Pretty straightforward question. I'm on Ironman mode playing as The Knights. It's in good humor.
Can you make the Pope your Vassal?
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After you annex the pope, he will just reappear again though somewhere else. Catholic theocracies get an event to cede a province to the pope if he is annexed and you refuse to release him.
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If you are the HRE emperor and have passed Erbkaisertum, you can militarily vassalize the pope, diploannex them, wait for the popup, immediately add their provinces to the Empire, then manually release them as a vassal and accept the event. This'll give you a free +50 relations with the Pope, but they'll still be your vassal, since they'll now be a member of the HRE.
Pope has a few other uses for keeping around as a vassal, other than to just annex it (as you might do with most vassals).
The most obvious one being that it's easy to keep the papal states at +200 relations for the papal influence, but I've read about people using it to excommunicate at will, etc.
I vassalized the Papal State as Sunni Granada, so it should work. Though it didn't prevent getting a crusade declared on me. Pope is useless.
Papacy =/= Pope.
Strategies for Vassalising and Annexing The Papal State
Vassalising The Papal State:
So, a fun strategy for Curia Controller:
Vassalising The Papal State:
- If you're not Curia Controller, or not Catholic, then doing so is just like for any other nation. No extra benefits, no downsides.
- If you are Curia Controller, there is a useful benefit:
- This will enable you to always excommunicate any nation with whom you are at war, and possibly also when you've recently been at war.
- This is because Excommunication requires -50 relations with The Papal State.
- Because they have to join your wars, they instantly get the "At War" / "Recently at war" modifiers against anyone you DOW.
- If you're not Catholic, then doing so is like for any other land - no extra benefits or downsides.
- If you're Catholic and not Curia Controller, doing it can give you a free +25 Prestige; otherwise, don't do it unless you really need that land.
- You'll get a popup asking you to re-cede Roma.
- If you decline, it's -1 stability, -10 Prestige, -20 relations with all Catholics.
- And The Papal State will popup as an OPM elsewhere in Europe, taking one province from a Theocracy.
- If you accept, you get +25 Prestige.
- But you lose Roma. So you need to weigh up if the resulting AE was worth the free Prestige.
- If you decline, it's -1 stability, -10 Prestige, -20 relations with all Catholics.
- You'll get a popup asking you to re-cede Roma.
- If you're Catholic, and you are Curia Controller, same applies as above - but, if there are no Theocracies left in the world, or all of them are OPMs, you should definitely do it.
- If there are no Catholic Theocracies left in the world, or all of them are OPMs, then The Papal State cannot re-appear in the world.
- Note that Litvonian Order and Teutonic Order are excluded from the list of nations that can cede PAP - so you can ignore them.
- Also, the event doesn't fire for Theocracies that have 5 provinces or more; you can ignore them too, as long as you don't fear they might later lose provinces and end up with between 2 and 4 provinces.
- This is awesome if you're Curia Controller!
- As mentioned, Excommunication requires -50 relations with The Papal State.
- But if PAP does not exist, there is no nation to check relations with!
- The effect of this is that the Curia Controller can excommunicate any Catholic nation, whenever he wants! (max once per three years.)
- If there are no Catholic Theocracies left in the world, or all of them are OPMs, then The Papal State cannot re-appear in the world.
So, a fun strategy for Curia Controller:
- Vassalise The Papal State when suitable, sooner is better.
- Go to war against all Catholic Theocracies in Europe, besides Litvonian Order and Teutonic Order:
- Annex their provinces, Return Cores, Release Nations - whatever is necessary, to ensure they either don't exist, or are OPMs.
- If they have 5 provinces or more, you can probably ignore them: as long as you're confident they won't later lose territory and end up with 2 - 4 provinces.
- Now annex The Papal State:
- You need to take the Prestige hit, Stability hit and Catholic nation relations hit for not ceding Roma
- But after this, The Papal State cannot re-appear; there are no European Catholic Theocracies to be asked to cede a province for them.
- Now you can excommunicate any Catholic with no relations penalty - in practice this means you get to use Excommunication 5 times more often as before!
- This is super fun - any nation you don't like, Excommunicate, and watch all the other Catholics pile drive into them. It also trashes their relations with Catholics. And gives you a free CB, if/when you neighbour them!
- Note that a very easy way to meet the requirements (no European Catholic Theocracies) is to form the HRE. But this has the big downsides of:
- a) probably taking a long time, thus reducing the period in which you can reap the benefits
- b) reducing the number of Catholics in the world, thereby also reducing your use of the excomm benefits.
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Another thing to note:
If the Papal State controls Rome and is your vassal, and if you are not Catholic, annexing them will trigger the modifier "Conquest of Rome" bringing you +1 missionary and +1 yearly prestige. Thus, conquering/annexing the Papal State for the sake of this can potentially outweigh pissing off every other Catholic nations by refusing to return it.
If the Papal State controls Rome and is your vassal, and if you are not Catholic, annexing them will trigger the modifier "Conquest of Rome" bringing you +1 missionary and +1 yearly prestige. Thus, conquering/annexing the Papal State for the sake of this can potentially outweigh pissing off every other Catholic nations by refusing to return it.
Won't they reappear outside the HRE, or why do the Orders and Riga not have to be eliminated?
All catholic theocracies (except Orders) are inside HRE I think? Edit: I guess Avignon is a possible outside-HRE-theocracy, if it appears.
Orders are specifically excluded from the event (see events/PapalState.txt, event id = 1082).
Riga isn't a theocracy.
The two Orders are excluded from the event that asks Theocracies to cede a province. Not sure why.
Edit: sinkingmist provided the answer, Riga is not a Theocracy.
If you want to check the specifics of the events, they are in events/PapalState.txt
Very nice! When I get home I'll edit my post to add that for the non Catholic case.
Re the pissing off: the event I listed, asking you to cede Rome else get prestig, Stab, Catholic relations penalty: that only runs for Catholics. That's why I said that for non Catholics, it was like annexing any other land (I didn't know about the missionary bonus you mention.)
Is there another event I've missed that gives relations penalties also to non Catholics? Or are you mistaken re non Catholics getting relations penalties for holding Rome?
If you grab them while you're still Catholic and then convert later (e.g. to Protestant) I believe you get the bonus after you convert, but you'll have taken the penalty in the meantime.
Exactly, this is one vassal that you need to keep around long term or else he'll just eat take provinces away from your HRE vassals if you try to annex him.
Ah yes. It does give you the extra missionary if you convert after taking it. Forgot to mention it!
The same modifier can also trigger if:
* Any Christian denomination conquers Mecca.
* Any Christian or Muslim denomination conquers Judea.
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Wait, what, so it is.
Shouldn't it be like a republic.
From wikipedia:
Riga's merchant citizenry chafed and sought greater autonomy from the Church. In 1221 they acquired the right to independently self-administer Riga and adopted a city constitution... a settlement was reached in 1225 whereby they no longer had to pay tax to the Bishop of Riga, and Riga's citizens acquired the right to elect their magistrates and town councilors.
OK so Riga is a Theocracy?
Then two possibilities from when I tested the HRE formation and confirmed it stopped the itinerant Pope:
1. Riga no longer existed by that point in my game, or had changed government. Unlikely?
2. Riga were an OPM, or had 5 or more provinces. Very likely?
The event that asks a Theocracy to cede a province to His Hatliness only fires if they have 2, 3, or 4 provinces.
It obviously has to exclude OPMs. But why it excludes those with 5 or more is a mystery, given that they can most afford the loss of one province.
Then two possibilities from when I tested the HRE formation and confirmed it stopped the itinerant Pope:
1. Riga no longer existed by that point in my game, or had changed government. Unlikely?
2. Riga were an OPM, or had 5 or more provinces. Very likely?
The event that asks a Theocracy to cede a province to His Hatliness only fires if they have 2, 3, or 4 provinces.
It obviously has to exclude OPMs. But why it excludes those with 5 or more is a mystery, given that they can most afford the loss of one province.
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