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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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One other thing is how can a Catholic country become an Empire? Do they have to bribe the pope or be in his good graces? Or would it be tied to a formable?
 
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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?
We try to take into account as many possibilities as possible, but flavor descriptions have unfortunately to fit to a specific time point, and cannot take into account all the possible shenanigans that can happen during the game.
 
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Also, I think it makes sense for some countries - like France or Spain - to build cardinals as seats in their country, but since cardinals are usually bishops or archbishops, it doesn't really make sense in the HRE where those are actually on the map.
Especially with the requirement that the country is higher than county rank - are bishoprics county rank? Does that mean a literal bishop can never become a cardinal, but France can dominate the council as long as they spend enough money?

My idea would be to instead make the cardinal seat buildings into bishopric seats, which have a chance to be elected to the council of cardinals. The council would have a fixed number of seats where one random seat is replaced regularly. Bishoprics that are independent countries would also start with such a building.
At least then it wouldn't be so deterministic, and maybe building a bunch of bishoprics in your country can also come with the drawback of giving the clergy a lot of power. And of course you'd be limited to one bishopric per province.
While bishops are present in the HRE, there are plenty more there than what you see on the map; not all bishops in the HRE are prince-bishops!
 
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Is there any plan to add more laws for the church? Some of the starting laws don’t seem entirely representative of the historical situation.

Cum Postquam especially seems odd as it wasn’t declared until 1518 in response to the beginning of the Lutheran reformation in Germany. While it was condemned by Clement V, it would make more sense for the church to start with “Culpa et Poena” as a starting law for indulgences to represent the widespread abuse, especially as that verbiage wasn’t revoked until Constance 1418.

It feels that a law to represent the ability of the pope to enforce the teaching of the church on local spiritual leadership without the collaboration of the local rulers would be necessary. Maybe this would fall under the Simony law?

Finally, is there a plan for the reintegration of the protesting churches if Trent accepts their doctrines? It always irked me that the Catholic Church embracing Sola Fide in EU4 didn’t have any content for the reestablishment of a truly Catholic Church, or at least to reintegrate the non-reformed protestants. It feels like if the Lutheran reformation gets the majority of what they want, they should see the newly reformed Catholic Church as legitimate?
 
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What if a non-Catholic empire wants to convert to Catholicism, i.e. the Mongol Empire? Does the ban on empires will prevent conversion in such a case?
 
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That's a problem considering that some mechanics are locked behind "Empire" rank.

E.g. recently we saw new Unify Culture Group mechanic:



One of historical examples given in the dev comments for that was France. But in order to do it France would have to convert to some other religion, declare itself empire, unify culture and than return to catholicism (?)
While not allowing catholic countries willy-nilly become empires generally speaking serves historical flavour, in this case it becomes anti-flavour.
Yet more reason why this "country rank" system is truly a drag on the game.
 
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While bishops are present in the HRE, there are plenty more there than what you see on the map; not all bishops in the HRE are prince-bishops!
Yep, you definitely would still be able to build that building inside the HRE, but of course not all the bishops would be represented in the game anyway, that would be too much detail.
 
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Why did you choose to tie cardinals to buildings rather to characters? Doesn't it make the Curia more static along a gameplay?

Is there enough characters so saints are not basically all kings (seems a bit gamey if that's the case)?

How do you model the Western Schism? Can I have Benedicto XIII in Aragon?

What means Castille and France being in a lighter blue in the map?

Do monasteries allowed mean just a building or it affects the gameplay more in depth? If I recall correctly you only showed a specific subtype (fortified monasteries) in Saturday Buildings
 
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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.
Better yet would be to pop out each diocese as its own building-based country. That way you can actually represent the fact that no Catholic country had unilateral control over its own church.

Imagine getting into arguments with the Pope over a greedy bishop causing all sorts of problems that the Pope won't remove because they happen to be great at raising indulgence money for the Pope. Or having to work with your bishops/archbishops for conversion of the people instead of just clicking a button and using a cabinet member. Or trying to make sure your bishops are aligned with you on what you want for papal bulls and the like, without the actual guarantee that they'll align with what you want (since they could be influenced by others as well).
 
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Can countries request funds from the Papacy in case there is a plague outbreak or a disaster?

Are Jesuits and similar non military orders in the game? Will they help with location development and literacy growth?
I accidentally read this as "Can countries request refunds", as in, what was all this praying good for then?
 
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Does this mean Cathedrals are cardinal seats or seperate?

Does voting for/against a bull give an opinion boni/malus?

Does pope start with a cardinal? I imagine so?

How are popes elected?
 
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