what to do with the pope?????

**fester** · 01-04-2006, 14:21

I've crushed the papacy but the pope has reamerged in four states, Three of them mine. Is this like any other reamergence or will it keep hapening because its the pope? If so I thought about just leaving the pope one state to go about his holy bussines and I'll deal with him at a later date.

**matteus the inbred** · 01-04-2006, 15:10

usually keeps happening, and is likely to get worse as well, ie. he re-emerges with more and better troops every time. it's supposedly VERY difficult to kill off the Pope...!

if you can get away with it, i'd leave him alone in the most easily isolated of his provinces (ie. fewest borders for you guard) and try and make peace.

**elbasto** · 01-04-2006, 15:13

It will keep coming, after all it is the pope ;)

In my opinion, the best thing to do is the following:
1. Destroy every single building in Rome (except for the port so that you can trade with the province).
2. Bribe every single army but the one that has the pope on it.
3. Fall back and sue for peace.
4. Kill the pope so that you are no longer excomunicated.

**Vladimir** · 01-04-2006, 17:29

Kill him early, don't garrison Rome/Papal States, and don't build troop improvements there. Use the re-emergences to train your heirs and the freedom to conquer to expand your empire. This doesn't work so well in GA but if I'm playing Italy, I popa the Popa.

**Odin** · 01-04-2006, 19:02

He will keep reemerging and its a real pain in the A$$ if you dont allow him Rome or the papal states. Since MTW dosent have a feature where you can bribe or control the pope, sometimes you have to kill him, but never eliminate all of his holdings.

Matteus's advice is pretty good, keep him isolated and make peace. Your particular situation looks pretty messy though.... In the future, be a good catholic and obey the holy father will ya

**Uesugi Kenshin** · 01-04-2006, 21:03

In my current Italian campaign I decided to go to war with him, but stopped attacking after I took Rome. I left the pope with the Papal States, he attacked twice, but got slaughtered. So eventually we made peace and the problem is solved.

**NodachiSam** · 01-04-2006, 21:55

Like others have said, don't bother to kill him off entirely, isolate him and leave him. Usually you should just leave him one province or if you kill him off, raze which ever province you intend him to keep to the ground when he reemerges. If you allow him Rome you'll only have 3 provinces to garrison. If you leave the Papal states you'll need to guard 4. I always find Rome so symbolic though.

**Lanemerkel1** · 01-06-2006, 01:47

you know what I say? :slips the finger: screw the pope.

chase him off the mainland and into an island somewhere

and blockade his ports too

or as the other guy said, trick him to papal states, take rome, launch an attack on papal states but don't kill everyone, then you have him standing there with an army in ruins and a measily 150 florins (or less if you keep him blockaded) a year and surrounded on all sides, since you didn't kill him he won't come back, he won't get enough money to do anything but stand around and since you destroyed everything there he's going to be spending everything he has getting up the buildings to make an army to defend himself much less go on the offensive again. and since he's not dead he won't come back and when he's alive he just can't pull 3 full stacks out of his hat.

one time when I did that (think I was playing Byzantium or Russia) I thought I was being a little one sided so I left him behind a little gift......an orthodox church

**NodachiSam** · 01-06-2006, 02:05

I would love some way to shove him on Corsica or Sardinia. In RTW you could at least gift it to him and kill him elsewhere. Maybe Hibernia, I mean Ireland would be suitable

Are there any conceivable strategies for this to work though? I've never seen the Pope with a large fleet in do a sea invasion. You could probably mod it some how for him to have more ships or even for his starting provicne to be in Corsica or Ireland. That defies the point though.

Roark's advice is good however.

**Marquis de Said** · 01-06-2006, 14:55

In my vanilla VI installation of the game, I modded the Pope to be able to launch Crusades. It was quite fun, because he launched quite a few. One ended up in Edessa. When the old Pope died and a new one was elected, he ended up in Edessa, because that's where his most powerful general was. I think he eventually got wiped off Italy, so Edessa was his only province.

**NodachiSam** · 01-06-2006, 22:24

That's a good idea.

**Weebeast** · 01-07-2006, 08:05

It was quite fun, because he launched quite a few. One ended up in Edessa. When the old Pope died and a new one was elected, he ended up in Edessa, because that's where his most powerful general was.

That's because Edessa had more buildings than any other provinces. I don't know why the devs made it like this. I guess a kingdom always makes big city as its capital and a heir gets crowned in the capital city.

A lot of players here had to ransom their King. lol

**KrooK** · 01-23-2006, 16:01

good option with papacy is not destroying them but make them really weak
papacy reappear and can make your life really hard.
but if they got 1 prowince, weak army and small ammount of money - they aren't dangerous