What do you do if you're at war with the papacy?

**human_male** · 06-19-2007, 09:51

Hi. So I got excommunicated despite keeping my relations with the pope pefect by bribing him. He ordered me to cease hostilites and I disobeyed. It wasn't that big a deal the first couple of times but then he attacked one of my towns and I've been at war with them for ages.

I know you can't wipe them out so I pushed them back into Rome and left them alone, offering bribes of 10000 to accept a ceasefire but they refuse. I'm getting rebellions all over the place.

What can I do?

**Callahan9119** · 06-19-2007, 10:20

wait till he dies, and get cardinals. i really never get excommunicated...and i know i'v never actually fought the papal states as a catholic faction

if the pope is young, maybe destroy papal states and vacate rome to rebels, when he reappears maybe you start of neutral, but i'm just guessing

**Kobal2fr** · 06-19-2007, 11:26

Hmmm pray ?

Ah, no, drat, that one's out too

But yeah, like sabutai said, rig the elections. Send twelve priests in deep dark Russia or in the middle of the desert, wait for them to get hunger-induced extatic visions (read : 5 Piety), then send send spies and good assassins around to find and purge the existing Council, like you would end the Jedi Order. If the blood-stained funny hats are handed out to anyone but your candidates, keep on killin'.

**snorky** · 06-19-2007, 11:34

War with the papacy should be carefully planed because there is nothing to gain from a war like that except land. So you should target there city's and then try to get ceasefire. I did this ones and when i took Rome they were actually keen on ceasefire. so my advise is lure the pope into Rome and then take the city ceasefire wil follow automatically but there is no guarantee

**Thurak** · 06-19-2007, 11:41

That doesn´t help if you are at war with them. You will still be excommunicated when the Pope dies and a new one is elected if you are at war with the Papacy.

In a Milan game I had exactly your situation. But I decided to take Rome and so I did. The newly eleted Pope appeared very close to Rome and I assume they had no other city and obviously no other catholic faction gave one to the Pope.
Without any city left all the Popes simply appeared next to Rome and did only the usual Pope-stuff. So I had some more regions for my own :), including Rome

And the price for peace was... 20.000. And then you are still excommunicated... either you do like other suggest or you kill your faction leader. Hey, he´s the bad one. So says the Pope! ;)

**Malkut** · 06-19-2007, 11:55

Originally Posted by sabutai

wait till he dies

Why wait?

**sapi** · 06-19-2007, 12:14

Well, you could always kill the Pope, but logic dictates that that may not be the most effective way to make peace with the papal states

**HoreTore** · 06-19-2007, 14:55

Well, your first mistake was disobeying him. The second was repeating it. However, the biggest mistake, was to take his land. That makes him REALLY hate you. No real idea at what you can do, but you could try eliminating your borders with him. It could work, but I'm not sure(it'll work on any other faction, but it may be something special with the papacy). You can do this by either gifting your provinces near rome to someone else, or destroy rome and hope he takes up residence somewhere else.

**PseRamesses** · 06-19-2007, 14:58

1. Take Rome and give him Malta (Anno Domini mod) or some other province you don´t need and sue for peace.

2. Wait until he´s 59. Attack and take Rome and/or all other provinces that you want. Pope dies at 60, hopefully. You´ll get reconciliated when the new pope arrives.

**Tyrac** · 06-19-2007, 15:11

Just keep upping the offer until he says yes.
Give many provinces.
Offer all your cash for a few turns. (save up)

It sounds like you actually have a decent empire so you CAN afford to not build troops for a bit.

Eventually he will say yes and then just pour money on him until he loves you.

**Malkut** · 06-20-2007, 08:11

Originally Posted by sapi

Well, you could always kill the Pope, but logic dictates that that may not be the most effective way to make peace with the papal states

Still, a chance to kill the Pope is a chance to kill the Pope! Sounds like he's a jerk, anyway.

**gardibolt** · 06-20-2007, 16:12

There are some things that set the Pope off on a rampage, it seems. In my M/M England game, Sicily attacked him and drove him out of Rome. Big mistake. Siciliy is excommunicated, Pope calls a crusade against Rome, I take and the Pope asks for it back. I give it to him and he goes wild, taking Sicily, Sardinia, the rest of Italy, North Africa and then goes on crusade and takes Jerusalem before I can get there! Luckily he wasn't able to hold it against the Timurids or I would have had a hard time fulfilling my victory conditions.