Free religion and shrines, Scientific Method and monasteries, and bears

[Wishbone]

Well, I guess I've been lurking long enough. I used to post questions on the old Civ3 forum under a different name but until now I haven't really felt the need with Civ4. Actually most of the questions I've had have been asked and answered before I got around to asking them (or even thinking of them) myself (or else they just didn't seem to carry enough weight to merit posting them – which assumption I might rethink cause there aren’t any bad questions, right? - Okay, there are dumb questions but I don’t think that’s the same thing - possibly). In fact, all the Apolyton forums I've visited seem to me to be among the best anywhere (intelligent, generous, and especially in the case of Civ4, very thorough).
Excuse me your honor but does Mr. Wishbone have a question for the witness or is he running for office?
Okay, okay. I did finally come up with a question to which I can’t seem to find an answer (searched for one but couldn’t quite get it nailed down). It are this:
In my current game I founded Confusionism (because I believe that confusion is a fundamental cosmic force and probably what caused the big bang and also because for once I managed to pull off a CS slingshot) and subsequently built the Kong Meow. Then I was the first to get Liberalism (which is, I think, even better than the CS deal) cause you get Nationalism for free as well as free speech and free religion, all of which is to say: Yippee Ki Yo. Plus I founded Taoism and built the Dai Meow (these good things do not happen to me very often in case you were wondering). But after I converted to Free Religion I started wondering if the Kong Meow is still paying me a buck per city and, likewise, if it was worth it to build the Taoist shrine and start spamming Taoist missionaries to get another buck per. The question is, therefore, what religious perks do you lose by disestablishing religion? Am I still getting one gold in all my Confusion cities and, for that matter, are my monasteries still giving me plus 10% research until Scientific Method makes them obsolete (and, now that I think about it, does SM nix that nice tech feature or does it just make them unable to build missionaries)? So that’s two questions but probably easy ones that one of you high priests or priestesses of the forum can answer in one shot – after which I will go away for awhile and not bother you anymore.
Oh yeah, and one more thing. I don’t know about you but I just really hate bears.

[Arrian]

Welcome

You will still get the shrine money. You will get happiness (more, if you have lots of religions per city, perhaps less if not - your will lose the happiness benifit of any cathedral type buildings you may have). You will no longer get the diplomacy effects (good or bad) of religion, and you will lose the effects of some religious type wonders (Spiral Minaret, University of Sankore).

Re: post- scientific method:

You will still be able to use your monasteries to produce missionaries, but the +10% science will be gone, and you will be unable to build new monasteries.

-Arrian

edit: with Liberalism, the "slingshot" I sometimes go for is democracy. It means you gotta have printing press and constitution (reqs nationalism, IIRC) and then get liberalism. The AI, as improved by Blake, does not appear inclined to allow me to do that anymore, though.

[Diadem]

Allow me to answer the questions you asked, and some you didn't ask

Temples and Monasterries (with double r! Didn't know that either, but just looked it up) work independently of what your state religion is. Every temple gives +1 happiness, regardless of state religion, every monastery gives you 10% science and the ability to build the missionaries of the monastery's religion, regardless of your state religion. So the effect of these buildings also work when you have no state religion.

The same is basicly true for Shrines. All their bonusses work regardless of state religion. The gold for shrines, by the way, is generated in the shrine city, not in the cities that have the religion. You also get gold for foreign cities having the religion.
Building Wall Street in a city with 1 or 2 shrines of religions that are well spread is a good idea - the gold bonus from wallstreet works over the shrine income. Same with banks, markets and grocers.

In warlords, you can actually check what your shrine income is by looking at the buildings list of the city. It will show how much gold your shrine generates after the shrine name. This might work in vanilla civ as well, but I wouldn't know

After scientific method you can no longer build monasterries. Existing monesterries are kept though. They will stop generating science, but they will still allow you to build missionaries. You can't build new ones though. This means that if you want to spread religions, you better build your monasterries before researching scientific method, because afterwards the only way to get missionaries out of cities where you haven't yet build them, is organized religion.

So what bonusses does a state religion give? Well, +1 happiness in every city with that religion (but that means that the free religion happiness bonus is always at least as big). In the holy city you can +5 culture, in every other city +1 culture. Without a state religion every religion in a city gives +1 culture though, so free religion will usually give you more culture in normal cities, and less in holy cities. So far, free religion is ahead

But if you run free religion, you do loose the bonus of other religious civics. That's rather logical, but still important. No more +100% GPP points or +25% production, once you start running free religion.

And of course, it has a major impact on diplomacy.

[Wishbone]

It seems I must add expeditious to my list of Apolyton forum virtues. Very quick and informative replies. Many thanks to both of you.
Arrian: If I understand you, Free Religion negates the effects of anything that gives a bonus to cities with a state religion (no state religion, no bonus) – thus Christian Cathedrals, Buddhist Stupas, Confusion Academies (sorry, just can’t resist those puns), and the Spiral Minaret lose those benefits (and only those benefits) that apply to state religions. It seems to follow, on the other hand, that The Spiral Minaret would continue, for example, to double production speed with stone or that (it looks like) all the Cathedral-like buildings would continue to add a happy face for incense. I have never really gotten or considered the Minaret before but looking at it now, I see that it gives one gold for all state buildings but I’m not sure if this means all state buildings in the city that it’s in or all state buildings in all cities (which, if all temples, monasteries, etc., of the state religion are considered state buildings, makes the Minaret seem very attractive until one goes secular). Moreover, I’m not really clear on what constitutes a state building. Apparently all buildings of the state religion count but are there others? Palace? Courthouses? Barracks? Castles? Jails? Bomb shelters? If any of these fall into that classification, that would seem to make the Minaret attractive even after adopting Free Religion.
Also, I’m wondering about your interest in a Democracy slingshot (I see the Statue of Liberty and two high-end civics, all three of which seem to come with nice features – I guess I’ve just never really considered the specific advantages of any of them) – I’m usually straining so hard to get my military and railroads, etc., fired up that some of those less obviously alluring techs tend to get ignored. Anyway, thanks again for your prompt reply.
Diadem: Likewise, I appreciate the speedy input. As to the double “r” in monasterries, I certainly would have gotten that one wrong in the spelling bee (and my respect for Webster and the OED notwithstanding, it still kinda looks wrong). Anyway, very clear explanation, good tip on financial institutions kicking in after shrines, and two very interesting revelations. That the coin from a shrine shows up in the shrine makes sense when you think about it and also explains why I was having a hard time trying to figure out if they were still paying off. However, the disclosure that foreign cities with the same religion pay my shrine gets another big yippee ki yo. Before I went secular, Confusionism had spread very well and three other Civs now have it as their state religion. You are also right that mousing over the shrine in the city screen (even in vanilla) shows the total income and, because of those foreign cities, that little Kong Meow is currently making a small fortune (I haven’t done the math but it looks like it doesn’t matter if it’s the state religion in those other civs or not – looks like any city with that religion pays my shrine). Now I’m gonna start spamming Taoism like crazy (though a little war does seem to be looming on the horizon and might put a cramp in the Taoist great awakening).
Also, I’m assuming that until I get Scientific Method my monasteries are still giving +10% science and that the 10% from Free Religion is on top of that. If that’s the case, it sounds like a good reason to put off researching SM until you absolutely have to have it (although not knowing where that oil is could make this a little nerve wracking).
As to diplomacy, this might change but it does seem like if they admired you before you went secular, they tend to keep on liking you after. We shall see.
Anyway, thanks again to both of you for the input.

[popejubal]

What Diadem said.

Also, you get 1 culture per turn for the city having your state religion (if it has your state religion, obviously). Your holy city gets 4 or 5 culture per turn if that religion is your state religion (I'll look it up later). If a city has a religion that is not your state religion, then you do not get that culture.


...unless you don't have any state religion at all. If you have no state religion, then you get the culture for every religion you have in each city and you get the big bonus culture ( 4 or 5) in every holy city. Not having a state religion can have some big bonuses if you need the culture.

Additionally, if you have Free Religion, you get +1 happiness for each religion in each of your cities, but you do not count as having a state religion, so you get the culture for every religion. As far as I can tell, however, you do not get any money from the Spiral Minaret or beakers from the University of Sanka. And how did religion and science get mixed up with instant coffee, anyway?

The only downsides to having Free Religion are (A) you can't run another religious civic (i.e. Theocracy, Philosophy or Organized Religion) at the same time, (B) you lose the primary benefits of Spiral Minaret and University of Sanka (which is why I never bother to build them) and (C) your brothers in religious awesomeness stop loving you quite so much.

Be prepared for a war if you switch to Free Religion and EVERYONE else is just one religion. You'll be the odd man out. You can also make people stop hating you with Free Religion as well, though.

Final thought. If you have a few religions spread throughout your empire (especially on the fringes), then Free Religion + Free Speech = very fast bumps to the fat cross for new cities if you ship them with a few missionaries and a Monasterry or 3 + a Cathedral can mean making massive inroads into your opponent's cultural boundaries.

I likes me that God stuff.

[Diadem]

Yes, it doesn't matter what the state religion of other cives is - as long as their cities have your religion, you get the shrine income from them. Even if they run theocracy. Theaocracy prevents a further spread of 'alien' religions, but does nothing against religions that are already there.

On big maps with lots of cities shrines can become huge fountains of money. Build markets, grocers and banks there with great priority. The income listed for the shrine is raw income, so your actual income from the shrine will be even more. Throw in a wall street and every city with your religion gives you 3 gold.

Even better is if you can get a single city to be the holy city of 2 (or more, but that's very hard) religions. You can build shrines for both these religions, spread them both, add Wall Street, and cash 6 gold per city you own. Enough to pay each city's upkeep. Say hello to ICS

Free religion looses you the bonus of The Spiral Minaret (and for warlords University of Sankathingie). I forgot that in my previous post. If you have those buildings that can be a significant disadvantage to free religion.

The bonus of Spiral Minaret is applied all religious buildings. Those are buildings with a religion in their name: Temples, Monasterries, Cathedrals and presumably also Shrines, though I've never checked the latter. In your average empire that means 2 or 4 gold per city (from the temple and sometimes a monastery).

Note that spiral minaret gold is generated within the city where those religious buildings are, not in the minaret city. But it counts as raw gold, over which markets and banks work. But you need those in each city for it to be really effective, not just in one city. That makes shrines a lot more powerful than the spiral minaret. Still it's a very useful building.

Another disadvantage of Free Religion: You loose line of sight into enemy cities.

[sjm]

Monastery has one 'r', or am I missing something?

http://m-w.com/dictionary/monastery

[binTravkin]

You're missing some sense of humour

[MojoJojoUK]

Hi I'm fairly new. Playing Civ Vanilla patched to the max (uhh, 1.61, isn't it?) with Blake's mod.

Do you lose the ability to "see" around cities you have the shrine for if you go free religion/have no state religion?

I thought this is what I saw in my last game. But then I htought I also lost my shrine income when I switched to free religion, but that was just based of looking at the number in the top left, and could of been something to do with one of the other civics I changed.

[Kuciwalker]

Do you lose the ability to "see" around cities you have the shrine for if you go free religion/have no state religion?

Yes.

[binTravkin]

But then I htought I also lost my shrine income when I switched to free religion, but that was just based of looking at the number in the top left, and could of been something to do with one of the other civics I changed.

One can always check that in the founder city's building list in front of the shrine.

[Diadem]

Originally posted by sjm
Monastery has one 'r', or am I missing something?

http://m-w.com/dictionary/monastery

Well Yourdictionary.com has it with 2 r's. And that's a very good dictionary in my experience. I always use it.

It looked extremely weird to me as well, but I'm not a native English speaker, so I usually trust dictionaries over my own judgement

But it's possible that it's an error. Most other dictionaries seem to have it with one r.

[binTravkin]

So, stop using it

[sjm]

Originally posted by Diadem


Well Yourdictionary.com has it with 2 r's. And that's a very good dictionary in my experience. I always use it.

It looked extremely weird to me as well, but I'm not a native English speaker, so I usually trust dictionaries over my own judgement

But it's possible that it's an error. Most other dictionaries seem to have it with one r.

hmm, webster's always has the most obscure spellings - including obsolete variations (scots, chaucer etc.). As a translator, I use webster's if in doubt (or the OED) - and I have never personally seen "monastery" with two rs. I'm pretty damn certain it's a typo; especially seeing as you get only 500-ish google hits for monastery with 2 rs... I was wondering whether I had missed a joke when first skim-reading the topic...

[Arrian]

Arrian: If I understand you, Free Religion negates the effects of anything that gives a bonus to cities with a state religion (no state religion, no bonus) – thus Christian Cathedrals, Buddhist Stupas, Confusion Academies (sorry, just can’t resist those puns), and the Spiral Minaret lose those benefits (and only those benefits) that apply to state religions. It seems to follow, on the other hand, that The Spiral Minaret would continue, for example, to double production speed with stone or that (it looks like) all the Cathedral-like buildings would continue to add a happy face for incense. I have never really gotten or considered the Minaret before but looking at it now, I see that it gives one gold for all state buildings but I’m not sure if this means all state buildings in the city that it’s in or all state buildings in all cities (which, if all temples, monasteries, etc., of the state religion are considered state buildings, makes the Minaret seem very attractive until one goes secular). Moreover, I’m not really clear on what constitutes a state building. Apparently all buildings of the state religion count but are there others? Palace? Courthouses? Barracks? Castles? Jails? Bomb shelters? If any of these fall into that classification, that would seem to make the Minaret attractive even after adopting Free Religion.

As for the cathedral buildings, I think you lose the happiness but keep the cultural benifit. Honestly I'm not 100% sure because I rarely build them.

The Spiral Minaret does not double production speed with stone. That tag line means that if you have stone, you would produce The Spiral Minaret itself at double speed. It provides +1 gold for each religious building of your state religion. So if you have Confucianism selected as your state religion, all confucian temples, monasteries and academies will produce 1 gold per turn.

-Arrian