Spanish Holy Orders

[Kaiser Ludwig]

I'm wondering... we have the Big Three being the Hospitaller, Templar and Teutonic Orders, but what about the Orders of Santiago (early XII C.), Calatrava (1164), and Alcantara (1154) for about the same time period?

Would it be possible to see them in the Peninsula in a future patch? Modding them in could be easy, but I have absolutely 0 chance of doing it myself specially with regards to the Coats of Arms, even if they're freely availabe in the Wiki...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Santiago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Calatrava
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Alcántara
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Montesa

They could be "mini" Holy Orders, perhaps... maybe Santiago being fully fledged with a full 7,700, but the other three with half that? This is not only historical, but they could expand the lifetime of the AI-Spanish Kingdoms... if they aren't wiped out sooner.

Might have to make them only hirable by Iberian Culture or Holders of Duke or above level titles in Hispania, though, to prevent them being used too much in the Orient and fuel a Catholic Steamroller...

Anyways, thoughts?

 

[Sleight of Hand]

I've seen this suggested before several times, and to me it seems like a good idea. Limiting them to Christians in the Iberian/Latin culture groups may be an idea.

 

[AJ2009]

I've seen this suggested before several times, and to me it seems like a good idea. Limiting them to Christians in the Iberian/Latin culture groups may be an idea.

+1 great idea

 

[Kaiser Ludwig]

I've seen this suggested before several times, and to me it seems like a good idea. Limiting them to Christians in the Iberian/Latin culture groups may be an idea.

Latin includes French, so that's a bit of a problem, blue blob again.

Yeah I've seen a lot of generic threads with that request, but now I've put links to the spiffy names and COAs! That counts!

 

[unmerged(494787)]

The problem is I'm not sure if you can limit Holy Orders that way under current mechanics... you could make them vassal mercenaries of the spanish kingdoms, but then they'll fight other christians.

 

[Comradebot]

I don't like it. It's by no means a guarantee that the Iberian states fall, and if they don't then they'll cause the typical mid-game collapse of Islam to be all the more expedited.


And it doesn't do anything to solve the fact that even if they do fall (or even if they don't), the HRE and/or France WILL gobble up Iberia and North Africa.

 

[No idea]

Any help ai gets would be welcomed, be cuase iberian states are always eaten in my games. And it would be cool and historical having acces to mini holy orders

 

[unmerged(467597)]

The problem is I'm not sure if you can limit Holy Orders that way under current mechanics... you could make them vassal mercenaries of the spanish kingdoms, but then they'll fight other christians.

Do vassalized holy orders fight other Catholics?

 

[Chlodio]

Great idea Kaiser Ludwig, I'm adding them into my mod. I'm going to give you credits from idea.

 

[Francis II]

It would be good to balance the strength of the Iberian Muslims. Could be a nice add-on to a DLC that deals with the Catholic Church.

 

[Sleight of Hand]

The problem is I'm not sure if you can limit Holy Orders that way under current mechanics... you could make them vassal mercenaries of the spanish kingdoms, but then they'll fight other christians.

You can easily add the Iberian culture group as a hire trigger, and holy orders won't fight non-heretical Christians.

 

[stormblind]

You can easily add the Iberian culture group as a hire trigger, and holy orders won't fight non-heretical Christians.

Not entirely true, they wont fight non-heretical CATHOLICS. They will happily smash into the Byzantines or other orthodox groups.

 

[lemonsquid]

Although it would be nice to see the smaller orders shown in the game. My most recent Kingdom of Aquitaine game has shown that the Iberians are much stronger then previous versions. Castille managed to take 5/6ths of northern Iberia, without the help of outside forces such as me. Funny how they are now led by de Normandie and are Cathars, but they still survived Muslim onslaught.

 

[Sleight of Hand]

Not entirely true, they wont fight non-heretical CATHOLICS. They will happily smash into the Byzantines or other orthodox groups.

Ah, well I never knew that. Still, if they're anything like the ones in Kingdom of Heaven then I can very well imagine they'd fight most people.

 

[victimizer]

No thanks. Catholics are ridicolously overpowered already: sure, the muslims usually take spain, but by mid-game, you usually have German north africa, English spain and crusades everwhere, fought by ungodly doomstacks spearheaded by utterly OP holy orders.

 

[Grubnessul]

It would be good to balance the strength of the Iberian Muslims.

First, French & Imperial troops should intervene less in Iberia.

 

[Kaiser Ludwig]

First, French & Imperial troops should intervene less in Iberia.

I think there's a bit of a chicken and egg thing going on there... Imperial and French troops' intervention is usually the result of weak or conquered Spanish Kingdoms, who are unable to exploit the weakness of the Moorish Territories in their generational succession wars or the like.

If there were Spanish Holy Orders, however, then this weakness might not be so pronounced, and therefore the Reconquista would be spearheaded by the Spanish themselves and not the French or Germans.

And maybe the solution to the D-Day landings can come from limiting the number of ships? Maybe halving or quartering the number of ships which can be raised from each holding, so that the total is itself halved or quartered would prevent an ungodly stack of DOOM of 200,000 soldiers in 2,500 ships by late game, making early game much more difficult to expand overseas.

Although that would pretty much destroy any chance at a successful Crusade for Jerusalem in 1066 Stamford Bridge Start, if the HRE and France can only transport their armies in 5,000 troop increments rather than 10,000 or 20,000...

 

[Grubnessul]

There are many more problems with the French and Germans:
- Germans are allowed to march through France without trouble
- Attrition too low
- Boats too fast, too cheap and too plentiful
- AI is easily willing to send troops abroad

 

[Cèsar de Quart]

The problem is I'm not sure if you can limit Holy Orders that way under current mechanics... you could make them vassal mercenaries of the spanish kingdoms, but then they'll fight other christians.

The Knights of St George, founded by king Peter II of Aragon, not only fought against other Christians during the Albigensian Crusade. They fought against French Crusaders. Defending their king and, in the way, protecting heretics.

In the Albigensian Crusade, most of the Tolosan nobles swore vassalage to King Peter the Catholic, breaking all ties with France. Northern France was the source for most of the knights that came down south to fight the heretic Cathars and the lords protecting them (and the ones that didn't too, because why not). So when the King of Aragon decided to stand in for the Southern lords, he was fighting against crusaders and for heretics.

He was Peter the Catholic. And he had a knightly order of military monks fighting for him against crusaders.

This is not a happy exception. In the powerfights for the crown or the regency in Castile, the order of Santiago sided with one of the factions and fought against Christians. Templars got to fight against Hospitallers at some point. In the Holy Land, when Baldwin of Edessa allied with the King of Damascus and fought Tancred of Antioch and his ally, the King of Mosul, crusaders fought against crusaders and there were Muslims, Greeks and Armenians in each side.

All things are possible. I don't say Spanish orders should be encouraged to fight Christians, but they might do it if they're a new kind of order; national orders. Santiago would be the national order of Castille, Alcántara that of León, Aviz of Portugal and St George of Aragon (Montesa was created much, much later, in the mid-1300's, merging what little remaied of the Order of St George with it a bit later; but St George was created around 1200).

 

[Kaiser Ludwig]

Hmmm... in that case they might as well just be mercenaries in game for ease of modelling, with a better troop composition, but I dunno if they can be made to be raised with piety rather than gold.

The capital could be put in the traditional capitals, and they could only be raised by Catholics who had that territory in their realm... could be, could be...