The Pope, and how he is even more annoying than you all thought

[Silver Rusher]

Alright.

I guess that you all have had some very bad experiences with the Pope, excommunication perhaps, even crusades being called against you. But lets just take a look at some of the other things that the Pope will do just to make him much more annoying.

1. The Papacy as a faction; The Papacy AI is completely useless, but for all the other reasons below this doesn't really matter. Not once have I seen a papal port or a papal ship, even though they are surrounded by water on both sides. They hardly ever upgrade their buildings, either.

2. Unfair crusading; Have you ever noticed how the Papacy only ever picks on the Almos, Egyptians and excom. factions? I have never seen the pope call for support for crusades against the Turks, the Byzantines, the Russians or the Golden Horde. This can be quite annoying when playing as the Egyptians.

3. What's going on with the Swiss; This is something very strange, and I think you will all agree. Even with the Swiss constantly rampaging around France and slaughtering them all mercilessly, the Pope never seems to give even the slightest fig. What's going on here?

4. The Inquisition and the Assasins; The Pope is always sending agents around, mainly Inquisitors and Bishops (we all know how annoying rival inquisitors are) and you can also very often get news of Papal assasins being caught in your provinces (more than anyone else by my count)

5. No, I think I'll turtle a little longer; Something else about the Papacy, they never ever stop building troops. Sometimes, Papal armies are the most concentrated forces in Europe, making an invasion and putting an end to their reign of terror much harder.

6. Sorry, I wasn't in power then. Cancel the crusade; A lot of very very high amounts of tripe here, the pope dies and his heir cancels excommunications, just when your English army is just about to reach that heretical 'Ile de France'.

7. Invade, excommunicate, repeat; One of my pet papal peeves- just when you think the Pope can't get any softer at all, he sends a small army into your unguarded province of Naples/Tuscany/Milan. It is only unguarded because you think that the Pope isn't a threat and the province has very high loyalty, don't get caught in that trap. In my game as the Sicilians/High/Hard I had conquered northern africa and much of the balkans. Then the Pope sends his titchy little force of UMs into Naples, destroys three buildings and damages one. So I send my large force of Feudal Knights in, straight from Malta, and bam, the Pope moves his huge, turtlified army in. I make a huge last stand to defend what rightfully belonged to me, failed, and got excommed.

8. Who are you?; Picture this. You are the aragonese. You have firmly held on to Aragon, as well as taking Valencia and Navarre. The Italians come along, and invade Valencia by sea, then crushing all of your armies. In a couple of years, the Italians get excommed and the war rages on. Then the Spanish decide to have a go at you and take Navarre. The Papacy just look straight past them and focus on the Italians. Remember, if the faction you are dealing with is already at war with someone else, you simply cannot be excommed for it.

9. You and whose army?; The most annoying thing about the Pope, which makes you want to scream and tear your hair out. Listen. You are the Polish (for the sake of fair randomness). You manage to build up a fairly large empire, halted on one side by the GH and having already taking Germany through cautious underhand tactics. You get through Italy, see the Pope, and think 'Pah! His armies are so puny my arms flop down just looking at them. So you invade. BIG BIG BIG MISTAKE! You think you've got 'em, turn your attention elsewhere, and BAM! The Papacy reemerge with 5000+ troops in each papal province, all at the Chivalric level with 3 valour and some armour upgrades. The funny thing is though, this happens even if you have 200 percent loyalty and some fairly large armies in rome and in the papal states. You don't want to kill the Pope unless you already own the rest of the world and have some massive armies, as they truly are the hardest enemy in the game to take on and defeat.

Post feedback please.

[solypsist]

1. I see Papal ships all the time. But I don't think I've ever seen a naval invasion (via port) by Papal armies.

[Procrustes]

1. The Papacy as a faction; The Papacy AI is completely useless, but for all the other reasons below this doesn't really matter. Not once have I seen a papal port or a papal ship, even though they are surrounded by water on both sides. They hardly ever upgrade their buildings, either.

I've seen papal ships, though I've never been attacked by one.

(Yeah, the pope's a pain, but I kinda like the added challenge he gives the game.)

EDIT - the AI does a poor job with all the factions, really. I've started to use the -IAN command line so that I can occasionally help them out. Otherwise, a lot of the factions end up hopelessly in debt - they just sit there unable to build anything waiting to be picked off. The Dane's are a good example - leave them alone and by 1175 they will likely be sitting in their one province with a crapload of royal knights and about 25,000 florins in debt. If it wasn't for things like the amazing pope and huge faction re-emergences, you could wipe the map up in no time.

[Qilue]

Concerning excommunication, I remember in one game when I was looking at a leader's stats, the crosses looked strange. It was only for a moment and then I remembered that was what they looked like when your not excom'ed.

[ichi]

you can add "I said TEN years" to the list

I routinely get the warning to cease and desist, and when I do stop attacking, invariably I get attacked and I retaliate, and sure enough . . .



ichi

[Blodrast]

lol, very very nice list, Silver Rusher.
I've also seen papal ships; they do build them, but it's probably not that much of a priority for them.
I guess reemergences are kinda silly for all factions, although I admit they are even more so for the Pope; where the hell do they just pop out with thousands and thousands of super-equipped and ultra-upgraded warriors ? what, they just found how to operate the stargates ?!

The list is, like I said, very good.
Even though it's really annoying quite often, I reckon the Pope does make the game more challenging and interesting. It just gives it a bit more flavour. Of course that doesn't stop you from cringing your teeth and cursing it all the time

[MerlinusCDXX]

Concerning excommunication, I remember in one game when I was looking at a leader's stats, the crosses looked strange. It was only for a moment and then I remembered that was what they looked like when your not excom'ed.

LMFAO...Yeah, I know what you mean...I play the HRE

[DisruptorX]

I've actually played a game where the papacy decided to go out and conquer all of italy and a bunch of Germany. One of the AI players decided to plant a large army on Rome and the Papacy emerged with an enourmous army and destroyed the italians and what was left of the Germans.

Most of the time, though, they just sit there and act annoying. Advise: do not keep large garrisons on their territory, or they will reemerge with large armies. Same with all new factions and rebellions. Don't put many troops on his land after conquering it, and you won' have problems. I usually just let him sit there and put big armies up next to him, though. Saves me alot of trouble.

[Lonewarrior]

Dam Pope always telling me to stop attacking, but u know I do the opposite, which I don't really have a problem with. I almost never use crusades so Pope, excommunicate me all u want. I just laugh every time he tells me to stop attacking, makes me wanna take over his provinces.