Catholicism is too weak in the 769 start

[MrFish291]

In every game I play in western Europe, if I'm not playing as Charlemagne or one of the bordering powers, Catholicism collapses. The Umayyads still consistently eat southern France and northern Iberia, despite the new Reconquista mechanics. The Saxons and other tribes eat away at the Catholics in bite sized pieces due to their absurd ability to bring in tons of allied troops and the AI's inability to actually build forts to counteract pagan attrition. Charlie never ends up forming an empire title, so when he dies his titles are either split up among his sons or among his vassals. The eastern front is slowly eaten up by Slavic pagans, and they always end up consolidating given Pannonia's extremely underpowered state. This recent DLC gave pagans a much needed buff by giving them access to Warrior Lodges, but they also ended up making it extremely unlikely that Catholics survive. Even when doing active intervention as a powerful vassal in Francia's wars, it seems to be nigh impossible to keep Catholicism from collapsing. This is compounded by the fact that this tends to tank Catholic moral authority, and the AI refuses to prioritize finishing off one war where it already has troops rather than marching all the way across Europe to fight religious rebels.

Catholic land is in dire need of a rework. Either that, or its neighbors need to be reworked. Holy Fury added plenty of flavor to Catholics, but most of the additional strength they got only comes in midgame. Yes, getting overrun might trigger early crusades. But the Catholics are simply not be in a position to fight in crusades by the time they are unlocked. I understand that historically, western Europe was simply not as developed as other parts of the world. However, the combined relative strength of all of its neighbors, particularly of the pagan tribes, gives the western Europeans ahistorical outcomes. Charlie can't handle the Saxons invading him, much less invade the Saxons himself. Please Paradox, I don't know what you will end up having to do, but give those of us wanting to play as Catholic vassals in early starts some way to survive.

 

[Malthazar]

In every game I play in western Europe, if I'm not playing as Charlemagne or one of the bordering powers, Catholicism collapses. The Umayyads still consistently eat southern France and northern Iberia, despite the new Reconquista mechanics. The Saxons and other tribes eat away at the Catholics in bite sized pieces due to their absurd ability to bring in tons of allied troops and the AI's inability to actually build forts to counteract pagan attrition. Charlie never ends up forming an empire title, so when he dies his titles are either split up among his sons or among his vassals. The eastern front is slowly eaten up by Slavic pagans, and they always end up consolidating given Pannonia's extremely underpowered state. This recent DLC gave pagans a much needed buff by giving them access to Warrior Lodges, but they also ended up making it extremely unlikely that Catholics survive. Even when doing active intervention as a powerful vassal in Francia's wars, it seems to be nigh impossible to keep Catholicism from collapsing. This is compounded by the fact that this tends to tank Catholic moral authority, and the AI refuses to prioritize finishing off one war where it already has troops rather than marching all the way across Europe to fight religious rebels.

Catholic land is in dire need of a rework. Either that, or its neighbors need to be reworked. Holy Fury added plenty of flavor to Catholics, but most of the additional strength they got only comes in midgame. Yes, getting overrun might trigger early crusades. But the Catholics are simply not be in a position to fight in crusades by the time they are unlocked. I understand that historically, western Europe was simply not as developed as other parts of the world. However, the combined relative strength of all of its neighbors, particularly of the pagan tribes, gives the western Europeans ahistorical outcomes. Charlie can't handle the Saxons invading him, much less invade the Saxons himself. Please Paradox, I don't know what you will end up having to do, but give those of us wanting to play as Catholic vassals in early starts some way to survive.

i believe the problem catholics are having is that damn pope
he's so fking trigger happy with the excommunications that the catholics start to destroy themselves with excommunication wars, not getting any help from catholic neighbours against enemies' holy wars and if you are excommunicated, man, you are so screwed
before holy fury i could play as catholic with no problem, but now i hate it. the pope keep excommunicating my liege, then my neighbours declare war because my liege is excommunicated, and this wars weaken the catholic armies

 

[makaramus]

i believe the problem catholics are having is that damn pope
he's so fking trigger happy with the excommunications that the catholics start to destroy themselves with excommunication wars, not getting any help from catholic neighbours against enemies' holy wars and if you are excommunicated, man, you are so screwed
before holy fury i could play as catholic with no problem, but now i hate it. the pope keep excommunicating my liege, then my neighbours declare war because my liege is excommunicated, and this wars weaken the catholic armies

they fixed excomunications althought :S

 

[vandevere]

they fixed excomunications althought :S

They said the fixed it. Haven't seen much evidence of it. Also, Charlemagne is waayyy too weak now. He starts out uncrowned, with Dukes that already hate him, and a trigger happy Pope. The only way he succeeds is if a player plays him. AI Charlie arrives dead in the water...

 

[peleliu]

I've had only one run with Catholics so far In my current game and things seem ok if a little tough. Chuck's dukes revolted and put Theoderic III on the throne of West Francia/France. Chuck was shuffled off to Middle Francia (I am a lowly count). Asturia, France, and Brittany have been fighting a pretty intense series of wars in Iberia. Asturia is very slowly making gains.

 

[MrFish291]

i believe the problem catholics are having is that damn pope
he's so fking trigger happy with the excommunications that the catholics start to destroy themselves with excommunication wars, not getting any help from catholic neighbours against enemies' holy wars and if you are excommunicated, man, you are so screwed
before holy fury i could play as catholic with no problem, but now i hate it. the pope keep excommunicating my liege, then my neighbours declare war because my liege is excommunicated, and this wars weaken the catholic armies

I haven't seen any problems with excommunications in my games. It's mostly the relative poverty of the Catholic lands and the internal pressures Charlie has.

 

[vandevere]

I haven't seen any problems with excommunications in my games. It's mostly the relative poverty of the Catholic lands and the internal pressures Charlie has.

That is the main problem if one wants to play the catholic Feudal Start in 769. Charlemagne starts out uncrowned, with three Dukes who already hate him; and this is before the Events that leave his brother dead and Charly King of Middle Francia.

Because he starts out already King of West Francia, he should start out already crowned, even if only by a lowly bishop. If he creates either Francia, or the HRE, he could maybe get s special coronation event for that.

Right now, the Uncrowned malus is just too strong for Charlemagne to succeed...

 

[junassa]

I've only had like 3 runs post patch. I'm currently running the beta. Catholicism is looking just fine for me. Charlemagne formed HRE, Britannia would probably form in a few decades but I'm gonna GHW it in a few years. Muslims however are fubar'ed. I thought I was in serious trouble when the Abbasids declared Hispania war on Ummayids but then the Abbassids got conquered (some rando Abbassid had a claim) but I guess that adventurer had high decadence because the Abbasssids imploded after winning Hispania, then former vassals lost decadence wars, etc. I don't know how to link a good map but this is from like 50 years ago.

 

[Habraka]

I've seen Charlie create the HRE two times so far, but usually Europe completely collapses into a bordergore until the Umayyads slowly eat their way up from Iberia. Sometimes they collapse too, but it's as rare as the HRE being formed.

Since I've wondered why Charlie is so weak, I did a few attempts to create the HRE in a 769 start. First couple times I failed miserably cause of internal revolts, being over vassal limit (and thus having no vassal levies) or Charlie dying way too young (seriously, the guy got sick every couple months and until he died a couple years after game start).
I figured out how to manage the vassals after a while however, waited to declare war on anyone, including Italy, till after the Saxon Wars event popped up. Managed to wipe the Saxons, then the Widukind revolt, then invaded Italy. Then... the pope excommunicated me cause I held a bunch of titles in Romagna, which the pope didn't like apparently. Had to put both my Court Chaplain and my Chancellor in Rome, coupled with expensive gifts and a Declaration of Repentance (which was expensive on it's own too) just to get the +25 relation to even be able to form the HRE.

Once the HRE is formed though, it gets a lot easier. You're well below vassal limit by then, you have a monthly income of 17-20+ gold, you're up to 15k troops and the pope likes you a lot more. Then it's just a matter of keeping the title in the family, which is as much 'fun' as doing it with the Byzantines.

Between the revolts, faction coups, random illness, vassal limit and external pressure of the Muslims and Pagans, it's no wonder AI Charlie almost never manages to form the HRE.

 

[MentziaIII]

A similar complaint seems to be pretty common for " Old Gods " as well ;

1 - Viking looting of Churches ( that appears to be the main culprit here ) knocks Catholic moral authority down to near nothing. Catholicism is right there in the basement with Taoism , except being in the basement in moral authority does not seem to have nearly as catastrophic an effect on Taoism.

2 - with Catholic moral authority in the basement , significant swathes of Europe go all Martin Luther. --- This wouldn't be so bad , except that within days or weeks of the spawning of heretic doom stacks , here comes another Viking doom stack waxed fat off of looted churches.

well ..........normally I hold in contempt and eschew game cheats / console commands , because it is cheating , or , more pragmatically , because it dumbs down a game where you already have a significant advantage over the crude adding machine AI.

But , what about when something in the programming is itself plain stupid and game -breaking?

Why honor a rule that is plain stupid / cyber suicide ?

So , in future , I'll simply avail myself of the console command that gives you an equally ridiculous and stupid amount of gold. ( ASSUMING that console command still works ?? )

problem solved . *shrug*

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

In every game I play in western Europe, if I'm not playing as Charlemagne or one of the bordering powers, Catholicism collapses. The Umayyads still consistently eat southern France and northern Iberia, despite the new Reconquista mechanics. The Saxons and other tribes eat away at the Catholics in bite sized pieces due to their absurd ability to bring in tons of allied troops and the AI's inability to actually build forts to counteract pagan attrition. Charlie never ends up forming an empire title, so when he dies his titles are either split up among his sons or among his vassals. The eastern front is slowly eaten up by Slavic pagans, and they always end up consolidating given Pannonia's extremely underpowered state. This recent DLC gave pagans a much needed buff by giving them access to Warrior Lodges, but they also ended up making it extremely unlikely that Catholics survive. Even when doing active intervention as a powerful vassal in Francia's wars, it seems to be nigh impossible to keep Catholicism from collapsing. This is compounded by the fact that this tends to tank Catholic moral authority, and the AI refuses to prioritize finishing off one war where it already has troops rather than marching all the way across Europe to fight religious rebels.

Catholic land is in dire need of a rework. Either that, or its neighbors need to be reworked. Holy Fury added plenty of flavor to Catholics, but most of the additional strength they got only comes in midgame. Yes, getting overrun might trigger early crusades. But the Catholics are simply not be in a position to fight in crusades by the time they are unlocked. I understand that historically, western Europe was simply not as developed as other parts of the world. However, the combined relative strength of all of its neighbors, particularly of the pagan tribes, gives the western Europeans ahistorical outcomes. Charlie can't handle the Saxons invading him, much less invade the Saxons himself. Please Paradox, I don't know what you will end up having to do, but give those of us wanting to play as Catholic vassals in early starts some way to survive.

Every game I play in Persia (notably not remotely close to any Catholics) in any non modded games they turn out fine in 769.

Umayyads at best case scenario (actually form empire, no Francia) takes some (never all) of Aquitane and then some of Britanny before Crusades murder them later in the game. That assuming they form the empire, which is at <50% chance these days given claimant factions splitting the kingdoms (Andalusia and w/e second kingdom they need to form Hispania,) independence factions (now that Andalusia has been broken up,) possible Shia uprising, and Reconquista mechanics. After overcoming all of that, in the 33% chance Francia/HRE forms, they don't get into Aquitane at all.

It's laughable to think Pagans actually make gains into Catholic lands. At best Bavaria and parts of England succumb. At best. None of the pagans ever actually declare on kingdom sized blobs like Germany. And in 769 even if Francia splits up there's always a Germany sized blob there.

It's true pagans are resistant to holy wars and hence losing land, but they rarely ever take core Catholic lands (Germany and Francia.) Then later on the pagans get converted en masse and it's typically to Catholics.

Catholics retain their core in France, Burgundy, Germany, and Italy, then push out rapidly with OP as hell Crusades (lol 5 holy orders on everyone else) and pagan preference for converting to Catholic over other religions. Happens every damn time I play 769. In Persia. Where my only interaction with Catholics pre 1000 would be to tributize Venice, if I even get enough of a Mediterranean navy to begin with.

I'm pretty sure most people complaining are typically playing as the raiders themselves, or as ambitious vassals (the larger you get the less direct vassals the liege can tax/draw direct levies from.)

Edit: Typical Umayyad start these days. Can't even form empire as the partition of de jure Andalusia results in this.

 

[Azhcristokos]

I always find it interesting how our experiences tend to vary so much. For me, in the past few games I've been running, Catholicism never falls apart. In my current game as a rampaging Norse Fylkir/Fylkja (867 start), I've overrun literally half of the Catholic world, including territory belonging to the many kingdoms that mass converted to Catholicism; I've also been raiding incessantly. The Catholic MA still keeps jumping back up to 50% and they have lost zero ground to the Muslims or Slavic pagans (the latter of whom are slowly dying out). In my last 769 game, it was even worse because Charlie just united the HRE and annihilated the Umayyads. I couldn't fight him after that.

I did see the AI (somehow) reform Germanic in one 769 game though. Saxony had defeated Charlie and then started holy warring Germany to annihilation, and when the Viking Age triggered the Norse invaded and overran Britain.

 

[Dragatus]

One thing to remember is that we're all operating with a rather small sample size of games and there is a good deal of randomness in what will happen. Even if you play 10 games that is still far to few to be certain that something always happens.

That said, you can make things easier for Charlie by turning off defensive pacts (achievement compatible) or by setting vassal limit to unlimited (*not* achievement compatible).

 

[Rags17]

:
well ..........normally I hold in contempt and eschew game cheats / console commands , because it is cheating , or , more pragmatically , because it dumbs down a game where you already have a significant advantage over the crude adding machine AI.

But , what about when something in the programming is itself plain stupid and game -breaking?

Why honor a rule that is plain stupid / cyber suicide ?

So , in future , I'll simply avail myself of the console command that gives you an equally ridiculous and stupid amount of gold. ( ASSUMING that console command still works ?? )

problem solved . *shrug*

If you're going to console cheat why not at least console cheat properly ? Destroy higher tier Viking titles (king or even Ducal titles), destroy the Abbasids or give the Asturias a crapton of attrition free event troops.

The same game for you, a greater chance that you will get history back on track for everyone else.

 

[MentziaIII]

If you're going to console cheat why not at least console cheat properly ? Destroy higher tier Viking titles (king or even Ducal titles), destroy the Abbasids or give the Asturias a crapton of attrition free event troops.

The same game for you, a greater chance that you will get history back on track for everyone else.

Thanks for the tips . I have never previously used cheats / console commands in this game. So I'm hardly an expert on that score.

Come to think of it , the only time I specifically recall resorting to such was in certain Total War - series games. Giving characters interesting traits or retinues , erasing fog of war and teleporting ambassadors to Princesses locations so I could get a rare royal marriage , that sort of thing , merely to spice up an otherwise utterly dull and bland game.

 

[Rags17]

Thanks for the tips . I have never previously used cheats / console commands in this game. So I'm hardly an expert on that score.

Come to think of it , the only time I specifically recall resorting to such was in certain Total War - series games. Giving characters interesting traits or retinues , erasing fog of war and teleporting ambassadors to Princesses locations so I could get a rare royal marriage , that sort of thing , merely to spice up an otherwise utterly dull and bland game.

In that case you will need this - https://ck2.paradoxwikis.com/Console_commands

Many (many) years ago I played one game and kept getting my butt kicked so I went ballistic and consoled myself 100,000 gold and hired every single merc in the game then started a merciless rampage. Or so I thought, in actual fact my 50,000 troop doomstack suffered horrible attrition and within a few short years I was out of money, out of troops and out of hirable mercs.

It was then that I realised that the best way to console cheat my way to success was to console INTO my biggest nemesis, make him go crazy with tyranny and lunatic decisions (revoke, regrant, revoke, imprison, slaughter, delete titles etc) then console out. I did this to the Abbasids once and the damned Caliph was so damned good and well liked that he ALMOST got out of it, in the end the 20-30 "War against the Tyranny of . . ." revolts finally did him in.

Nowadays I only cheat for RP purposes (did I REALLY lose that war or was it all just a bad dream ?), but if I did want to cheat I would simply gut my biggest enemy with some well chosen console action such as making him Excommunicated, -100 Tyranny, locked away in my prison or more simply - dead.

 

[jwalche]

In my Norse game, Francia is divided into over a dozen independent states with many heresies. Catholic's MA has been 0 for a long time. I helped it a bit by helping revolts with my hostile raiders, but it really didn't need a lot of help. I would leave them that way until I deal with Islam and Byzantium.

 

[Mackus]

Possible ways to make Catholicism a bit stronger and to prevent Uma-blob.
- give Asturias some event troops
- give Ummayads high starting decadence
- if Muslim ever expand too much into Christian territory (take Spanish Holy site or conquer part of Aquitaine, for example), then knights of Calatrava / Santiago will become active, even if crusades didn't start yet.
- give Karl / Karloman (whomever outlives his brother) some bonus to health, so they don't both die too early.

Part of what makes Catholics really vulnerable in 769, is that their Crusades (and holy orders) will not unlock before 900s, even if they're completely collapsing.

 

[Bomber678]

Please Paradox, I don't know what you will end up having to do, but give those of us wanting to play as Catholic vassals in early starts some way to survive.

You should have written which version you are playing (current beta or the hf release version?). The HF release version was totally bugged so it was pure "shit" for catholics.
Mainly because:
- HRE couldn't be formed, so if charlemange got enough land to form it he just created dozens of kingdom tiers all weak, all broken because of internal troubles
- Pope excommunicated everything he could
- catholic Moral Authority almost always went to 0 and if the player didn't do everything to build it up again it stayed at 0. Meaning heresy everywhere, revolts everywhere, instable small kingdoms duchy's everywhere.
- AI defending against pagans was bugged again and sadly pagan's convertism was bugged too, so pagans stayed strong
- With no ai christian empire antipopes could only be deposed by the player.. which is kind of hard if the player only owns a duchy etc


Most of the stuff and many more bugs are fixed in the current beta. That's why some wrote catholics are strong as ever. In my opinion the only remaining issue with catholics in the current beta is the pope. They "fixed" his excommunication, but for me it feels like its still too much. (It still seems that every time you get at least -1 opinion the pope immediately excommunicates you.)

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

In my Norse game, Francia is divided into over a dozen independent states with many heresies. Catholic's MA has been 0 for a long time. I helped it a bit by helping revolts with my hostile raiders, but it really didn't need a lot of help. I would leave them that way until I deal with Islam and Byzantium.

Case in point.