[Mod] The Holy See (Papacy Mechanics)

[Nicolas-]

The Holy See is a Papacy focused mod that I've been working on in the past few days. My vision for the mod is to make the Papacy the historical force to not be reckoned with.

Right now, it doesn't feel like the Pope is relevant enough. And Catholicism has some major fervor issues that I intend to balance in this mod.

First, I'd like to start with the first mechanic that you'd expect from a Papacy mod: A College of Cardinals and the ability to influence who could be the next Pope.

Conclave:

1. I added a new character interaction "Nominate a Cardinal" which will allow you to submit a nominee for the Pope to consider. The Pope will keep a short list of potential nominees. When there is a cardinalship vacancy, the Pope will pick the nominee with the highest score from his shortlist. The score is determined by how much the Pope likes the nominees, based on the nominee's traits, skills, piety etc..

Next is the College of Cardinals. The College of Cardinals is composed of a number of landed characters throughout Christendom. These characters were selected by the Pope from his shortlist. Obviously, the more pious, virtuous a character is, the more likely he will be added to the College of Cardinals. Characters with sinful traits rarely make it.

Cardinals will vote for each based based on a lot of factors including how they view each other. But you can designate your favored candidate, and other cardinals that are your vassals will be more inclined to choose your candidate. Though this may be outweighed by how much they dislike the character.

You can also force foreign cardinals to vote for your candidate if you have a strong hook on them. More on that later.

Since you are not a voter yourself, your voting strength is determined based on how many cardinals you are able to sway. Every cardinal is worth 1 vote only.

I am considering adding the ability to bribe cardinals to vote for your candidate, but that interaction will not be possible on characters with specific traits such as Just and Honest. And considering that most people who make it in the college of cardinals have virtuous traits, it'll be difficult for you to just buy the Papacy.

But cardinals are also a doubled edged sword. They will have the Pope's protection, and if you try to imprison a vassal that is a cardinal, the Pope may threaten you with excommunication.

Here is a screenshot of the Pope's shortlist. I intent to include more details and mechanics to help the player/AI improve their candidates chances:

Papal Inquisitions:

In the medieval times, as heresy outbreaks started to appear in certain parts of Europe, certain Popes decided to start taking action to make sure that heresy is suppressed. These actions were in the form of Episcopal and Papal Inquisitions. Papal Inquisitors/Legates would travel to the said region and conduct a series of trials to punish heretics in ways that are consistent with canon law.

So I decided to implement a similar mechanic in Crusader Kings III. No longer will the Pope stay idle as Heresy spreads in Christendom unchecked. Instead if a Heresy breaks in the part of a catholic Duke, the Pope may request his or her permission to conduct a Papal Inquisition. Rejecting such request will greatly upset the Pope.

Once the inquisition begins, an icon would appear on the map to represent progress towards conversion. During that process, heretic characters that reside in that county may also be put to trial and given the choice to either recant (convert back to Catholicism) or be burned at the stake. If you are a heretic count and your liege is a catholic who likes the Pope, depending on your strength, he may accept that you or members of your family be put to trial. But you will always be given the chance to recant.

These changes are intended to make the state of Catholicism in this era more accurately represented. If you are a weak ruler, adopting a heretic religion will come with its own challenges especially if your liege is a devout catholic. However, if Catholicism's fervor becomes very low and too many heresy outbreaks appear, the Pope may be too preoccupied with other counties to notice yours. So if you are a count, the best strategy would be to only convert if you are strong enough to assert your religious choices.

 

[Lordy's]

The Holy See is a Papacy focused mod that I've been working on in the past few days. My vision for the mod is to make the Papacy the historical force to not be reckoned with.

Right now, it doesn't feel like the Pope is relevant enough. And Catholicism has some major fervor issues that I intend to balance in this mod.

First, I'd like to start with the first mechanic that you'd expect from a Papacy mod: A College of Cardinals and the ability to influence who could be the next Pope.

1. I added a new character interaction "Nominate a Cardinal" which will allow you to submit a nominee for the Pope to consider. The Pope will keep a short list of potential nominees. When there is a cardinalship vacancy, the Pope will pick the nominee with the highest score from his shortlist. The score is determined by how much the Pope likes the nominees, based on the nominee's traits, skills, piety etc..

Next is the College of Cardinals. The College of Cardinals is composed of a number of landed characters throughout Christendom. These characters were selected by the Pope from his shortlist. Obviously, the more pious, virtuous a character is, the more likely he will be added to the College of Cardinals. Characters with sinful traits rarely make it.

Cardinals will vote for each based based on a lot of factors including how they view each other. But you can designate your favored candidate, and other cardinals that are your vassals will be more inclined to choose your candidate. Though this may be outweighed by how much they dislike the character.

You can also force foreign cardinals to vote for your candidate if you have a strong hook on them. More on that later.

Since you are not a voter yourself, your voting strength is determined based on how many cardinals you are able to sway. Every cardinal is worth 1 vote only.

I am considering adding the ability to bribe cardinals to vote for your candidate, but that interaction will not be possible on characters with specific traits such as Just and Honest. And considering that most people who make it in the college of cardinals have virtuous traits, it'll be difficult for you to just buy the Papacy.

But cardinals are also a doubled edged sword. They will have the Pope's protection, and if you try to imprison a vassal that is a cardinal, the Pope may threaten you with excommunication.

Here is a screenshot of the Pope's shortlist. I intent to include more details and mechanics to help the player/AI improve their candidates chances:

In the future, I will talk about Papal Bulls, and other new mechanics that I'm still working on.

Looks great!
How did you manage to make the papacy an elective title? I also tried to do that but it always resulted in the papacy being destroyed on death of the pope.

 

[Nicolas-]

Looks great!
How did you manage to make the papacy an elective title? I also tried to do that but it always resulted in the papacy being destroyed on death of the pope.

I don't recall which edits made it finally possible, but I changed several things including the papacy title in the history folder. I also created a new theocratic government type for the Pope. Only issue is that it's currently playable as a result. But I haven't been trying to prevent that. I could though.

Is your intent to make it playable? If so it's definitely possible. You just have to edit the title in history files and create new government type.

Also expect a lot of work on the GUI side as well. You're going to have to dig deep into the code, because the current standard election systems are not really fit for the Papacy.

 

[Lordy's]

I don't recall which edits made it finally possible, but I changed several things including the papacy title in the history folder. I also created a new theocratic government type for the Pope. Only issue is that it's currently playable as a result. But I haven't been trying to prevent that. I could though.

Is your intent to make it playable? If so it's definitely possible. You just have to edit the title in history files and create new government type.

Making the papacy playable actually doesn't require a new government and can be achieved by changing one of the scripted_rules. And yes, that was one of my goals.
You could use the same "is_character_allowed_to_be_player" rule to make your new government unplayable if you don't want it to be playable.
So I did not make a new government, which might be why it did not work for me... Does the game still consider your papal government a theocracy and do "clergy_opinion" modifiers have an effect on him? Because that's the reason why I did not want to make a completely new government type - I did that in CK2 for my theocracy mod, but it was a weird workaround.

 

[Nicolas-]

Making the papacy playable actually doesn't require a new government and can be achieved by changing one of the scripted_rules. And yes, that was one of my goals.
You could use the same "is_character_allowed_to_be_player" rule to make your new government unplayable if you don't want it to be playable.
So I did not make a new government, which might be why it did not work for me... Does the game still consider your papal government a theocracy and do "clergy_opinion" modifiers have an effect on him? Because that's the reason why I did not want to make a completely new government type - I did that in CK2 for my theocracy mod, but it was a weird workaround.

It is a theocracy yes. In the new government type I set is to religious = yes. The only way it was possible for me to do what I need to create, that is, an elective theocracy where the ruler keeps the title and mechanics of the pope is by creating a new government type.

Also I think CK3 code is totally different from CK2. I found it to be much closer to Imperator Rome than any other game. Because they both use Jomini.

 

[Lordy's]

It is a theocracy yes. In the new government type I set is to religious = yes. The only way it was possible for me to do what I need to create, that is, an elective theocracy where the ruler keeps the title and mechanics of the pope is by creating a new government type.

Also I think CK3 code is totally different from CK2. I found it to be much closer to Imperator Rome than any other game. Because they both use Jomini.

Ah, didn't saw that but that should fix most issues. Although some events might require the pope to have the "theocracy" government.
Yes, I saw that you managed to make an extra tab in the election screen to show the potential cardinals. Pretty amazing what can be done with Jomini.
On the other hand for someone who is used to CK2 to it its a bit confusing at times...

 

[Magnus Helvetti]

Nice! This is something that is vital to Christendom and should've been in the game. Great work!

 

[LordDamien]

It looks quite good, looking forward to using it!, Will it be save game compatible?

 

[Nicolas-]

It looks quite good, looking forward to using it!, Will it be save game compatible?

Haven't tried it. But it's not like this mod is going to be released in few days anyway. There's a lot more I still want to add.

 

[Pied-Noir]

Looks good - if you haven't already, remove the pope as ruler of the kingdom of Romagna; it'll fix the king-bishop naming issue and it also makes more sense the title not having been created yet.

 

[Drakken]

Paradox, give this man a job offer.

 

[Nicolas-]

Added:
Papal Inquisitions:

In the medieval times, as heresy outbreaks started to appear in certain parts of Europe, certain Popes decided to start taking action to make sure that heresy is suppressed. These actions were in the form of Episcopal and Papal Inquisitions. Papal Inquisitors/Legates would travel to the said region and conduct a series of trials to punish heretics in ways that are consistent with canon law.

So I decided to implement a similar mechanic in Crusader Kings III. No longer will the Pope stay idle as Heresy spreads in Christendom unchecked. Instead if a Heresy breaks in the part of a catholic Duke, the Pope may request his or her permission to conduct a Papal Inquisition. Rejecting such request will greatly upset the Pope.

Once the inquisition begins, an icon would appear on the map to represent progress towards conversion. During that process, heretic characters that reside in that county may also be put to trial and given the choice to either recant (convert back to Catholicism) or be burned at the stake. If you are a heretic count and your liege is a catholic who likes the Pope, depending on your strength, he may accept that you or members of your family be put to trial. But you will always be given the chance to recant.

These changes are intended to make the state of Catholicism in this era more accurately represented. If you are a weak ruler, adopting a heretic religion will come with its own challenges especially if your liege is a devout catholic. However, if Catholicism's fervor becomes very low and too many heresy outbreaks appear, the Pope may be too preoccupied with other counties to notice yours. So if you are a count, the best strategy would be to only convert if you are strong enough to assert your religious choices.

 

[Pied-Noir]

That is awesome work, Nicolas!

 

[Lordy's]

I did not expect that!
Hey, that looks pretty good. I assume that it is a councillor task, right?
A few ideas:

• CB/Faction against liege to stop him from allowing the inquisition to be present.
• Use conditional localisation to include a Monty-Python reference if the inquisition happens in spain.

I've given up my own plans for a playable theocracy mod for now, given that your mod will add so many great mechanics (that should have been in the base game...).

 

[Nicolas-]

I did not expect that!
Hey, that looks pretty good. I assume that it is a councillor task, right?
A few ideas:

• CB/Faction against liege to stop him from allowing the inquisition to be present.
• Use conditional localisation to include a Monty-Python reference if the inquisition happens in spain.

I've given up my own plans for a playable theocracy mod for now, given that your mod will add so many great mechanics (that should have been in the base game...).

Thank you! The CB idea could be good yeah. And no it isn't a council task, since those wouldn't appear to everyone but the councillor liege. I had to make my own tweaks to the map icons code to have a separate system that displays the process on the map.

You shouldn't give up your mod maybe you have great ideas! And how are you finding CK3 modding so far?

 

[Lordy's]

Thank you! The CB idea could be good yeah. And no it isn't a council task, since those wouldn't appear to everyone but the councillor liege. I had to make my own tweaks to the map icons code to have a separate system that displays the process on the map.

You shouldn't give up your mod maybe you have great ideas! And how are you finding CK3 modding so far?

Maybe it could also be an interaction that requires a hook on your liege / the inquisitor / the pope. But I think from a players perspective it's quite important to have some potential way to protect yourself from it.
So it's more like a feast/pilgrimage? Or something entirely new?
Well, I only postponed my plans. Making a submod for your mod seems to be a much better idea than trying to find out how to implement cardinals myself. I had a look at the GUI system, but I really don't get how you managed to show a list certain characters that does not rely on some hardcoded list (it's probably a global list variable?). Not to mention that apparently you found a way to make an elective system that circumvents the restrictions on the candidate pool (claimants, vassals, family).
The lack of tutorials and my lack of experience in imperator modding makes it somewhat hard to even understand how one would do such things.

 

[Nicolas-]

Maybe it could also be an interaction that requires a hook on your liege / the inquisitor / the pope. But I think from a players perspective it's quite important to have some potential way to protect yourself from it.
So it's more like a feast/pilgrimage? Or something entirely new?
Well, I only postponed my plans. Making a submod for your mod seems to be a much better idea than trying to find out how to implement cardinals myself. I had a look at the GUI system, but I really don't get how you managed to show a list certain characters that does not rely on some hardcoded list (it's probably a global list variable?). Not to mention that apparently you found a way to make an elective system that circumvents the restrictions on the candidate pool (claimants, vassals, family).
The lack of tutorials and my lack of experience in imperator modding makes it somewhat hard to even understand how one would do such things.

Actually I haven't decided whether to give cardinals claims or not, for now, only because I'm thinking about the possibility to be able to depose the Pope under certain conditions such as criminal behavior or public lechery etc.. Charles VIII of France threatened to do so at the urging of Cardinal Della Rovere, based on the lecherous reputation of the Borgia Pope.
So there could be some historical basis for it. But I'll have to think about ways to balance it.

As for the list it can be a global list or list saved in character or any acceptable scope etc.. whatever works for you, then you use the GUI system (GetList) to extract the info. It's a bit tough. I only knew how to do it because I did it in Imperator and still remembered the details.

 

[Reavy]

Looks very promising so far, I appreciate the free DLC you're making.

It's already pretty ambitious, but are there any plans to model the rise of the Papacy as a dominant force, with the Gregorian Reforms in the 11th century? Prior to it, the independence of the Papacy was often questionable, with the 'Tusculan Papacy' as an example, or the HRE-appointed popes. You also have the consequences of the Papacy trying to assert itself, such as the Investiture Controversy, along with its subsequent anti-popes and anti-kings. I think it would be very interesting. If nothing else, it would be neat to reintroduce Investiture laws as you had in CK2.

 

[SMiki Lorebringer]

Once the shared religious head feature is introduced by Paradox, would you be able to allow both mainland Catholic and Insular cardinals and popes? Also, will the Fraticellis or Coptics have their own papal elections?

 

[Nicolas-]

Looks very promising so far, I appreciate the free DLC you're making.

It's already pretty ambitious, but are there any plans to model the rise of the Papacy as a dominant force, with the Gregorian Reforms in the 11th century? Prior to it, the independence of the Papacy was often questionable, with the 'Tusculan Papacy' as an example, or the HRE-appointed popes. You also have the consequences of the Papacy trying to assert itself, such as the Investiture Controversy, along with its subsequent anti-popes and anti-kings. I think it would be very interesting. If nothing else, it would be neat to reintroduce Investiture laws as you had in CK2.

Thank you! To be honest, this mod is focused on the papacy, past that period of tusculan papacy. There are many events that happened that are interesting, but I try to choose/model things that I have a clear vision for in the game.Catholicism in CK3 needs a lot of work. And I'm trying to come up with mechanics that allow the player to have fun but also affect things that they are unhappy with such as fervor, bad bishops etc... I don't see much purpose in trying to recreate the Tusculan Papacy, at least not yet.

As for Investiture laws and anti-pope, I will be including that, but not exactly like CK2.