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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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There are currently no requirements, as we decided to abstract the process. Countries didn't always follow the papal procedures before they started venerating their past rulers as saints, and saints are not exclusive to Catholicism (and thus tied to the Pope) anyway.
While that is true it’s NOT respected unless the Pope approves it. Even if people did it, at the time period that changed. Even today the Cardinals and Popes have to have a really stringent process with miracles to canonize them so it’s something to change. Especially if you don’t want to really offend Catholics. It’s that important
 
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I guess I wasn't misreading the post, unfortunately.


Catholic doctrine by this point in history is that only the pope can canonize (Through this organization). It shouldn't matter to the Catholic mechanics what other religious practices do for their saints. This discussion is about the mechanics for Catholicism. Surely the system should be setup in a way that can accurately portray a multitude of faiths and how they handle the 'revered dead' of various kinds, Saints included.

Those people who start being revered as saints but are not yet canonized by the pope might get a different status if you want to portray them - Folk Saints, perhaps - and be potential candidates for canonization, but they should not instantly be recognized by the wider Catholic world as saints before an official canonization. Besides, if the pope then rejects the claims of sainthood, that's interesting - it means causing unrest between those that follow the Pope's decree and those who reject it.

Right now the system sounds boring as well as inaccurate. Getting a saint sounds like it's just a cost problem, not one of trying to get acceptance from the head of the faith, which it should be. Cost might come into that, but it should not be the sole determining factor.


There should be hard blocks.

The pope's influence is one of the core tenants of Catholicism, and you're undermining it by the very nature of how you're portraying the faith, mechanically. Perhaps countries should be able to build a cardinal's seat, but they should still have to try and get a cardinal elected to that position. This is completely the wrong way of representing the way cardinals were appointed. If it's meant to show the corruption in the system, that should be done by having countries able to try and bribe the papacy for a seat. Cardinals didn't just show up at the college of cardinals without the pope's explicit approval and endorsement for the position (A minimum relation wouldn't even suffice. There are only a few seats, sometimes fewer than 30).

In addition, there should ideally be ways for the pope to adjust the number of seats in the College, as was done historically. This was done in order to limit the College's power when it suited the pope, and to open opportunities to appoint new cardinals if that would win allies and support.

I also don't know how the Western Schism is going to be portrayed even halfway accurately if you're not going to be representing how the various competing popes were all appointing their own cardinals, which would not be recognized by the other popes. Quite honestly there's a lot we should rather be discussing, such as whether there should be enough nuance to have cardinals from your country not always vote in line with your wishes, or what should happen if your cardinal dies and you lose that seat in the College, but the basics should be correct before we can have that sort of conversation.

Right now it seems like you've neutered the papacies role in the faith to an unhistorical degree. Under this system, he's a powerless figurehead in his own College and unable to even control who is canonized.

Again, this is boring. I don't mind some abstraction, but you've removed all of the political nuance and intrigue that came with the position of cardinal. Somehow it's made the most politically bloody, interesting institution in Catholicism a boring one where the pope has no power and there's just a positive opinion and some money between any Catholic country and having a seat in the College.
I took note of this for suggestions on improving the system, thank you.
 
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I took note of this for suggestions on improving the system, thank you.
Thank you! I always appreciate the team being able to take criticism and improve the game.
I hope to see a much more interesting system.
 
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I think Cardinals need to be characters, and that this is where you'll ultimately end up. Having the number of cardinals being dictated by your decision on whether to build a building in your own realm is not going to work out. Can you set a condition at least that you must either have good relations with Rome or have power over them or give them a lot of tithes?

Otherwise this is looking really cool. Much better than CK3, and religion was even more important then.
 
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Could be an option, but there's still a double negative. "Disallowed X Yes" is not that much different than "Cannot do X Yes". But as I said in another comment, we will see how we can improve the readability of those.
Maybe try to find a "positive" way to describe the modifier.
"Cannot declare war on religious head without casus belli" => "Requires CB to declare war on religous head"
This avoids the double negative.
 
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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)
If I may ask why not add Anglo-Saxon as an unobtainable culture for this not only would it add some extra detail to historic characters but I’d be fun to mess around with it with cheats
 
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Well the pope was present when napoleon crowned himself emperor. Maybe there should be a way to obtain the empire title later iin the game when religion isn't that important in politics or when HRE dies
 
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First off, I REALLY appreciate seeing a fleshed out Catholicism compared to something like CK3 where it’s basically reduced to generic religion with XYZ selected traits. Makes it feel much more real. And most of the features shown look great! That said, I will add my voice to those expressing dissatisfaction with Cardinals and Saints as proposed.

Cardinals should be a set number (perhaps allowed to increase over time passively, or perhaps due to pope’s discretion) and reassigned on cardinal death to an applicable character. The cathedral/important religious building should be a prerequisite for a cardinal, sure, but we absolutely shouldn’t be able to just spam cathedrals and cardinal seats for guaranteed cardinals. Can have Cardinal assignment be influenced by things like papal relations, so players can have some way of influencing it, but complete control is really off putting to me honestly.

Regarding saints, it would be much more enjoyable to be playing, say, Castile and 20 years after your Reconquista-ing ruler died you get some pop-up “the people have developed a local cult of veneration to the departed Isabel of Castile, beloved as she was for spreading the borders of Christendom. Perhaps we should promote their efforts, building a shrine, and seeking Papal recognition of her holiness.” Gives option to do nothing vs paying cost to build shrine and promote cause of canonization. Then may not find out anything for 20-40 years, and maybe it’s a dud and remains a local cult or maybe you get pleasantly surprised to hear news of canonization upgrading the shrine and gaining prestige or temporary tolerance of the true faith or something. Besides active holy wars, characters could be flagged for consideration for building lots of holy buildings or if helping the poor somehow (schools, lowering taxes). That would be way more fun than “press button to make anyone a saint whenever you want”.
 
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honestly the restriction should be that no catholic country get to become an empire as long as the HRE stands

I took note of this as a possible option to consider.

Maybe as long as HRE stands and is catholic?
After all if HRE betrays the True Faith papacy should be more open to establishing a new catholic empire.
 
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I’m not sure how I feel about cardinals being entirely in the hands of the country.

I feel like the pope wouldn’t take it seriously if a ruler he excommunicated, for instance, decided to build a bigger cathedral and just expect the local bishop to get promoted.
 
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Still makes no sense.

Please reconsider. For a Saint to be recognised as such the Pope has to declare it.

Also it does not matter what other religions do, this is for the Catholic one. Protestanta can declare whoever they want as a Saint, its a separate mechanic.

At the minimum please consider a +100 relationship with the Pope minimum and having a cardinal or something.

Otherwise it sounds too OP too.

Saints in the Catholic Church are recognized internationally. One Country venerating a person does not make it bind it for all the faithful
Saints are incredibly important to Catholicism too so it can be considered really offensive to just have it be seen willy nilly like that too.
 
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Will say I'm not the biggest fan of the current flow for getting cardinals to be purely have a building and get one.

I feel a more interesting, flavourful, and accurate way to represent it, would be to swap from it being guaranteed to get a cardinal; to instead having it be that you can have one assigned there.

The Pope would then assign the cardinals as he sees fit; or is bribed/coerced into. Balance it out by requiring expending some of the curia's funds for an enthronement and having the more powerful countries expecting to have atleast a cardinal[and having consequences for snubbing them of course]. It would also innately dilute the curia's voting power, so discourages one from just going all out and giving everyone a cardinal.

Overall though looks good and I hope that holy sites aren't just a catholic thing!
I think they could have just expanded how they did it in eu4
 
Why can catholic countries not become empires? What’s the reasoning behind this(historically speaking)?
It should be that Catholic countries can't become Rome, as that's the only empire any of them would (and IMO should in game) be striving towards, and obviously there's already a Rome in the HRE. Such gimps any hope of a east-west problem of two emperors settlement which is incredibly disappointing imo.
 
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So are Church rules a "mechanic" or a "recommendation"?
First would simply disable certain policies. Second gives me as a ruler the Option to break them, and risking upsetting the Pope. :)