...on destroying the French

[Bilbo of Bag End]

I have utterly destroyed the French. After countless times of being backstabbed by these individuals, I have finally destroyed them completely. I attempted to marry into an alliance, I offered several attempts at a ceasefire, but the French King was never interested- until he was reduced to one small province. Then, of course, he asked for peace. I destroyed him.

For my troubles, I was excommunicated. Not the French, who started the whole fight and refused my repeated attempts at a peaceful resolution. Me. This caused major troubles in Scottland where I spend the next several years putting down one revolt after another.

How did the French have the Pope in their pocket, even until the bitter end?
Better yet, if I destroy the Papacy, the Pope can not excommunicate me again, right? I have my sites on him now.......

[Inferno]

Who gets excommunicated seems to depend mainly on:

1) Size of factions involved.
2) Influence of King.
3) History of attacking catholics.

To the best of my knowledge.

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It's getting warm in here...that must be one hell of an INFERNO!

[el_slapper]

Trying to crush us was not very nice from you, anyways ;=)

On a more serious topic, you're big, they're small, and you're winning the war : 3 reason that will make the pope upset against you Whoever you play, whoever you fight.

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War is not about who is right, only about who is left

[Bilbo of Bag End]

But it doesn't start that way- the french backstabbed me when i was fighting a war with the arabs on another front- i kept trying to be diplomatic, marry into the french ranks, offering alliances, etc. but the french just blew me off- i got sick of it ( the constant skirmishes and pillaging was becoming increasing expensive )so i turned the table on them and beat them back to their furthest provinces, ONLY THEN did the french king wanted to talk treaty- out of frustration,i wasted everyone- the pope was suddenly offended, calling it aggression against another christian nation- so i was excommunicated. He never excommunicated the french for their consistent attacks on me, even while I was fighting a muslim nation in a war sanctioned by the pope himself!

[cart6566]

Agreed. The behavior of the Holy See has been irrational in my campaign. I believe it is this way to increase the challenge, but it does so at the expense of immersion/RP value. Wouldn't mind seeing this tweaked.

[DojoRat]

The Pope isn't being that irrational. After the threat of Islam, the greatest threat to the papacy was a unified western empire and its emperor who would claim overlordship of both church and state.

By championing the weak he's trying to maintain the balance of power that allows him to keep his job.

[BlackWatch McKenna]

Those Franks helped out the pope on the first crusade. They are his boys.

[ravenking]

Don't bother atacking the pope and trying to take rome, you won't keep it for long. New popes keep coming in often, and with better troops. Asassinating him is a better way, but perhaps if your king isn't that good, you could "arrange" or his death (run him into some sergeants).

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"You there, knight!" "Yes, sir?" "We just lost that battle. Why did you order your men to charge that unit of enemy sergeants?" "Uh, I was impetuous, sir" "'IMPETUOUS!? Impetuous!? Men! Kill him, I want his head!"

[maroule]

well, this point at least is historical

there has always been a special relationship between france 'the elder sister of the church' and the pope, and France later on in history was as well the protector of papal states (by its armies), even if this relation was extremely tense at times (ex. counter popes in avignon)

but of course in your case it's pure game mechanics. And bilbo, as a hobbit whose main power is to disappear for his birthday and bore everybody to death with average poetry, you should not try to destroy the French anyway.

[Rosacrux]

OTOH, hobbits are notorious for messing around with things they don't understand, and this particular hobbit moreso.

Does not come as a surprise he angered the holy one. Just feel lucky it's the pope and not Sauron

btw you were playing as ze english?