Collage of CAARdinals: An interactive history of the Papal States

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Okay than I shall be the bronchitic pope. Expect the update sometime this week

[Emperor Ike]

So ill be the one to welcome you to the league of extraordinary pointyhats.

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tbh I'm utterly lost about what needs to be done to make sure the savegame is transferrable.

Can someone do a really nice step-by-step, link-by-link guide for me? My own CK installation has been modded by me to the point where it's impossible to restore to vanilla status. If I simply superimpose the mods in the first post over that thing I have, how will that work?

i.e. Please Enlighten A Trog.

Other than that I'd love to be pope.

[Emperor Ike]

Okay first take back up from your current files and put them in a safe place then download these files.
IP2 and Welsh mod
Then just replace the old files with those and you have everything as it should be and then you only have to edit savefile so that the new pope is the controller of papacy and that papal state can be selected.

[Murmurandus]

...

I like [these] short popes. They're very manageable.

Please! It's a family forum, dammit...

[Llywelyn]

Please!

Did something get edited or does this really make no sense?

Can someone do a really nice step-by-step, link-by-link guide for me?

Ike is on the right track, but if you want a list

1. Assuming you have the space on your hard drive, copy and paste your entire CK directory. Relabel it "I'm the Pope, b!atch" or something similar to remind you why it is there and to delete it after consumption.
2. If you do not have enough space on your hard drive for step i, clear your internet cache, delete some of your unholy pr0n and Satanist rock .mp3s, and return to step i.
3. Install IP2 over whatever other mods you may or may not have infested your once-virginal (if maddeningly bug-beridden) CK proggy with.
4. Either install Drachenfire's Welsh mod next or simply use the dynasties.txt included with the save game.
5. Do not download tmad's save game above, unless you want to edit it yourself. A tweaked out save game is available here. No fuss, no muss: just click on the Papal States under the Kingdom list. Ordelaffo's Italian but his old posting was Holstein, so he's essentially yet another German pope.
   
   Amusingly enough, he's a historical character, who apparently ended up on a different track from his RL stint as a Venetian doge. For what it's worth, it's just as well, since Venice is now an occupied Imperial city...

[Murmurandus]

Did something get edited or does this really make no sense?



...

Mmmm, I guess the lame joke sounded better in my head or so... Nothing to worry about, maybe phargle will get it...

[RGB]

Llewelyn - thank you enormously.

Setting up the "I'm the pope-inator" folder right now.

[phargle]

Sometimes, all we have time for is a short poping, Murmurandus.

[grayghost]

Nice job TM with Pope Innocentus...I think. Another Arab Kingdom bites the Papal dust so to speak.

[Murmurandus]

Sometimes, all we have time for is a short poping, Murmurandus.

Indeed, indeed...

[Secret Master]

I just wanted to say I've been lurking for a few days, catching up on your work here. Good stuff, folks. In fact, it's so good, that you may notice an award for the AAR here.

I encourage all the writers here to go and receive their accolades. Congratulations on the Weekly Showcase award.

[Emperor Ike]

That is nice!

[Llywelyn]

Sure is right nice to be recognized from somethin' other than a mugshot!

Thanks, y'all!
j.

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Pope Faliero

Dramatis Personae:

Pope Gregory VI (Ordelafo Faliero), henceforth Pope
Fra Bocconcino, the Pope’s Secretary
Fra Barbaresco, the Pope’s confessor
Fra Provolone, the Pope’s hanger-on, cause everyone needs one.
A Messenger
Ahmed, a Muslim Soldier in Pope Gregory’s army
Bragadoccio, an Italian Soldier in the Pope’s army

Introduction

Here is, after so much delay, a tale
Of one Gregorius Sextus,
episcopus Romanus, who before being such
was one Ordelafo Faliero of Holstein; it’s short –
but quite dramatic. Its execution, I do hope, is skilful
enough for you to grant me pardon
for my quite shameless plug about my othAAR.
From the ghosts of Shakespeare
and Pushkin, in their graves unquiet,
I ask no mercy, like they got none from me.
As to the play itself: for reasons
pertaining to forum rules and board layout mechanics
no pictures will accompany my magnum opus.
Instead, you must perforce
click on the hyperlinks to see the illustrations.
Enough preambles! Let us start as customary,
in media res.

A big, filthily ostentatious room in the Pope’s Rome residence. Pope is standing in front of the mirror, talking to himself, quite pleased.

Pope:
November the 14th, of the 1130th
year of Our Dear Lord’s dominion.
Oh what a splendid day, what splendid morning!
They’ll mutter and they’ll scheme,
but in the end, they will proclaim. Habemus Papam!
You were a sickly youth when la Serenissima,
your father’s fair domain, fell to the Germans.
You saw your future dashed upon the jagged
rocks of Billung greed. You joined the church.
The ruling Pope did not forgive you your Venetian blood;
he exiled you, may Satan bless his memory!
And where? To the far north, where pizza ovens
scarcely thaw the icicles. Away from Italy
and off into the land of pickled herring.
You rotted there, and caught a cold a year,
until the day the illness had decided
‘twas not enough to merely occupy your body.
No. It claimed a duchy there, and thence a kingdom
Carved out with a warlike, generous hand,
And dealt out fiefs unto afflictions lesser.
Oh, but now look at you! A pope!
What splendid hat! What splendid robes!
What splendid splendour of this splendorous day!
Even your sickly paleness is no issue.
Nor skinny neck, nor Autumn years. Right now
Ordelafo, you are the first, the greatest
the most amazing man of Christendom.
Of course the greedy growling German needs his bone;
the Billung needs to be placated. The Pope
in this benighted world is Emperor’s slave;
or worse still, the hapless puppet
of some upstart rustic from bucolic Corsica.
I will appease the Hun by taking up a name
that paints me as yet another German Peter,
loyal to my Holsteiner bishopric. Well, Gregory the Sixth
May well pretend to be a humble man of God,
The Emperor’s good friend, and loyal backer.
Indeed, pope Gregory may even well pretend
that pickled herring’s to his liking. Pope Ordelafo,
however, will one day, provided
his life is long enough, ride in
upon a richly panoplied horse right into Venice.
And failing that, he will build up the holy might of Papal Statehood,
so that one day another Faliero
will do the same, and liberate his homeland,
a Mitred Alexander.

Enter Bocconcino

Bocconcino:
Your Popishness, my holy father,
the rock of Christendom. You’ve been elected, right?
They’ve handed in their ballots.
We all await your first ex cathedra
and it is getting rather stuffy in the hall.
Ending this wait shall probably preserve
the goodwill of the Cardinal college.
They will be grateful to escape their neighbours
the old men cannot stand the smell
of one another; it makes them vexed. Now go
urbi et orbi proclaim what the new Pope intends.
Make it brief and wry, but not too clever,
the audience might find it patronising.
Don’t overstay your welcome. No-one
likes hearing an overblown acceptance speech -
And thanking God but once is quite sufficient.

pauses, catches breath

And don’t you think of thanking Satan
There was one Pope who tried, and before long -
- in fact quite before dinner - he was Antipope
and two new Popes were waging war on him
among the streets of Rome. It may seem like
a good idea at the time, a riotous hoot
But don’t. They take that seriously here.
Now, now, don’t look at me that way. I’ve seen
So many Popes elected and then die
My observations are statistically proven.
Now go and get them, holy tiger!

Pope and Bocconcino exit. Behind the curtains one can hear the Pope say a short and to the point speech. There’s thunderous applause. You can almost hear the standing ovation, flag waving, and car horns.

Pope comes back inside, takes off the mitre, pours himself a glass of wine.

Pope:
In truth, I find that being Pope is quite restrictive;
Behold the wealth of Peter’s seat – it’s vast
And yet my prestige seems a little low
for such a mighty ruler. Too bad I can’t claim duchies
and kingdoms too, for otherwise I’d well be duke of Carthage,
Sicily and Algiers, and Neapolitan King, as well as Pope.
And that’s not all! Look at my piety score!
You’d think a Pope indeed deserves much better.

Enter Provolone

Provolone:
Piety? Your Papacity - why not create some bishopricks? I’d like a spot.

Pope:
Believe me, I have tried. It must be hard-coded.

Bocconcino enters from behind the curtain.

Pope
Hey, Bocconcino – why can’t I make bishops
And hand out titles like some royal git?

Bocconcino
Your Papality – ‘tis so indeed because
Papal bureaucracy has infinite efficiency. We can rule
twenty thousand counties at a time
and break no sweat.

Pope
Wherefore?

Bocconcino
God doth direct us in minutest detail
in all we do; ‘tis He that guides the hand
of every clerk in calculating profits;
no job too small or tedious
for God to supervise on the behalf of Peter’s throne.
Quod erat demonstrandum, your Papaciousness.

Provolone
Indeed, indeed. Still, I would like to be a bishop-prince.

Enter Barbaresco

Pope (aside)
Here’s some wine to go with the cheese

to Barbaresco
Is it that time of day again?

Barbaresco:
Yes, your Popeness.

Pope to Bocconcino and Provolone
Away, the two of you!

Bocconcino and Provolone exit

Pope:
Forsooth, I know not why I am so sad…

Barbaresco:
Perhaps the usual, O Prince of Faith,
a bit of the old self-doubting, a tiny tinge
of mortal sin or two; or that old thing,
ahem, you know, like what they say,
“With wine and novices
the Monk hath no need o’ the Devil”.
I’m totally down with that, just so you know.
I would absolve you in a jiffy.

Pope:
Nay, nay, not that. I meant to say,
not all is peaceful in the Holy Kingdom.
Sheer pragmatism has lead to mortal folly
and tolerance of sin unnatural. For Alas!
Sardinia is still posess’d by the undying Torcotore
accursed by God to be unfit to cease
the title even after death; while Trent
and Sicily’s Crown, Palermo are in the hands
of unrepentant reprobate Sieghard,
whom the previous Pope, in all his wisdom
had cast away from Mother Church’s ample bosom,
but left him no worse off in temporal strength.
But that’s not all. In Africa, I hear
there’s whole entire counties
worshipping Mohammad, and not paying taxes.
Oh, but thou art heavy, Peter's Mitre!

Barbaresco:
The sins of omission are in God’s eyes
still sins; and thus forgivable. Now, as penance
I say you go and get those taxes flowing.
Now I absolve you.

Pope:
Thank you, Frater.

Barbaresco exits. Pope nods off on the chair.

Thus ends Act the First. To hear more
of our protagonist's Popish deeds
pop in again into this selfsame thread
Sometime before the next guy writes his piece.

Much thanks for reading. Ta.

[Murmurandus]

Very nice!!

[JimboIX]

Nice contribution- I like the bit in the middle where the Pope laments the tragedy of hard-coding and the joys of infinite demesne, the context made them humorous. Gregory better hurry up- before he dies out of breath.

[thrashing mad]

Good funny stuff, I like way that you pointed out strange mechanics things.

[phargle]

Very tasty. I love it for a variety of reasons.

[grayghost]

Nice job RGB. Your intro was almost Phagleish in its tone.

Oh, but thou art heavy, Peter's Mitre!

Ain't that the truth.