How to get pious generals?

[steev]

Most of my generals have zero piety, and at most maybe 2 piety. It doesn't matter much, as i rarely have the Inquisition come round, and those level-10 inquisitors even kill off the level-7 bishops, let alone a zero piety king. Just curious how a general would get pious. Have a priest follow him around?

[Bob the Insane]

Build churches when the general is a govenor...

[Durallan]

or leave them in a city with a huge cathedral too I think.

[steev]

that building churches doesnt seem to do much good. it seems the main thing to watch out for is the pagan magician you get if you go in a place that isnt highly catholic. pagan magicians are a real nuisance.

[detroitmechworks]

Does 1.2 fix that little annoyance, BTW? Seems like every other general I have gets a pagan magician...

[HoreTore]

The trigger for pagan magician in the new patch, is less than 90% of your own religion AND 10% or more heresy. So they are a lot rarer. Only got one so far into my english campaign at turn 50.

The way to get pious generals, is first to either install the 1.2 patch, or if that's not an option, fix the religionstarter trait. In the trait description, change "characters general" to "characters family".

Second, build churches, priests and join crusades. These are the traits giving piety, and how you get them(all v1.2):

PublicFaith: staying in a settlement with a level 2 or higher religious building gives a 15% chance each turn of getting one point. If you have a cathedral in your empire, characters have a 35% chance of gaining it when they are born. For a huge cathedral, the chance is 65%.

TouchedByTheGods: 4% chance of gaining it on birth, which is then selfperpetuating at 4% each turn. Nothing can be done about it.

ForcedReligious: 10% when damaged by a natural disaster(like flood). 100% chance when found innocent of heresy.

CrusaderHistory: first level gained when joining a crusade. Second trait when arriving at the target. Third level when you take the target.

AdoredbyPope: only way I've got this trait, was when rome fell, and I took it back. When I did, the following turn I got a mission from the pope to give it to him. I did, and got the first level of the trait.

ReligiousActivity: 1 point per priest the governor recruits. 12 priests needed for the final level, giving +4 piety and +2 chivalry.

PublicFaith and ReligiousActivity are the easiest and most convinient ones. CrusaderHistory is an option once in a while. So, stay in a settlement with a church and train priests.

[Shahed]

Great explanation HoreTore.

[phunkbot]

does using assassins (and/or spies) lower your piety?

[Shahed]

I don't think so. Using them influences the chances of other traits e.g Prone to Murder, Spymaster etc.

Does having priests always accompany your general increase his piety ?

[Zajuts149]

There's a bug that hinders your Generals from getting the trait ReligionStarter 1, which should give them piety 3 at start.

[HoreTore]

Does having priests always accompany your general increase his piety ?

Nope, only the things I posted give piety. Taken straight from the traits file

However, I haven't checked the ancillary file...

[Slaists]

In the unofficial 1.02, generals seem to consistenty gain peity if they build priests. I got several with almost maxed out piety this way.

[TevashSzat]

If you feel like exploiting the system, wait until a crusade or jihad is in progress and then repeatedly join/ abandon it until you get saintly ruler trait which gives quite a bit of chivalry and piety

[HoreTore]

Saintly Ruler, or StrategyChivalry, gives 5 chivalry and 3 authority, no piety. Also, that's impossible in v1.2. You now get StrategyDread every time you abandon.