What are some effective ways to remove religion?

[Lu Bu]

Played against someone with lots of cities next to each other with the "spread faster" perk. Their religion, like weed, would just quickly be replicated in a city where my inquisitor had just cleansed and are quickly encroaching my own cities. My missionaries do nothing and the costs of both Great Prophet and Inquisitors are quickly ramping up to the point that it would be hard to spread any more religion. In a scenario like this, is there nothing I can do besides burning down all the heretical cities and replacing them with mine?

 

[Barghaest]

Don't need to burn them down, if you simply conquer them they become eligible targets for Inquisitors.... but similar issue happened to me and sparked a massive genocidal crusade against the heathens and I didn't stop until no other founder of a religion existed on my continent...

Nothing like adding religion into a game to give you a good reason to warmonger!

 

[Infantry#14]

Similar thing happened to me the other day. The heathen ai sent a GP to convert my capital. Next turn captured it and burned it at the stake.

 

[Xotite potancev]

tempting me to start my next game as spain, save up prophets and inquisitors and screen shot a 10 spanish inquisitor zerg

 

[Peacemongerer]

Not really. Make sure that where you use your missionaries is strategic. Prioritize getting majorities in as many ciites as possible and try building large blocs where you can generate 30+ pressure per city minimum... if your religion is scattered then individual cities are poached easily.

 

[Barghaest]

Not really. Make sure that where you use your missionaries is strategic. Prioritize getting majorities in as many ciites as possible and try building large blocs where you can generate 30+ pressure per city minimum... if your religion is scattered then individual cities are poached easily.

Yeah, my one complaint with the religion system is this facet right here because it REALLY encourages ICS... since I tend to place my cities 4-5 tiles apart for less overlap and more room for expansion it's hard to compete with the AI's religion when their ICS encroaches my borders...

 

[Peacemongerer]

It should honestly be like pressure per population and be that citizens within a city exert greater internal pressure than they do on outlying cities. Maybe 1 citizen = 2 pressure on citizens within a city and 1 pressure on citizens in other cities nearby.

 

[Miravlix]

The effective way of removing a religion is capture the holy city, then raze all the other cities with the religion.

Now thats the "effective" way...

The not so effective way is taking the holy city (no way around that it's the only way to disable the holy city) and then use greater prophets to convert the heathens, but here your going to be fighting the original civ's missionaries/greater prophets + that he already has a strongly spreading religion even without the holy city.

 

[Barghaest]

It should honestly be like pressure per population and be that citizens within a city exert greater internal pressure than they do on outlying cities. Maybe 1 citizen = 2 pressure on citizens within a city and 1 pressure on citizens in other cities nearby.

Yeah, this system would work better as it would be fine for either ICS or taller empires to compete instead of ICS always exerting greater pressure.

 

[jg4444]

If your city Is converted you need to inquisitor it then missionary it on same turn. Inquisitor alone will just allow the pressure of Ai civ to build back up. Or a great prophet works wonderfully on his own

 

[nokmirt]

Let me ask a few questions. This is the closest religion thread I could find.

First, if you don't build a pantheon, you cannot build missionaries or inquistors? You do have to actually have a religion to do this, correct?

Without having built a pantheon, is there anything I can do religiously? I was hoping to be able to spread a religion that contacts my empire if possible. At least for the follower belief, which is what a city that has a religion spread to it, benefits from. Isn't that true? The reason I ask this is that I have never tried not to build a religion.

I am playing a game as the Vikings. Initially, I was trying to gain a pantheon, which I failed to do. My goal was to spread whatever religion was in Rome to my cities. Or, Christianity, if it was close by. I did not want the Vikings to have their own religion, because they converted to Christianity later on. Aside from the fact that they worshiped their Norse gods. For the purpose of my game, they do that from the outset. In any case, what I am trying to do is not possible? Spread a foreign religion, without a pantheon? Even if i had a pantheon, I probably could not do this, right? Let me know. Sorry if this is confusing.

 

[Barghaest]

First, if you don't build a pantheon, you cannot build missionaries or inquistors? You do have to actually have a religion to do this, correct?

Your city has to be religious to purchase missionaries/inquisitors (doesn't have to be your religion because you can purchase the wrong ones if another religion converts your city); however, I am unsure if you have access to any of these features if you do not create a pantheon or religion yourself, I would assume it was possible otherwise faith is useless to those who fail to get pantheons/religions before the limit per map is filled.

Aside from the fact that they worshiped their Norse gods. For the purpose of my game, they do that from the outset.

Actually the worshipping of Norse gods would be a Pantheon, you should at least shoot for founding a pantheon even if you don't found a religion (can use your GPs for Holy Sites instead of founding a religion).

 

[nokmirt]

I tried but was a tad late. I did not make it a priority, just to see what it would be like without a religion.