Converting a Non-Roman Empire to Hellenic

[Mister Dellamorte]

I am currently 250 years in a playthrough in which I wanted to created the Phalaris Bloodline and make a custom Empire from Sicily. I control all of Sicily, Sardina and Corsica, Romagna and almost all of the Kingdom of Italy. I recently start conquering Epirus and have a bit of Greece as tributary. My Empire is almost entirely Greek and Orthodox. It was a lot of fun, but now it starting to get a little boring.

So I was thinking since I have access to the Delve into Classic decision, I could try to revive the Hellenic religion. I fully control two holy sites already (Syrakusa and Rome) and will control two more in the near future. Can I convert my Empire to Reform Hellenic even if I don't plan to recreate the Roman Empire or will it be too much of a pain?

And if it can be done, what do you think will be the best (or more fun) Nature, Doctrines and Leadership when reforming it? For Nature I was thinking may be Unyielding, since I hope to get Holy War by the Christians and the Muslims. I already have the Castellan Bloodline on my character and a Great Wall build in my Capital, so the 20% more levy on top look great. Or do I need to take Proselytizing to help with conversion? As for doctrines, I know for sure I will take Civilized, but I'm not sure about the other one nor which Leadership will be the best.

What do you guys think?


Edits :

- Secret Cults and Satanist are off
- Sorry for all the mistakes, English is not my mother tongue.

 

[Patriarch of Bub]

Of course it can be done!

Unyielding is good, but you only gain the bonus when defending on counties with your religion.
And considering you won't have a single county of hellenic, i suggest you pick proselytising.

If converrting is not your thing, maybe peaceful? Religious tax, would make you swim in money.

Your English is good, don't worry.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

Of course it can be done!

Unyielding is good, but you only gain the bonus when defending on counties with your religion.
And considering you won't have a single county of hellenic, i suggest you pick proselytising.

If converrting is not your thing, maybe peaceful? Religious tax, would make you swim in money.

Your English is good, don't worry.

You're right, proselytising will be better in my case. Religious tax is not a bad idea, but I have Venice and Corsica as merchant republic and don't really have money problem. May be Monasticism? It will help giving me access to all my Hermetic artifact without being in the society. I want to form the Olympian and the Stoic Intelligentsia and be in one of those.

As for Leadership I was thinking Hierocratic for the excommunication.

 

[Dragatus]

The nature of your religion has a hidden effect on the willingness of AI characters to convert the provinces of their realm. Proselytizing nature is the only one that makes them do that consistently. With Unyielding your vassals will only convert their provinces if they have a high ai_zeal attribute, which is a hidden stat that affects AI behaviour. While you can't see ai_zeal directly, you can be pretty sure a character has a high ai_zeal if the character has the Zealous trait.

This can be annoying as you need your vassals to convert their provinces to actually get the full benefit of Unyielding. So Unyielding really works best for small realms that you can manually convert.

For your second doctrine it's largely a matter of personal preference. You can't really go wrong with any of the option, but a few noteworthy picks are:
- Stability: It has synergy with both Astrology and Meritocracy/Civilized, so it can be an attractive option if you want all the synergies.
- Polygamy: It would allow you to get a much bigger pool of potential heirs to choose for designation and you get a lot more options for making marriage pacts with vassals (or foreign rulers)
- Bloodthirsty Gods: This is probably the one doctrine that gives more flavor than any other and would be a thematic match for the Phalaris bloodline. But you can't really go wrong with any of the other options either.

For leadership the logic is as follows:
- Temporal is the default option because you get a fancy hat and can direct great holy wars
- pick Hierocratic if you want to be able to bypass defensive pacts (the war is declared by your vassal, not by you, so defensive pacts aren't triggered) or excommunicate unruly vassals
- pick Autonomous if you don't want to expand any further and would rather get a stat boost
- pick Autocephalous if there are any independent kings of your religion that you want to be able to benefit from having a pet mini-pope

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

- Bloodthirsty Gods: This is probably the one doctrine that gives more flavor than any other and would be a thematic match for the Phalaris bloodline. But you can't really go wrong with any of the other options either.

The problem with Bloodthirsty Gods is that I can either sacrifice a prisoner or throwing him in the brazen bull, but not both.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

How do you form the Stoic Intelligentsia? I see the decision to form the Olympian but not them. Do I need to reform first?

 

[Patriarch of Bub]

You need to reform hellenic or hold roman culture, and you can form the Stoics.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

- Stability: It has synergy with both Astrology and Meritocracy/Civilized, so it can be an attractive option if you want all the synergies.

Does the synergies actually work with Hellenic? I seem to remember people complaining about it.

 

[Dragatus]

I checked the files and indeed the Stability + Meritocracy synergy only works if you actually have Meritocracy. Astrology + Stability does work for reformed Hellenic though.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

I checked the files and indeed the Stability + Meritocracy synergy only works if you actually have Meritocracy. Astrology + Stability does work for reformed Hellenic though.

Do you know what effect the Astrology + Stablility give? The wiki only says : Reading the stars an heir is born under.

 

[Dragatus]

Sorry, I mixed it up. It's Astrology + Haruspicy that works for reformed Hellenic. Astrology + Stability actually doesn't. So it turns out my advice was bad and Stability synergies don't actually work.

As for Astrology + Stability, depending on the Piety and Learning of your character you get a very good, good, bad, or very bad omen. A very good omen gives the child +2 to a random attribute and +15 opinion from your vassals for 20 years. A good omen gives the child +2 health. A bad omen gives -1 health. And finally a very bad omen gives -0.5 health and -15 opinion from your vassals for 20 years.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

Animistic could be a fun doctrine, I normally ignore it because I either take Unyielding or play a pagan religion with a levy bonus. Do you know if Paradox have fix it since Holy Fury?

Edit : Since you made a mod called Animism Fix, I guess the answer is no.

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

Well, it's done. Since I was already an empire, it's was pretty easy to simply convert to Hellenic and keep factions and plots under control even if everyone hated my guts. The Pope basically gave me 10% moral authority for free since he start a crusade against me with very little back-up. The 50% was way easier to get than I thought.

For reformation I took : Proselytizing - Civilized - Polygamy - Hierocratic.

 

[Dragatus]

Animistic could be a fun doctrine, I normally ignore it because I either take Unyielding or play a pagan religion with a levy bonus. Do you know if Paradox have fix it since Holy Fury?

Edit : Since you made a mod called Animism Fix, I guess the answer is no.

My mod is now a few months old, but we've had two patches since and there was no mention of it in any of the patch notes. That said, I haven't actually tested it so I can't say for sure. On the plus side, using my mod should be safe because it's made in such a way that it will automatically disable itself if the problem is fixed.

 

[Patriarch of Bub]

Poligamy? Sad Roman is sad

 

[Dragatus]

I tested Animism and it's still broken.

 

[Sunshine Moon]

Wow, I'm impressed you're going for it without secret cults on--I did this with a custom empire in my most recent game, but I spent years spreading the cult first, and I don't think I could've managed it without that. So...yeah, I'm just impressed, and moreso that it seems like it's working!

 

[Mister Dellamorte]

Well, when you can burn vassal alive in the Brazen Bull for a free +20 opinion to your other vassals, -5% chance of revolt and +10% plot power defence, it's not that hard to just do what you want. And I guess being one of the strongest Empire in the world before converting also help.


Edit : I love my little Brazen Bull so much!