Any way to turn off the Witch nonsense?

[namewhichisnottakenyet]

How does one even become a witch? I have hundreds of hours in CK3 and have rarely ever seen a witch. How do they become a problem to the point that you needed a rule for them?

That being said, I don't see anything wrong with witches. There are no supernatural powers, at least no more than any religion provides, so why not treat them as a society? If anything we need more clubs, societies, gatherings and such.

When you spend most of your life in the learning focus, there's a good chance that you'll trigger an event which allows you to become a witch. I would guess the MTTH is somewhere around 25 years.
Also, other characters can convert you to witchcraft.
Once you're a witch and you've converted the majority of your house, you can form a witch coven which triggers events in which you can get perk points for free.

Witch covens are really powerful (arguably too powerful) from a power gaming perspective, so I try to unlock them as soon as possible, but I can see more RP focused characters having issues with them.
The odd witch here or there wouldn't be much if an issue, but since witches tend to convert other characters to witchcraft, the trait can spread once it reaches critical mass.

 

[Silverbow]

So this is how it looks mid-game without actually looking for witches actively (i.e. no looking for secrets by spymaster). Imprison one, another 2 pop up...

 

[Grand Admiral Edward]

So this is how it looks mid-game without actually looking for witches actively (i.e. no looking for secrets by spymaster). Imprison one, another 2 pop up...
View attachment 963929

43 characters that are witches out of 40721. certianly everyone is a witch...

 

[Silverbow]

43 characters that are witches out of 40721. certianly everyone is a witch...

71 exposed witches, actually. Care to guess how many don't have the trait publicly? Also, good luck imprisoning 71 idiots that you can't even banish or execute. Great gameplay. Much fun.

 

[davidproxy]

Well hopefully they make the witchy stuff a setting that you can turn off. Personally I really like the witch content but I wish it was more in-depth.

(Alleged) Witch covens popping up at the lowest levels requiring you to intervene. Witches themselves organizing more like a faction and trying to enact more localized goals. First the Count’s Steward becomes one of them. The court priest speaks out and goes missing and is replaced by a new, somewhat unorthodox man but he’s very charismatic. Honestly, you could substitute cultist for witch and I’d be equally happy since they’re more or less the same thing - worshipping strange gods in exchange for power.

Op, at least with the new travel system the witches will have to be at your court to induct you into their coven so hopefully you’ll see less messages inviting you and also you can discover who is a witch easier and then execute them.

 

[IanReSc]

When you spend most of your life in the learning focus, there's a good chance that you'll trigger an event which allows you to become a witch. I would guess the MTTH is somewhere around 25 years.

That explains is. I rarely spend that long in one tree. Then again, I usally reform a religion to allow all kinds of deviant witchrafty things.

 

[kawamuratc]

Kings and emperors being "witches". But maybe I just missed the historical occurrence where Henry III. got burned at the stake because he stubbornly insisted he's something that doesn't even exist and that he dances with Satan at midnight masses.

When you said “fantasy” I thought we were still talking about the supernatural.

Let me try the question again: what supernatural stuff have you encountered?

 

[LeoDiesis]

Personally, whenever I reform faith I tend to always allow witchcraft for the free perk gain from the Grand Rite decision, but I understand OP's sentiment that it gets silly when you are not actively seeking out Satan and just trying to RP a little. And we all know all too well how much the AI is adulterer/fornicator/murderer/scheming happy in the current game balancing, so much so that I've not interacted with the "Can imprison criminals" current situation since my first hundred hours because it seems that everyone everywhere is sinning like there's no tomorrow.

Anyway as the devs have pointed out in other posts, adding game rules is not always the best answer because it adds variables that must be tested out for balancing everytime a patch is to be released. The best answer would be to tackle the underlying issue, i.e. implementing a more fleshed out punishment system or making witchcraft less snowball-y and out of the player's (and heads of faith's...) agency.

 

[Silverbow]

When you said “fantasy” I thought we were still talking about the supernatural.

Let me try the question again: what supernatural stuff have you encountered?

What is important here, semantics whether "witchcraft" really is supernatural as presented in the game, or the possibility to turn this ahistorical, made-up fantasy feature off?

I also like the 11 people who disagree with the OP, gotta love the sentiment of "I want to keep people from enjoying their games, even if fixing this would have absolutely no effect whatsoever on the way I play the game myself".

 

[Emperor 1997]

That explains is. I rarely spend that long in one tree. Then again, I usally reform a religion to allow all kinds of deviant witchrafty things.

Why?

If you do this, you lose a lot of Imprisonment Reason and Title Revocation Reasons against your Vassals.

The more your faiths forbids = The better for you, because you can easily revoke their titles and imprison them without being viewed as Tyrant.

 

[kawamuratc]

What is important here, semantics whether "witchcraft" really is supernatural as presented in the game, or the possibility to turn this ahistorical, made-up fantasy feature off?

I also like the 11 people who disagree with the OP, gotta love the sentiment of "I want to keep people from enjoying their games, even if fixing this would have absolutely no effect whatsoever on the way I play the game myself".

Have you tried finding or making a mod to disable this?

There’s lots of fantastical and ahistorical things that can happen in the game; thats not the same as supernatural, which I thought was your original problem?

 

[Darsara]

Kings and emperors being "witches". But maybe I just missed the historical occurrence where Henry III. got burned at the stake because he stubbornly insisted he's something that doesn't even exist and that he dances with Satan at midnight masses.

Why would Henry III get burned, he didn't have a sovereign to arrest him, nor, to my knowledge, was he every successfully captured and imprisoned by someone else who could execute him?
And really, couldn't one argue that both witches & kings are just as real as each other? Made up titles that describe roles & assign powers without any basis beyond the ability to say that that's what you are? It's just that monarchism had more social acceptance.

 

[Silverbow]

Have you tried finding or making a mod to disable this?

There’s lots of fantastical and ahistorical things that can happen in the game; thats not the same as supernatural, which I thought was your original problem?

No, my problem is that I find witchcraft game-ruining, since:
1. I find it ridiculously unrealistic
2. It's extremely prolific
3. There is no good way to stop it - the game essentially tries to force you to become dynastic kinslayer slaughtering children (because that's the age people apparently turn into occult maniacs at) to deal with it

I couldn't find a mod for it on steam, and believe you me, I have looked... Don't really have any modding knowledge myself either.

 

[Silverbow]

Why would Henry III get burned, he didn't have a sovereign to arrest him, nor, to my knowledge, was he every successfully captured and imprisoned by someone else who could execute him?
And really, couldn't one argue that both witches & kings are just as real as each other? Made up titles that describe roles & assign powers without any basis beyond the ability to say that that's what you are? It's just that monarchism had more social acceptance.

Last time I checked, some medieval catholic rulers did actually proclaim themselves as kings and were accepted as such. No medieval catholic ruler ever has proclaimed themselves a "witch".

 

[Darsara]

Last time I checked, some medieval catholic rulers did actually proclaim themselves as kings and were accepted as such. No medieval catholic ruler ever has proclaimed themselves a "witch".

Yes, that's why I said that monarchism had more social acceptance? Right there, last few words of the post? But anyways, remember that lots of people DID get killed/banished punished for trying to claim to be kings without the backing to assert themselves.

But what about how Henry would have been burned since he was never in jail? Who would have burned him according to the CK3 system?

No comment, just down vote, since you've decided I'm against you (I'm really not), got it!

 

[kawamuratc]

I couldn't find a mod for it on steam, and believe you me, I have looked... Don't really have any modding knowledge myself either.

Now’s a good time to learn, and any skill you pick up in modding will allow you to even further customize your game to your liking.

 

[Gwydden]

But yes, the witch stuff is very silly and out of place (witch covens were not real, for one, and even the belief in witch covens is something that belongs more in EU4 than CK3), though I can't say I've encountered it much. I'd probably turn it off if it was an option, nevertheless.

 

[WeeLittleSpoon]

The Witch trait and Witch secret have always stuck out to me in CK3 as kind of a weird choice to be included in 1.0.

No, my problem is that I find witchcraft game-ruining, since:
1. I find it ridiculously unrealistic
2. It's extremely prolific
3. There is no good way to stop it - the game essentially tries to force you to become dynastic kinslayer slaughtering children (because that's the age people apparently turn into occult maniacs at) to deal with it

I couldn't find a mod for it on steam, and believe you me, I have looked... Don't really have any modding knowledge myself either.

If you don't mind me asking, what do you want such a mod to do, exactly? Just turn off the ability to get the Witch trait/secret? Or limit it/make it less frequent/affect the severity of its consequences/etc.?

 

[Silverbow]

The Witch trait and Witch secret have always stuck out to me in CK3 as kind of a weird choice to be included in 1.0.

If you don't mind me asking, what do you want such a mod to do, exactly? Just turn off the ability to get the Witch trait/secret? Or limit it/make it less frequent/affect the severity of its consequences/etc.?

Turning it off would do the trick.

Alternatively maybe being able to tell them to stop the witchery? If I can somehow feasibly demand a zealous muslim holy order member to stop being a muslim... But turning it off seems far easier and cleaner.

 

[LeoDiesis]

The Witch trait and Witch secret have always stuck out to me in CK3 as kind of a weird choice to be included in 1.0.

I think it derives from the "...and a little bit of everything from CK2" policy that they used in CK3 base game's features. Hopefully, the fact that it is included since launch means they will eventually get to flesh out witchcraft (and/or societies) a bit more in the future, maybe in a more dynamic and RP compelling way than CK2's iteration ever was.