One City, No District Cost Scaling Problems!-- England Adventure 1

[fluffyflyingpig]

The tactical AI is befuddled.  AI will never retreat the chariot so my Warrior will hold the pass forever.  

I get a couple of mines pillaged, but Rome sues for white peace eventually.  For some reason I went for Astronomy instead of beelining Industrialization, I think I switch back immediately after this. 

My scouts die so the turns pass quickly. I find all the AIs except Japan, who I'm guessing is in the gap between Egypt
Found Catholicism in London.
London grabs the Hagia Sophia for +1 charge for religious units and a entertainment district and an industrial district.
Annoyingly, I lose control of Yerevan to China so the religious push is delayed till that is restored.


T150



London is looking good, though district choices are kinda odd.  Looks like I go with Campus, Holy Site, Entertainment, Industrial, Harbor, and Theater Sq this game.  Who knows why.



Religious choices.  Arabia and Egypt took the Islam and Sikhism respectively. Itinerant Preachers on Normal speed make pressure radius 13 tiles from any converted city instead of 10.  Scripture increases the pressure per turn by 25%, boosted to 50% after printing press.  I suspect Itinerant Preachers is better in most cases, but I'm not 100% sure.  Both of these are worse than just taking the Holy Order 30% discount to religious units when Yerevan is in the game, since the apostle promotions are so overpowered.  Oops.  Also, I don't know if I need a full charge apostle to evangelize and add a new belief or just 2 remaining charges.  After going to the trouble of getting the buildings to give me 2 extra charges, I may have wasted 4 of them! 
I've got a bunch more turns till I get another envoy so I'm just twiddling my thumbs with the game on autopilot.


My culture per turn is terrible, but I still lead the AIs in science.  China and Arabia are still running OCCs on T150.  

[fluffyflyingpig]

Religion

As far as I can tell, Religion works largely like it did in Civ V.  Each city has roughly 100 religious pressure points per citizen, every time it accumulates 100 points of pressure a citizen is converted.  Once a city has a majority of its citizens following one religion it will convert.  Once pressure in one city reaches the maximum for the city's population all new pressure will accumulate more slowly as it displaces existing pressure.  Pressure is spread slowly from existing converted cities in a 10 tile radius.  Pressure is spread quickly in 250ish sized chunks by missionaries or apostles expending conversion charges.  It is also spread by winning theological combat. 

Once more than half of an AI's cities follow a religion it will convert to that religion. If all Civs follow the same religion, the founder of that religion wins a religious victory.



Apostles

Apostles cost more than missionaries do, but are able to promote, evangelize, and declare inquisitions.  Promotions quickly make apostles much more valuable than missionaries.  Normal Apostles get to pick one of two promotions from the following list. Each Apostle is allowed to promote once. Once a promotion is picked you are not allowed to pick it again.

• Chaplain
  

Apostle operates as a Medic, providing extra healing to units within 1 tile.

• Debater
  

+20 Religious Strength in Theological Combat

• Heathen Conversion
  

Can convert all adjacent Barbarians to your side by using a religious charge.

• Indulgence Vendor
  

Gain 100 Gold if this unit converts a city to your Religion for the first time.

• Martyr
  

Relic is created if this Apostle dies in Theological Combat

• Orator
  

Can spread Religion 2 extra times.

• Pilgrim
  

Gains 3 extra spreads when moving adjacent to a natural wonder for the first time.

• Proselytizer
  

Religious spread eliminates other Religions in the target city.

• Translator
  

Religious spread is triple strength in cities of other civilizations.


Some are clearly much much stronger than others. Proselytizer particularly will convert opposing cities of opposing religions in one or two charges, which would normally take dozens from an unpromoted unit.  Translation triples effectiveness of converting cities with no religion.  Due to how combat calculations work, the +20 combat from Debator allows an Apostle to kill missionaries in one or two attacks, resulting in -250 pressure for the losing religion and +250 pressure for the winning religion in a 10 tile radius for no charges. 

Yerevan



Yerevan is a city state with the unique bonus that allows you to chose any possible promotions for your Apostles.  Winning a religious victory efficiently is very much reliant on having Yerevan nearby.  In another very odd UI choice, you can stockpile envoys by closing out of the City State menu when prompted to save envoys as needed.


Once you have Apostles with the right promotions the rest of the game is a simple matter of marching apostles around the map and forcibly converting any cities that have religious buildings of other religions.  Once the rest of the city has been converted no more religious units for that religion can be produced unless it is converted back.  Then its simple to mop up the remaining cities and claim victory.

[fluffyflyingpig]

 


One charge expended, and Eastern Orthodoxy is effectively dead.  On to Washington!  3 more religions to go!

First wave will snuff out Protestantism and scout east of Washington for Japan. Next couple of missionaries will go north to Kongo and China for the bonus faith.

[fluffyflyingpig]

Much inane Apostle micromanagement later, here we are at the year 1390 AD.  Stupid T0 change.  The Missionary Zeal religion enhancer belief that lets all religious units ignore movement costs seems awfully appealing.

China and Japan both have one city.  Arabia has two.  Kongo has settled cities on the other side of the American capital, and the Americans have done the same to Kongo.  Rome settled a 4th city on the opposite side of the world from Rome.     The AIs generally don't like each other, Rome just took the Kogolese capital.  Japan still has barb problems, and massive swaths of the globe remain empty wastelands.

Religion wise, we are doing okay.  Egypt converted the Islamic cities to Sikhism, so the first apostle wave converted the Roman, American, and Egyptian capitals and crippled the other religions. All the missionaries in America and Rome are actually Catholic!  The slog of finding spots to move in the carpet of units led to a quick diversion to sailing techs so the second wave of missionaries could convert the eastern side of the continent in a reasonable amount of time.  The missionaries are just now approaching the shores of Arabia and Egypt, timed so the last Apostles can be used to convert the nearby cities in Rome and America.  











London glamor shot from T201, after Ruhr finishes

[fluffyflyingpig]

Okay, let's wrap things up. 



T203 Rome declares war again.  One catapult, 2 chariots, neither are able to cross the border.  An E for Effort.  Rome is stuck in the Medieval Era and doesn't have Iron.  But legions are resource-less, and Trajan HAS to have Iron Working.... right?  I guess I'll queue up some archers.

T207 America dogpiles Rome, while already at war with Kongo

T210 Apostles in the far east convert both Arabian cities and 4/7 Egyptian cities!  Okay, let's check the victory screen...



A: There's a super annoying bug/UI choice that hides the religious overlay when at least one citizen is following a religion but there isn't a majority.  Memphis used to be 4/6 Sikh, a Catholic apostle reduced that to 2/6 Sikh, 2/6 Catholic, but because there is no longer a majority religion the overlay went away completely.  
B: Japan has fallen off the list of converts.

Let's check the diplo screen.  Japan appears to have finally settled a second city!  I guess I need to track that down... 
Other weirdness: China still has one city.  Arabia and Japan have 2.  No AI is friendly with another AI!  Most AIs are actually angry with each other.  Arabia has only made contact with Egypt and England.


T211 Vector remaining missionaries and apostles to find the missing Japanese city

[fluffyflyingpig]

Uhh, victory?   Apparently the last Japanese city converted on its own due to religious pressure on the turn roll after T211.