New Faction Leader Question

[Martok]

I'm pretty sure putts has the right of it. Papal (Crusade against ex-commed faction) calculations seem to take place before the (ex-commed faction leader dies) event.

Totally unable to comment whether it's correct but it makes a lot of sense.

Only thing I would add is that, IRRC, it happened to me few times to be at the receiving end of a crusade even though my ex-com leader had died in the meantime. Perhpas totally unrelated since there some other apparent glitches that favour IA factions when it comes to disbanding crusades.

Yeah, it's a different situation in those cases. If a Crusade is launched against you while you're ex-commed, it will continue even if your current leader dies and your faction regains good standing with the Pope.

On the flip side, however, if you launch a Crusade against an ex-commed faction who then regains good Papal standing, your Crusade is automatically disbanded (and you suffer the standard influence hit as a result). The AI does get a sort of "cheat" in this regard.