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J.B.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianisation_of_Scotland#Picts

"Conversion of the general population may have stretched into the eighth century." The Celtic paganism of what became Scotland was likely only recently gone or still active at the time of the 769 start, though the elites would have been mostly Christian.

I remember playing the Mount & Blade: Warband mod called Brytenwalda, set during the 630s AD, and I have noticed that only the most northern settlements of the Picts/Fortriu were depicted as having a predominantly pagan population. It could be worth considering to add that to northern Scotland/Pictland, which seems to have still been around in 769. In the same game, I have not noticed any remnants of paganism anywhere else, pertaining to the Celts, but Mercia was still pagan in the 630s.
 

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Was wondering how long it would be till the "MANI PENINSULA" would change to "SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS" in regards to the local flavor of paganism.
 

Aquamancer

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Was wondering how long it would be till the "MANI PENINSULA" would change to "SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS" in regards to the local flavor of paganism.

To be fair, pagan religions are quite interesting, and Celtic paganism has been among the most requested new religions, so it was kind of inevitable that people would start suggesting some ways that'd allow them to play as Celtic pagans without having to resort to using mods.

Speaking of Picts, shouldn't there still be Pictish provinces in 867 bookmark? From what I've read, the assimilation of Pictish culture to Scots Gaelic culture wasn't completed until the 11th century, and contemporary sources describe the king of Scotland in 867, Causantín mac Cináeda, as a Pictish king, so by all logic most of Scotland should still have Pictish culture.
 

Rags17

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Hey, they made one single province Crimean Gothic and another Hellenic 9and one in India Nestorian) so it shouldn't be much to make say the Shetlands or Orkneys Celtic.

The more variety the better !
 

Snow Crystal

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Hey, they made one single province Crimean Gothic and another Hellenic 9and one in India Nestorian) so it shouldn't be much to make say the Shetlands or Orkneys Celtic.

The more variety the better !

There is a certain difference between the two things though. With a culture you can do all of it in Script in an afternoon (at least for minor ones with few characters, whereas a larger one with a lot of character changes would take more time), whereas with religion you need to have art, modify societies to fit, potentially fit in more flavor for the religion, find holy sites etc. There is a sizable difference in the amount of time needed for adding a new religion and a minor culture. Not to mention the fact that you need to have both art and script to be able to add new religions, which is hard for those of us who aren't @Silfae .
 

Xenrek

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There is a certain difference between the two things though. With a culture you can do all of it in Script in an afternoon (at least for minor ones with few characters, whereas a larger one with a lot of character changes would take more time), whereas with religion you need to have art, modify societies to fit, potentially fit in more flavor for the religion, find holy sites etc. There is a sizable difference in the amount of time needed for adding a new religion and a minor culture. Not to mention the fact that you need to have both art and script to be able to add new religions, which is hard for those of us who aren't @Silfae .
Understandable.

Still would be nice to have a western-focused pagan religion to threaten england/spain a little more.
 

Snow Crystal

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Understandable.

Still would be nice to have a western-focused pagan religion to threaten england/spain a little more.

I personally would like to have Celtic paganism in the game as well, particularly after doing some work on it for Imperator. I have considered making it in my spare-time for fun, and try to get it into a patch down the line.
 

Aquamancer

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Understandable.

Still would be nice to have a western-focused pagan religion to threaten england/spain a little more.

For the British Isles, Celtic paganism or Germanic paganism (to simulate Anglo-Saxon religion) would work, but both were by the time of Charlemagne moribund at best, so adding even one pagan province there would be as contentious as the addition of the Hellenic province to Peloponnese to represent the Maniots.

As for Iberia though, there actually happened to be a group who followed pagan polytheism and were a majority in their lands for a significant portion of the game's timespan: the Basques. While the cities of Basque Country appear to have Christianized quite early, the vast majority of the rural population was still pagan for most of the game's timespan, and large-scale conversion of the Basques did not start until the 10th and 11th centuries. Even after conversion efforts started, Vasconic paganism lived side by side with Christianity all the way to 12th-13th century, and possibly even beyond that in smaller, isolated communities. As such, Vasconic paganism could be a good choice for an Iberian pagan religion.
 

neutrondecay

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I think that if and when any more early pagan religions are introduced, it would be wise to have them controlled by rules choices in the same way Hellenism is - just expand the event that removes Hellenism from Monemvasia on startup to remove Celtic paganism from Pictland, etc.

nd
 

Shadoon4

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For the British Isles, Celtic paganism or Germanic paganism (to simulate Anglo-Saxon religion) would work, but both were by the time of Charlemagne moribund at best, so adding even one pagan province there would be as contentious as the addition of the Hellenic province to Peloponnese to represent the Maniots.

As for Iberia though, there actually happened to be a group who followed pagan polytheism and were a majority in their lands for a significant portion of the game's timespan: the Basques. While the cities of Basque Country appear to have Christianized quite early, the vast majority of the rural population was still pagan for most of the game's timespan, and large-scale conversion of the Basques did not start until the 10th and 11th centuries. Even after conversion efforts started, Vasconic paganism lived side by side with Christianity all the way to 12th-13th century, and possibly even beyond that in smaller, isolated communities. As such, Vasconic paganism could be a good choice for an Iberian pagan religion.

Vasconic paganism runs into a serious holy site problem, in that any reasonable placement would have the holy sites if not in a single kingdom (Navarra) then EXTREMELY close together in northern-ish Iberia/Southern France. Thus any Basque Pagan King can be unstoppable quite quickly (capture a small amount of territory, reform, GHW the hell out of your muslim neighbors until you can take on Christians.

The only way around this would (in my mind) to make them already reformed with weak doctrines to compensate (autonomous with Suomenusko +2 intrigue bonus, cosmopolitan, special mechanic, and something else weak) but then you wouldn't have fun playing them
 

Xenrek

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Vasconic paganism runs into a serious holy site problem, in that any reasonable placement would have the holy sites if not in a single kingdom (Navarra) then EXTREMELY close together in northern-ish Iberia/Southern France. Thus any Basque Pagan King can be unstoppable quite quickly (capture a small amount of territory, reform, GHW the hell out of your muslim neighbors until you can take on Christians.

The only way around this would (in my mind) to make them already reformed with weak doctrines to compensate (autonomous with Suomenusko +2 intrigue bonus, cosmopolitan, special mechanic, and something else weak) but then you wouldn't have fun playing them
Yeah that's a legitimate concern. Celtic paganism could get away with 1 per kingdom on the isles, and 1 in brittany, and that would still be fairly powerful/central.

I think the basque's paganism could be balanced In the early bookmark though by requiring basque culture to adopt (already a minority of nobles). Because that would leave you as a small realm sandwiched between a caliphate and a karling.

Though if we actually add Basque paganism, I'd like to see at least one of their unique doctrine's bonuses include equality, if only because it's useless as a basque cultural bonus since the AI never uses it.
 

Kljunas

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I don't know all that much on the topic but afaik Irish missionaries had reached all Pictish areas including Shetland by the 7th century but I guess the extent to which they were converted can be argued.
 

Kljunas

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Vasconic paganism runs into a serious holy site problem, in that any reasonable placement would have the holy sites if not in a single kingdom (Navarra) then EXTREMELY close together in northern-ish Iberia/Southern France. Thus any Basque Pagan King can be unstoppable quite quickly (capture a small amount of territory, reform, GHW the hell out of your muslim neighbors until you can take on Christians.

The only way around this would (in my mind) to make them already reformed with weak doctrines to compensate (autonomous with Suomenusko +2 intrigue bonus, cosmopolitan, special mechanic, and something else weak) but then you wouldn't have fun playing them

idk, it would be strong but also challenging to pull off since you're kinda squeezed in between Christians and Muslims which you'd have to take on to get your holy sites, and with probably only a handful of provinces of your religion at first.
 

Shadoon4

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idk, it would be strong but also challenging to pull off since you're kinda squeezed in between Christians and Muslims which you'd have to take on to get your holy sites, and with probably only a handful of provinces of your religion at first.

Pagan County conquest don't allow co-religious joining and Basque would be relatively strong in most starts compared to surrounding states (especially 1066 when northern Iberia is falling apart)
 

loup99

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Still would be nice to have a western-focused pagan religion to threaten england/spain a little more.
How would a Celtic pagan religion "threaten England/Spain a little more" in the vanilla game? Unless you mean with a random world? This justification doesn't make sense at all. Is your point that the setup should be ahistorical to create fictional "threats"? Because if that is the concern there are many historical factors that could be modelled in before dead religions.
As for Iberia though, there actually happened to be a group who followed pagan polytheism and were a majority in their lands for a significant portion of the game's timespan: the Basques. While the cities of Basque Country appear to have Christianized quite early, the vast majority of the rural population was still pagan for most of the game's timespan, and large-scale conversion of the Basques did not start until the 10th and 11th centuries. Even after conversion efforts started, Vasconic paganism lived side by side with Christianity all the way to 12th-13th century, and possibly even beyond that in smaller, isolated communities. As such, Vasconic paganism could be a good choice for an Iberian pagan religion.
The issue is that this rural population is not the nobility which would be as courtiers in any court and is not a majority in any province. Therefore in CK2, which doesn't represent the peasantry or religious minorities, Vasconic Paganism does not fit on the map.
 
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Aquamancer

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Vasconic paganism runs into a serious holy site problem, in that any reasonable placement would have the holy sites if not in a single kingdom (Navarra) then EXTREMELY close together in northern-ish Iberia/Southern France. Thus any Basque Pagan King can be unstoppable quite quickly (capture a small amount of territory, reform, GHW the hell out of your muslim neighbors until you can take on Christians.

The only way around this would (in my mind) to make them already reformed with weak doctrines to compensate (autonomous with Suomenusko +2 intrigue bonus, cosmopolitan, special mechanic, and something else weak) but then you wouldn't have fun playing them

I agree, the holy site placement is problematic, though not something that cannot be overcome. Romuva and Zunism are both small pagan religions, and while some of their holy sites are within one kingdom or at its border (Romuva has two holy sites in Lithuania and a third one right next to it, while Zunists already own one holy site and a second one is right next to them), both religions have holy sites that are distant or very hard to conquer: Zunist holy sites in Cairo, Nishapur and Multan are controlled by either the Abbasids or one of their tributaries, making conquering the provinces quite challenging; and Romuva's last two holy sites are in Bryansk (quite deep in Russia), and Rana (in Pomerania), though neither are that hard to gain access to.

In addition, in the mod When the World Stopped Making Sense, which includes Vasconic paganism, the holy sites are placed somewhat like Romuva, with three holy sites near Navarra and the last two further away: the holy sites are in Navarra (d_navarra, k_navarra), Asturias de Santillana (d_castile, k_castile/asturias), Toulouse (d_toulouse, k_aquitaine), Cadiz (d_seville, k_andalusia) and Roma (d_latium, k_romagna).

Finally, it is worth noting that while thee Basque were during the Middle Ages limited to the region around the Bay of Biscay, during earlier periods of time they were spread much further in Gascony and Iberia, so if push comes to shove, holy sites could be introduced to provinces which haven't had Basque presence since the Roman era. So with this in mind, I would probably place the holy sites a bit like this: one in Navarra (either Viscaya, Nájera or Navarra), another relatively close, either in Iberia or Aquitaine; third one a bit further away in the region that wasn't chosen: and the last two in some distant location in Iberia and Western Europe, respectively.

And yeah, Vasconic paganism would be partially balanced by its difficult starting position, either lodged between Francia and the Umayyads, or France and the Spanish kingdoms. An independent pagan Basque realm could wind up easily holy-warred into oblivion, much like Zunists.

The issue is that this rural population is not the nobility which would be as courtiers in any court and is not a majority in any province. Therefore in CK2, which doesn't represent the peasantry or religious minorities, Vasconic Paganism does not fit on the map.

Province culture and religion are meant to represent the culture and religion of a given region's population and peasantry; not the culture and religion of the nobility who rule over the region. Do also remember that the rural population does usually make up the majority of a given region's population: especially in Navarra, which wasn't a particularly urbanized region during the Middle Ages. As such, the Christian nobility and city dwellers would probably be the minority in comparison to the pagan rural population, especially given how there weren't serious attempts to convert the rural population until the 10th-11th century, and even then, the pagan communities persisted for centuries. So to summarise: no, Vasconic paganism would perfectly fit on the map. The situation would probably be best represented by having Christian Basque rulers govern over pagan provinces, and giving Vasconic pagan provinces "hard to convert" modifier, similar to Romuva and Bön.

And yes, while courtiers are primarily meant to represent the nobility and the upper echelon of a given region's society, they can represent any noteworthy character interacting with the rulers, and as such, courtiers aren't all necessarely members of the nobility, as there are several ways for lowborn characters to become members of the court in-game, be it via events or being generated randomly over time. I also want to point out that there's a mention of a Basque warrior called "Saltan, knight of the pagans" in Umayyad sources, so I think it wouldn't be that big of a stretch to assume that notable rural community leaders and pagan warriors could've become part of the Christian Basque rulers' courts.
 
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loup99

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Province culture and religion is meant to represent the culture and religion of a given region's population and peasantry; not the culture and religion of the nobility who rule over the region. In addition, the rural population does usually make up the majority of a given region's population: especially in Navarra, which wasn't a particularly urbanized region. As such, the Christian nobility and city dwellers would probably be the minority in comparison to the pagan rural population. So to summarise: no, Vasconic paganism would fit on the map. The situation would probably be best represented by having Christian rulers govern over pagan provinces.
Interesting claim, what source do you base it upon?
And yes, while courtiers are meant to represent the nobility and the upper echelon of a given region's society, as well. However, courtiers aren't all necessarely members of the nobility, as there are several ways for lowborn characters to become members of the court in-game, be it via events or being generated randomly.
All lowborn courtiers are generated for a reason, there are very few generations of a lowborn peasant courtier with no further context.
I also want to point out that there's a mention of a Basque warrior called "Saltan, knight of the pagans" in Umayyad sources, so I think it wouldn't be that big of a stretch to assume that notable rural community leaders and pagan warriors could've become part of the Christian Basque rulers' courts.
Also interesting, especially to analyse if this is a reliable portrayal or if it is the external eye of the Ummayad source that distorts it in interpretation or trying to legitimise a fight.
 
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Straigthtsilver

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How about instead of the glut of attention that paganism seemingly gets non-stop, Paradox instead focuses on the Christians and Muslims who haven't gotten attention in some cases since Sword of Islam and its patches were released? And, you know, they were the religions actually relevant for 99% of the game's timeframe everywhere outside of India and Northern Europe.

Seriously, all of the Christian religions outside of Catholicism now have a tenth the flavour and attention that most of the pagans get. The Orthodox/Miaphysite patriarchate system makes no sense, and the Ecumenical Patriarch is bizarrely both too strong and too weak by being both a powerful head of religion who often bulldozes the local patriarchates (especially the Pentarchy, and it makes no sense that no bishops for them exist unless held by an Orthodox power) while also incapable of being replaced by willful emperors (as was often the case).

Then you have ridiculous cases like "Iconoclast" being considered its own religion, as if its entire existence was predicated on destroying things rather than, you know, being a difference of doctrine paired with socio-political factionalism in the ERE. Having an in-depth Church Council system could be hugely interesting for Eastern Christianity, but instead we get a updated "pagan reformation" system, for religions that historically were completely irrelevant past the first couple start dates.

Muslims are arguably in an even worse position, still being saddled with the bizarre "Decadence" system and barely representing any of the nuances of basically any flavour of Islam outside of the simplistic Ashari/Mu'Tazilite split. Sunnis and Shias are almost indistinguishable, while their heresies are a mixture of ahistorical (Zikris) and religions that shouldn't even be included in the Muslim group (Druze, Yazidi).

This isn't to say that "fantasy" options like pagan reformations shouldn't exist, I'll fully admit its an interesting gaming mechanic. But at the same time, I think it's time Paradox stops pandering to the vocal part of the community demanding neverending pagan flavour for increasingly obscure religions and instead focus on the faiths that actually defined the period the game was set in.
 
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Shadoon4

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I agree, the holy site placement is problematic, though not something that cannot be overcome. Romuva and Zunism are both small pagan religions, and while some of their holy sites are within one kingdom or at its border (Romuva has two holy sites in Lithuania and a third one right next to it, while Zunists already own one holy site and a second one is right next to them), both religions have holy sites that are distant or very hard to conquer: Zunist holy sites in Cairo, Nishapur and Multan are controlled by either the Abbasids or one of their tributaries, making conquering the provinces quite challenging; and Romuva's last two holy sites are in Bryansk (quite deep in Russia), and Rana (in Pomerania), though neither are that hard to gain access to.

In addition, in the mod When the World Stopped Making Sense, which includes Vasconic paganism, the holy sites are placed somewhat like Romuva, with three holy sites near Navarra and the last two further away: the holy sites are in Navarra (d_navarra, k_navarra), Asturias de Santillana (d_castile, k_castile/asturias), Toulouse (d_toulouse, k_aquitaine), Cadiz (d_seville, k_andalusia) and Roma (d_latium, k_romagna).

Finally, it is worth noting that while thee Basque were during the Middle Ages limited to the region around the Bay of Biscay, during earlier periods of time they were spread much further in Gascony and Iberia, so if push comes to shove, holy sites could be introduced to provinces which haven't had Basque presence since the Roman era. So with this in mind, I would probably place the holy sites a bit like this: one in Navarra (either Viscaya, Nájera or Navarra), another relatively close, either in Iberia or Aquitaine; third one a bit further away in the region that wasn't chosen: and the last two in some distant location in Iberia and Western Europe, respectively.

And yeah, Vasconic paganism would be partially balanced by its difficult starting position, either lodged between Francia and the Umayyads, or France and the Spanish kingdoms. An independent pagan Basque realm could wind up easily holy-warred into oblivion, much like Zunists.



Province culture and religion are meant to represent the culture and religion of a given region's population and peasantry; not the culture and religion of the nobility who rule over the region. Do also remember that the rural population does usually make up the majority of a given region's population: especially in Navarra, which wasn't a particularly urbanized region during the Middle Ages. As such, the Christian nobility and city dwellers would probably be the minority in comparison to the pagan rural population, especially given how there weren't serious attempts to convert the rural population until the 10th-11th century, and even then, the pagan communities persisted for centuries. So to summarise: no, Vasconic paganism would perfectly fit on the map. The situation would probably be best represented by having Christian Basque rulers govern over pagan provinces, and giving Vasconic pagan provinces "hard to convert" modifier, similar to Romuva and Bön.

And yes, while courtiers are primarily meant to represent the nobility and the upper echelon of a given region's society, they can represent any noteworthy character interacting with the rulers, and as such, courtiers aren't all necessarely members of the nobility, as there are several ways for lowborn characters to become members of the court in-game, be it via events or being generated randomly over time. I also want to point out that there's a mention of a Basque warrior called "Saltan, knight of the pagans" in Umayyad sources, so I think it wouldn't be that big of a stretch to assume that notable rural community leaders and pagan warriors could've become part of the Christian Basque rulers' courts.

While you draw reasonable conclusions, Cairo's placement for Zunist is made up for gameplay (Heliopolis historically == Sun stuff right?) and the use of Rome in WtWSMS is also nonsense, there hasn't been Pre-indoeuropean groups in Italy for 5000 years. Romuva uses historical holy sites in an effective way, as does Suomensusko (both of which have larger historic ranges than their more modern ranges at game starts) and thus have some basis in history.

Unlike them Basque pagans are unattested outside of the Pyrenean region since before there was written history about the region, thus placing any holy site outside of that range makes ZERO sense (much in the case of my biggest holy site grip Cairo for Zun). And unlike the Zun case the Basque historic range consists of a much much smaller region (Gascony+Navarra vs. All of historic Afghanistan) and this is where your suggested holy sites run into big problems, 1) in Navarra, 2) Gascony 3) ???? 4),5) All of Western Europe is an option? If you cant even give 3 reasonably distant locations that also make historical sense then Basque is going to be way too strong as soon as it comes into existence for a Paganism that while resistant to conversion had little conventional religious authority