[GS] Which Pantheon To Found?

[krossingkhory]

I am mostly new to Civ VI, but I've been playing pretty steadily for the last 10ish days since I was able to pick this up on Epic. I am in the midst of a game where I want to aim for a religious victory, although I wouldn't be upset if I simply just played and had fun. Anyhow, I am playing as Trajan, and I'm currently at Turn 24 in 3080 BC. I set the following to be true for my game:

1. Gathering Storm, with disasters set to 2
2. Standard difficulty (Prince)
3. Continents
4. Standard map size
5. No barbarians. Every time I've played with Barbs turned on I end up getting swarmed before I can even get my civ off the ground.
6. No turn limit (I hate having games just end because of some time limit)

I have 2 scouts and a warrior roaming the countryside. One of the scouts I built, the other was given to me by one of the goody huts/tribal villages. I have 2 cities - my capital (Rome), and one that I have settled not too far away that is in the midst of a bunch of resources.

I have met 3 city-states, and I have envoys to all 3 of them. However, thanks to getting really lucky with the goody huts, I ended up being able to send 2 more envoys to Armagh, which greatly increased the amount of Faith I get in the capital (3 per turn). I am actively sending a trader to one of the city-states, primarily because its route takes it directly through Ravenna...and traders automatically build roads over time on their routes. So that's just free roads through my two cities, which I cannot argue with.

So why am I here? I need the community's help in determining what Pantheon to found. I do not have Astrology (yet; that will get picked up as soon as I'm done with Irrigation), so I can't build a Holy Site yet. I have found one place for it...but the amount of production surrounding the area is rather lacking. While that site is currently a +3, the selection of a Pantheon could increase this. But again, the lack of production would make dropping a city there rather terrible.

I have placed tacks in multiple spots across the map, and I'm seeing mostly +2s wherever I drop them. I'm not the best with just looking at the map and determining what the adjacency bonuses are, so I have to use DMT to help me with this. Yes, I know there is a large swath of uncovered map right next to my little kingdom, and trust me when I say my scouts are going to be heading there shortly to uncover that. But that's not the issue at hand.

What Pantheon should I found? There is a desert to the east of Rome, which means I could get all those bonuses for adjacent desert tiles. Again, though, at the cost of Production. If you guys need a larger view of the map to see the rest of the continent, I can certainly provide that. But here's the shots I took this morning to (hopefully) help you to help me.

 

[Pengwin7]

With Chocolate and Bananas nearby, my choices would be:

1. Sacred Path* (adjacency bonus from Rainforests),
2. Goddess of Festivals (+1 culture from every worked Plantation - which would include banana tiles and chocolate... also dyes - can't see any others).

If you get the Sacred Path pantheon, you'll have a lot of faith - and you could promote Moksha as your 1st-4th governor choice so that you can quickly FAITH-BUY a holy site in each new city (after 5 turn wait).
[To get Moksha there quickly, you do want to build the Gov.Plaza somewhere - and probably Ancestral Hall as soon as you finish the civic Political Philosophy.]

If you get the Sacred-Path (adjacency pantheon) AND a religion, then you make sure to choose WORK ETHIC as one of your 'found religion' perks.
Work Ethic will really jump start that city towards early-game production. (A +6 Holy Site becomes a +6 production tile as well... and it doubles when you get the 100% Holy Site policy card... so +12.)
[You wouldn't have to play 'religion' - you could choose any route with lots of faith, an adjacency pantheon, and work ethic.]
*Note: If/when you chose Sacred Path, you could 'tack' prospective Holy Sites and see much, much higher locations (some +4 thru +6 probably), depending on how many rainforest/forest/mountain tiles in an area.
Southeast of Rome is a nice coastal settle you can do... and then two tiles from city-center is a no-tree tile that would probably give you around +5 or +6 HS (2 Chocolate, 1 Banana, 2 Forest, 1 Mountain) surrounding that tile. Gorgeous HS tile.
And the coastal settle would be nice for exploration (Galley), Harbor, maybe Mauseleum (if you've read up on the perks of that wonder). If you do SacredPath/Religion/WorkEthic... then that would maybe be +6 production... and when you get the 100% policy card it becomes +12 production... and you could make your second district Harbor (at pop4)... then build Mauseleum. (How I'd play out your 3rd city location & build.)


If you don't get Sacred Path, then Goddess of Festivals is a nice 2nd option.
Culture is always really helpful, for any victory-type.
There is YouTube video of a couple guys both trying Trajan towards early culture video, fun watch (maybe)...:

He takes GoF at the 36min mark.



Overall - really nice land for a game.
I think there's 5 amazing cities here just to start!!!

I can 'count' tile-spacings well here... but if you were able to put a 6th city in the middle of all these... with Entertainment District/Arena/Colosseum... oh man... gorgeous.

 

[vorlon_mi]

Turn 24 is a grat time to ask for help. I play on Prince level as well.

https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_pantheons_in_Civ6
The first rules I follow in picking a pantheon is to look at the terrain.
If I have potential mines or quarries, if I have tundra, if I have deserts.

Goddess of Festivals will give you some bonuses in the short term from your chocolate, dyes, and truffles.
Sacred Path is not bad, either.
River Goddess looks good, given your rivers near your cities. But the bonus only applies if the Holy Site is next to a river.
One of my personal favorites is Divine Spark, since it benefits 3 district types through the whole game.

Yes, you have a good spot near the mountains. But nearly every city -- especially in the early game, turn 100 or earlier -- could get a Holy Site. The incentive to place HS in your core cities is strengthened if you can get Work Ethic as one of your Religion beliefs. It's super powerful.

Pacing your expansion, that is, when to found the next city, takes some practice. It's also tempting to get bogged down by producing districts in cities not yet developed, so they have low production. Civ6 has very few penalties to expansion, especially as you have turned off barbarians. Place a district as soon as you can, to lock in the production cost. You don't have to finish it, as you can switch to building something else, such as a slinger, warrior, or monument. Given that the AI will seldom declare war on you, focus on growth and expansion.