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Tinto Talks #59 - 16th of April 2025

Hello and welcome once again to our super secret Project Caesar Tinto Talks. I will be your host this time, where we will be talking about the mechanics of Catholicism and its associated Catholic Church International Organization.

Here’s an overview of the religion itself:
Catholicism Tooltip.png


One thing to highlight here besides all the other effects, is that Catholic countries are not able to tax their clergy at all by default, although there may be other things modifying this on top of it. However, the clergy won’t necessarily swim in money, as that has to be instead paid to the Papacy directly in the form of a tithe.
Tithe.png


Another key aspect of Catholicism is that all Catholic countries will belong to the Catholic Church IO:
Catholic Church Map.png

Catholic Church IO pannel.png


You can see here that there are quite many countries belonging to it (the total list is expandable and scrollable), with some of them having some special statuses. For Bishopric and Military Order these are self-explanatory, but the Curia and Cardinals need some more information.

The decisions concerning the Catholic Church are taken by the Curia, which is composed of Cardinals. In Project Caesar, Cardinals are represented by a special building, called Cardinal Seat, available to be built by Catholic countries higher than county rank in any location where they already own a large religious building. Each Cardinal Seat will grant its owner country a Cardinal, which the country can use to influence the decisions of the Curia (more on that later). Countries can have more than one Cardinal Seat and thus more than one Cardinal, that’s why in the panel you can see that there’s 7 countries in the Curia but a total of 16 Cardinals among them.
Cardinal Seat.png


Another aspect of the Catholic Church IO is its doctrines, represented by a set of laws. These laws are not something that’s easily changed, as it’s what defines the core values of Catholicism, but some important events will be able to shape them, like for example the Council of Trent (more on that in future Tinto Talks). Here are some of these laws effects:
Papal Authority.png

Purchase of Indulgence.png

Marriage of Priests.png

Persecution of Witchcraft.png


Next to the Doctrines, we have the Papal Bulls. These are actions that any Catholic country can choose to propose, but only those in the Curia can vote on whether to pass them or refuse them. Here are the possible bulls with some examples:
Papal Bulls.png

Illius Qui Se Pro Divini.png

In Coena Domini.png


When voting on a Papal Bull, the interface changes slightly to show how many cardinals support each option. It goes without saying that all the cardinals that a country has will be assigned to vote for the same option, so the amount of cardinals a country has is effectively its amount of votes.
Papal Bulls Vote.png


Besides the Papal Bulls, there’s also the action of Excommunication, available to all countries of the Curia, that if approved, will get the excommunicated country some very nasty modifiers and allow for a special casus belli.

Excommunication Effects.png


The Catholic Church also has some extra aspects in the form of Saints and Holy Sites. Saints are characters of a country that have been elevated to sainthood. A country can choose to canonize any of its previous rulers, and they will get benefits depending on the abilities of such character. Holy Sites are special locations to the Catholic faith, giving some extra income to their owner due to the affluence of faithful in them.
Saints.png

Holy Sites.png


Outside the Catholic Church per se and instead in the main religion panel, there are some extra religious actions available to certain countries, besides the already mentioned option to canonize a character.
Religious Actions.png


  • Demand Apostolic Tax is an action exclusive to the Papacy, in which they will demand extra payment from those countries with the Apostolic Tax privilege enabled.
  • Request Aid is an action exclusive to the military orders, in which they can ask to petition support to the Pope for their infrastructure, military, or coffers.
  • Placitum Regium is an action available to kingdoms or empires that gives them some extra crown power at the expense of relations with the Papacy.

One last thing to mention here is that, as you can see, Catholicism also has Reform Desire. However, in contrast to some other of our titles that also present this value, here it is not a ticking clock for the Reformation, but instead something that will come into play in the Council of Trent. As such, you will have to wait a bit for a further explanation on it.

And that is all for today, next week we will resolve these cliffhangers by taking a further look at what Catholicism has in store after the start of the game, including the situations of the Western Schism, Reformation, and the Council of Trent. On the other hand, in this week’s Tinto Flavor we will go directly to the head of Catholicism by taking a look at the flavor content for the Papal States. Also, remember that this week’s Tinto Flavour will be on Thursday, as this week is Good Friday and the Papal States would be too busy to attend their own Tinto Flavor then (oh, and it’s also a holiday).

See you next time!
 
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Hello and welcome once again to our super secret Project Caesar Tinto Talks. I will be your host this time, where we will be talking about the mechanics of Catholicism and its associated Catholic Church International Organization.

Here’s an overview of the religion itself:
View attachment 1281815

One thing to highlight here besides all the other effects, is that Catholic countries are not able to tax their clergy at all by default, although there may be other things modifying this on top of it. However, the clergy won’t necessarily swim in money, as that has to be instead paid to the Papacy directly in the form of a tithe.
View attachment 1281816

Another key aspect of Catholicism is that all Catholic countries will belong to the Catholic Church IO:
View attachment 1281817
View attachment 1281818

You can see here that there are quite many countries belonging to it (the total list is expandable and scrollable), with some of them having some special statuses. For Bishopric and Military Order these are self-explanatory, but the Curia and Cardinals need some more information.

The decisions concerning the Catholic Church are taken by the Curia, which is composed of Cardinals. In Project Caesar, Cardinals are represented by a special building, called Cardinal Seat, available to be built by Catholic countries higher than county rank in any location where they already own a large religious building. Each Cardinal Seat will grant its owner country a Cardinal, which the country can use to influence the decisions of the Curia (more on that later). Countries can have more than one Cardinal Seat and thus more than one Cardinal, that’s why in the panel you can see that there’s 7 countries in the Curia but a total of 16 Cardinals among them.
View attachment 1281819

Another aspect of the Catholic Church IO is its doctrines, represented by a set of laws. These laws are not something that’s easily changed, as it’s what defines the core values of Catholicism, but some important events will be able to shape them, like for example the Council of Trent (more on that in future Tinto Talks). Here are some of these laws effects:
View attachment 1281820
View attachment 1281821
View attachment 1281822
View attachment 1281823

Next to the Doctrines, we have the Papal Bulls. These are actions that any Catholic country can choose to propose, but only those in the Curia can vote on whether to pass them or refuse them. Here are the possible bulls with some examples:
View attachment 1281826
View attachment 1281827
View attachment 1281828

When voting on a Papal Bull, the interface changes slightly to show how many cardinals support each option. It goes without saying that all the cardinals that a country has will be assigned to vote for the same option, so the amount of cardinals a country has is effectively its amount of votes.View attachment 1281829

Besides the Papal Bulls, there’s also the action of Excommunication, available to all countries of the Curia, that if approved, will get the excommunicated country some very nasty modifiers and allow for a special casus belli.

View attachment 1281830

The Catholic Church also has some extra aspects in the form of Saints and Holy Sites. Saints are characters of a country that have been elevated to sainthood. A country can choose to canonize any of its previous rulers, and they will get benefits depending on the abilities of such character. Holy Sites are special locations to the Catholic faith, giving some extra income to their owner due to the affluence of faithful in them.
View attachment 1281831
View attachment 1281832

Outside the Catholic Church per se and instead in the main religion panel, there are some extra religious actions available to certain countries, besides the already mentioned option to canonize a character.
View attachment 1281833

  • Demand Apostolic Tax is an action exclusive to the Papacy, in which they will demand extra payment from those countries with the Apostolic Tax privilege enabled.
  • Request Aid is an action exclusive to the military orders, in which they can ask to petition support to the Pope for their infrastructure, military, or coffers.
  • Placitum Regium is an action available to kingdoms or empires that gives them some extra crown power at the expense of relations with the Papacy.

One last thing to mention here is that, as you can see, Catholicism also has Reform Desire. However, in contrast to some other of our titles that also present this value, here it is not a ticking clock for the Reformation, but instead something that will come into play in the Council of Trent. As such, you will have to wait a bit for a further explanation on it.

And that is all for today, next week we will resolve these cliffhangers by taking a further look at what Catholicism has in store after the start of the game, including the situations of the Western Schism, Reformation, and the Council of Trent. On the other hand, in this week’s Tinto Flavor we will go directly to the head of Catholicism by taking a look at the flavor content for the Papal States. Also, remember that this week’s Tinto Flavour will be on Thursday, as this week is Good Friday and the Papal States would be too busy to attend their own Tinto Flavor then (oh, and it’s also a holiday).

See you next time!
Are the benefits from canonising a ruler temporary? for how long?
 
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I spy with my little eye the Order of Christ.
Why no order of Aviz?
Hopefully not counting them as Knights of Calatrava, because never ceased to have a Portuguese grand master, dependent for temporalities on the Portuguese King.
 
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I apologize for not understanding the HRE being the only empire accepted by the pope part, or maybe I don't understand the feature correctly. Does this mean that Spain or France (to put an example) cannot become empires? Or is HRE rank different than other empire tier?
 
1. Any dead character of the country
2. We don't have Anglo-Saxon in the game and thus they are English, which is using the "de" because it's already been influenced by French
3. No, holy sites are defined at setup
4. It's for all theocracies (but they have to be countries, ofc)
5. There's too many of them to list here (but I can assure you they are using the correct terms)


Can the saints below their name get the birth and death year of the character?
 
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This is not really related to this TT, but the Saints mechanic made me think : How much did you consider existing overhaul mods such as Annebenar or Voltaire's Nightmare when designing PC ? Did you look at some mechanics and thought "Oh we could give modders tools to make them awesome" ?
 
What will you do if the description of the tooltip for Catholicism changes due to in-game events? It says that Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination. What happens if the Protestants win really hard and there are more Protestants than Catholics? Will the tooltip update?
 
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It feels a bit weird that you get cardinals simply by building a building? But equally, I have no idea how this worked in real life.
In real life any member of the Church (usually a bishop or archbishop) can be granted the position of Cardinal on top of their existing position.

Ideally this would be a whole contest of jockeying for power and the like, but the base game doesn't operate at the level of bishops and archbishops (unless they're the land-owning kind).
 
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Will dioceses be featured in any way to represent the physical realm of church influence?
They already exist somewhat though land-based Bishopric countries, so I wonder if dioceses could be building-based countries?
If yes, the Land-based Bishoprics might also own churches in other nations, representing their jurisdiction?

An example would be the diocese of Tournai, which had the entirety of Flanders under its jurisdiction, even though it would classify as an independent nation.

Interactive map of all European Dioceses here:
https://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/pt668dz7698
I've got plans to represent them through building-based countries and IOs, but to my knowledge the base game has no intent to represent dioceses and non-country bishops/archbishops or the ecclesiastical hierarchy whatsoever.
 
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Will dioceses be featured in any way to represent the physical realm of church influence?
They already exist somewhat though land-based Bishopric countries, so I wonder if dioceses could be building-based countries?
If yes, the Land-based Bishoprics might also own churches in other nations, representing their jurisdiction?

An example would be the diocese of Tournai, which had the entirety of Flanders under its jurisdiction, even though it would classify as an independent nation.

Interactive map of all European Dioceses here:
https://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/pt668dz7698
Actually regarding dioceses, I'm wondering if it was possible for an IO like the Catholic Church to have something akin to dioceses, i.e. areas of influence defined within the framework of the IO?
Sounds like a feature that would be useful for IOs in general.
 
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What’s really weird is you can get your rulers to become Saints but what about characters? Like Saint Joan of Arc or people who aren’t rulers? Is there a way for that?
 
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If it provides bonuses, it will be metagamed
Absolutely, a good change could be you can only receive the benefits on one saint at a time if they want to keep the limitations away from the amount of characters that can be designated as saints. Maybe the most recent saint is always the default, and for a cost you can change who you have as the designated saint?
 
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