Catholics aiding Muslims — threat level?

[PoeticShaman]

Briefly poked around the internet for an answer to this and couldn’t come up with a solid explanation. I’m currently emperor of a good chunk of Europe and Africa. Threat level is at 81%. Declaring holy war on the Muslim tribes all the way down in Ghana results in almost every faction in the game — catholic, orthodox and otherwise declaring war on me.

Is this intended? Because it has got to be one of the most absurdly immersion breaking and frustrating mechanics I’ve encountered in this game yet. Why are the knights templar defending Muslim tribesman against me? I’m a crusader emperor with enough piety to make Jesus jealous! It’s silly.

 

[vandevere]

Play with the Threat turned off in Game Rules. It won't disable Achievements.

 

[PoeticShaman]

Guess it’s time to edit another save...

 

[Sunshine Moon]

If that's something you want to remove, the advice above is the way to go, but just to clarify, this is WAD (though you're free to feel that's silly); as the tooltip under the "threatening!" alert says, the thresholds are:

5%: Defensive pacts form (one per religion group)
50%: The different defensive pacts of different religious groups will band together (except yours)
75%: All religious groups band together
100%: Even your religious head & holy orders will get in on it

 

[Karlington]

If that's something you want to remove, the advice above is the way to go, but just to clarify, this is WAD (though you're free to feel that's silly); as the tooltip under the "threatening!" alert says, the thresholds are:

5%: Defensive pacts form (one per religion group)
50%: The different defensive pacts of different religious groups will band together (except yours)
75%: All religious groups band together
100%: Even your religious head & holy orders will get in on it

The last one should be 95%. Otherwise correct.

If you can't remember this, @PoeticShaman, you can hover over your threat or the alert in-game and it will tell you.

 

[danest]

I understand why defensive pacts were put into the game -- mostly to stop players who are "unnaturally" good at "blobbing" and painting the whole world their own color, with an efficiency that would make Alexander the Great or Genghis khan envious.
But the defensive pacts malfunction sometimes, badly. I've read stories online of the pope and a muslim nation forming a defensive pact out of an often very real and justified fear that that player going to easily kill them both in the next few years -- but then the pope might still declare a crusade on the muslims, and then attack you when you join that crusade, because of the defensive pact. It's a mess that needs to be reviewed.

 

[Sunshine Moon]

Yeah, I agree with you that more nuance would improve the system. Like, given the Knights Templar's mission statement, they probably shouldn't come to the defence of the Sunni Caliph if he's being attacked by a Christian realm no matter what. But another neighbouring, even non-Islamic ruler who's in very real danger of being swallowed next should definitely help if threat is high enough. I'm not sure how one would implement that nuance, but if there's a way, it would be good.

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

Briefly poked around the internet for an answer to this and couldn’t come up with a solid explanation. I’m currently emperor of a good chunk of Europe and Africa. Threat level is at 81%. Declaring holy war on the Muslim tribes all the way down in Ghana results in almost every faction in the game — catholic, orthodox and otherwise declaring war on me.

Is this intended? Because it has got to be one of the most absurdly immersion breaking and frustrating mechanics I’ve encountered in this game yet. Why are the knights templar defending Muslim tribesman against me? I’m a crusader emperor with enough piety to make Jesus jealous! It’s silly.

Yes, because Paradox relies on external threat to keep realms from blobbing ahistorically out of control.

A solution that is flawed. If you beat the world at 40% vs 60% the next war will be easier 41% vs 59%. Repeat ad nauseum.

If they had the balls to make internal threats an actual threat they wouldn't need this cheesy threat mechanic to contain blobbing. But players *really* dislike the idea of their realm splitting up (or just loss in general,) and Paradox caved enough to give us massive realms that even the AI could run for centuries without collapse.

 

[Al Davoodi]

Yeah maybe some sanctions by the pope that he would be okay with it, and ppl of your faith will get some problems with the pope if they still join the war against you. But for having the pope good faith in your actions maybe some other area, needs to get independent. Has to be part of the church our giving to a holy order, depending on the plans of the pope. So somehow more and deeper diplomacy in the game.