Auto-ceasefire with the pope?

**macsen rufus** · 03-12-2008, 12:02

It usually works every time for me - if a castle is under siege by your forces you can withdraw from the province and so long as the besieged enemy doesn't sally, contact is broken. Obviously it depends on the besieged faction's entire army being in that castle, and the presence of any ships can also maintain contact if they are in a sea region next to one of your territories or a sea region you control.

I've done this many times with the Pope to keep him holed up in the Papal States.

**Caerfanan** · 03-12-2008, 14:27

Yes, but that doesn't put you at peace with the guy, right? You just leave the province, if not by water and removing the boats, you don't get the cease fire, do you?

EDIT: Oh... If the only contact is by land and that's the last province, it works??
EDIT2: yes, I'm learning to read!

**I of the Storm** · 03-12-2008, 17:45

So, in that specific case it's important NOT to have ships in the adriatic sea? And also if the papacy has ships running around it's going to be difficult, right?

**macsen rufus** · 03-12-2008, 18:04

Right

That siege really needs to be your only point of contact.

Edit: It just occured to me that is probably why it works best if you do it with a re-emerged Papacy -- they haven't had time to build any ships yet

**PershsNhpios** · 03-12-2008, 23:13

I have seen the Genoese, Venetians and Sicilians all conquer the Papal States and Rome, and hold them for over 50 years before losing them to a re-emergence.

Currently, as Venice, I control from Bavaria to Sicily, and from Austria to Savoy - but I am afraid to take Rome and the Papal States because of what has been mentioned here.

Can't I simply overwhelm them with a military like the AI and keep loyalty above 120%?

**macsen rufus** · 03-13-2008, 10:47

The Papacy will ALWAYS re-emerge, regardless of loyalty, regardless of the size of your garrison. In fact keeping a large garrison is going to be worse for you once the Pope does come back, as his forces will be scaled to yours. That's why you need to cripple the faction and shunt it into the Papal States - if it's still alive it can't re-emerge

**Vladimir** · 03-13-2008, 18:44

If you play a northern Italian faction and you don't play "keep the pope down" you're cheating. It's the only logical way to counter the advantage of all those sweet Italian units.

**Prussian1** · 03-17-2008, 16:05

Originally Posted by macsen rufus

The Papacy will ALWAYS re-emerge, regardless of loyalty, regardless of the size of your garrison. In fact keeping a large garrison is going to be worse for you once the Pope does come back, as his forces will be scaled to yours. That's why you need to cripple the faction and shunt it into the Papal States - if it's still alive it can't re-emerge

I had a confounding experience after I knocked out the Pope . . . .

I held all the provinces in Italy but the Papal States (which I razed to the ground and let go rebel).

I kept a peasant Garrison in Rome. No muss no fuss.

Then the bugger re-emerged, he had about six stacks of Cavalry in Rome and a small stack of UM in Papal States.

I was understandably upset.