Switching back to State Religion

[couerdelion]

Here’s a question I want to open to everyone which has crossed my mind now that I have captured University of Sankore. I am considering switching from Free Religion to allow myself to run a state religion for the bonuses from the wonder and have yet to decide if it is worthwhile. To put this in some context, I have a little over 20 cities and am about to complete Communism. This will allow me to switch to State Property (a given) and I will also change to Representation of Universal Suffrage at the same time. The question is whether or not I switch also to Theocracy or Pacifism and to take a state religion ( I guess this will be another Anarchy hit).

The effects will be as follows:

+2 beakers (pre-adjustment) to each city with Christian Temple
+2 beakers (pre-adjustment) to each city with Cathedral (2 or 3)
+2 beakers for Church of the Nativity
+2 happy for each city with Cathedral
-1 happy for each non-state religion in every city
Either +100% GPP in “all” cities less military unit costs – Statue of Liberty almost finished – or +2 XP for all units

With the prospect of a cultural victory, there is quite a significant hit here although I wonder if, in the scheme of things, this is all that high (Cultural City 2 is producing 213 culture/turn and will lose about 21 points from any switch to a religion). Later on, with Computers, I can always switch back to Free Religion so perhaps I can ignore this.

Where the cultural impact is greatest is with newly captured cities, which will potentially lose 2 points for each religion they have. So the first border pop might be delayed a little without specialists/rushed culture. On the upside, those cities will be that little bit more valuable because the temple becomes a more profitable build option

What’s the general opinion?

[rah]

Other things to consider. How does it impact your relations with others on ther map?

What are your short term goals. i.e. almost done with a tech that will give you momentary superiority. Are you at war where the extra happies of all religion are needed. And yes the victory condition you're trying to achieve is critical.

But looking at it without a lot of other issues.
How many beakers are you cranking out in Free religion.
1000? For 20 cities that may be a bit low or high depending on your builder skills I actually believe it will be higher in your case.

SO that 10% bonus is worth almost 100 beakers, so add up the number of buildings and see how many are religious.
Keeping in mind any loss of happiness that makes you restructure and decrease your base count of beakers must be taken into account. And you'll loose 1000 beakers in your revolt. That's probably just enough to make it not worth it, unless you've spread the religion quite well.

[Quillan]

My gut call is don't do it. On reflection, 20 cities means 20 temples and as many as 5-6 cathedrals depending on your map size, so that's only 52 beakers max, while potentially a lot more from the 10% bonus due to free religion. However, if you decide to do it, it may only take one switch. Did you have a state religion before you went with Free Religion? If so, it didn't go away, it was just superceded by your choice of civic, so it will be back where it was before should you switch to Theocracy or Pacifism.

[Aeson]

Depends on how close you are to Cultural victory? How many GP have you produced so far? Sankore isn't much of a factor, but the switch to a State Religion and Pacifism is probably a good idea anyways.

In general...

Research really isn't even a factor for you at this point. Nationalism and Biology are the furthest in the tech tree you should ever need to go for a Cultural victory, except to stay safe militarily.

Put the slider to Culture. That will give you Culture of course, plus a lot of happy faces. So you can ditch Emancipation and run Caste System and a ton of Farms and Artists everywhere, except your top 2 Culture cities (if they're heavy Cottages as they should be). Pacifism would be a very good idea too in that case. Save the Artists for Great Works in the 3rd city (ideally), or to even things up at the end.

Run Representation. It will give you enough beakers to put towards military techs to keep you safe. If you have polluted GP pools, the non-Artist GP you get can help out by lightbulbing too. And if you need to, you can use the slider to help out from time to time as well. (If you look like you might start to fall behind, go 100% Research to a tech you think you can get first, trade it around, then back to Culture.)

Whatever economic Civic you're in is fine, no need to spend turns switching. The extra Specialists from Mercantilism contributing Artist GPP nationwide or the free trade routes in your 3 culture cities are going to be roughly the same value in most cases. State Property isn't going to add much towards Culture.

If you do have a lot of building to do yet, a switch to Slavery until your Cultural buildings are finished could be a good idea, then to Caste System to spam Artists.

[couerdelion]

The relations thing was something that, at the moment, is tempting me away from switching back at the moment – the delay in switching is partly due to a my current need to finish Physics which I am currently running head to head against Washington’s commerce machine. But I don’t like the idea of losing some valuable overseas trade with 6 nations who are, almost all Confucian. These also supply Fur, Silver, Gold, Rice, Bananas, Dye, Sugar and Wine so I am also heavily reliant on these guys for resources.

I definitely need to get science up to a level where I can go into a late game lockdown phase. And I need the late game wonders too for yet more culture which I hope to add to the planned five cathedrals. So science is something that I cannot pass up on. If I recall, it was running at something close to 1400 beakers per turn during a golden age and dropped to below 1000 after this finished and I acquired Scientific Method. As yet, I have a core of around 10 cities which have varied uses but are well developed. A large number of newer cities are less developed with few of these possessing gold/science modifiers

I’m now undecided about USuff versus Rep. The beaker bonus from Rep makes a strong contribution but my latest foray into Indian lands has left me with a lot of Towns which is tempting me towards the hammer bonus and the option of buy rushing –Kremlin now looking like an easy target.

[Aeson]

There's some good reading about Cultural victory strategies in the CivFanatics' CIV HOF forum. Late game wonders really don't have much impact on Cultural victory. It's all about the Culture slider, modifiers, and Great Works.

Don't worry about the Happiness resources. With a high Culture rate you'll have plenty of Happiness to spare. Trading shouldn't be an issue anyways, most AI will still trade Health/Happy resources even with different religions. And even if it turns out to be an impact, you can always go Confucian yourself, right?

[couerdelion]

Those "late" game wonders are the ones with modifiers.

[Aeson]

Those wonders are just overpriced Cathedrals (which you should have built ages ago) and are opened up by techs that represent thousands of Beakers that should have been Culture.