Neoncats Guide to handle priest/imams

[Neoncat]

Neoncats Guide to handle priests/imams

Contents:
1. Some words first
2. Something about priest/imam units
2.1. Catholics
2.2. Orthodox
2.3. Islamic
3. Retinue
4. Traits, conversion and denounce
5. Priests/imams strategy in game
6. Last words

1. Some words first

Hi I am Neoncat and this guide will tell you something about priests and imams. I don't include heretics and pagans as they aren't playable in vanilla.

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2. Something about priest/imam units

2.1. Catholics

Catholics have three different kind of priests. They are:

2^=Unit|Effect|How to get
Priest|None|You can get priests from all cities, which have church that isn't cathedral.
Bishop|+1 piety|Bishops emerge from cathedrals.(You won't get them from huge cathedral. This is a known bug.)
Cardinal|+1 piety, Heresy immunity|Only pope can appoint cardinals. More piety your priests or bishops have more likely they will get appointed. As your priest can only be cardinal or bishop you won't get more piety when your bishop is appointed to be a cardinal.


As you have cardinals your cardinals can be elected to became pope. When your cardinal gets elected you will lose your cardinal. However your reputation with pope will get nice boost.

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2.2. Orthodox

Orthodox have only priests. They should have bishops like catholics, but theres a bug which prevents you from getting bishops. After orthodox priest get more than 5 piety, they cannot fall into heresy.

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2.3. Islamic

Islamic factions don't have second special unit for imams. So they get only imams. After imams get more than 5 piety, they cannot fall into heresy.

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3. Retinue

First of all theres some ancillaries(retinue) that priest can get. Lets see what they can get, when you should get them and why to get them.

2^=Ancillary|Requirements|Effects|Excludes
Paladin|30% chance when agent created in castle with militia drill square|+1 Personal security, +1 Purity, +1 Violence|Islamic factions
Choir boy|20% chance when agent created in town with abbey or higher|+1 Piety, +1 Unorthodoxy, -1 Purity|Royal Seminarian,Islamic factions
Royal seminarian|20% chance when agent created in town with mayors palace or higher,20% chance in castle with castle or higher|+1 Piety,+1 Unorthodoxy|Monk, Choir boy, Islamic factions
Deacon|50% chance when agent created in town with cathedral or higher(catholics),25% chance in town with cathedral or higher(orthodox)|+1 piety|Islamic factions
Monk|100% chance if character is idle for 4 turns and religion shift is less than 10% and regions religion is 70% or more your own religion.|+1 piety, -1 Purity|None
Witch hunter|20% chance if theres more than 15% heretics in region and your priest have been 3 or more turns in region or 10% chance when agent created and your kings piety is more than 1|+1 piety,-1 Unorthodoxy| Islamic factions
Knight crusader|33% chance in region with crusading target city|+2 personal, security, +1 violence|Islamic factions, Orthodox factions

As you can see unfortunately most ancillaries in this list apply only for orthodox and catholic factions. We can see also that...

You should stay stationary for 4 turns after your get your priest/imam, if you are on region with 70% or more your own religion to get a monk. As you can see from the list above you won't get monk if your priest have royal seminarian. However even imams get monks.

If your priests get killed all the time, it should be good to get knight crusader by going into region with crusading target city. Unfortunately you can't do this with orthodox and islamic factions.

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4. Traits, conversion and denounce

(Notice that I am not listing all traits you can get with your priests/imams. I didn't see any reason to list all of em.)

Starting traits:
2^=Trait|Name|Requirements|Effect
Natural Priest Skill 1|Blessed|100% chance when agent is created|+1 piety
Natural Priest Skill 2|Divine Connection|50% chance when agent is created|+2 piety
Natural Priest Skill 3|Chosen One|20% chance when agent is created and have already level 2 skill|+3 piety
Secretly Female 1|Secretly Female|3% chance when agent is created and faction isn't islamic|+1 piety, -1 eligibility, +1 purity, -1 violence
Theologians Guild Trained|Orthodox Instruction|100% chance when agent is created in city with theologians guild|+1 piety
Theologians Guild Member 1|Theologians Guild Apprentice|100% chance when agent is created and faction has master theologians guild|+1 piety
Theologians Guild Member 2|Theologians Guild Journeyman|100% chance when agent is created and faction has theologians guild head quarters|+2 piety


So your have now your priest/imam. What you can do with it?

With priests/imams you can do 2 things. They are:

1. Convert people to your religion
2. Denounce('Kill') heretics

For conversion you shouldn't send only one priest/imam to fight other religions. If you do your priest/imam can get minuses for piety and will be easier to turn in heretic. Right way to convert people is use small groups of priests/imams. Their strong faith trait will rise when you can convert more than 10% of people per turn. However you will get first strong faith trait only for 3 first turns on region, which you are turning. After first strong faith trait it will be 5 first turns. After that you can get missionary trait, if you can get your own religion in the region 95% or over. You will also get nice bonuses if you convert regions with heresy. Trait you can get is purifier trait. Note that more there is another religion than yours religion shift will be more if you send your priest to convert people there.

Traits to gain:
2^=Trait|Name|Effect
Strong faith level 1|Growing Faith|+1 piety
Strong faith level 2|Strong Faith|+2 piety
Strong faith level 3|Shining Faith|+3 piety
Strong faith level 4|Unquestionable Faith|+4 piety
Missionary level 1|Missionary|+1 piety, +1 Eligibility, +1 Purity, -1 Violence
Missionary level 2|Spreader of Faith|+2 piety, +1 Eligibility, +2 Purity, -2 Violence
Missionary level 3|Beacon of Faith|+3 piety, +2 Eligibility, +3 Purity, -2 Violence
Purifier level 1|Battler of Heresy|+1 piety, +1 Eligibility, +1 Purity, +1 Violence
Purifier level 2|Enemy of Heresy|+2 piety, +1 Eligibility, +2 Purity, +2 Violence
Purifier level 3|Purger of Heresy|+3 piety, +2 Eligibility, +3 Purity, +2 Violence


Then the denounce. You can denounce heretics by clicking them with your priest/imam selected. After that pop-up will tell you percentage to success and let you denounce them. More you have piety more easier it would be to denounce heretics. However theres always chance to fail. Failing can mean 2 things. Lose of piety with bad denouncer trait or even lose of your priest/imam. When you lose your priest/imam it will convert to heretic. So watch out those low percentages. On the contrary when you success denouncement you will get piety bonus with good denounce trait. There were somewhere that more orthodoxy your priest/imam have less it have chance to fall into heresy.

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5. Priests/imams strategy in game

Number of priest you can have is limited to number of churches you have. Cities with church lower than abbey/minaret masjid will support only one priest and cities with abbey/minaret masjid or higher will support 2 priests.

You should leave few priest/imams on your land to defend your regions from heretics and all other priests should go and start converting other religions lands. Of course if you only leave your newbie priest to defend your land you can get nothing but troubles when heretics invade your lands. You should get few of your more experienced priests/imams to protect your land after they have done some conversion job.

If you have to defend your own land for another religion, don't just sit and try to fight back with your own priests/imams. Way to get rid of them is to go spread your religion in their region so they have to defend it. Its really hard to win conversion battle because more your religion is there less you will convert people and otherway around. Of course one way is to use assassins to take out that priest/imam which is corrupting your soil.

For the theologians guild you should concentrate your priest/imam training into one city at the beginning of game. After you get head quarters you can start training priest in other cities/castles as you will lose only one piety, if you don't train them in city where head quarters are located. Unless of course you build first level theologians guild in city where you want to build your priests/imams.

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6. Last words

I tried to write only few things about priests/imams. However my nature didn't let me finish after I got some more ideas about to write. So this guide got bigger... bigger... bigger... Yes, and I know my english skills aren't that good and many of you may find lots of typos and language errors in my text. I just hate how they make games with manuals that are good only for lightening up fireplace. Theres so much in this game unexplained. I hope I did lightened even some of that shroud of darkness. Yah, its me Neoncat. I am out for now, but remember the Neonbits... (I just had to) ;D

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And yes, you may put this on "M2TW Guides" part on these forums, if you see that this guide is good enough to be there. This will guide will be at least on my site too. No I am not going to tell you where it is. :)

[Sir_Hawkwood]

Great guide, Neoncat, and, as you mentioned it, in perfect English too...

So there really is no point in putting your holy men with your armys?

Best regards
SJH

[seneschal.the]

Great guide, Neoncat, and, as you mentioned it, in perfect English too...

So there really is no point in putting your holy men with your armys?

Best regards
SJH

No point what so ever. Unless you got a very poor memory and can't remember to move them. :) Someone said that it affects the inquisitors success rate on the general but never showed the code for it, so..

[Ars Moriendi]

Nice guide, Neoncat - particularly the section on when/how to get good traits/ancillaries.

I think there's something wrong here :



2.3. Islamic
Islamic factions don't have second special unit for imams. So they get only imams. After orthodox priest get more than 5 piety, they cannot fall into heresy.

[Neoncat]

I think there's something wrong here :

Fixed...

And holy men in army doesn't give/get any bonuses or whatsoever(Except minuses for moving range, for example when you are on crusade/jihad. Somehow bonus for moving doesn't seem to apply for agents.). I can't say anything about inquisitors. There wasn't anything about them in any file. Only CA can tell us do they help us to save our generals from getting burned on stake. What I have experienced is that they still can kill your generals even if you have whole army of holy men with you.

Of course some reverse-engineering can reveal all about the game, but I not doing it. Even if I could. :)

[dopp]

A few more observations, based on the traits file (assuming the triggers are all working properly):

1. The trait gain of priests after creation is determined to a large extent by the religion shift in the region where he is stationed. Spending time in a region where the religion shift is high (8% or more) can increase the piety of the priest significantly. This is why it is best to use priests together in groups, especially when they are still inexperienced. Building religious buildings can also help.

2. Spending time in a region where the population has been 95% converted for 10 turns or more and the religion shift is still above 10% will give priests the coveted missionary trait.

3. Hanging around heretics makes priests unorthodox. Burn them before this happens.

4. Spending time a region where less than 40% of the population follows his religion can also make a priest unorthodox. Spending time in a region where 85% or more of the people are believers makes him dogmatic (good trait).

5. In a similar way to missionary, priest who spend time in a region where heresy has been virtually elminated will pick up the purifier trait. I usually move my priests off immediately once the heresy is elminated, so I never get to reap the rewards, so to speak.

6. Cathedrals promote priests to bishop. However, an error in the code prevents Huge Cathedrals from doing the same. Another error or omission in the triggers makes it impossible for Orthodox priests to become bishops, even though the Orthodox factions start with bishops. Becoming a bishop gives +1 piety. The priest also gets religious training and is less likely to turn heretic (dogmatic trait).

7. Promotion to cardinal for a Catholic priest gives +2 piety (if he was a bishop then it is only +1 piety). The cardinal stand a chance of gaining up to 3 levels of warlike or peaceful when he is promoted. The game also randomly calculates whether the cardinal is a righteous or corrupt man. He will gain or lose up to 3 points of piety depending on the result. However, another error in the script mixed up the Corrupted trait line (for priests) with the Corrupt trait line (for RTW governors and stuff), so the cardinal cannot become corrupt if you play the vanilla game.

[akodo]

I don't understand the secondary traits... Violance? Elegebility? What do they do?

[seneschal.the]

Violence etc. affects Inquisitors trait when/if the priest becomes pope.

[Shahed]

This is a GREAT guide. I definetly learned stuff here.

Is there a fix available for the Orthodox priest and also is there a fix available for the Grand Catherdral ?

Many thanks for the guide.

[Doug-Thompson]

Definitely a prospect for the guides section. Excellent.

[Philbert]

I have heard and experienced that if you have a priest in a general's stack, an inquisitor will always attack that priest first, giving your general an extra turn to get away from the inquisitor. So if an inquisitor roams your land, it does come in handy to add a priest to the general's company.

[gardibolt]

Excellent guide, with a ton of stuff I didn't know. Definitely should be stickied in the Strategy Guide section.

[Shahed]

I'm ALT+TABing all the time to read this before I move my priests ! I found it by chance searching for other stuff... it was waaay back there. Defintely needs a sticky.

[TevashSzat]

Very well done :yes:

[Martok]

Very nice, indeed. I'll talk to sapi about stickying this.

EDIT: Have contacted Froggy to see if she'll be so kind as to add it to the Guides section. ~:)

[Shahed]

Hey Martok, Thanks !

Anyone.... Is there a fix available for the Orthodox priest and for the Grand Catherdral ?

[frogbeastegg]

Nice work. I've added a link to this in the guide forum's table of contents. :bow:

[Shahed]

Thank you very much for your attention, dear Lady Frog. :bow:

[The_Notorious_P]

Is it fixed in unofficial 1.2?

[Foz]

;------------------------------------------
Trigger agents43a
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd

Condition not AtSea
and AgentType = priest
and TimeInRegion > 4
and TimeSinceHeresy < 5 >= 10
and PopulationHeretic < 5
and ReligionShift > 10

Affects Purifier 1 Chance 100

;------------------------------------------
Trigger agents43b
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd

Condition not AtSea
and AgentType = priest
and TimeInRegion > 4
and TimeSinceReligion > 95 >= 10
and PopulationOwnReligion > 95
and ReligionShift > 10

Affects Missionary 1 Chance 100

These are the triggers for Purifier and Missionary traits. Can someone explain them for me? My instinct is to say for 43a for instance, that the priest must be in the region at least 5 turns, have 10 turns passed since heresy went below 5% (not necessarily caused by this priest though - this condition is settlement-based), still have less than 5% heretic, and have a religion shift of at least 10. The question comes up with ReligionShift, probably. My first thought was it is the percent of ground your religion gained that turn. If ReligionShift is only good for one turn though, then these 2 trait lines would be basically impossible to get... so I must be making bad assumptions about ReligionShift. The docudemon description isn't exactly helpful. ReligionShift is... total percentage of conversion in your favor for the full length of time the priest has been in the region, then? That's the only way I can think of that those triggers would be possible to get and make sense.

To be clear, if priest A has been in the region while your religion went from 44 to 65%, the ReligionShift for that priest would be 21? If priest B joins the party late, say at 52%, he'll have a different ReligionShift? Would it be 13 since he went from 52 to 65?

Some comments on ReligionShift would be a good idea, as it seems like a hard concept to figure out just from looking at game files and reading tips, and is integral to most aspects of using priests/imams effectively.

[grapedog]

In the early years, I tend to lump a bunch of priests in with an army thats going out. It does slow down movement a little, but it's so much easier to toss 5+ priests into an army stack for one easy movement, as opposed to dealing with each priest individually, and any obstacles in their way.

Excellent guide!