Founding A Religion, Is It Worth It?

[Jerh9e1k5]

Hello everyone!

I've been scouring the forums and reading up on all the of the latest CIV strategies. However I have not come accross very much content on the value of starting a religion. Whenever the opportunity presents itself (in my limited number of games) have always researched something else. Founding a religion would seem to have a detrimental effect on one's reputation with the other Civilizations, unless quick missionaries spread the religion to the other parts of the world. I remember reading somewhere that once a Civ has a state religion it is very difficult to make them convert to your state religion.

Are the advantages of fouding a religion (the sight bonus, and the GPT) worth the negative impact on relations with the opposing AI's (unless your religion was the first to spread). Adding to the negative side would also be the time spent building the missionaries and the required buildings instead of building other improvements and military units in the meantime.

In your games, do you try to found a religion, or do you skip over this tech, and avoid this whole branch of the tree like I have in my few games?

Jerh9e1k5
Happy Holidays!

[Kirghiz]

It is always good to found a religion. Actually it is good to found as many as you possibly can. The reason is that you can than build the special religious buildings that give you 1 gold for every city that religion is present in, even your enemy's.

Also, having three, four, or even five religions in each of your cities does wonders for your happiness since you can build Temples, Monasteries, and Cathedrals for each religion in your city. That is a particularly big deal when you consider that each Monastery you build gives a 10% research bonus. It adds up pretty fast.

Having said all of that you will also get a pretty powerful culture bonus for all those religious buildings.

Basically, don't just found one, found all seven if you can. He who controls religion controls pretty much everything.

[Blake]

It can be worth it. But sometimes it just doesn't work out and everyone else switches to another religion...

Try to go for an early religion and one of the later ones, spread the early religion around.

Bear in mind you can only research an early religion reliably if you have a good commerce start - spanish on a lake, wines/silks etc on a river (found on it for +1 city tile commerce). It's an oppurtunistic thing. You can only use the Oracle to get Code of Laws or a great prophet to get Theology...

If it pays off, it pays off big. Get 3 religious allys and the game is pretty much in the bah. But it only seems to go really well about 1/3rd the time, most the time your neighbours found their own religions and stuff...

[Proteus_MST]

Yep, it´s definitely useful to found as many religions as possible.

The ability to build a temple and monastery for every religion in a city (and a cathedral for every 6 or 8 temples) is a good boost to happiness, science and culture.
And of course having the holy city for each/many of the religions can give you a very large financial boost as well as a good spy capability, as you are able to see every city (along with its surroundings and all military units in it) on the world with your state religion if you own the holy city of your state religion.

[eluciv]

I agree - with certain civs, it's far and away the best reliable strat for a quick and lengthy lead. I just started a (prince) game with Asoka in which I've founded every religion so far (Buddhist, Hindu, Judiasm Christian, Confucian). When I got my first GP, I noticed that the entire known world (8 other civs) was Jewish! I built the Temple of Solomon and immediately went from negative 2 gpt and 80% science to +11 gpt at 100% science. After a dozen turns or so, I was up to +21 gold at 100% science. It's like a perpetual uber golden age. Well, not perpetual because I'm sure religions will change - but not until I'm womping ass on everyone.
I've never done this before, so I'm kind of excited as you see...

The thing I've noticed is that rushing all the religions will leave you deficient in most other areas. I try to sneak agriculture and archery in there during my rush. I build as many archers as I can to stave off that early attack (not to mention the barbs that come). If I can plant a couple warriors or scouts to lift the immediate fog of war, I can rest a little easier with regard to barbs and get some infrastructure in there.

Rome attacked me just before I quit for bed last night, but he's doomed now. I was suprised, because I've never had a "brother of the faith" attack me so early. He must know he'd be speaking Indian soon anyway...hehe.

[eluciv]

One more thing - has anyone noticed that certain cities (or religions) are harder to spread a different religion in? I've noticed (maybe coincidence) that cities with Judaism seem to reject my missionary most of the time. Even my own - and it's not due to Theocracy in these cases. It probably is coincidence, but sometimes it really bugs me. I'm not being anti-semitic, either.

[Saurus]

As always, it depends. In a game where I played Enlglish, I founded Hinduism, Budhism and Judaism. The result? .. Well, in a few turns Louis has converted to Hinduism, Isabella to Budism and Saladin to Judaism. For some leaders religion seem to have a very, very serious matter and inpact alot on relations...and theese three abowe included those. I was constantly close to war with everyone becouse I only could please one of my rivals at any given time. Missionairies did little to help since all three religions spread alot and randomly. So Finaly I gave up and chose no state religion...

However, Its difficult to overlook the early religion-related technologies. The problem is that going for a cultural-builder game is difficult without any of the early wonders and culture you can get out of the religious techs so you will probably find yourself pursuing the religious techs anyway very early

[Diadem]

I always used to think religions were always worth it. But I'm starting to doubt this now.

I'm playing on deity these days, and I really need diplomatic skills to survive in the game. War with a deity AI usually hurts quite badly. Not founding any religions is a major boost to your diplomacy. Noone will have penalties towards you from the start. A good thing!

On the lower levels, I used to be quite succesful at converting AIs to my religion. At the highest levels, this just takes too much energy, and they just won't stay at my religions. They change as soon as they have another one.

There is another, even more important, advantage though. If you found less religions, the AI will found more. Meaning they will end up with more different religions between them.

So now, we have a game where noone dislikes you from the start, but they mostly dislike eachother.

That is just perfection. There is simply no better scenario than the one where all AIs fight eachother, and noone bothers you.

[Diadem]

By the way, I'm not saying founding religions is bad. I don't know, I'm undecided on the matter.

I'm just giving advantages of not founding any religions, that I discovered. I'm not sure if they outweigh the disadvantages. As always, it depends. If you try to win a cultural victory, for instance, religions are certainly extremely important.

[Blake]

I've decided that religions are an oppurtunistic thing and you should only ever go for one early religion (buddhism or hinduism) and maybe one late religion (Islam or Tao, for the wonders on the tech as well). You need the other religions out there in the wild causing divisions between AI's.

Now for the oppurtunity thing:
Indian AI's usually research Buddhism, if you are an Indian Leader you (probably) wont have an indian AI for competition and will thus usually get Buddhism. India also starts closest to Monotheism if you want to make a grab for Juadism.

If you can get "+3" or higher commerce at your capital (over a no-lake no-river no-special start) you have a most excellent chance of getting the religion of your choice (buddhism or hinduism), +3 for example is a financial civ working an oasis. Founding on a river tile with a +1 commerce special (ie wines, silks etc) also gives an excellent research boost.

The absolute ideal start is Financial, founded on wines on a river, working an oasis, this gives a whopping +5 commerce over the worst possible start.

More generally though, a +2 commerce start is enough to consider going for Buddhism or Hinduism, just bear in mind you lose out if another civ has a +3 commerce start, and unless you're actually Inca with a +5 commerce start there is no way to absolutely guarantee you'll get the religion.

In any case, if I do get a +2 commerce start with a spi/myst civ I'll definitely try for an early religion.

[Blake]

Now, on the use and spreading of religion.

Religion only spreads along trade links - roads, rivers and coast, make damn sure your holy city is connected to your other cities, and build trade links to your neighbours (hook roads onto rivers flowing out of their territory and stuff).

Religion seems to want to spread at least once ASAP, so if for example you found Buddhism in your capital, if you connect to another civ before your 2nd city, Buddhism will probably spread to that civs capital right away. In this way the spread of the religion can be directed to a degree.

And again, always make damn sure your holy city is actually connected (in the case of non-capital religions), it wont spread anywhere without a connection. (altough you can of course use the free missionary)

[Risa]

Diadem, founding a religion itself won't hurt diplomatic relations with AI, as long as not converting to it. You can still get good income from shrine and a good +5 culture per turn for holy city.