its religion. It would be pointless to let follwer civilizations benefit from this, otherwise then a civilization who had adopted a religion could use this benefit AGAINST the founder.

Reliquiary is the one that gives faith for expending Great People, right? I think that just benefits the founder as well.

 

[nefloyd]

You're thinking about it wrong. Enhancer applies to the religion itself, not to any units.

 

[Pazyryk]

@Peacemongerer, you might be right, and the your answer is at least self-consistent. But I've heard plenty of folks that say it's not founder-only. Would be nice to see some evidence either way.

@nefloyd, I know it's associated with the religion. See my post #5. But a religion doesn't get +20% combat. A unit does. But which units if your civ is mixed religion?

 

[Peacemongerer]

I know for a fact that defender of the faith and just war are founder only because I used them both as Byzantium at the same time against Bismarck. He was following my religion at the time and he recieved no buffs in my territory while I recieved the combat bonus. When I got to his lands and attacked on of his cities of my religion, he had no buffs and again I had it.

The others I don't use, so idk about.

 

[nefloyd]

@Peacemongerer, you might be right, and the your answer is at least self-consistent. But I've heard plenty of folks that say it's not founder-only. Would be nice to see some evidence either way.

@nefloyd, I know it's associated with the religion. See my post #5. But a religion doesn't get +20% combat. A unit does. But which units if your civ is mixed religion?

It doesn't apply to units. It applies to a city that has the respective religious majority, and units that attack or defend that city receive the bonus.

You're just overthinking this, like I said. There is no 'mixed religion' or 'dominant religion' that applies empire-wide. Units don't 'pick' a religion to follow.

City has Defender of the Faith religious majority? Any of your units in range of that city, assuming you control it, get a combat bonus.

City has Just War religious majority? Your units get a bonus attacking it. The opposite of above, it's a reason TO spread your religion to an opposing civ's city before you attack it.

 

[Harv72b]

Pantheon, Founder, and Enhancer beliefs apply only to the empire who founded the religion. Follower beliefs benefit all cities which embrace that religion as their majority faith.

Regarding Defender of the Faith...this is also a city-based belief; in order to receive the 20% bonus, units must be within a certain radius of a friendly city in which that religion holds the majority (and of course, you must be the founder of that religion).

 

[Lakissov]

Pantheon, Founder, and Enhancer beliefs apply only to the empire who founded the religion. Follower beliefs benefit all cities which embrace that religion as their majority faith.

Not true about Pantheon belief. It works exactly like a follower belief.

 

[Babri]

Pantheon, Founder, and Enhancer beliefs apply only to the empire who founded the religion. Follower beliefs benefit all cities which embrace that religion as their majority faith.

Regarding Defender of the Faith...this is also a city-based belief; in order to receive the 20% bonus, units must be within a certain radius of a friendly city in which that religion holds the majority (and of course, you must be the founder of that religion).

Wrong. After founding religion the pantheon acts as a follower belief.
And as mentioned by other fellow civers Just War & Defender of the faith only apply to the founder. (I actually tested defender of the faith in one one of my game as well as the pantheon mechanics).

However I think the enhancers which enhance religion spread rate effect everyone.

 

[Pazyryk]

It doesn't apply to units. It applies to a city that has the respective religious majority, and units that attack or defend that city receive the bonus.

You're just overthinking this, like I said. There is no 'mixed religion' or 'dominant religion' that applies empire-wide. Units don't 'pick' a religion to follow.

City has Defender of the Faith religious majority? Any of your units in range of that city, assuming you control it, get a combat bonus.

City has Just War religious majority? Your units get a bonus attacking it. The opposite of above, it's a reason TO spread your religion to an opposing civ's city before you attack it.

Still baffles me. Are you saying that only the city religion matters, and not unit religion nor civ-dominant religion nor civ-founded religion? Let's test this idea with a thought experiment. What if I'm atheist and attacking a Christian-dominant city and Christianity has Just War belief? Does that mean the "+20% Combat near enemy Cities that follow this Religion" applies and I get a bonus? That can't be right.

It seems to me that Just War, at least, has to rely on something about the attacker. That could be unit religion, civ-dominant religion, or civ-founded religion. I agree that the first one seems unlikely (though, for what it's worth, units do have religions). If it's based on attacker civ-dominant religion, then it could work as a Follower belief (i.e., applies to any civ with this religion dominant). But if it's based on attacker founded religion, then it is working as a Founder belief.

Reliquary and Religious Unity are also problematic if you try to view them as follower effects that depend only on a city's dominant religion. For Reliquary, which GP if you have >1 religion dominant in your cities? For Religious Unity, does the CS already have to have the religion to have the increased spread to it? (Again, doesn't make sense.)

On the other hand, many of the other enhancer beliefs could act purely on a city level and could (plausibly) work as follower effects.

That leaves me two alternatives. 1) Enhancer beliefs work exactly as Founder beliefs. Or 2) Some Enhancer beliefs work as Founder and others as Followers.

#2 seems overly complicated. But #1 seems pointless (why not just call them Founder beliefs?).

I still think there is something fundamental about Enhancer effects that no one here understands. Amazing the confusion on this topic.

Wrong. After founding religion the pantheon acts as a follower belief.
And as mentioned by other fellow civers Just War & Defender of the faith only apply to the founder. (I actually tested defender of the faith in one one of my game as well as the pantheon mechanics).

However I think the enhancers which enhance religion spread rate effect everyone.

OK, this confirms the idea that at least some Ehancer belief act as Founder belief. Now the only question is whether they all work that way, or if some do and others act as Follower beliefs.

 

[shaglio]

OK, this confirms the idea that at least some Ehancer belief act as Founder belief. Now the only question is whether they all work that way, or if some do and others act as Follower beliefs.

My guess is that, like you suspect, some work as a Founder Belief and some work as a Follower belief. That's why they called them Enhancer Beliefs.

If they wanted them all to work as Founder Beliefs, they would have inluded them in the Founder Belief list and given the founder a 2nd one to choose.

If they wanted them all to work as Follower Beliefs, they would have inluded them in the Follower Belief list and given the founder a 3rd one to choose.

Though I wish they would label them more clearly to avoid this confusion. I've never taken Defender Of The Faith in the past because I was afraid my religion would spread to my neighbor and it would come back to bite me in the rear. Now I know it's safe to take in my future games.

 

[Peacemongerer]

Well the Enhancer beliefs would be religion-wide and not determined by national borders, but only the founder of that religion's units can really be said to be pledged to that religion. The point of the enhancers is to "help spread of the faith".

That means that some beliefs like reducing the cost of missionaries or increasing their strength should apply to all cities of that religion bc any missionaries founded there will inevitably spread that religion of their city, even if the city owner is not the founder. Military buffs only help spread the religion if they only help the founder. Just War would inevitably HURT spreading the religion if it applied to anybody near a city of that religion bc it would be used AGAINST the founder by another heathen civilization. Defender of the Faith would be a detriment to the founder as well if they tried to attack another civilization of that religion.

Bonuses like getting faith for expending great people or reducing the cost of prophets only help spread the religion if in the founder's hands; a follower civilization with these benefits will instead use the extra faith to found their own religion or (if they have Holy Warriors), to buy military units to use against them. Those types of benefits shouldn't be extended to civilizations that simply follow a religion, as it in no way really benefits the religion on the whole.

 

[nefloyd]

My god, you're still way overthinking this. There is no 'civ dominant' thing.

When does Just War apply?

1. You must have founded the religion
2. Your unit is attacking a foreign city with YOUR religion that has the Just War belief.

That's *all* there is to it. If you're atheist, never founded a religion, you get nothing. If the city you're attacking isn't following the Just War religion, you get nothing.

Combat units don't have religions. Only the 3 religious units are tied to a religion.