The new papacy options - waste of programming time

[Azmodael]

As the title says, the new papacy options are incredibly overwhelming.

At base papacy growth of 0.5 (or 0.75 with relation bonus) it takes 200! or 150! years to get +1 stab or +20 gold.

Nations with papacy relation bonuses take a whopping 50 or 100 years for the same bonus, which is better but still laughably bad.

There are events that grant papacy influence, but most of the time the non-papacy bonus is much better - +1 stab or 20 papal influence, +1 dip relation or the like.

Investing in the papacy is just as bad, due to all countries investing your chance to become curia controller is very diluted, highest I've gotten was like 40% when at 50 investment. Of course Riga was elected at 6% chance.

 

[Denkt]

Each Cardinal give you an extra 0.5 influnce per year.
The religion is only really good for large European nations that can get alot of cardinals, religious help to.
For many nations however other forms of Christianity is better.

 

[jazzroen]

In general I like how the new system works. its a lot more interesting and engaging. (even though its a bit broken with the cardinal bug atm). I do agree with you that the amount of papal influence you need to buy things could use some finetuning. that, or the amount of papal influence you gain needs to be increased.

 

[ChildeR]

I think it's good that you get the bonuses rarely, though base could be buffed so large nations have less of an advantage. However, some of them could use a buff. 3 months of manpower from the holy war? Meh.

 

[balmung60]

Catholicism's always been a big nation religion. Smaller nations (and now overseas nations, too) are much better off rolling with either Protestant or Reformed as soon as possible.

 

[Five_X]

Catholicism's always been a big nation religion. Smaller nations (and now overseas nations, too) are much better off rolling with either Protestant or Reformed as soon as possible.

Which is pretty realistic when you think about it.

 

[Ricox]

Uh, I think it's pretty okay. Was playing France and kept getting cardinals that really boosted my papal influence, I managed to increase my mercantilism by at least 5 percent or so before I converted to Protestant sometime in mid-1600s (and I also did a few rare investments, also once picked prestige boost for 40 influence), IIRC. So that's about 500-700 influence in the span of about 150 years, not bad. And that was without the yearly papal influence boost from religious idea group, which I only got shortly before I was about to convert to Protestant (to make it easier to convert). As said here - Catholic is the religion of big nations, although the investment-based chance system gives smaller nations a chance to at least get Curia controller.

 

[fleetothemoon]

Even for nations that try to stack on papal influence, papal options won't be frequently used.

For example, Castille can get +2 from NI, +2 from religious, +1 from DoF. If they can also control about 5 cardinals (Very likely if Spain is formed), maintain good relations with Papal State, they can break through the +10 influence per year... but even then, the prospect of getting a stab boost or +1 mercantilism every 10 years is not all that appealing.

Of course, if you can also blob greatly, and control 20+ cardinals or eradicate other catholic powers/support their conversion, you can easily shrink this time to 5 years.

The way cardinal works is like the power you get in The One: you increase your power (or papal influence) by eliminating other copies of yourself (or other catholics). Once you become the last catholic nation on earth, you become immortal (although you may want to keep Papal State as a vassal).

 

[Xara]

Without continuous control of the curia, it makes Catholic a much less desired religion. Even while messing around with France, having 6 cardinals, I could not get control of it. It takes a while to get papal points, and some of the options are laughable (ridicously low manpower boost, and -1 interest? Seriously? why is this stupid less interest costs ever in the @#$# game?); stability boost is pretty much the only thing I'd ever get from it.

 

[Nyrael]

Catholicism's always been a big nation religion. Smaller nations (and now overseas nations, too) are much better off rolling with either Protestant or Reformed as soon as possible.

England, Sweden, Netherlands, Hungary, Prussia (and France was not that far from converting either)... they are not exactly small. Overseas too: other than USA, most colonies were Catholics. The only small nations that liked it were HRE principalities. So something is not right in the design.

And honestly, the whole focus on Cardinals is a bit questionable. The Cardinals and Curia Control gave more to Monarchs than to the nations, which in-game would mean no bonuses should be given other than Legitimacy and maybe Prestige.

 

[pgroves]

Is it better for Poland to stay Catholic or go Protestant now? I don't have any Cardinal cities yet and would like to expand into Scandinavia (after taking down Russia a peg or two) so was thinking of going Protestant and taking Humanism as my 3rd idea group (after Diplomacy then Aristocracy)...

 

[Denkt]

Is it better for Poland to stay Catholic or go Protestant now? I don't have any Cardinal cities yet and would like to expand into Scandinavia (after taking down Russia a peg or two) so was thinking of going Protestant and taking Humanism as my 3rd idea group (after Diplomacy then Aristocracy)...

Go Orthodox with religious ideas and conquer europe.

 

[Ricox]

Well, at least it's something, Protestant and Reformed religions don't really have a Curia at all, but that's just a reminder. Staying Catholic doesn't make the game worse, you only have additional options, although miss out on the bonuses of other branches, but that can partly be compensated with Curia.

 

[pgroves]

Go Orthodox with religious ideas and conquer europe.

I don't see how that would enable you to convert to orthodox, nor do I want to!

 

[Panzerschiffe]

There should be an incentive to stay Catholic as a small nation, otherwise, go protestant and get some sort of bonus. Unless you are allied to France and they stay Catholic and you want to remain their bff.

 

[Vestinus]

Remeber that taking a bonus, you pay only a part of the PI required.
For example taking +1 mercantilism needs to have 100 PI, but once you activate it PI drop to 70, not to 0.

 

[pgroves]

Remeber that taking a bonus, you pay only a part of the PI required.
For example taking +1 mercantilism needs to have 100 PI, but once you activate it PI drop to 70, not to 0.

Well that makes quite a difference!

 

[TheBoozehammer]

Remeber that taking a bonus, you pay only a part of the PI required.
For example taking +1 mercantilism needs to have 100 PI, but once you activate it PI drop to 70, not to 0.

Really? Well, that changes my mind on the subject. Do you know the actual costs of some of the other ones?

 

[Denkt]

I don't see how that would enable you to convert to orthodox, nor do I want to!

You use the cb from religious ideas against catolic europe, you can do that as protestant/reformed but you can be orthodox before the other are in the game.

 

[pgroves]

You use the cb from religious ideas against catolic europe, you can do that as protestant/reformed but you can be orthodox before the other are in the game.

How? Catholic can't convert to Orthodox AFAIK