{The List-} Religion

[GhengisFarb™]

I would like to see two options: a religion and a government.

And I think it would be cool if they were in a "design you own" format like snoopy's unit workshop idea.

Basically, religious and political elements are achieved through tech research and can be added or removed throughout the game.

You start out with squat,
GOVERNMENT
Who hits hardest gets his way

RELIGION
Rock feel hard.


G: Nobility - Gives you 1-2 content citiizens per city due to their trust in the Nobility
G/R: Divine Right - 1 Happy citizen per city with temple while government includes Nobility.
G: Enlightened Rule - eliminates commerce penalty per tile
G: Oligarchy - ?
G: Democracy - ?
G: Nationalism (should be required for Republic) - ?
G/R: State Religion
R: Monotheism
R: Mysticism - Allows temples
R: Polytheism - Priests, +1 content person per temple
R: Atheism
R: Humanism
R: Fanatism

Just an idea not fully worked out yet.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

OK, just thought I'd recap my position in a more succinct fashion !!

My ideas for religion are:

1) Numerous general Religious Advances from Mysticism to Atheism-and everything in between!

2) No religious advances should be a requirement for an era!

3) Should be able to change religions like changing government. In both cases, though, the people should be able to DEMAND what they want to change to (based on cultural preferences etc)

4) Refusal to listen to your peoples religious preferences should risk a 'Religious Schism' (same with government preferences, though it would risk a CW instead !)

5) Orthodoxy vs. Protestantism (Reformist) should be a seperate religious decision on top of your basic religion (eg Orthodox Monotheist or Reformist Polytheist)

6) Each type of religion should have a series of advantages/disadvantages, as well as its own set units and buildings.

7) Unit and building effects are lost when you change religions, but buildings remain. Also, changing religions should bring a period of anarchy-but much shorter than for changing governments.

8) Religious Civs would suffer a penalty equivalent to any other civ changing its government.

9) Religious units would do the following:

a) Convert foreign nationals in a city to YOUR nationality.
b) Rally discontented foreign citizens to destroy a religious improvement in that city.
c) Convert weak foreign units to 'religious converts' who can be joined to your cities.
d) Build shrines/missions (religious fortresses) which can claim territory!

10) Civs can produce Cultural/Religious GL's, who can:

a) Be 'sacrificed' to increase the cultural value of a city (Empire??) by 25% for 20 turns.
b) Allow a religion change without penalty.
c) Convert a foreign city and, in so doing, potentially spark a religious schism in the city's former Empire!

Anyway, I hope that makes a little more sense!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[Brent]

Rivalry with Similar Religions

Civs on either side of a religious schism would be more aggressive to eachother than to more distantly related religions.

Different tech trees for different religions

All technology and perhaps other things in one game would reflect the player's religion. This could be Bible- based, Far Eastern, Native American, or nonreligious. Actually, I could enjoy doing this with religions other than my own. For Bible- based, Polytheism wouldn't have to come before Monotheism. What is currently called a Temple could be a Church or Synagogue. What is now called a Cathedral could be a Temple.

Aussie:

5) yes.

More religions per civ for fewer civs

In a game with fewer Civs, have a larger number of distinct religions per civ.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

I've actually, thought of some other ideas for religion-though related to many of those I've already discussed.

Firstly, if a city (cities) undergo a religious schism, they will either go over to the closest Civ with the religion type your people demanded! If none fit the bill, then they will form an independant civ!

Secondly, it should be possible to have Heresy! Like the plague, it should turn up almost at random in a city! Though the chances of it appearing could be increased by City Size, corruption and unhappiness-and reduced by the presence of religious improvements like cathedrals and ecclesiastical courts! A city that has heresy would have a cross symbol similar to the one in the CTP mod mentioned above, but of the same colour as your civ. In your city view, one of your citizens would have a cross symbol over them. Heretics increase the chances of religious schism, cannot be used as specialists, and reduce the efectiveness of religious improvements in the city! In addition, they can cause the heresy to spread to other citizens in the city, and/or to nearby cities on your trade route (including in foreign civs). The only way to deal with heretics is to starve them out, turn them into workers/settlers (though they'll STILL be heretics) or build an Ecclesiastical Court-which increases unhappiness, reduces population by 1 point, but 'convert' heretics back to 'normal'! They also reduce the chance of Heresy spreading!

Anyway, just a few more thoughts!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[Plotinus]

Lots of good ideas here. I very much support having more about religion to add depth to the game, and I especially like the idea that religions should act, to some degree, as autonomous entities, which could in theory become powerful on the world stage - like the Papacy in the Middle Ages. Imagine something like - "The Pope has condemned our war against the Iroquois. All Catholic citizens in our empire are protesting!"

[Plotinus]

Not sure about the heresy idea, by the way. Historically, most heresies were considered heretical only in retrospect. For example, Christianity split fairly evenly between Arians and Nicene supporters in the fourth century, but it was only when Theodosius the Great became emperor and outlawed Arianism that everyone "realised" that the Arians had been the heretics and the Nicenes all along. I would prefer the model of schism rather than heresy when thinking about how religions might develop, but of course it depends on just how much depth this area of gameplay were given.

[Aqualung71]

The religion debate has gone quiet. I think there should definitely be some religion component in Civ4 - as has already been stated, religion has probably been the most important factor in defining the world's civilisations and any civ game without it is simply missing a vital element.

As to how to represent it, a lot of the ideas listed here have a lot of merit, as long as there's no perception of bias.

Theoretically, religion should be a separate concept something like government, that interacts with the government causing certain effects - either positive or negative, depending upon the perceived attitude of a particular government type. I can see useful applications of religion in the capture of foreign cities, resistance levels, propaganda (ie, missionary infiltration) from other civs, perhaps even troop morale. It may be that your civ (ie government) not only needs to maintain diplomatic relations with other civs, but also with the religious organisations in which its people place their faith.

[Patroklos]

My two cents on the matter.

First the concept. I have no problem with religion in civ. As it is people ranted and raved about adding facism, human sacrifice, rush building by citizen kill, and a host of other "taboo" topic and not one has either detracted from the game play or caused controvery. Religion has been included in games like AoE and AoK and greatly increased the potential of those titles.

That being said there are some basic limitations that should be applied. Abstractness. I think we can learn some basic tools of the civ religious trade from CtP. There no religion was named and no tenents of any of the religions expressed. All you had was "Roman Religion" or "Indian Religion." Simple and non obtrusive. And of course the problem of using historical religions is that in any one civ game, besides the dawn of time (4000BC), history doesn't exist. Technology moves the same way, but at what pace? What order? Civilization is about ALTERNATE history, so expecting the same religions to rise is perposterous. Of course for those sentemental types we can have the human player rename their religion to whatever they want in game, just like cities and units.

Of course Civ3 is not devoid of religion, but in my opinion it abstracts it too far. I always thought "culture" should be renamed "influence" in general, so that things like religion are not tied exclusively to that concept.

My ideas.

1.) Each civ starts with a unique religion.

2.) Civs have an overall point stucture for religion that parallels culture, but is independant. So religious points grow at the same rate as your civs overall culture rating. You can "buy" great events like "crusade" or "reformation" or "fanaticism." your religious score will then rise again at the same rate as your overall civ culture.

3.) All the convert city and other missions be done with invisible units.

4.) I like the schism idea.

5.) I like the heresy idea.

[OzzyKP]

Religion is an excellent idea for the game, and I'm glad Firaxis is looking at including it. I very much like and appreciate Stefu's list of ideas. I believe I read through it before Civ3 came out, and I browsed through it a bit now.

I absolutely love the idea about prophets, and the spread of religions. Also the evangalism/conviction rating is good too.

I think we need to simplify the rest of it though. According to some other thread I read, the designers want to simplify Civ4, and I support that. So we need to think of incorporating religion with broad strokes, not minute detail.

[OzzyKP]

I think we should use real religions. We use real civilizations, and in Civ3 there was a mind for history by having UUs and starting positions by each other. As long as the effects of the religions are all the same, I say no harm in using real ones.

Muslim prophets are more likely to pop up among the Ottomans, Egyptians, Arabs, etc. Christian prophets are more likely among Romans, English, Greeks, etc.

I like having holy cities. Dependent on things like where the religion started, where wonders have been built, and a certain point in the religion's development.

I like having an AI Pope character that factors in diplomatically in the game.

I don't like titheing, or having church treasuries, also I think the happy bonuses in Stefu's list were too much. Remember to keep things simple.

State religion, persecution, religious freedom, etc, are all great concepts.

A thought about schism & holy war. If you have state religion X and go to war with a nation with religion Y you can get a war weariness or support bonus if your religion's leader declares it a holy war. If you go to war with a nation that has the same state religion as you, then you run the risk of schism.

[Jon Shafer]

The thing to keep in mind about this (and other) new feature(s) is that they probably won't be greatly detailed and intricate systems with 50 new things to worry about and hooks into all areas of the game. Think simplistic, but important.

With that in mind, there's a lot that needs to be shaved off of Stefu's massive list.

Baseline stuff:

• Each civ has a religion (or lack thereof ).
  - This religion should affect relations between different civs.
  - This religion will probably be selectable by the player.
  
• Each citizen has a religion (or not).
  - Each citizen's religion CANNOT be selected by the player.
  - If the civ's religion is one thing and the citizen's religion is another, he should be unhappy (or perhaps if they're the SAME he IS happy), in some intensity (e.g. 4 Christians under an Islamic civ will result in 2 unhappy people or 1 unhappy person, etc.).
  - Religions can be spread from city to city like plague is in Conquests. The rate at which will depend on exposure between cities (movement of units, number of roads or harbors) and an intrinsic factor which can be set in the editor.
  
• Each civ can try to evangelize.
  - For cash money you can attempt to convert citizens of another religion to your state religion. They can be within your own cities or in another civ's (kind of espionage).
  
• Religions pop up randomly or as a result of certain triggers.
  - This would be worked into Civ 4's scripting system. You could have the establishment of a new religion linked to the researching of a tech, the capture of a city, the passage of a certain date, etc.
  - In addition to triggers, the location of the religion springing up would have to be specified (the location of a certain battle, the location of a city founded in a certain order, etc.).
  - Finally, the intensity of the creation/spread of the religion would be specified. For example, the spread of Christianity was slow and steady, whereas the spread of Islam was fast and violent in nature (which was partially due to conquest, but that's beside the point for this example ).

This is the bare minimum and most abstract implimentation of religion as I can see it.

Everything else from the pope to religious wars to tithing and religious states could be thrown into the mix, but my best guess is that the baseline and probably not much else will be in, maybe one more special feature.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

the old list religion ideas are cool, but they said they all want it simplified and on one screen, so most of it would be gone.

[rilzic]

my thoughts are that large cities become cosmpolitian (did i spell that right) anyway this is simply to keep from players losing a major city to conversion or culture and destroying the game.

for instance losing your biggest production city to another religion while you were building the best wonder in the game or in the middle of a war.

may not be the best idea but this is the thing that is not so grand but helps playablity and most people don't even know it's there.

by cosmopolitian i mean more understanding and tolerant or more motivated by money and what big cities bring. but religion is more dominate in rural or less developed areas and more of a foundation of the community. plus it would improve gameplay

[OzzyKP]

I don't think religion would ever take a city, like culture does. As Stefu and others outlined, you could have different faiths in a city.

[Ijuin]

Here are my thoughts on religions in Civ:

1.) Religions should be international--it should be possible for citizens of neighboring civs to become "infected" with a religion.

2.) Religions should affect diplomacy--other civs who share a religion with you should be more friendly, while civs with certain different religions should want to shun you (some religions will hate each other).

3.) Religions should give a happiness bonus to the citizens who belong to it, and also a bonus or penalty to your ability to control your citizens (depending on how well the religious philosophy matches with the philosophy of your government type).

4.) You should be able to have public policies regarding religion.

Selecting a state religion, for example, would give a big bonus to citizens belonging to that religion, and would also promote the spread of that religion within your empire, but would cancel any bonuses to citizens of other religions--it would even cause unhappiness among them. It would also further antagonize civilizations whose religions dislike your chosen state religion.

On the other hand, allowing religious freedom would allow citizens of all religions to experience some benefit, and would reduce diplomatic tensions, but you would get less benefit within your civ than if you had homogeneous adherence to a single religion (i.e. if all citizens belonged to a state religion).

For authoritarian governments, you would have the "Inquisition" option, which would prevent religions other than your State religion from spreading further within your empire (i.e. the number of citizens belonging to other religions would be unable to increase), but at the cost of added unhappiness.

[GePap]

My idea on the subject:

-religions should be random, but come in three flavors-polytheistic, monothestic, nondeist.

States have the ability to declare a state religion-this affects happyness and public order- making population who shares that religion more supportive, those who don't much harder to appease.

Religion type affects cost of religious buildings, their effectiveness.

Religion would slighty modify the effects of governments.

I agree with previous thoughts about setting a religious policy, but it need not be too comlex-either your policy is inclusive (lessens both unhappiness and hapiness cause by religion), exclusive (normal effects), discriminative (heightens the effects).

[Max Sinister]

I'm still wondering whether they'll include real world religions in the game. If the answer is yes, it will be difficult... (and I'm not talking about possible bad publicity if Civ4 players might find out that Islam is the best religion for a domination victory)... f.e. how much does the christian religion of Jesus himself, St. Francis, pope Alexander (the Borgia pope), Martin Luther and pope John Paul II have in common? Maybe they'll introduce sliders with given maximums and minimums for certain religions: If the slider for war/peace goes from 0 (radical pacifism) to 10 (war and nothing else), Islam may not go lower than 3, while Buddhism mustn't go higher than 7.

[Naokaukodem]

not sure about the dates but here the fundamentals about religions that would have been included in Civ:

1500 BC: Psychology (technology). Well, it would have to be called "occultism" or something, as it is always "occult" nowadays, but not false. With writing, knowledge about human itself grew from generation to generation, or in some areas of the earth. People can manipulate others and manipulate the human society to their own wishes or fantasmes.

BC: Chistianism and what were just before. A religion studied to scare people in their psychology and drain their attention to some capital points of the human psychology and way of work, in order to expand to all over the world and dominate according to religious rulers'wishes, fantasmes and conceptions of a society.

[0bsidi0n]

Lots of interesting ideas here, I'd throw my support behind a SMAC-esque slider system without real religions. However, I'd like to propose someone simplify these ideas and post a poll- we can focus more clearly on the options and debate the disagreements.

[Heffalump]

* Use real religions

* Religions offer differing benefits, buildings, wonders. They do not offer negatives.

* A religion is started by a Prophet unit

* A prophet may be used to build a great religious monument or center. (E.g. Jesus allows construction of the Vatican)

* A religious center acts as a strong influence on the citizens of that city and surrounding cities.

* A city with a majority of citizens of a given religion may build improvements, units specific to that religion.

* Building religious buildings has a domino affect. Once a city is converted to Islam, for example, it may begin construction of a mosque. This mosque then will have an influence on citizens of neighboring cities, gradually converting them until the majority of that city too is Islam.

*Religion is not entirely under your control. Citizens in your outlying cities may be affected by the religious influence of cities from neighboring civs.

*Having cities of different religion in your empire increases the risk of civil war, or schism.

*If a prophet does not appear in your lands, you may ask a foreign civ to establish a missionary in your capitol. This will begin the process of converting people in your cities.

*If you generate further prophets during the game you may use them to:
a) begin another religious movement (i.e. change religions),
b) convert citizens in your civ that are not yet members of your religion (in this case the prophet is converted into a great religious monument in one of your cities)
c) send the prophet abroad to help convert people in other civs.

*You may similarly attempt to spread your religion by establishing missionaries in other civs. A civ may allow you to do this for free (if they want your religion), for a price, or you may cough up the big bucks and try to do it subversively

*The "default" religion of any civ is paganism

*Civs with a "religious" characteristic may start the game with a religion other than paganism. Alternatively, they could just be more likely to generate prophet units.

*Secularism appears as a tech in the latter half of the game. It allows you to maintain cities of different religion in your empire with a reduced risk of schism.

*New Victory Condition: unite the world in one faith. (You will need to control the seat of the religion)

Additional Religious Considerations.

*By capturing the seat of an opposing religion you risk uniting other civs of that faith in war against you.

*The appeal of your religion on other civs is magnified by your overall cultural strength.

[Brent]

Use real religions: Could be fun.

No negatives: Agreed.

Jesus? The Vatican? I think not. He never even went to Rome!

Religious Improvements, Units: Agreed.

Domino Effect: Agreed.

Religion not entirely under your control: Agreed.

What benefits would a civ get from inviting another civ's religion in? Unity? I guess the religious improvements and units would be worth it. Would no temples or such religious improvements or any equivalent be allowed without a religion other than Paganism?

Functions of Further Prophets: Agreed.

Default Religion as Paganism: depends. Maybe the player can set the default religion in setup. I would want to be able to start with Judaism or some other sort of Monotheism like in the Bible, but then the game might have to start around 2000 BC with only the Semites, Hamites, and Japhethites available but possibly certain to split. But this would work better as a scenario, no more important than any other. Or you could allow for a universal flood, maybe with only Cainites and Sethites available to start, but that might have to be a scenario won by whoever builds the Ark. Anyway I can understand the default game working much more like it does now. And Pagans should be able to play however they want to as well.

Religious Trait allows to start game with other religion: Very good idea.

Secularism: Fair enough.

Victory Condition: Very good idea.

Religion should be very moddable. It should be easy to accurately create an unincluded religion or alter an included one to the player's liking.

[Max Sinister]

So you could convert other cities, if the influence of your religious buildings is strong enough?

[Heffalump]

So you could convert other cities, if the influence of your religious buildings is strong enough?

Yes, depending on how close they are, you're overall cultural influence, and religious influence.

Religious influence depends on
*whether or not your city is the seat of the religion
* number of great religious monuments & improvements
* size of the city (big cities exert more influence than smaller ones)

Your first city will be converted automatically when your prophet makes a great religious monument and establishes the seat of the religion there.

Or, if the religion you want has already been started by another civ's prophet, you will need to ask that civ to establish a missionary in your capitol. And your religions influence will expand gradually from your capitol.

[raingoon]

I worked on the Civ 3 Religion forum, and here is what that entire proposal boiled down to:

Every unit of population (represented in your city screen) should be able to subscribe to a religion.

That's it. That's what it all added up to. If Firaxis can build that in, work on it, prototype it, whatever they have to do, that's the key to implementing religion in a meaningful, playable, fun way.

Best of luck all, adios. Look forward to playing the next one!

Raingoon

[Oncle Boris]

Originally posted by GePap
My idea on the subject:

-religions should be random, but come in three flavors-polytheistic, monothestic, nondeist.

This would be very important, as to avoid controversy. Don't name religions.

States have the ability to declare a state religion-this affects happyness and public order- making population who shares that religion more supportive, those who don't much harder to appease.

Religion type affects cost of religious buildings, their effectiveness.

Religion would slighty modify the effects of governments.

I agree with previous thoughts about setting a religious policy, but it need not be too comlex-either your policy is inclusive (lessens both unhappiness and hapiness cause by religion), exclusive (normal effects), discriminative (heightens the effects).

Great idea. Also, instead of creating a super complex system of religious clashes, that would just mean that civs with exclusive religions conflict more than those with inclusive.