Papal States Details (M2TW Faction)

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Overview

The Papal States is a non-playable faction in Medieval II: Total War. Historically one of the major Italian states until the Unification of Italy in 1861, the faction leader of the Papal States is always the Pope, who can participate in battles like a regular General unit. The faction's starting settlement is Rome.

Players cannot play as the Papal States unless enabled by modifyinging the descr_strat file. While it is possible to unlock the Papal States and other non-playable factions, it should be noted that gameplay as them can be unstable.

Unique Characteristics

The Papal States is the only faction that can control Inquisitors, can excommunicate Catholic factions, and gives the player specific missions (Crusades, conversion of settlements, disposal of heretics, etc.

The Papal States has unique properties in that it has no family tree - although it has "family members", these generals are immune from marriage and immune to bribery.

The Papal States is also the only indestructible faction in the Grand Campaign – it cannot be destroyed even after the loss of all settlements, armies and agents.

Religion

The Papal States is Catholic. While Papal States Family Members can technically join crusades alongside other Catholic factions, the faction generally lacks an army large enough to participate, although in certain circumstances the Papal States may become aggressive and expand through military force, even initiating war against other Catholic factions, thus forcing their excommunication.

The settlement of Rome starts with 100% Catholic, but may be converted by other religions' agents or siezing the city and building religious structures. Occasionally the Papal States may recruit priests who may even become Cardinals, and also may spawn Inqusitors in Catholic factions' territories when heresy has risen significantly.

Military

Like most of the Italian factions the Papal States have limited cavalry, but excellent infantry and militia units. The Papal States also boasts two unique units- the Papal Guard spearmen and the Swiss Guard halberdiers, which are essentially variants of conventional Spear and Halberd Miltia. The Papal States' armies are generally small and consist of militia units, unless castle settlements are obtained to allow the training of stronger castle units. Like the other Italian actions, the Papal States can train Men At Arms and Broken Lance units.

Inquisitors

If you have modded your game and play as the Papal States, you have access to a unique and quite charming agent: the Inquisitor. That's right, you can actually use these buggers against your enemy. Inquisitors spawn at random, in an area that is either rife with heresy, or in a region that is owned by a faction that has fallen out of favor with the pope. They can attempt to condemn ANY character for heresy, although they have to be out in the open field for you to try this - for some reason they don't work in settlements. This makes it possible for you to hunt down enemy generals, spies or assassins, or clear the college of cardinals of all clergymen that don't support the papal dogma (or even eliminate a faction!). Inquisitors also seem to disappear at random at times.

The Papal States can occasionally spawn Inquisitors, agents who act both as conversion agents as well as perform prosecutions against Catholic priests and any family member characters of Catholic factions, including the faction heir and leader. Like the conventional priest's procsectuion against heretics, Inquisitors' prosecutions will succeed or fail depending on the targeted character's Piety level- success can lead to the character's death at the stake. Inquisitors also have their own unique set of traits, and are generally spawned with little Piety, allowing most characters to avoid punishment. Inquisitors will generally chase a target, but most characters can outrun them.

Strategies to deal with Inquisitors involve running away and assassination, either method usually easy to execute. A failed assassination attempt may result in the culprit faction being automatically excommunicated.

A Non-Catholic faction does not need to deal with Inquisitors, as they will only target Catholic characters.