Reformation / Religious League Issues

[AlbTroll]

Since Art of war I have only played a few games, I have been trying to play longer / until the end, so I don't have a lot of data but in almost all the games I have played the new Centers of Reformation seem to have some issues in my opinion.

01. Location(s)

I guess my biggest concern is England and Scotland in almost EVERY game since Art of War I have played England and Scotland have gotten the first two centers of reformation with England usually getting the first. This first center is usually on the boarder with Scotland and converts a Scottish Province first and immediately after that first conversion Scotland goes Protestant getting the Second center. This usually results in two Protestant centers within 2 provinces of each other in the northern half of Great Britain... The third center has about 50% of the time for me ended up in Sweden. So basically in my games having a Protestant Center of Reformation even in the HRE is about a coin flip...

In my latest game as Brandenburg I had taken Mecklenburg, Pomerania, and almost all of the Teutonic Order (save Chelmno which I let Poland have for helping with the Knights) within MONTHS of the Reformation Event Popup I changed to Protestant, I had to convert this quickly because as soon as the event fired England and Scotland had their Centers already... wtf.

My Center (as Brandenburg) ended up in Warmia... way out in the east. Yes Prussian was an accepted culture for me thanks to Danzig but how did in not end up in my capital or even in a HRE Province.

Because my center was way out in Warmia virtually no other HRE members became Protestant (again the first two centers where in Great Britain). Eventually a Reformed Catholic Center just appeared in Brandenburg (Yay for a random steam achievement....). But then I had a Reformed Catholic center blocking off Protestant from the heart of the HRE. Eventually the Protestant center in England tagged East Frisia (still OPM) and I got a two province Bohemia to convert to the True Faith but that was my entire Protestant League.

<For Paradox>
---How does the game determine where a country's center is located?
---Why isn't it automatically the capital?
---Is there a max/min base tax for these centers?
---Is there any bias for HRE Provinces and if not why not?
</For Paradox>

02. Range
I have been looking around for information about this but do Centers of Reformation have a range?

The centers that always end up in England and Scotland only seem to Convert the British Isles and maybe a half dozen coastal provinces in Europe and Norway. My Warmia Center only seemed to convert a 1-3 province ring on its side of the Baltic. It didn't really try and get Sweden and largely petered out after converting my Teutonic lands and a few Polish provinces. It didn't even bother to work on Lithuania even though it was only 2 Provinces away...

If there is a range shouldn't the range of the Center be increased with the base tax of the Province? (Larger city more influence) or based on the total base tax of the Nation controlling the Center?

03. Benefits / Support of Centers of Reformation.

The only current benefit you get from having a Center of Reformation in your Country is a "free missionary" you can't control. I don't think you should get to control where your Center of Reformation operates but I think it would be nice to be able to "influence" its behavior.

---Giving the Center more "power" if the country it is in has the same religion.
---The option to spend ducats or dare I say it Diplo/Admin Points to "support" the movement.
---Suggest a target region for conversion.

04. MISC

---I don't really have an issue with either Scotland or England having a bias towards wanting to move away from Catholic but... Scotland should maybe get an event to turn them Reformed over Protestant
---England might also benefit from an event that might keep the AI from grabbing an early center of reformation but provide for unique benefits for an Anglican Church to be formed. If the Anglican Church isn't going to be separate from "Protestant", "Reformed", "Coptic", "Orthodox" or "Catholic" in game, push them toward Reformed VS. Protestant. Though I would really like to see Anglican be its own designation.
---Support conversion of your Vassals or help prevent it.

 

[yerm]

01 The first one really does seem to be random. I've actually never seen the first center for either pop in the isles, but I've seen Norway twice. Depending on location, I usually see all the protestant centers go in months and the reformed in under a year, so yeah, it's something you can definitely miss if you wait (or are locked in a war). I don't believe there's any HRE or base tax bias; there may be a formula, but it is surely arbitrary. I know it's not 100% random; I had a center pop in siena and tried reloading; NOPE still pops there.

02 The range seems to be neighbors and catholic counties of non-Catholic countries. So, if you convert to reformed but are too late to grab a center, I believe other centers (both protestant and reformed) go absolutely nuts all over your land. This results in things like almost every game I see Rome converted. It also means if someone like a successful England and Denmark grab centers, there becomes plenty of converted area, while if all 3 fall into the middle of the HRE you don't see them do much!

03 It WOULD be nice if centers had more cost and control; reformation could be spawned by event and centers from there from DotF or other costly choices rather than just the first nobodies to grab it. My experience is I WISH England etc. would convert immediately; instead, it's usually the OPM who spawns it converts a neighbor, who is now likely at least 25% protestant, converts, spawns the other one a couple counties away... anything that removes pure chance elements and increases cost vs benefit interactions would be a good thing in my book.

04 I do think there's a bias. I see frequently Protestant England and Denmark, and Reformed Switzerland and Scotland. I assumed there was some weighted modifier that could even be looked up in change similar to how countries favor various things in the game.

The lack of ability to influence vassal religion is annoying. I also consider forcing conversion to be the same as annexing in cost is awful. Force conversion should NEVER cost over 100%, it needs to be an option no matter what, and ideally it should be more along the lines of the flat rate (60% for trade, 15% MA, etc.) that other similar peace deals are handled with. I should be able to force convert vassals at perhaps an opinion malus or a big loss of contributions, and I should be able to convert an enemy without it being simpler to eat them and convert myself.