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Dev Diary #101 - Saints and Ancestors

Hello there! Another week, another Dev Diary!


This week we are going to take a look at the Saints, their potential Pagan counterparts, and how they will work in Holy Fury.


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After the death of a pious Christian character, there is a chance for the Pope/Patriarch/local bishop to decide to beatify them. This is how they’re shown to be truly pious Christians. There will be an announcement sent out to the dynasty as well as the ones in the realm of the character. A beatified character gets a special trait, and a chance to later on be canonized.


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If they do indeed go on to become Saints, another announcement message will be sent out to all Christians of the same faith, as well as their dynasty members. The character in question will be given a special nickname, a miracle will be associated with him/her (this is mostly for flavour) and they will be given a special bloodline. Note, any Christian with a religious head can become canonized, not only Catholics.


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The Saint will have their burial site made public, usually in their capital or another nearby province in the form of a Province Modifier. This gives a permanent benefit for whoever holds the Burial Site, as well as some new flavor events that might happen. Any church holdings in the province will be able to create a small shrine to the local Saint. As well, if any raiders were to drop by the province, they might loot and ruin the burial site for some extra gold and prestige.


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A new icon and menu have been added to the religion screen for Christians, where they can check all the Saints that have been created for their faith throughout the game. We figured it would be a handy way of keeping track of everything.


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For those enjoying pilgrimages and traveling, we have added a new option and event chain to travel to a Saint’s burial site. It will find 4 relevant burial sites of Saints created throughout the game. If there isn’t 4 existing in the game yet, there will be up to 3 placeholders filling those spots. Hopefully it will be an interesting change of pace from the regular pilgrimages.


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If the Catholics are led by a particularly terrible Pope, you might even see the cases of “Impious Saints” as we call them. In the worst case scenarios, this can end up with all of Catholicism embroiled in a massive war, fighting for the piety of the Holy See. The impious Saint in question will get a Bloodline as well, but it doesn’t quite bring as many benefits as most other bloodlines do.


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For those of you who don’t care particularly much about Catholics, or Christians in general, we have added a new Reformation doctrine where one can take on the benefits of Saints into your pagan faith. Instead of caring about such silly things as “Piety”, “Humbleness” or other supposed positive traits, the Venerated Ancestors will be based on things your religion cares about. So if you reform your religion to be a warlike one, one is more likely to become a Venerated Ancestor if you do things that are warlike.


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For those of you preferring to lead religions yourself, you will occasionally be given the choice of people the religion will venerate as a worthy ancestor. The dynasty of the character in question will, of course, be very appreciative of their family member being venerated as an Ancestor.

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For the characters receiving that honor, there is a whole slew of new special bloodlines attached to them, as well some special nicknames.


Hopefully you enjoyed this little peek into the upcoming feature for CK2, and we are excited to hear your thoughts on it. Until next time!
 
Any events that can lead to a schism and the creation of an Antipope?

We already have antipope mechanics. Any independent Catholic king or emperor with free investiture can appoint one.
 
What will happen with the nickname "the Saint"? Since apparently only dead characters get sainthood, wouldn't someone known as "the Saint" be considered a heresy?

Could we expedite the canonization process of someone relevant to our bloodline?
 
What will happen with the nickname "the Saint"? Since apparently only dead characters get sainthood, wouldn't someone known as "the Saint" be considered a heresy?
I'd imagine one could be called such without having to be canonized as such. Popularly beloved, historically known for his piety, etc.

When people talk about their mother being a saint or someone having the patience of a saint, they aren't invoking the wrath of the Church.
 
I'd imagine one could be called such without having to be canonized as such. Popularly beloved, historically known for his piety, etc.

When people talk about their mother being a saint or someone having the patience of a saint, they aren't invoking the wrath of the Church.
I don't mean they should obliterate the nick, but take it into consideration. Perhaps getting it make your chances of beatification spike up instead of being something bad; who knows...
 
Can we also have Buddhist and Hindu "Bhakti" saints, like Bodhidharma, Xuanzang, Adi Shankar, Madhavacharya, Pragya and so on?

What about the Sufi ones?
 
What will happen with the nickname "the Saint"? Since apparently only dead characters get sainthood, wouldn't someone known as "the Saint" be considered a heresy?

Could we expedite the canonization process of someone relevant to our bloodline?

well in the real world there were saint mechanics and rulers went around proclaiming themselves as saintly and saints, meaning lo look at me, I am the example of what all christians should aspire to be. Some of them even became saints later, most were regarded as gits and ignored and called proud though.
Not heresy though. Unless you were claiming to be performing miracles or unnatural magic or actively leading a political and religious uprising against the social order, deeds not words.
Also if you wanted someone to be a saint, you started calling them it right after they died, the monastry or cathedral trying to canonise their founder would refer to them as a saint to give legitimacy to the cause for canonisation. It wasn't technically legal but it was common practice.
Or in cases where everyone believed the person was a saint from the moment they died, such as martyrs, and didn't need to wait for the official declaration.
so no?
 
It would be nice and hilariously opportune if there were a miracle mechanic. I think of Saint Barbara, patron saint of Artillery, who is said to have called down lightning on the enemies of God.
 
It would be nice and hilariously opportune if there were a miracle mechanic. I think of Saint Barbara, patron saint of Artillery, who is said to have called down lightning on the enemies of God.
That's a fun idea; but it should be limited to like once per ruler's lifetime and only during a large crusade/holy war battle with a small chance for a major spectacular event. It could toggled by the supernatural game rule. Is there a mod for this?
 
Please include a proper fix towards AI path finding with fleets? Especially during crusades. It looks stupid to see the Franks marching from their 15k troops down to 2k when they arrive the Holy Land
 
Something on the other end, to represent the crusaders who turned around and went home the moment they reached jerusalem and had no interesting in fighting a war after, maybe making land promises and throwing cash at them to try and prevent it?
thatd be historical and fun
 
How about a flavor mechanic for martyrs, even if they don't get cannonized as saints ? There could be a lesser effect, where for example close kin of martyrs get +5 religion/church opinion for 30 years when a character is martyred, as well as a post-mortem added trait/modifier to the martyr.
 
Uhm, the writing of that event is quite weird. If she lived a pious life why are people wondering is she was a true Christian? Maybe a true Saint, but that she was a Christian should be obvious.
 
It's literally a word in English being used as such, with use as such :eek:

But it having an uncommon, niche use doesn't make it incorrect. It just makes it niche jargon. Thus reopening the "pre-" prefix ambiguities.


No, English usage does not have "Blesseds" as nouns. The Blessed Benedicta, fine; Benedicta is a Blessed, no. Check with your local CoE vicar or Catholic priest.
 
No, English usage does not have "Blesseds" as nouns. The Blessed Benedicta, fine; Benedicta is a Blessed, no. Check with your local CoE vicar or Catholic priest.
It does occur as a noun, in a standard verb-to-noun modification. "The blessed" works just as well as "The damned" and "The slain". It's somewhat archaic usage, but it works.
 
It does occur as a noun, in a standard verb-to-noun modification. "The blessed" works just as well as "The damned" and "The slain". It's somewhat archaic usage, but it works.

You're right, I was too broad there. But examples such as "the damned" are ellipses. So, for example, "The meek shall inherit the earth"="The meek (humans) shall inherit the earth". In each case, the noun phrase has to be plural and definite. ("I love the rich" works, "I love some rich", "I love a rich" don't.)

I'll amend my statement. It doesn't work in the singular, which was my original point way back
"A Blessed"?
"A blessed" makes about as much sense as "a damned" or "a slain". Have you ever heard in English someone refer to "My mother, a murdered", "My father, a slain", "The dog, a damned"?

I'll stretch it so far as to allow, perhaps, "My mother, the murdered" (which would really be odd, not archaic), but never with an indefinite article.

So, no, Benedicta cannot be a Blessed and "A blessed has passed" is not English.
 
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Huh. I guess I'm used to Dutch, where we can use that in singular as well. "A blessed has passed" = "Een gezegende is heengegaan."