Social model proposition

[Mark_Everson]

Theben:

Yep, everyone has opinions on everyone else. We just have to cut it off somewhere or you end up using all the memory just keeping track of it all . Probably we'll just cut off where it stops seriously contributing the social dynamics feeling right. IMO fairly short.

On control of the new government... Yeah, I'm getting there too.

And I am leerie about modeling real religions too. I think your approach is probably the way to go, so we don't get ourselves in too much trouble...

[Druid2]

RE: Religions

I think it is important *NOT* to make links between real world religions and the ones we put in the game. Otherwise people will be upset at how the game treats those religions.

I'd think we could have several "generic" religions, and still keep them separate from each other, without patterning them too obviously on real world religions.

[manurein]

About religions : I agree with, I've never forecasted to give names to religions (and IMO there could be the same problem if we name cultures...)
What I'm doing is just providing a framework which will aloow to model different kinds of religions (see : with only two attributes for the mono rel which are valued from 0 to 100, we have about 10,000 possible different religions...)

[Kull]

This is dangerous ground. On the one hand, we want to create a "real world" atmosphere by including religions and cultures. On the other, we don't want to offend anyone by using the names of real ones. So we'll have generic religion "X" within generic culture "Y" taking on some other generic culture/religion. It may work, but I'm skeptical.

I recommend that we make no final decisions on naming until AFTER playtesting. If users can't get excited about generics, we ought to use the real names. Will some folks get upset? Sure. But the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue generates horrified letters every year, and they haven't gone out of business!

[Theben]

I wasn't really concerned about offending anyone, more that once you develop a particular religion you will be constrained by a set of values that may not have any bearing on the what is happening in your game. FE, in real life Shintoism and Buddhism in Japan blended together nicely and it became impossible to tell them apart until 1868. Most people would agree that Christianity has not been very tolerant of other religions, but if the conditions are met in your game, why couldn't the above occur instead if you wind up with christians? If you have a "blank slate" or almost blank slate to start with, that later evolves as the game progresses, IMHO it would be more historically accurate.

[manurein]

Theben :
A priori, the Great Monotheistic religions wont exist at the beginning of the game. At the beginning, IMO there should be only early polytheistic religions.
So monotheistic religions will appear later, and IMO we should create them to match the culture in which they were born.
Note : I've said it, I repeat it : I think monotheistic religios must have a geographic origin (be it only to implement stuff like crusades).

[Theben]

Do you mean a specific point where the religion comes from or religions that have effects associated with their geographic origin?

I've been working on a rough idea for religions. The basic idea is based on the MOO2 interface for racial abilities. Religions would get bonuses/penalties to a variety of attributes; growth, warfare, morale (of the people, not your military), seafaring, tolerance of other religions, etc. When you "receive" your 1st polytheistic religion, you will receive a message (via the "newspaper"?), "A new religion has arisen amongst our people in the province of [ ]". You will get this message each time a religion is born or arrives in your lands. You will be directed to the MOO2-like interface where you will see the various attributes possible for religions. Yours will come with a set of values not of your choosing (but based on previous events and local geography). You will also be given 3 choices: encourage the religion, suppress it, or influence it, as well as being allowed to name it whatever you want (it could come with a title based on the name of your civ). Encouraging the religion will allow it to spread quickly, and probably make it the state religion. If influencing them you get to choose some other variables on the interface, but there will only be a % chance that the religion will change, lower % chance for every modification you try to make. Religions can be imported from other cultures as well (this was done often throughout history. Usually the imported religion helped "legitimize" the ruling class; i.e. "authority acceptance". BTW, this also was how some monotheistic religions pushed out polytheistic ones. Ruling class adopted, other classes later adopted to gain acceptance). Suppression will most likely make some of your people unhappy, and may not be successful. Successful suppression will remove it from your empire. Suppression will only be available when extra religions arise, are imported by your people, or are the state religion of an older regime that has been overthrown (in civ terms, changing from monarchy to republic or some such). Monotheistic religions will arrive later following the same basic pattern, OR monotheism can be an "attribute" found in the religion interface screen, which tends to arrive later in the game. Of course, all religions would evolve as the game progressed, and you will be free to encourage, suppress, or influence them as the game went on. I'd limit it to just one polytheistic religion and one monotheistic one per civ, but allow religions to mix the various nations.

[Mark_Everson]

Theben:

That sounds like a reasonable model to me. What do you think Manu? The only thing is IMO it isn't Just the player's choice whether to support a new religion. If an old religion exists that has power is should fight the player's attempts to aid the new one.

[manurein]

Theben, Mark :
Yes, the ideas here fit quite well the social model. Just a few remarks :
- I'm not sure the effects of a give religion will be so straight forward as giving direct bonus in specific fields, but this has still to be tested and decided;
- About the MOO2-like religion interface : the fact that the figures will be presented here is related to the question Mark asked in the "numbers avaiable for players poll" thread.
- About the influence : as I said it, the ruler/player may or may not be the main "shaman" for a ploy religion, or the main "priest" for a mono relgion; also, the religious class may be more or less associated with the ruler. In the case where the ruler is the main "priest/shaman", he may influence the religion quite deeply; in the case where the RC is strongly associated, he may try to influence the rel through the RC with good chances. In other cases, he would have troubles with theRC if he tried to influence the religion too deeply (he may even have no mean to influence it at all).
- suppressing the religion : this would more accuratley be represented through, for exemple, a law the leader takes that would make the new religion illegal; also, as stated Mark, if a new religion arises the officials of the anciet religion will fight the new one without ruler's help.
- encouraging the new religion : this is the contrary; it can be made through associating the new RC to the ruler and making the old one illegal, fe. It could also be done through "converting" the leader to the new religion.
- about limitations : in my first ideas, poly religions are civ-based, so there may be only one poly religion at a time in a given civ, which would be the official religion; mono religions are world-based, so they can be shared between several civs; also, when a group of people migrates, it migrates with its religion, so a given civ can host several religions at a time. It's then the responsibility of the ruler to make this new religion illegal or not. One last point : in modern times, in occidental countries, there is no official religion at all anymore (seperation between the church and the state).