cckerberos
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 2, 2005
- Messages
- 41
This is an idea for a mod I've had for a little while now. I don't know if it's practical (although I have some ideas how it could be done) and I won't be able to start on it for a little while (until mid-December at the earliest), but I thought I might as well toss out the idea so that I could see if there was any interest and if some bugs in the idea could be worked out.
Basically, I'd like the religion founded by a certain technology to be affected by the civilization that founds it. For example, the Egyptians would, upon discovering Monotheism, found Atenism, not Judaism, the Persians would found Zoroastrianism, and so on. I'm not suggesting that the number of active religions be increased; only the first discoverer of a tech would get to found a religion. I think this would be an interesting change that could add color to the game; a rather painless way of getting some of the other religions in. It would also cut down on some of the silly culture-religion combinations.
Having put some thought into this, I have come up with some points that I would like some comments on.
1. With 18 civilizations in the (vanilla) game and 7 religions, that's a lot of religions if they were to be unique. Even though a lot of the later cultures have overlapping religions, I'll need some help with suggestions for some blanks.
2. I've tried to come up with 7 categories for religions, but it's been difficult. At this point I'm thinking of Aminism, Polytheism, Meditation, Early Monotheism, Middle Monotheism, Late Monotheism, and Ethical Codes. Unfortunately, Buddhism strikes me as being unique enough that it can't help but have its own category.
3. To help fill blanks, I've thought that some plausible but non-existant religions could be included. For example, the move from polytheism to monotheism is often made by elevating one member of the polytheistic pantheon above all the other gods (this happened/is theorized to have happened in Atenism, Judaism, Vaishnavism, etc.) Thus I was thinking that the sole worship of Amaterasu for Japan, or of Odin for the Germanic civilizations could be used as their Early Monotheistic religions.
4. Some of the religions included aren't perfect matches for where they are, perhaps... but I thought including as many religions as possible would be interesting.
Here are the thoughts I currently have for what religions I'd like to include:
Polytheism:
- most civilizations have their own... the crossovers are the Norse & Greco-Roman pantheons.
E. Monotheism:
- Worship of Odin
- Judaism
- Atenism
- Mithraism
- Vaishnavism
- Zoroastrianism
- Ise Cult (Amaterasu)
M. Monotheism
- Catholicism
- Islam
L. Monotheism
- Deism
- Shi'a
- Protestantism
- East Orthodox
- Tenrikyo
Any comments and/or criticism would be welcome.
Basically, I'd like the religion founded by a certain technology to be affected by the civilization that founds it. For example, the Egyptians would, upon discovering Monotheism, found Atenism, not Judaism, the Persians would found Zoroastrianism, and so on. I'm not suggesting that the number of active religions be increased; only the first discoverer of a tech would get to found a religion. I think this would be an interesting change that could add color to the game; a rather painless way of getting some of the other religions in. It would also cut down on some of the silly culture-religion combinations.
Having put some thought into this, I have come up with some points that I would like some comments on.
1. With 18 civilizations in the (vanilla) game and 7 religions, that's a lot of religions if they were to be unique. Even though a lot of the later cultures have overlapping religions, I'll need some help with suggestions for some blanks.
2. I've tried to come up with 7 categories for religions, but it's been difficult. At this point I'm thinking of Aminism, Polytheism, Meditation, Early Monotheism, Middle Monotheism, Late Monotheism, and Ethical Codes. Unfortunately, Buddhism strikes me as being unique enough that it can't help but have its own category.
3. To help fill blanks, I've thought that some plausible but non-existant religions could be included. For example, the move from polytheism to monotheism is often made by elevating one member of the polytheistic pantheon above all the other gods (this happened/is theorized to have happened in Atenism, Judaism, Vaishnavism, etc.) Thus I was thinking that the sole worship of Amaterasu for Japan, or of Odin for the Germanic civilizations could be used as their Early Monotheistic religions.
4. Some of the religions included aren't perfect matches for where they are, perhaps... but I thought including as many religions as possible would be interesting.
Here are the thoughts I currently have for what religions I'd like to include:
Polytheism:
- most civilizations have their own... the crossovers are the Norse & Greco-Roman pantheons.
E. Monotheism:
- Worship of Odin
- Judaism
- Atenism
- Mithraism
- Vaishnavism
- Zoroastrianism
- Ise Cult (Amaterasu)
M. Monotheism
- Catholicism
- Islam
L. Monotheism
- Deism
- Shi'a
- Protestantism
- East Orthodox
- Tenrikyo
Any comments and/or criticism would be welcome.
