Ancient Religions

[superskierpat]

Religion is like a pair of shoes.....Find one that fits for you, but don't make me wear your shoes.
George Carlin

The mod is currently undergoing a pretty large celtic overhaul and is thus not fully released.

Try the Alpha, it contains a bunch of new features that need testing, but might be broken or incomplete.

Description:
This mod aims at recreating dead or pseudo-dead religions in vanilla Crusader Kings 2, the current release features the ancient cults of the brythons, gaels and greco-romans. Other plans include Basque, Guanche and Mesopotamian paganism and further plans include Egyptian paganism and the Cult of Cthulhu.

Ancient Religions->EUIV Converter v1.0:

Spoiler

Ancient Religions->EUIV Converter v1.0

Because druid celts with guns are just too good to pass on

Download
http://www.mediafire.com/download/6oc613tw9fodtvn/Ancient_Religions_Reborn_EUIV_Converter_V1.0.rar

Instructions
-**Only use this if you are playing Ancient Religions without Project Balance and/or VIET Immersion**
-VIET and PB+VIET version compatible with Ancient Religions are avaliable in the VIET thread
-Install as you would any other mod
-You only need to select the mod when you actually want to convert your save

Current Religions: (Click on the links for the relevant post with screenshots and information)
Brythonic Druidism
Gaelic Druidism
Hellenic Polytheism

Requires:
Crusader Kings 2 version 2.0 and The Old Gods dlc

Modules:
Music Module Flavorful music when playing certain religions

Installation:

1. Important: Delete your Ancient Religions folder if you have one
2. Extract the Ancient Religions folder and .mod file to your mod-folder (Crusader Kings II\mod)
3. Enable it when launching the game
4. Have fun

I you want a compatibility patch with a popular mod, just let me know.

Known compatible mods:*

• Project Balance
• Vanilla Immersion, Events and Traits
• Arko Armories
• Some What More Historic Mod
• High Kings and Consuls
• Some What More Historic
• Ailoresgyniad - Cymraeg/Welsh Reconquest

* Compatibility patches are presently not up to date.

This mod is created and maintained by Super(skier)pat. If you want to include it in any publicly released mod you need my permission.

Thanks:

Spoiler

• OrdepNM, for the EU 4 converter
• AnaxXiphos, religious icons, trait icons and flags.
• Jon Severinsson, for all the work on the Hellenic Polytheists
• Lascupa0788, for event coding.
• Meneth, for help with event coding
• Cybrxkhan, for help with event coding and suggestions
• Luca0312, for gracefully sharing his work on the winter king mod
• And anyone else who helped through their discussions, suggestions, bug reports and information.

Changelog:

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0.1:

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• First release, featuring the Brythonic branch of Druidism

0.11:

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• Removed useless name limitations, they go in the group entry
• Added Gaelic Pagan and Gaelic Pagan Reformed entries. (Gael localised Brythonic religion)
• Removed the at peace penalty and the no raised vassal opinion loss to the reformed versions
• Changed the reformed religion scriptures (Ballads to Sacred Stones) for the druidic religions and gave them the ability to call crusades once reformed
• Fixed a few character flag problems in the holy order events
• Gave the druidic religions the ability to switch to the true cognatic succession law (Based on the matriarchal aspects of the celtic cults)

0.2:

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• Official first release of hellenic polytheism
• Added all hellenic emperors as pontifex maximus in history files
• Fixed there being no holy wars for reformed brythonic and gaelic pagans
• Some characters in your realm will now actually convert when you change your religion to druidism
• Differentiated gaelic and brythonic religious icons and title flags
• Brythonic and Gaelic holy orders will now reform
• The sacrifice chain for britons and gaels will now have unique text when sacrificing Norse Pagans
• Headhunter events now only triggered if you get the heroic battle events (to make sure the actual character gets the trait and not his liege)
• The schism can be mended by the catholics
• The Holy Roman Empire can reform the Roman Empire
• Added two modules: One containing only druidism and the other containing only hellenism

0.21:

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General

• Updated to CK2 v1.10.3
• Fixed a few typos
• Added the Egyptian icon, you can now check it out and tell me what you think

Extended Legacy of Rome

• Reworked the Lost Roman Provinces event chain: The list of duchies are now more historically accurate; and updated for the 1.10 map.
• Reworked the Roman Borders Restored event: The list of duchies now matches the updated Lost Roman Provincesevent chain.
• Reworked the Imperial Reconquest CB:
• It is now based on the same duchy list as the updated Roman Borders Restored event, rather than a list of kingdoms whose de jure duchies might change during the course of a game.
• Added the same distance condition as for holy war.
• It is now disabled if, and only if, you could holy war the target instead, rather than being disabled against all Muslims.

Hellenic Polytheism

• Now behaves mostly like an already reformed pagan religion, but without a religious head at the start of the game:
• Hellenic pagans form and join factions just like reformed pagans, not like unreformed pagans.
• Hellenic pagans convert and are converted like reformed pagans, not like unreformed pagans.
• Hellenic pagans can now use any Crown Authority level
• AI characters that would have agreed to "Demand Religious Conversion", had it been available, will instead spontaneously convert in on average one year.
• Hellenic pagans can no longer use the Pagan Subjugation CB
• Hellenic pagans got a Hellenic Liberation CB against any Roman, Italian or Greek county not ruled by a pagan.
• Any Hellenic pagan King or Emperor can now use the Imperial Reconquest CB once every five years against non-pagans (a Hellenic pagan Roman Emperor has of course unlimited use of it).
• When an unlanded character converts to Hellenic Polytheism after having "Studied the Classics", his host is now informed via an event.
• You now use the standard pagan interface to become Pontifex Maximus instead of a special decision.
• Only the Pontifex Maximus is now able to appoint flamines.
• Added the Vestales (a.k.a. Vestal Virgins) as minor titles appointed by the Pontifex Maximus, and a decision + events for other Hellenic rulers to nominate children for the position.
• Hellenic characters now use zoroastrian coat of arms (Temporary)

Gaelic Druidism

• The Gaelic Reformed religion is now named Tuatha
• The Religious head is now an Ard Ri, rules over Tara and is a caliph like title
• Aonach Tailteann event chain, can be used once per rule by independent dukes, kings and emperors
• Gaelic barons and counts are now called Chiefs and High Chiefs and rule over a Tuath and a Tuatha
• The duchy of Meath no longer uses the pagan coat of arms when held by a pagan
• Fixed the court wizard event firing repeatedly for irish and scottish lords
• Gaelic holy sites are now located in Mellifont (Dublin), Iona (Scotland), Reykjavik (Iceland), Tydewwi (Wales) and A Coruna (Galicia)
• Gaels now have a Divination that can be used every 5 years instead of the Celtic celebrations
• Added an event to allow Lunatic or Possessed characters of irish or scottish culture to become gaelic pagans
• Gaelic characters now use pagan coat of arms
• When Iceland is held by an Irish or Scottish character it is named Íoslainn

Brythonic Druidism

• Fixed the court wizard event firing repeatedly for welsh and breton lords
• Brythonic holy sites are now located in Waltham (England), Whithorn (Scotland), Locmine (Brittany), Chartres (France) and Bangor Fawr (Wales)
• Brythons now have a Divination that can be used every 5 years instead of the Celtic celebrations
• Added an event to allow Lunatic or Possessed characters of welsh or breton culture to become brythonic pagans
• Brythonic characters now use pagan coat of arms

0.3:

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• Updated to Crusader Kings 2 version 1.11
• Six new mythological and cultural flavor events
• Released compatibility patches or instructions for Project Balance, Viet, PB + Viet, SWMH and Arko Armories.

0.31:

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General

• Updated to CK2 v1.111
• The 0.3 flavor events will now fire much less often
• Fixed druidic decisions not appearing in decisions tab
• Various localisation fixes
• Added a music module, contains music that will fire only when playing certain religions, flavorful and free of copyright

Compatibility Patches

• All compatibility patches updated to latest builds (Viet 1.4, PB 3.2.28, SWMH 2.81)
• Fixed Imperial Reconquest being unavailable for Hellenic Pagans in compatibility patches
• Fixed gaelic religion tab causing CTD in SWMH
• Druidic rebirth event now takes into account new SWMH celtic cultures

 

[Ols]

I'd be interested, especially if I could use some of the mechanics we/you come up with on the Winter King mod (assuming Luca wants them). PM me if you want to have a talk about it, the best way to start would be to explore how they'd trigger, how they'd differ and which cults would be appropriate for which area. Some people are sticklers for historical plausibility, so writing in storyline to explain why Christianity/Islam has collapsed would probably be advisable.

By the way, Mesopotamian mythology would be best modelled by simply making Yazidi a Pagan religion or inside an Iranic group with Zoroastrianism. I know there could be more, but the religions that pop up within the Persian Empire would probably all have some relation to such Indo-European cults.

 

[Darkgamma]

For Celiticism, you might only barely make an argument for the Scottish isles, and Hellenic paganism was still persistant in Monemvasía. As for Mesopotamians, you won't get far, although Egypt might also have held a community or two that clung to the Older Gods as they've had only a smallish exposure to Christianity compared to other areas.

 

[Ols]

Some new hybrid religions would probably have to be invented in places. I think a Celtic-Christianity hybrid could work, but it'd probably need to be linked to some high-profile heretic spreading new ideas all around. I don't know that much about the dynamics of how new schismatic religions form, but I think the main problem is that Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam) are typically very resistant to notions that God is anything but one being, and would probably not suddenly become polytheist. For the Germans, I think a comprehensive defeat to invading Norsemen could probably revise a pan-germanic sentiment, so that people would eventually convert first to Norse practices then differentiate back to their original set of gods.

Hellenic paganism is one solution for Latin groups, another is mystery cults springing back up. All of those could be thrown into an Imperial religious group. As for the Maghreb I suspect Berber practices could be the model, which could probably use the West African Paganism religion as a model. The rest already have stuff, such as Slavic, the Magyars have Tengri, the Armenians could choose between Hellenism and Iranic cults and populations with residual individualism after being formerly Latin influenced could probably identify with some other obscure cult.

 

[superskierpat]

PM me if you want to have a talk about it [...] Some people are sticklers for historical plausibility, so writing in storyline to explain why Christianity/Islam has collapsed would probably be advisable.

I'm really backlogged at school right now, but I am starting preliminary research and will pm you once I can start some real work.

EDIT: In the meantime, if anybody has suggestions just post them here

EDIT 2: We could maybe use a mix of tamrielic lore/abrahamic religion and the divine mandate of rulers, so lets say a great king could be deified where instead of becoming a saint he became a new god, taking the identity of an ancient pagan god for legitimacy, but without revoking the power of god, rather representing a different facecette. Sort of like Tiber Septim becoming a god on the same level as the others.

 

[Atridij]

Or you can play Lux Invitica?

 

[Darkgamma]

Or you can play Lux Invitica?

I could barely resist saying that.

 

[Mr. Capiatlist]

Or you can play Lux Invitica?

I could barely resist saying that.

But you should, because Lux Invicta is a barely comprehensible pile of syncretic religions and mysticism that changes much, much more than just adding a few polytheistic religions. I don't think that OP's intent is the same as the completely over-hauled Lux Invicta map.

 

[Darkgamma]

Barely-comprehensible to you, completely logical to me!

 

[superskierpat]

Lux Invicta made great sense, from what I read of the alternate timeline, the evolution was very well thought out, but my idea is more geared towards actually spending an effort in reviving a dead religion in the base game, making the new religions more focused and expansive than the absolute anarchy of Lux Invicta, so basically creating events, traits and decisions for each religion based on careful research and not creating an alternate history.

In other words, heres an example about how druidism could be revived: Your celtic character is hunting in the woods when he comes across an ancient mound, inside is the last resting place of an ancient druid, who, despite the refusal of the druids to write their practices down, had wrote a compendium of all druidic knowledge and practices, your character, depending on his traits and relations with the pope, could decided to read the book, or burn it, if he reads it, then he gets the opportunity to revive druidism, launching an event chain that would ultimately drive to the reestablishment of druidism as a religion (represented by changing the religion of your direct family and capital province.

 

[Ols]

I was wondering if someone would mention Lux Invitica too. I'm looking for a vanilla start with a small chance that old religions will restore themselves, not an overhaul. (And I want access to code that I can put in a different mod.)

 

[superskierpat]

Thaaats exactly what I meant.

 

[Darkgamma]

Lux Invicta made great sense, from what I read of the alternate timeline, the evolution was very well thought out, but my idea is more geared towards actually spending an effort in reviving a dead religion in the base game, making the new religions more focused and expansive than the absolute anarchy of Lux Invicta, so basically creating events, traits and decisions for each religion based on careful research and not creating an alternate history.

In other words, heres an example about how druidism could be revived: Your celtic character is hunting in the woods when he comes across an ancient mound, inside is the last resting place of an ancient druid, who, despite the refusal of the druids to write their practices down, had wrote a compendium of all druidic knowledge and practices, your character, depending on his traits and relations with the pope, could decided to read the book, or burn it, if he reads it, then he gets the opportunity to revive druidism, launching an event chain that would ultimately drive to the reestablishment of druidism as a religion (represented by changing the religion of your direct family and capital province.

Why not just convert himself and nothing else?
Also, it would have a lower MTTH if you're in the isles of Scotland (yes I know I'm repetitive) ~

 

[superskierpat]

Perhaps, but I was thinking that the conversion of the character would happen earlier in the event chain, I was thinking it would be a long chain involving pilgrimages and maybe other stuff. And I was thinking that for certain religions it could be possible to use the rebels with a cause in TOG to revive a religion that doesn't have any more landed characters but still has a province that adheres to it (or maybe if I find proof of that religion still having followers in that time then there could be a chance for a popular rebellion even wthout a full province following its precepts)

 

[itigo205]

The Roman faith could be plausible if ,for say, a crazy preacher wandered into your town, providing that you are in a Roman influenced area, and begin preaching for a new Roman Empire with the Roman gods.
He could convince people that abandoning them was why Rome fell and then convert them.

 

[superskierpat]

The province of Methone was supposedly still following the graeco-roman gods, so any character could meet that crazy preacher if he lives in or rules over that province (possible event chain)

 

[Roguedemon]

Why not just convert himself and nothing else?
Also, it would have a lower MTTH if you're in the isles of Scotland (yes I know I'm repetitive) ~

I would imagine the central or northern highlands would be a more likely last bastion of Celtic paganism, given that the Isles were the first part of Scotland to be Christianised by the Irish monks.

Some new hybrid religions would probably have to be invented in places. I think a Celtic-Christianity hybrid could work, but it'd probably need to be linked to some high-profile heretic spreading new ideas all around. I don't know that much about the dynamics of how new schismatic religions form, but I think the main problem is that Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam) are typically very resistant to notions that God is anything but one being, and would probably not suddenly become polytheist. For the Germans, I think a comprehensive defeat to invading Norsemen could probably revise a pan-germanic sentiment, so that people would eventually convert first to Norse practices then differentiate back to their original set of gods.

Celtic Christianity did infact exist, but it was simply Christianity practised in a different way than normal Catholicism. Many pre-Christian traditions were retained, but the religion itself was monotheistic. As far as I know it wasn't even technically a different religion from Catholicism (like the catholic/orthodox schism) but the differences simply arose due to the distance from Rome making it impossible for there to be any enforced standards.

As for the Germans, I could be wrong, but it is my understanding that there original set of gods were infact the Norse gods. Several of our days (Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday) are named after Norse gods (Tyr, Odin, Thor and Freya) but I'm fairly sure these words were introduced by the Germanic tribes that settled Britain rather than the Vikings.

 

[superskierpat]

I would imagine the central or northern highlands would be a more likely last bastion of Celtic paganism, given that the Isles were the first part of Scotland to be Christianised by the Irish monks.

I'm thinking about just planting a crazy old man (who is actually a druid) somewhere in the british islands at the old gods start date.

 

[Jon Severinsson]

I've been working on the Greo-Roman part of this mod, and thought it was time to share what I have come up with so far: grecoroman-prototype-2013-05-25.zip

This is obviously an early prototype; parts will have to be rewritten for TOG, and there is still a lot to do, but I'm now at a point where it actually works (though you have to cheat using the console to make use of it) and I could use some input if a more experienced moder would like to take a look at the code. If you want to see what I have changed in more manageable increments, you can take a look at the git history of the project.

If you are not a modder, I could also use some help with graphics and flavor texts too. Any good ideas are welcome as well.

Stuff still on my ToDo list is:
1. New pagan game mechanics
- Will obviously have to see what TOG brings i this area, but my basic idea is to make Greco-Roman an offensive pagan religion, so anything common to Norse and Tengri should probably apply to Greco-Roman as well.
- Planed holy sites are: Rome (College of Pontiffs), Neapolis (Temple of Apollo), Achaia (Temple of Olympia/Statue of Zeus), Hellas (Oracle of Delphi), Ephesos (Temple of Artemis). If it turns out to be too easy to reform, some might have to move further out in the old roman empire, for now I've got two in Italy (one in de-jure Sardinia), two in Greece, and one in Asia Minor (actually also in de-jure Greece).
- Planed head-of-religion is he Pontifex Maximum, to be held by the king/emperor (like the Norse Fylkir) after reformation.
2. Overhaul of minor titles. I have added those I intend to, though the Flamines Maiores and the Vestales should only be available after reformation, but I want to take a second look on what else to remove or reuse after TOG is out.
3. Replace the generic feast events with something more Greco-Roman oriented. Current candidates are the Olympic Games, the Ludi Saeculares, the Ludi Florae and the Saturnalia, but I want to see what TOG feasts can be (wholly or partially) reused before starting on this. [Help appreciated]
4. Some flavor around the Varingian Guard if the Emperor becomes pagan. I'll have to take a look at what TOG has added first, but my current thinking is that the guard shouldn't become Orthodox if the Emperor isn't, and should be allowed to return to Norse if the Emperor becomes pagan after the guard has already turned Orthodox.
5. Improved flavor texts for the events and decisions I've already implemented. For example: the "Victory Triumphs" currently talks about the Empire and Emperor even when a non-byzantine greco-roman ruler holds a triumph. [Help needed]
6. Improved/New graphics for the new stuff. I'm currently reusing as much as I can from the base game, but some of it don't really fit. [Help needed]

 

[Thure]

What about Saxon religion for North Germans and Anglo-Saxons? With Seaxnot as main god. Or make a Continental Germanic Religion for all Germans and Saxons together. The Saxons first converted around 800 because the conquest of Charlemagne.