Cornering inquisitors. Exploit or legal maneuver?

[Daveybaby]

Its an exploit, obviously. Doesnt mean you shouldnt use it if you feel it improves your enjoyment of a single player game though.

[Rameusb5]

Sure, it's an exploit. But let's think about it for a second. Could an army general capture (and then kill) an Inquisition that was running about killing your KINGS and Royal line? Sure!


Not only are Inquisitors totally broken, their implimentation is flawed as well. Typically, Local authority was given permission by the Church to start an Inquisition in order to quell heresy in their regions (as well as to scare the living crap out of the commoners).

The ONLY case of a standing general (or other important person) being tried by an Inquisition that I'm aware of was Joan of Arc, and that Inquisition was performed AFTER she had been captured during a raid into Burgundian Territory. AND the Inquistors were Bergundian and English, NOT emmisaries sent from Rome. (Correction - There was a Religious University in Paris (which was held by Enland at the time) which provided at least some of the Inquisitors. But they were under massive political pressure from the English to execute her)

The idea of Inquisitors roaming around the countryside and burning whoever they want at the stake (particularly people of such great importance that they would be represented as a "person" in a strategic game like MTW2) is ridiculous.


Since CA has decided to make Inquisitors cartoonish representations of their historical counterparts (see here), I have absolutely no qualms about using the "surround the bastard with an army and then execute him" exploit to deal with them. Assuming they fix the code so at the very least they aren't killing anybody and everybody at will, then I won't use the exploit any more. Until then, any Inquisitors found on French soil had better watch their asses!

[Darkmoor_Dragon]

I'm not an expert on the period, but I think it was exceedingly rare for an Inquisitor to target the king or heir of a powerful faction

Are there ANY historical instances at all?

Originally Posted by Kraxis
Really? I haven't gotten a single negative trait from 'winning' such fights (save the 'enemies' trait for big killers).

Niether have I. And I have also found that merchants are much better on the offensive--a low ranked guy of mine can kill a high ranked foreign merchant easier than my high ranked merchant can defend. So, I've adopted the first strike doctrine for my merchants...

I find the total opposite - merchants on the defence are far more "powerful" in that a lower ranked merchant has a higher chance of surviving an attack than the same lower rank merchant has of succeeding attacking the higher ranked Merchant.

Indeed I think that's relatively easy to verify as "fact".

It is also highly profitable.

You make more money by chasing merchants than actually trading... That is wrong to me.

Not if you avoid the "distance-to-capital" bug. I've regularly got merchants earning 500-1200 florins per turn on vh/vh - but that drops to about 100 per turn if you load/reload and dont avoid the bug.


(After a load/reload simply move your capital to another town and then back and the modifier kicks back in)

Overall I've found that it is pretty easy to earn 200-300 per turn per Merchant on average (over 10 merchants) without requiring any attention be paid to them chasing down other merchants and so forth... and once you are on a resource you've the better chance of surviving an attack than launching one.

[Kraxis]

But I play most of my turns without saving and reloading... and at best one of my top notch merchants have gained me about 58 florins a turn (full financial ability plus sitting on gold in a home province).
So the big question is if it is intended to give you such massive bonusses, or if it is you who is experiencing a bug when you do the move? I can't seem to figure it out.

I have no preferance to defensive/offensive actions to the merchants, only that offensive seems to be the only way to be sure to gain the money.

[Lord Ovaat]

INQUISITORS!!!!!! This has been a major problem since MTW. Yes, the inquisition was just as nasty as you've heard, BUT, it must always be remembered that inquisitors--nor any other clergy--never had ANY secular authority outside, perhaps, the Vatican and Papal States. Period. If you research the era, you find that when heretics, or whatnot, were found quilty, three monks did not drag them to the stake. Sentences were executed by the state, if they chose, unless the inquisitor was mad as a hatter and acted on his own. There were a few instances of that, and the inquisitor usually came up missing if the victim had court favor. After all, remember the defendent was ALREADY in secular custody.

In my current campaign, I lost TWO kings, TWO heirs, and THREE high ranking family members in about fifteen turns to the same inquisitor. And one of the kings was on Crusade! Assassination? Impossible. A high valor assassin gets a 5% chance. This is NOT a bug; it's meant to inhance the game. Fine. Give me a way to mod it out.. I was able to do that in MTW simply by having those slimy little pests cost 1,000,000 florins and 100 years to build. Hey, it worked. So if I can use any means to improve (mod) my game to my historical liking, so be it. How does that differ from changing units or provinces? It doesn't.

It is inconceivable to me to even think that a king would allow himself or sons to be executed by anyone. It's absurd. What I would like to see, will obviously never happen. I would like to see inquisitions "fixed" so that a convicted toady, who was by fact already in secular custody, be punished by secular authority, IF THE AUTHORITY defers to Papal opinion. And the worst punishment for refusing the inquisitor's findings would simply be excommunication. That is the way it was. While most would consider that laughable today, it had a tad more weight during our period of play. And let's face it, the inquisition was used as a tool, not only by the church to cement their monopoly of the riches involved, but also by the peerage. Not all convicted were executed; the majority weren't. Instead, they were stripped of all their wealth. Golly-gee! Wonder who got the money and land? Most of you folks are aware of Phillip and the murder/theft of the Templars, and I'm sure most are aware that Joan of Arc was executed by secular authority (English) because she was a political/military threat, not a bloody witch. Those are rather well know examples, but hadly exceptional. Church and State have always had a symbiotic relationship. They didn't ruffle each other's feathers over minor issues.

[Doug-Thompson]

In my current campaign, I lost TWO kings, TWO heirs, and THREE high ranking family members in about fifteen turns to the same inquisitor. And one of the kings was on Crusade! Assassination? Impossible. A high valor assassin gets a 5% chance. This is NOT a bug; it's meant to inhance the game. Fine. Give me a way to mod it out.. I was able to do that in MTW simply by having those slimy little pests cost 1,000,000 florins and 100 years to build. Hey, it worked.

I love playing Muslims.

[CvC]

Look at it this way: You are using large portions of your army to cordon and search a specific area for an Iquisitor, Merchant, Diplomat, Priest, whatever...not unrealistic if the sought after character is being a real thorn in your side...if you have the resources to spare that large a force looking for one man then go for it...I don't see any problem at all.