Religious Leader Victory

[Calvin Vu]

I had a BTS GOTM game starting at Renaissance period. I was doing great from my smaller continent and just started to invade the main continent the second time with tanks and infantry against Riflemen and have already eliminated some 70 units from the strongest player (after taking the beach cities and defended against the counter attacks twice) and was on the way to take more of his cities. Then Gandhi called for the Religious Leader vote and with one support from one wayward civ (a vassal), he won with a religious leader victory.
The problem is that most civs stuck with their own religions and there were not many votes from anybody else (i.e. the remaining 4 civs who opposed, not counting the one eliminated by me). So, with 2 FOR and 4 AGAINST, Gandhi won.
That seems to make religious leader victory too easy if you pretty much own the religion and there's not many votes from anybody else. What am I missing ? What makes it hard ? What are the conditions to win a religious leader victory ?
Anyway, I replayed the game and snatched the wonder this time just to make sure it would not happen again.

[rah]

One condition is that every civ must have at least one city with that religion so theology can stop the spread. Capturing and razing is quite effective. (since building it is no guarantee). But to me the easiest way to avoid it is to do a custom start and check no diplo victory.

[Blaupanzer]

Uncheck diplo victory in the custom game start. I.e., what rah said. The current victory condition is an exploit, not an achievement.

[rah]

And a secondary benefit is that AI doesn't realize that it's been disabled so it still rushes for the tech to build the wonder.
Kind of like the AI not knowing that siege units can't kill units anymore.

[Calvin Vu]

The problem is that this game is a GOTM so I have to use a special mod and play the game 'as is' (or at lease I'm supposed to). I don't think the option to turn off diplomatic victory is possible but I'll look again. Anyway, instead of using my first Engineer to build something useful I have to snatch that wonder first even though I have no use for it.

[Blaupanzer]

You could run the same exploit in a gotm. That is spread your religion to at least one city in each civ, then build the AP and win the game.

[Calvin Vu]

That's true . That's why I asked which conditions are needed for a religious leader victory. I have a huge army this time but shipping them to a big continent with 5 civs from far away is a huge hassle. I guess I will try to ship the missionaries instead just to have a different kind of victory this time.
Just one city for each civ is needed then ? Hopefully, none of them is having theocracy (or I will have to eliminate that civ first ). I'll check that when I get home. Thanks.

[Lord Avalon]

If you don't build the AP, go raze the city where it's located.

[Calvin Vu]

If you don't build the AP, go raze the city where it's located.

India is far away and it takes almost 10 turns to send the troops there by ships. Since it's near impossible to send reinforcement promptly that way, the invasion force has to be huge so it can almost win the battle almost all by itself and that means I need a lot of transports and destroyers also, not just troops so the preparation takes quite a while. Then it will take many turns to me to get to the city with the AP and, by that time, he might have already won the religious leader victory if I have not taken enough of his cities (with his religion) to make my votes count. If I have enough votes then he can't win by religious leader victory anyway.
BTW, in my replayed game, after I got the AP, Gandhi became the vassal to Suleman (the last time Suleman owned Bismask and I was about to crush Suleman when Gandhi declared himself the victor). I guess he did not have the AP to save his skin any more .

[rah]

If it's a coastal city and you can dow and attack on the same turn, it won't take that many troops. It's now like you have to hold the city against counter attacks, just raz it.

[Calvin Vu]

You're right. If it is a coastal city then I can just take it and raze it. Maybe I will replay that lost game and see where that city is . It's kinda annoying having to play a game where the first wonder I build is the one I don't use.

[rah]

I remember the first time I ever built it and I had been soooo successful spreading my religion, I couldn't even get elected.

[Garth Vader]

I always play with diplo victory enabled and don't think I have ever seen a religious victory. The condition that you can't just have the necessary votes yourself and so some AI's have to vote for you is the tough one. I don't play with vassals though, which might make it tougher.

[rah]

What types of worlds do you play on. I would guess that not every civ gets the religion so that type of win is not possible.

[Garth Vader]

Normal size, Fractal.

I usually found Confucianism and spread it to civs that I will want peace with. I didn't realize everybody needed to have it, just that your pop wasn't enough for the win. That explains a lot!

Last game I tried large and didn't found a religion till islam, so I'd already built the AP and as the most common religion. I wasn't even elected on the first vote. I almost won religious leader that game, but was always one AI voting for me short.