Best type of Christianity in the game currently?

[wizteddy13]

Hello everyone.
So after the Third Rome update, and what we have in the CoC update so far, it seems that Christianity will not be seeing much changes in the near future. So, I thought it was a good opportunity to discuss what branch is currently the 'best' in the game.

What we have is Catholic, Protestant and Reformed, along with Orthodox and Coptic.
From what I understand in my limited time so far, Catholic is great if a) you can consistently generate papal points and b) you can convert a lot of provinces. This imo lends itself to a more colonial game being suited to stay catholic (unless of course emperor stuff).
Then we have the bulk of the debate, Protestant vs Reformed. At first glance, it seems Protestant is a lot better. Nifty little bonuses that can be switched around fairly often, and a decent tax and improve relations bonus. But on the other hand, while being reformed means you'll usually only be able to hold one type of fervor ability at a time, how does 10% morale compare vs 5% morale and 2.5% discipline? Also, is possible advisors (something I've come to appreciate more I play), and +2 tolerance ultimately a better combo.

However, what I think is the main debate is, has Orthodox, with Third Rome, surpassed all other Christianity branches? We know that if a player controls all 5 Coptic centers, Coptic is pretty damn strong, but Orthodox just seems so much more...flexible now. Events to increase authority come somewhat frequently, metropolitans are a quick boost, and the tolerance is also pretty good. The icons themselves are also pretty damn good, in my opinion at least. Finally, high authority allows quicker conversions, and combined with religious for tolerance, once a province is converted, it hardly ever revels (on a level similar to, if not better than, taking humanist).

So what do you all think is the 'best' at this moment?

 

[JSparks101]

I believe Catholic is weakest unless coloniser, Pope or in the Empire. It just doesn't give many bonuses that are easy to pick up.

I'd support Protestant over Reformed - especially when bigger powers (Denmark and England and Brandenburg mainly) will switch giving you strong possible allies - plus Protestant is easier, can control the league and I think has better bonuses.

I think Coptic is easily the best, I find that getting the second site is easy and Armenia seems to become independent in my games giving a third. The last two become easier the later you get, but 3 to me seem the ones to get which is good.

Orthodox is nice I suppose, but it still feels a little lackluster. If the idol was permanent till changed it would be better, but is still better than Catholic.

Overall, probably; Coptic -> Protestant -> Reformed/Orthodox -> Catholic

 

[makaramus]

depends on your gameplay
if you want to play tall and flexible: protestant
if you want to play for trade:Reformed
if you want to conquer a lot:Catholic
Overall good one:Orthodox

Coptic on the other hand is really strong but hard to get benefits O_O

 

[Pelthis]

Considering my wide playstyle, I'd say I really lvoed Orthodox in my last WC attempt run. The -3 unrest icon is so fucking op. Furthermore with metropolitans you can stack PA pretty easily without having to wait for random events.
Catholic stay kinda nice if you convert ltos of stuff because you can have free money, free stab free prestige etc, but tbh unless you're curia controller I don't think catholic is really useful.
I'd also put protestant over reformed as you can switch your bonuses depending o nwhat you're currently focusing on (you can also switcha s reformed, but protestant is more versatile).
Concerning coptic, I never played it myself, the CCR and military boosts are cool. However I feel it's a bit lackluster, concerning interactions, as once you got the 5 holy sites, you have nothing left to do.

 

[Aepdneds]

Concerning coptic, I never played it myself, the CCR and military boosts are cool. However I feel it's a bit lackluster, concerning interactions, as once you got the 5 holy sites, you have nothing left to do.

And exact this is making it great

 

[Sfan]

Well it completely depends on what you want to do, and how you're already doing it.
Let's think about strengths of every religion.

Catholic: Papal Controller, nice bonuses from having PI you get from converting, easy to become the Emperor, will be the dominant faith of Europe and especially of the colonizers, so the dominant faith of America --> Best for One Faith without having to deal with half of Europe and without bothering about colonization, or at least heavy expansion into heathen land and conversion, best for European politics if you are a major. Still the worst imo unless in those very specific scenarios.

Protestant: BROT, a lot of flexibility which allows to do everything ok-ish even if you do nothing extremely well, some unique bonuses like Dev Cost --> Best for when you are in the HRE and want to have an extra BROT modifier, you want to play tall (the only viable bonuses to play tall are here), you have overall no fixed goal besides doing what you want.

Reformed: Only 3 bonuses but insanely powerful ones. Stabililty focus means that you will never have revolts if you also have humanist and tolerance of heretics has a perfect synergy with humanist. War focus allows you to outclass literally everyone, especially if you already play as a major. --> The most powerful one to do a WC in synergy with humanist.

Orthodox: Multiple extremely powerful bonuses, OP events, but you can't have all the bonuses all the time or you won't stack Patriarch Authority, and most of the bonuses only apply on Orthodox provinces. --> The most powerful one to do a WC in synergy with religious, as you have to convert to benefit from that +1 ToTF and -3 unrest in right religion provinces, and comes really close to Reformed even if you chose humanist, as you can also not convert and ignore PA, and use it all on icons instead.

Coptic: Has been nerfed to the point where all of the bonuses are ok at best, except the oustanding 10% RCC. Overrated imo, as since the introduction of absolutism unrest is the limiting factor and not monarch points anymore, still best if you can get all the bonuses very easily (Ottomans) or need to do an insane lategame rush and need even less coring time and monarch points cost (Ryukyu, but I would still go Hindu as Ryukyu).

 

[ChloePech]

Reformed and Protestant are actually pretty bad at the moment. Catholic is good so long as you're a large country in Europe, while Orthodox is best for one faith WC. Coptic is meh.

 

[bbqftw]

Preface: this is from the perspective of SP WCing, not one faith.

Keep in mind, since its Christian religious group, even the worst is still a good religion (at least top half, probably even top third)

Worst is clear - Protestant, by large margin. Catholic -> Protestant is basically -65 relations instantly against most of the impactful European countries. And when you are coalition juggling most of Europe already, -65 is a nonstarter. You just can't afford it, and the Protestant bonuses are meh.

Reformed is better than Protestant. Better bonuses (readily available -2 unrest / +1 dip rep, both very valuable, morale is more impactful during early game which is when you need that military strength). Due to high tol heretic you can flip on a dime without destabilization.

Orthodox / Catholic / Coptic is harder. All three are actually relatively hit by the nerfs to religious since synergy is excellent.

Orthodox - god bonuses (with BROT and disc), but lacks RCC. Catholic has hofgericht - and yes you can have your cake (HREmperor) and eat it too (Empire rank for sweet bonuses). Perfectly one-tag compatible, since HRE does not dissolve with zero princes. Mind you, you can be an HRE prince and Empire too, but involving EoC is too much can of worms...

You don't even have to go Erbkaisertum too, you can do Hofgericht then execute all the electors. This also installs hereditary rule and (afaik) allows you to flip religion. So if you want to really go for all the bonuses Cathocopts or Cathodox are perfectly legitimate once you've dealt with the electors.

Its very difficult to overstate how good RCC is, remember its also reduced coring time. And reduced coring time means less of all the very nasty OE penalties (BROT / +corruption, occasionally overseas trade power will matter if you are just getting your TCs operational).

Overall verdict:

Catholic > Coptic > Orthodox > Reformed > Protestant

 

[wizteddy13]

Hmm, a lot of different opinions and reasonings here, and very solid points behind them.
The main point being that each religion is situationally the best depending on what goal the player has in mind. Thanks for the replies everyone!

 

[bbqftw]

honestly the balance within the Christian religious group is pretty good.

My metric is "would I go out of the way to convert from Protestant to Coptic?" (for example, old Buddhism -> Hindu was a no brainer) and the fact that the answer is "not always" means that the balance is decent

 

[ecrurudesby]

One thing to remember when comparing Protestant and Reformed is that your Protestant aspects can be permanent upon activation if you so desire, whereas the Reformed bonuses can be very difficult if not impossible to maintain for a good length of time. If you're at war, with a lot of wrong religion land, and without high stability, then you're almost guaranteed to be losing fervor hand over fist. And when you hit 0 fervor your focus is cancelled. Then you have to decide when you want to reactivate your focus, wait to hit 100 or go sooner and have the focus for a shorter overall time. Very stop and start. Honestly Protestant's quality of life advantage here is a pretty big consideration for me.

I think it would be entirely reasonable if the Fervor increase from Religious ideas was increased from +0.25 to +1. The maximum gain for a player all things considered would then be +9 and for a lucky AI it would be 10, but in practice it would often be much lower.

 

[Foefaller]

One thing to remember when comparing Protestant and Reformed is that your Protestant aspects can be permanent upon activation if you so desire, whereas the Reformed bonuses can be very difficult if not impossible to maintain for a good length of time. If you're at war, with a lot of wrong religion land, and without high stability, then you're almost guaranteed to be losing fervor hand over fist. And when you hit 0 fervor your focus is cancelled. Then you have to decide when you want to reactivate your focus, wait to hit 100 or go sooner and have the focus for a shorter overall time. Very stop and start. Honestly Protestant's quality of life advantage here is a pretty big consideration for me.

I think it would be entirely reasonable if the Fervor increase from Religious ideas was increased from +0.25 to +1. The maximum gain for a player all things considered would then be +9 and for a lucky AI it would be 10, but in practice it would often be much lower.

Religious Unity is not a problem as Reformed with Humanist Ideas, especially concerning heretics; You will almost always be capped at +3 Tolerance once you get the third Humanist idea, which means the Catholic and Protestant provinces in your realm might as well be Reformed as far as Religious Unity is concerned. with 2 stab and positive Prestige you should be able to maintain at least one Fervor effect at all times at peace, and with 3 stab during war.

 

[Sfan]

Well the last time I played with Reformed, I was gaining fervor with Stability being permanently active, which allowed me to enable War for major conflicts. 3 stab, 100 prestige and 100 legitimacy is almost guaranteed if you WC (we're still talking about WC perspective), and that ensures you win fervor in synergy with Humanist for the religious unity, even at war.
That -2 unrest and +1 diprep totally insane. Yes, even the diprep, because speeding up the integration of vassals is also extremely important.

 

[ecrurudesby]

Religious Unity is not a problem as Reformed with Humanist Ideas, especially concerning heretics; You will almost always be capped at +3 Tolerance once you get the third Humanist idea, which means the Catholic and Protestant provinces in your realm might as well be Reformed as far as Religious Unity is concerned. with 2 stab and positive Prestige you should be able to maintain at least one Fervor effect at all times at peace, and with 3 stab during war.

While true, I purposefully tried to compare the two religions without taking idea group choices or other variables (outside of the religions themselves) into account.

Humanist ideas are just so effective that it's hard to find mechanics that don't benefit greatly from them. I suppose Court and Country with its national unrest requirement, but that -2 unrest isn't too difficult to overcome with things like war exhaustion.

Well the last time I played with Reformed, I was gaining fervor with Stability being permanently active, which allowed me to enable War for major conflicts. 3 stab, 100 prestige and 100 legitimacy is almost guaranteed if you WC (we're still talking about WC perspective), and that ensures you win fervor in synergy with Humanist for the religious unity, even at war.
That -2 unrest and +1 diprep totally insane. Yes, even the diprep, because speeding up the integration of vassals is also extremely important.

Forgive me, I don't do WCs, but I would've thought Stability was not high up on the list of priorities due to cost and would tend to be less than perfect due to monarch deaths.

Also Legitimacy is not a factor in Reformed fervor.

 

[ValgardWillRuleEurope]

Protestantism is the best. Church of Norway > all else.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

While true, I purposefully tried to compare the two religions without taking idea group choices or other variables (outside of the religions themselves) into account.

Humanist ideas are just so effective that it's hard to find mechanics that don't benefit greatly from them. I suppose Court and Country with its national unrest requirement, but that -2 unrest isn't too difficult to overcome with things like war exhaustion.

Forgive me, I don't do WCs, but I would've thought Stability was not high up on the list of priorities due to cost and would tend to be less than perfect due to monarch deaths.

Also Legitimacy is not a factor in Reformed fervor.

+stab events from combination of corruption and level 3 advisers put you to 3 stab pretty often in the end game. You'd generally not boost it past 1 yourself.

WC runs will almost always feature either religious or humanist, so it's more relevant to assume one of these when comparing between faiths.

 

[Sfan]

Well if I may say, you have to compare faiths based on idea choices, and thus on playstyles. If you plan to have right religion provinces so religious, Orthodox is the best imo. If you plan to have wrong religion provinces, so not religious and obviously humanist, then Reformed is superior imo. Not looking at playstyle is assuming that one faith is superior in any situation. That's not the case.

And as said, if you run with 3 level 3 advisors, you'll have the +1 stab event extremely often, so you don't have to try to be at +3 or at least +2 stab.

 

[bly08]

A non-horde WC will always be capped by points before unrest. If blobbing is the goal then Coptic easily even though the bonuses besides CCR are not very good.

 

[schondetta]

Coptic has the best map color and decent mechanic but low accessibility. orthodox has the best colored cross and pretty decent mechanics. Protestant has second best map color and best passive modifiers and good mechanics as well. Catholic is gross looking and par mechanics and crap passive modifiers. Reformed is tradenation.tag

 

[Sfan]

A non-horde WC will always be capped by points before unrest. If blobbing is the goal then Coptic easily even though the bonuses besides CCR are not very good.

Definitely not anymore if you have 100 absolutism from 162-30.
I now find myself with excessive amounts of monarch points even when I WC.