Which Pantheons are good to take?

[dthompson32]

I looked around for something to discuss the religious choice strategies, but couldn't find anything. I'm trying out a game as the Celts on an Arboreal world, meaning I'm first to get a pantheon and have my choice.

Looking through the long list of choices, not to many of them are saying "This is a good one, take it". So I'm wondering if I'm missing a not so obvious valuable selection.

The two that look obviously good are the ones that give +2 science in religious cities (I assume those go into the base before modifiers) and the +15% to the early wonders.

Does anyone have suggestions on others that are good choices?

 

[Khadroth]

Dance of the Aurora: Great for Tundra Starts
Desert Folklore: Great for Desert Starts
Faith Healers: Probably the best for Warmongering Imo
Fertility Rites: Great for Science, Cultural, or any other tall game style.
God of the Open Sky: One of the best Culture Game choices depending on your surroundings.
God of the Sea: Great for Coastal Starts with lots of Sea Resources.
Goddess of Festivals: Should be great if you have a lot of Wine and Insence nearby for Culture games, unfortunately I haven't seen one yet that justified this over Open Sky
Goddess of Protection: Good for Tall games where you know you're going to get attacked, generally chosen when what you want isn't available
Messenger of the Gods: Strong Science one, though I think fertility rights benefits more in the long run as more people are more bulbs. Great with Carthage Sea starts.
Monument to the Gods: Basically a crappy version of Egypt's UA, that phases out, don't take it.
One with Nature: Very situationally dependant on having multiple wonders nearby or a great second city location with a wonder. Probably not going to be your first choice.
Oral Tradition: One of the best Culture Game choices depending on your surroundings.
Religious Idols: See Goddess of Festivals
Sacred Path: The best Cultural choice in a Jungle Start.
Stone Circles: Good Faith Generator if you have a lot of stone/marble in the area.

If I didn't mention it, it probably wasn't worth mentioning.

 

[Louis8k8]

Dance of the Aurora: Great for Tundra Starts
Desert Folklore: Great for Desert Starts
Faith Healers: Probably the best for Warmongering Imo
Fertility Rites: Great for Science, Cultural, or any other tall game style.
God of the Open Sky: One of the best Culture Game choices depending on your surroundings.
God of the Sea: Great for Coastal Starts with lots of Sea Resources.
Goddess of Festivals: Should be great if you have a lot of Wine and Insence nearby for Culture games, unfortunately I haven't seen one yet that justified this over Open Sky
Goddess of Protection: Good for Tall games where you know you're going to get attacked, generally chosen when what you want isn't available
Messenger of the Gods: Strong Science one, though I think fertility rights benefits more in the long run as more people are more bulbs. Great with Carthage Sea starts.
Monument to the Gods: Basically a crappy version of Egypt's UA, that phases out, don't take it.
One with Nature: Very situationally dependant on having multiple wonders nearby or a great second city location with a wonder. Probably not going to be your first choice.
Oral Tradition: One of the best Culture Game choices depending on your surroundings.
Religious Idols: See Goddess of Festivals
Sacred Path: The best Cultural choice in a Jungle Start.
Stone Circles: Good Faith Generator if you have a lot of stone/marble in the area.

If I didn't mention it, it probably wasn't worth mentioning.

Agreed with most of this list, I bolded the ones that I would normally use. I don't use nearly as much variety.

Favorite is the God of the Open sky or Sea. Monument to the Gods only applies to when I play vs Players or non-handicapped AI. That would allow me to hoard some of my favorite wonders if I play a tall in the beginning. If against my friends, I can almost get 100% of all the starting wonders. Because we are always racing for the same wonders in the same order. I also don't recommend it. It's more of a fun pantheon than a powerful one.

Only time where I would get One with Nature is if I found the Great Barrier Reef x2 before Pantheon (like once in every 50 games?)

 

[Khadroth]

Agreed with most of this list, I bolded the ones that I would normally use. I don't use nearly as much variety.

Favorite is the God of the Open sky or Sea. Monument to the Gods only applies to when I play vs Players or non-handicapped AI. That would allow me to hoard some of my favorite wonders if I play a tall in the beginning. If against my friends, I can almost get 100% of all the starting wonders. Because we are always racing for the same wonders in the same order. I also don't recommend it. It's more of a fun pantheon than a powerful one.

Only time where I would get One with Nature is if I found the Great Barrier Reef x2 before Pantheon (like once in every 50 games?)

Aye, only thing I don't like too much about the Wonder Bonus here is the opportunity cost of missing out on something else. After all Wonders are One and Done's mostly, so it doesn't really matter if you beat someone by 1 turn or 20 turns as long as you beat them.

One with Nature I can still really only see as Spain.

 

[dthompson32]

Wow, thanks! This is exactly why I asked, I would have never considered God of the Open Sky.

I did use Fertility Rites in my last game and was seeing it make a difference on cities where I was maxing production.

 

[dthompson32]

Currently playing a Mayan game with a lot of jungles on rivers near my two main cities. Sacred path turned out to be a great choice, especially since the culture bonus stays even if you have put and road and trading post on the tile.

I'm going to also try out God of War as a test. This particular map, the French and Greeks are both very aggressive but my city locations are highly defensible. They throw their troops at my position constantly. I'm curious just how much faith I can get from it.

 

[Bandersnatching]

Currently playing a Mayan game with a lot of jungles on rivers near my two main cities. Sacred path turned out to be a great choice, especially since the culture bonus stays even if you have put and road and trading post on the tile.

I'm going to also try out God of War as a test. This particular map, the French and Greeks are both very aggressive but my city locations are highly defensible. They throw their troops at my position constantly. I'm curious just how much faith I can get from it.

How much faith do you generate from God of War? I haven't tested it yet, but I'd assume that it's something like the Pictish Warrior ability, that gives half the combat strength as faith. That would be a nice little bonus if you were getting attacked a lot.
Also, as to Sacred Path: one day I want to take that, get the Rationalism and Commerce TP bonuses, and then build myself a university city on a river, surrounded by 10-yield jungle tiles (2, 3, 4, 1) . I think that would be fun.

 

[dthompson32]

I don't know, but I bet it is identical to the Pictish warrior. Easier to just have one coding thread that is reused.

My current game, my science city is pretty close to that, hill on a river next to a mountain with 9 jungle tiles within range. Three of those are next to the river.

I'm going to be hanging onto this save file, it seems to have a lot of interesting features, though I have yet to beat it.

 

[trystero49]

I can confirm that God of War is identical to Pictish Warrior benefit, at least with barbarians. I was getting half of combat strength from each kill. I did not have the opportunity to try it out on other civs or city states.

 

[peddroelm]

Dance of the Aurora: Great for Tundra Starts
...
If I didn't mention it, it probably wasn't worth mentioning.

Goddess of the Hunt: +1 Food from Hunting Camps

Camps are pretty deep in tech, usually you don't get that many camps, on deity faith generated from the pantheon is usually invaluable for getting to establish a religion ...Garbage ...(99/100 times)

And yet for some civs with forest start bias you sometimes get starts like this - had 13 camps (truffles, furs, deer ) in my 4 tradition cities in my last continents Mayan game... Spread like this 5 5 3 per city ... This was almost a nerfed HG equivalent in 2 cities and helped to grow them up incredibly fast ....

 

[pontias]

I can confirm that God of War is identical to Pictish Warrior benefit, at least with barbarians. I was getting half of combat strength from each kill. I did not have the opportunity to try it out on other civs or city states.

Just been playing with god of war and can confirm above.

It looks like puppet cities don't count though so as you expand this benefit becomes less useful.

 

[Khadroth]

Goddess of the Hunt: +1 Food from Hunting Camps

Camps are pretty deep in tech, usually you don't get that many camps, on deity faith generated from the pantheon is usually invaluable for getting to establish a religion ...Garbage ...(99/100 times)

And yet for some civs with forest start bias you sometimes get starts like this - had 13 camps (truffles, furs, deer ) in my 4 tradition cities in my last continents Mayan game... Spread like this 5 5 3 per city ... This was almost a nerfed HG equivalent in 2 cities and helped to grow them up incredibly fast ....

Sure it could work, but it's extremely situational as you yourself pointed out.

Also, what? How is early faith generation not helpful to founding a religion on diety? Half the diety strategies listed on various threads involve building stonehenge or allying a religious CS, or rushing for the liberty finisher. If you can replace any one of those with a pantheon belief, it frees them up to use on something else early.

 

[Sleepingghost]

Iroquois + Goddess of the hunt is insane, you get 4 3 2 on deer when a longhouse is built. It's incredibly powerful, and I'm having quite some fun with legendary starts and building mohwak warriors in 1 turn (you can get up to 5 deer and 4 truffles on your starting location).

 

[Lexicus]

If I didn't mention it, it probably wasn't worth mentioning.

I'm surprised you didn't mention Sacred Waters. That's a very powerful pantheon if you're going wide, since most cities will be on rivers anyway.

 

[budweiser]

With a single marble start, I took Monument to the Gods last night as Japan on Emperor. I combined that with Aristocracy and proceded to build 8 Ancient/Classical Wonders. Then, when I made my religion I took the belief that gave +2 Faith per Wonder. The faith is pouring in.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

The thing about pantheons and many other things in civ 5 is that it depends, any pantheon can probably be stronger then any of the other if the circumstances for it to be that is right. Its far better to be flexible then to keep to old build orders and such.

 

[prince_caspian]

Another thing not mentioned is Religious Settlements is a good complement to Liberty/Honor if you don't want to go kreposts or Tradition just for the borders.

 

[Bibor]

I look at great synergy ones first (quarry, silver/gold, wine/incense) followed by culture from pastures or plantations. Basically, tiles that i will work all the time anyway.

 

[rrhal]

God of Craftsmen is pretty nice - early hammers are very good.
Messenger of the Gods is a nice science boost
All the rest seem situational.

 

[qyll]

Of course, the Pantheons are pretty circumstantial. If it's not completely obvious which one to take (spawned with 4 stone tiles nearby? Stone circles is a no brainer), I usually go for faith healers. It's by far the best way to survive on immortal/deity when you get early DoWed by the AI. One fortified warrior/spearman will be able to hold off 3 or 4 enemies if you park it next to a city, and it continues to be useful through later eras.