Religious mechanics in future titles

Commisar#2307

So this has came up a couple of times in recent discussions for future titles, religion has been stripped for a number of the recent titles and has lacked mechanics before on it. Not counting Troys or WHs take on it of course. Most of the discussion has been on Medieval and Pike and Shot period, which had a lot of religious conflicts and changes in religion.

The old system of just getting a happiness negative for wrong religion and simply building your own religious building and/or moving a religious agent in to solve it is a rather lacking system overall for these periods. Its not really an engaging mechanic.

So what mechanics could they bring in to flesh out and make it a more interesting system? I know there was the "cults" in one of the DLCs campaigns that added some reason to have none state groups. That could be expanded if they ever covered the Ottoman empire, as their famous force the Janissaries was raised from mostly Christian subjects. Would think then also might need a mechanic to mitigate the loss in happiness from that culture as it is a benefit.

The Norse valued Christians as slaves, the ability to write and so on was of use and why they weren't overly interested in purging other religions. So they could get a bonus for administration and trade based off their %.

Jewish groups were often well known for their businesses and ability to loan money as early banking type systems, personally I think that is also why they often got targeted - quick source of cash but at the cost of long term economic benefits.

Would also think having some events from different religions would fit, might also have it expand unit rosters for the local area.

dge1

If I may I will add Slaves to your subject. Religion and Slaves need to be addressed/redone/worked in any future TW Historical based period games contemplated or issued in the early Medieval to the end of the Eighteen century.

The problem, in my personal opinion, is that in our current political and social awareness cultural presence gaming companies will not chance the "social stigma" that might occur with any game process that remotely approximates the actual social attitudes in the time period. The points you raised about a couple of groups are valid, but difficult to set up in a game format where that are just another element of the game that supports the total game play.

I believe it could be done, given the proper resources (time and money). Just not sure how to do it.

As for your basic question , how can it be done. Let me think on it some more.

Commisar#2307

Well Pdox has done some of it, like the Ottoman suggestion with it letting you raise special army units.

I know, CA is rather conservative on these type of things, but as we already are encouraged or wipe out other cultures in the game...seems it'd be better to expand on it and actually give reasons to NOT do such things lol.

But yeah it's really awkward to come up with a system that is based off history and is fun. Really need to have the Religious side play some role in the Holy League wars in the P&S game and not just be a paint the map because they are at war.

SiWI#8629

Well one way would take a page of CIvs book on religion:
allow to influence them with perks.

Now with alot of the time you would share your religion with others so you shouldn't be able to just stamp something one without lets say papal approval or having the majority of that religion under you.

but other wise:
"religious warriors" allows for cheaper units and special monk units
"church property" religious building produce income

ect.

Lotor12#2810

In medieval period:

with crusade or jihad , there would be acces to special units - like in medieval 2 , pagans could have acces to berserkers

In Reformation period, also the era of religion conflict:

In diplomacy, You could ask another faction to switch religion - process of "Recatholization"
also switching from catholic to protestant religion gives the economical bonuses

__________________________

About the portraying Jews as "gombeen men" or "targeting Jews" mechanic to confiscate their money; I think, this is bad idea,

I am not Jew or related to them, so I am not sensitive about this, but I am sure, this would offend some people, and bring unwanted "emotions",
IMO is just better to let them be, and not including them in the game

Also with the religion, we do not need to going "deeper" here,
Again, I personaly do not care about it, but the people in Northern Ireland or people from former Yugoslavia could have different view on the religion history

I want to have Total War focusing to be "Wargame", not political-religion simulator

bli-nk#6314

Lotor12 said:

I want to have Total War focusing to be "Wargame", not political-religion simulator

The problem with that is the closer to the modern period the more war IS politics/economics and religion for most of human history was one of the biggest factors in politics other than dynastic intrigues.

So having wars without dealing with religion and politics is only custom battles, in a campaign they have to be included to some extent.

The main issue is the simplistic + or - system CA tends to use when dealing with complex systems.

For games the easiest way to put into practice more intuitive and fun mechanics that represent complex systems is via networks as they are easy to understand, interaction can be complex without being easily reduced to min/max and can fit into the rock, paper, scissors form CA prefers.

For example what are the main factors in going to war?

1. manpower
2. money
3. will/fortitude
4. geography
5. interest groups
6. technology

Manpower, interest groups, and will can be represented by 3 networks which each are in turn influenced directly by a 2nd network and indirectly via 2 other networks.

Manpower is directly influenced by Will and indirectly influenced by Interest groups and Geography in medieval and ancient settings but by Technology and Money in modern settings.

Money is directly influencd by Interest groups in medieval and ancient settings with indirect influence from Will and Technology. For modern settings primary influence is Technology with secondary influences Geography and Will.

For TW raising new units currently is almost 100% about money but CA explored other forms of resources in the game in Troy and could easily add Interest group and Will where some units are raised and maintained from those resources which in turn are dependent on other factors.

Raising a full 20 unit army at the start of a campaign with all those factors in play it might be difficult to raise the full 20 units of anything higher than tier 2 until the player is able to utilize Will (anger at enemy transgressions, war vs hereditary enemies, long term propaganda from agents) and Interest groups (representing various classes like nobles, soldiers, merchants, priests, rich citizens, poor citizens) which have special resource points which can be used to recruit and maintain unique units.

Improving technology throughout a game might improve infrastructure and grow the size of various Interest groups or make propaganda more effective in increasing Will but not directly improve units and would only unlock a handful of units.

Compared to fully committing to long term investment in maximizing Will which increases resources from ALL Interest groups and unlocks higher taxes and extra manpower but isn't enough to unlock the highest tier units that each Interest group could supply and does nothing to deal with geography and focusing on Will over Technology means certain units will be unlocked much later or not at all before the campaign ends.

Fully committing to Will might also lock other option like changing religions, alliances with different culture factions, or divorcing to improve the dynasty family line.

Basically it is like a tech tree but with 5/6 techs based on players in-game actions, not simply clicking on a new branch of the tree AND is dynamic.

If players want a certain unit unlocked to deal with a new enemy or suddenly find their current war is hugely impacted by geography or need to recover from a devastating defeat, changing the focus of their faction might require giving up access to other units or vastly increasing the numbers of low tier units that can be recruited but lowering the number of higher tier units available.

Making peace with a long-term enemy without attaining victory conditions might decrease Will but allow an alliance, improve relations with the merchants and poor citizens, and generate a peace dividend for a few turns of increased taxes and improved technology research and also unlock the ability to recruit new units from friendly factions that can better deal with harsh geography or provide some unique in battle bonuses your faction lacks access to.

Most factions should have a single high tier unit associated with maxing each of the 5 factors with the 6th factor, Manpower increasing replenishment, lowering recruitment cost and muster time, and improving tax rates when fewer armies vs infrastructure are deployed but not having a unique unit associated with it except for a couple of factions which represent the 'swarm' style of play.

For most of the ancient and medieval era Will is represented largely by Religion where the state religion or main pagan cults have a big say in how a war is carried out and how willing the population are to fight even if a war is going badly.

bilbobaggins764

dge1 said:

If I may I will add Slaves to your subject. Religion and Slaves need to be addressed/redone/worked in any future TW Historical based period games contemplated or issued in the early Medieval to the end of the Eighteen century.

The problem, in my personal opinion, is that in our current political and social awareness cultural presence gaming companies will not chance the "social stigma" that might occur with any game process that remotely approximates the actual social attitudes in the time period. The points you raised about a couple of groups are valid, but difficult to set up in a game format where that are just another element of the game that supports the total game play.

I believe it could be done, given the proper resources (time and money). Just not sure how to do it.

As for your basic question , how can it be done. Let me think on it some more.

yet they will lose people like me [they already have] who prefer reality to PC.

davedave1124#4773

I wouldn't mind religion being part of a grand scheme of you as the ruler having to balance a council of various interest groups including religion. A player must balance each section to keep the kingdom running as efficiently as possible.

Lotor12#2810

Ichon said:

Lotor12 said:

I want to have Total War focusing to be "Wargame", not political-religion simulator

The problem with that is the closer to the modern period the more war IS politics/economics and religion for most of human history was one of the biggest factors in politics other than dynastic intrigues.

And where is the problem?

Ichon said:

So having wars without dealing with religion and politics is only custom battles, in a campaign they have to be included to some extent.

This really depends on the seeting - In the era of Napoleonic Wars , the relegion was completely irrelevant, in the eras of Reformation (16th- 17th century) or crusades, the religion played essential role

Ichon said:

The main issue is the simplistic + or - system CA tends to use when dealing with complex systems.

For games the easiest way to put into practice more intuitive and fun mechanics that represent complex systems is via networks as they are easy to understand, interaction can be complex without being easily reduced to min/max and can fit into the rock, paper, scissors form CA prefers.

Probably I do not understand, what You want to say here.
Total War is game about real-time tactical battles and turn based empire managment / grand strategy - building cities, training and moving armies. And it is game, many things (complex systems) are abstract in.

Ichon said:

For example what are the main factors in going to war?

1. manpower
2. money
3. will/fortitude
4. geography
5. interest groups
6. technology

And how to implement these factors in to the game, and make it interesting and fun part?

bli-nk#6314

Lotor12 said:

ntrigues.

And where is the problem?


This really depends on the seeting - In the era of Napoleonic Wars , the relegion was completely irrelevant, in the eras of Reformation (16th- 17th century) or crusades, the religion played essential role


Probably I do not understand, what You want to say here.
Total War is game about real-time tactical battles and turn based empire managment / grand strategy - building cities, training and moving armies. And it is game, many things (complex systems) are abstract in.


And how to implement these factors in to the game, and make it interesting and fun part?



The problem was Lotor12 saying they want TW to be wargame not political simulator but even wargames include politics to some extent via prestige, influence, or various ways resources are accumulated and spent when most of an economy is abstracted the one thing most wargames do not absract completely is the politics.

I said religion OR politics- one or the other was important aspect of every single war in human history though in some small wars culture or misunderstandings might barely qualify as politics there has to be someone in the tribe/group who thought they would benefit from any fighting.

Total War was originally primarily real-time tactical battles with barebones campaign to give a barebones reason for fighting the battles rather than series of skirmish battles. As the series progressed the campaign became more and more important as there are many real time war games but not nearly the same competition for dual RTS and dynamic campaigns.

CA has abstracted many things to just + or - numbers or a scale like with public order of -100 to +100 with varying effects depending where in that range a faction is currently at.

Most of these systems exist independently of anything else- for example ,where it is especially evident is how armies are recruited in Total War with faction, buildings, technology, and money being the only factors until 3K introduced Character rank.

While that allows certain factions to have unique units and allows some differentiation, it does not really represent the most important factors for recruitment and more importantly, does not have much interaction with other things going on in the game.

Jam#4399

Do you guys think that Crusade and Jihad are still possible?

Lotor12#2810

Ichon said:

The problem was Lotor12 saying they want TW to be wargame not political simulator but even wargames include politics to some extent via prestige, influence, or various ways resources are accumulated and spent when most of an economy is abstracted the one thing most wargames do not absract completely is the politics.

I said religion OR politics- one or the other was important aspect of every single war in human history though in some small wars culture or misunderstandings might barely qualify as politics there has to be someone in the tribe/group who thought they would benefit from any fighting.

No, there is not a problem

Total War is about fighting tactical real-time battles, building cities and moving armies on turn-based campaign map, this is the core of the game

"the D-Day" wargame about american participation in WW2 is about defeat enemy with army, not about american politics, democratic vs republican or something like that

"the The Punic Wars: Rome vs Carthage" wargame about conflict between Rome and Carthage is about defeat enemy with army and not about politics or religion

the wargames do not need complicated inner-faction managment about politics

Ichon said:

Total War was originally primarily real-time tactical battles with barebones campaign to give a barebones reason for fighting the battles rather than series of skirmish battles. As the series progressed the campaign became more and more important as there are many real time war games but not nearly the same competition for dual RTS and dynamic campaigns.

You do not have more reasons for fighting the battles in Three Kingdoms (newer) than Rome 1 (older) - You need to defeat enemy army in battle and on campaign map

the good change cames in Rome 2, from this title, the army should be leaded by general, stand-alone units can not move on the campaign map - this eliminated these small awkward battles.

This very discutable how the series progressed, in the Rome 2 and Attila were lot of new new mechanics introduced, same of them do not work properly (character managment, food, "public order" upkeep for buildings), which brought more problems than fun and AI could not handle it properly

In Warhammer, most of these problematic campaign mechanics were removed, and interesting campaign mechanics were added, and this game became super succesful

Ichon said:

CA has abstracted many things to just + or - numbers or a scale like with public order of -100 to +100 with varying effects depending where in that range a faction is currently at.

Most of these systems exist independently of anything else- for example ,where it is especially evident is how armies are recruited in Total War with faction, buildings, technology, and money being the only factors until 3K introduced Character rank.

While that allows certain factions to have unique units and allows some differentiation, it does not really represent the most important factors for recruitment and more importantly, does not have much interaction with other things going on in the game.

It is represent by recruitment cost and upkeep per turn,
I do not not understand what interaction You speak about here

Lotor12#2810

jamreal18 said:

Do you guys think that Crusade and Jihad are still possible?

I think Yes, but it should be presented primary as part of military medieval history, and not going deeper in to religion themes

I would compare it to World War II enviroment, in the strategy games (or "wargames") from eastern front, You can fight against Soviet Union as Germany and opposite

both of these sides had "a controversial politics" , but the wargames do not work with that stuff



https://youtu.be/TgFrXX84Tu8