Can/Do Civs change religions if they founded it?

[EternalSpark]

It seems that whenever a Civ discovers a religion, he or she will quickly adopt it as the state religion. And I've never ever been able to get them to switch to anything else.

Has this happened to anyone else? I had a great relationship with Asoka (up to like +6 or more), he finds Taoism, and immediately went to "I hate you and your lack of Taoishness".

[Nikolai]

I've convinced other civs to convert or even had them do it themselves if only the new religion has been widely enough spread. Use your misssionaries extensively, and you'll see results.

[Nacht]

In my experience, when a civ has the holy city of their state religion, they won't change. Or they do change but change back the next turn after you paid a hefty amount of money

[CerberusIV]

My experience is that it is purely down to how widespread a religion is in their empire. I have had games where I spread my religion to almost all of an AI's cities, they then founded a new religion but stuck with mine.

I have only paid an AI to change once, after I had spread my religion to all their cities but they did convert back to their original religion within a few turns so I don't bother with asking them to convert any more.

[Axxaer]

Originally posted by Nikolai
I've convinced other civs to convert or even had them do it themselves if only the new religion has been widely enough spread. Use your misssionaries extensively, and you'll see results.

That depends very much on situation - AI, difficulty, time.

If the AI already has a religion founded (which, by the OP, is the scenario were working with) then they will be very stubborn. Chuck in an AI like Isabella and then its nearly impossible, as on all but the mildest of difficulties, they will try their hardest to spread their religion at least throughout their own empire.

In my experience (playing noble+) it is almost impossible to convert an enemy, although I haven't tried significant bribes (more than a few units some gold and a couple of techs).

[Martinus]

You can always declare war on them and burn their new holy city to the ground - this should convince them to go back to their old, proper religion you spread to them before.

[Blake]

I've only very rarely managed to have civs with a holy city switch to a religion that they don't own. I think it can happen when there's a large religious power block that they'd rather not get on the wrong side of, most the time though they are very stubborn, even when the new religion is barely spread.

[Axxaer]

Originally posted by Martinus
You can always declare war on them and burn their new holy city to the ground - this should convince them to go back to their old, proper religion you spread to them before.

I take it you play as a spiritual civ on noble or lower if you can spread your religion to everyone before they can establish their own.

[gdgrimm]

Originally posted by Axxaer


I take it you play as a spiritual civ on noble or lower if you can spread your religion to everyone before they can establish their own.

Not necessarily. I recently had a Prince level game where I (Alexander), Roosevelt, Frederick, and Montezuma all started on the same smallish continent. We had a LOT of early war mongering going on. Eventually, when things cooled off, I realized that none of us had any religion!

The only one left was Islam, so I founded that and spread it quickly through the continent.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by Axxaer


I take it you play as a spiritual civ on noble or lower if you can spread your religion to everyone before they can establish their own.

Well, I'm playing Russia now on Prince and most of the world follows my Hinduism (which I renamed Wotanism, as it is a Europe-only game). Isabella is alone with her Buddhism (renamed Zoroastrianism).

[Urban Ranger]

How do you rename religions?

[Aro]

XML files?

[Axxaer]

Yeah, I believe you have to mod it in.

[Silver14]

Originally posted by Martinus
You can always declare war on them and burn their new holy city to the ground - this should convince them to go back to their old, proper religion you spread to them before.

Someone I can see eye to eye with here. Some games of mine where my religion is dominant with an AI - I'll be sure to raze any holy city of a newly founded religion they may have gotten before they can spread it or switch religions. The bonus for being the same religion usually outdoes the negatives of razing one of their cities, especially if you can do it before they switch religions to avoid the -2 "you razed a holy city" fuss.

[TomVeil]

This is a special case, but, if an AI Civ has two or more holy cities, they will switch among those religions readily, provided that the religions are fairly evenly spread in their cities.