Converting religions in provinces?!

[Rommel22]

Hi,

Right now I got a huge empire (ottoman empire). I have lost of provinces and I got 3 saperate religions spaning the empire. I want to convert some of them using the missioneries. I tried, but some of those provinces give me 20% chance or 17% chance and so on.

So my question is:
How can I improve my chances of converting those provinces? How can I get that 20% to be maybe 50% or 70%?

Thanx in advance!

 

[unmerged(1609)]

Not much of a chance. You could improve your odds by slaughtering part of a province population.

 

[Idiotboy]

Originally posted by Jan Zamojski
Not much of a chance. You could improve your odds by slaughtering part of a province population.

Good choice. No really there is no realistical way to improve the odds....yet.

 

[Rommel22]

Thanx for the response.

I hope in the next patch maybe, there will be a way to improve your chances of a converting provinces. Like maybe sending more missionarys to one province. For example, you have one missionary and your chances of concverting that province is 20%. You can send another missionary, that would bump up the chance to 30% or 35%.

I think something like that would help.

 

[Idiotboy]

Originally posted by Rommel22
Thanx for the response.

I hope in the next patch maybe, there will be a way to improve your chances of a converting provinces. Like maybe sending more missionarys to one province. For example, you have one missionary and your chances of concverting that province is 20%. You can send another missionary, that would bump up the chance to 30% or 35%.

I think something like that would help.

Thats is a pretty good idea. Even though it would be more expensive long term it would save considerable time. Post in the wish-forum.

 

[Grunthex]

I'm not even sure how much effect killing off population has. If the province culture is not a national culture, there seems to be a straight 1/2 penalty. So if you'd normally have 60% chance, it cuts it to 30%.

For me, converting non-state cultures is ALWAYS 20-30% success. State cultures are 40-60%. If population is making the difference in that 10%, that's it. Nothing else seems to improve it (I've heard that monarch dip rating does, but it doesn't reflect in the percentages, and I haven't noticed it.)

 

[unmerged(5978)]

I think there should be some restrictions on this. Historically, no province was ever converted from Islam to Christianity. I am reading about Jesuits attempts to converted Coptic christians to RC- completely undermined society structure.

 

[Shadowstrike]

Monarchs with high adminstrative (when the actual conversion is about to occur, not when you start it, can boost the chance by about 5 - 10%. Otherwise, start. Then, before it finshs, save. Reload as needed. Not that I'd stoop so low, but if its desperate.... Or edit the saved game.

 

[unmerged(4953)]

Historically, no province was ever converted from Islam to Christianit

Yes but Historicly the Ottomans simply re-located the Christian populations to Asia minor and then colonised the provinces . The game wont let one do that so missionaries is the next best thing although imo it would be nice if I could have a "trade population" option.

 

[Idiotboy]

Originally posted by ZheShiWO

Yes but Historicly the Ottomans simply re-located the Christian populations to Asia minor and then colonised the provinces . The game wont let one do that so missionaries is the next best thing although imo it would be nice if I could have a "trade population" option.

Well I think many would have a problem with an ethnical cleansing option so I´m pretty happy the way it is.

 

[Ebusitanus]

That's odd, I always thought the Bosnian moslems where basically moslem Slavs and not Turk stock. Same goes for Greece. Do you have any hard evidence on your claim?
About no provinces being converted back...The muslim population in Spain was basically still the same stock that converted to moslem in the 700's and although big numbers to them decided to keep their faith in the 1400'-1500', therby being subjected to deportations to North Africa, the vast majority, after some coaction, went back to Christianity.

There is also the "increased" conversion percentage of Pagan nations in America. A Spanish monk can do the job for 60%.
I have had the odd situation where I had two monks on the same province converting but they had no cumlative effect. When one failed the other kept on converting (time counting from when you placed him not when the first failed). This also applies to succesful conversions in the first try, the other monk will still do his work even when not needed anymore.

 

[Vormaerin]

Well, there was a significant conversion from Christianity to Islam in the Ottoman Empire as well. However, this wasn't really a function of missionary work. Basically, all christian subjects of the Porte had to pay special taxes and were subject to the janissary draft (where a certain percentage of the young boys in each christian village were taken away to be trained as Janissaries). Political perferment was also restricted to Moslems. All of these things could be escaped simply by converting to Islam, which was a relatively hassle free thing to do. Combine this with the fact that medieval christian lay education was abysmal and you can see why those provinces changed over time.

Christian rulers tended to believe that alternate faiths were inherently seditious, so they tried to actively crush them rather than let them melt away. No Islamic province was ever converted to Christianity for a couple of reasons. The main one is that no Christian power in this time period actually gained lasting control of any Moslem province (Iberia being the main exception). That didn't really happen until the later colonial period, when governments weren't much concerned about the religions of their colonials. Its also true that all the moslem provinces has significant christian populations, since they had started Christian to begin with. So most of the people willing to endure second class citizenship over religious matters were already Christian.

Aloha
Vormaerin

 

[Ebusitanus]

So, is there any basis to ZheShiWO's line of massive christian relocation to Asia minor and subsequent colonization by Turks of those conquered Balkan provinces? I don't think so but would love to hear where that idea comes from.

 

[PMLF]

I read somewhere that half of Kazan population converted from Islam to Christianity after Russian conquest. Also, almost all Muslims in Serbia and Montenegro converted to Christianity after Serbia and Montenegro achieved independence.

 

[Vormaerin]

Well, there is some basis to it. I think he overstates the case, though, at least in relation to province conversion. Mehmed II forcibly repopulated Istanbul shortly after the conquest of Byzantium. The Rumelian and Anatolian governors were required to send 4000 families to occupy abandoned sections of the city. Other provinces like Trebizond were subject to such drafts later. Merchants and artisans from conquered cities often required to relocate to the capital as well.

There are other instances as well, along with the Janissary drafts and such. But mass relocation for religious reasons wasn't any sort of sustained Ottoman policy.

Aloha
Vormaerin

 

[unmerged(5934)]

IMHO there is no historical base to say that muslim provinces never did convert to Christianism, because the only place that I know where political domain passed from muslim states to christian ones before the XVIII century was the Iberian Peninsula,and that is exactly what happened. Up to a certain extent muslims migrated south, first to Granada and then to Africa and the Near East (in fact the existence of Granada probably helped the process, providing a way out for the more militant muslims), but the majority stayed and converted well before 1492. There is no way that the christian populations from the northern kingdoms could have multiplied so fast as to populate all of the Peninsula in that period of time.

 

[PMLF]

Originally posted by Alatriste
IMHO there is no historical base to say that muslim provinces never did convert to Christianism, because the only place that I know where political domain passed from muslim states to christian ones before the XVIII century was the Iberian Peninsula,and that is exactly what happened. Up to a certain extent muslims migrated south, first to Granada and then to Africa and the Near East (in fact the existence of Granada probably helped the process, providing a way out for the more militant muslims), but the majority stayed and converted well before 1492. There is no way that the christian populations from the northern kingdoms could have multiplied so fast as to populate all of the Peninsula in that period of time.

Many people from France and Germany fought against the Moors during the Iberian Reconquista and they probably were absorbed by Spanish population. But, of course many Muslims (and Jews) converted to Christianity too.

Spain was not the only land conquered by Muslims that turned back to Christianity. What about Sicily, Malta, Most of Modern Russia and the Balkans?

In all these lands, many Muslims converted to Christianity.

 

[unmerged(5435)]

Yes, Modern Russia seems to be a good example of Muslim converts to Christianity. What about Crimea? Thats Ukrianian now, used to be Russian, and before that Tatar and Muslim right? I'm pretty sure its Christian now. Other than that, I don't think so. There would have been no Muslims in the Balkans if it weren't for conversions, I don't think Serbs ect converting back in a sense counts. Interesting how still today there is so little reception of Christianity by Bosnians and Albanians for example.
What about places around Indonesia? Were those areas originally native religions or Islam? Many are now Catholic; the Phillipines, E. Timor ect.
Whats really interesting in the game are "Turkish Orthodox" provinces. I don't understand that for the life of me.

 

[unmerged(7086)]

I am Bosnian and there is no evidence that any of my ancestors are Turkish. Turks never populated Bosnia but Bosnians in other hand did go to Turkey after Austria annexed us and right now there are about 2 million ethnic Bosnians living in Turkey. Regarding the Bosnian conversion to Islam it happened pretty fast without any use of force because most of the Bosnians were regarded as heretics by the Vatican. They were so called "Bogumils" who also existed in Bulgaria and Southern France and followers of Church of Bosnia who were independent from both Bisantium and the Vatican. They were some kind of Christians who didn't allow any use of icons or any pictures of God and they also didn't regard Virgin Mary as a holly figure and many other things that the Pope took serious enough to ask the Hungarians to wage a "minor crussade" against Bosnia. Hungarians beat the Bosnians and they executed most of the Nobels that didn't want to convert to Catholicism. Bosnian King converted just to get Hungary of his back also but in fact he continued to follow his old beliefs and "Church of Bosnia" and the Bogumils continued to exist in Bosnia. So when the Turks conquered Bosnia the nobles who wanted ofcourse to retain they titles and who didn't like the catholics in the first place converted to Islam and most of the population followed their lead. Now there is much debate about the Serbs living in Bosnia right now because many people were Orthodox Christians back in those days and in a Document signed by Bosnian King Stjepan Tvrtko and the Duke of Dubrovnik/Ragusa the King of Bosnia calls all his subjects as Bosniaks (Bosnjani) and there were even some nobles who were Orthodox Christians and served the Bosnian King. Some people think that todays Serbs living in Bosnia are actually Bosniaks who remained Orthodox Christians and represented about 50% of the population back in those days but ofcourse nobody wants to take their right to selfdetermination away from them. If they want to be Serbs like the people from our neighboring country it's all good because Muslims who live in Serbia in the region of Sandzak which covers parts of Serbia and Montenegro call themselves Bosnians. In fact those are the Serbs who kept Islam as their religion after Serbia gained it's independence and because Bosnia is the only Slavic country with Muslim majority and they speak our language they consider themselves a part of us just like Orthodox Christians in Bosnia are identifying with their religious brothers from the east. Actually not many Serbs did convert to Islam in Serbia except in those regions bordering Bosnia so there were not many Serbs who converted back to Christianity because there were not many of them who converted to Islam in the first place unless they were kidnaped as children and raised as janissaries. Anyways to make things clear Ebusitanus is right when he calls Bosnians as not Turks but Muslim Slavs. We have Slavic last names we speak the Slavic language but we were not Slavs originaly but a group of Ilyric tribes who with time mixed with the newcomers that came to that region. They eventually adpated the Slavic language and customs like the Montenegrians did who are also ofsprings of many Ilyric tribes. There are couple of documents in Turkey preserved from Byzantium writen by byzantine emperor Konstantin Porfirogenet in year 948 AD talking about land Basina(Bosnia) about it's church about it's people and all other National identifications. Year 948! That means way before the Sebs and Croats came to that area and before either Catholics or Eastern Orthodox churches could establish their dominance. With time Serbs became more Influenced by the Eastern orthodox religion and the Croats who vere vassalised by the Hungary adopted Catholicism but we the Bosnians remained mostly what could be called as Bosnain Christians and Bogumils untill Turks came. People who wonder why Bosniaks are not so villing to convert to Christianity after all these years since the Otoman Empire left Bosnia should know that as first we didn't identify neither with the Catholics nor the Orthodox Christians and our neighboring countries (Serbia which is mostly Christian Orthodox) would like to claim Bosnia as it's own and Bosniaks as Serbs who became Muslims while the Croats who are Catholics are trying to do the same claiming us as part of them and as being Croats. If we had changed our religion whatever we would have chosen we would have probably been assimilated either by Serbia or Croatia. Keeping Islam was the only way to retain our National identity after years of missinformation and attempts to make Bosniaks forget who we were and who we are. For example after the Kingdom of Serbs Croats and Slovenians was formed in 1918 Bosnians were not even recognised as a national or Ethnic group in that country and we were forced to be registerd either as Serbs or Croats and we had to do that untill 1974 when Tito gave us the right to call ourselves as Moslems and recognised "Moslem" as a nationality but he didn't allow us to call ourselves as Bosniaks either. Our School system never thought us about Bosnian history we just knew things about Serbia and Croatia and we got some little info on Slovenia but we never learned about Bosnia as a independent nation with it's King it's army it's church it's curency and so on all as an attempt by Serbs to make us believe that we are in fact Serbs or Croats that we belong to them. That changed ofcourse after Bosnia became independent once again and we are proud to call ourselves Bosniaks once again and be recognised as such and we are proud to be Muslims, we will remain Muslims Inshallah and we will step in front of the allmighty God as such.

 

[unmerged(7086)]

Damn I didn't realise i wrote this much. Must be the emotions running high. Sorry people!