User Guide

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that a special chain of historic events will begin
to unfold. These simulate the start of the Ref-
ormation and may occur in any Catholic coun-
tries that meet a special set of requirements (we
won’t reveal those here, though, because we
don’t want to spoil the surprise). The events
will usually begin sometime in the 16
th
cen-
tury, and the conditions that trigger them will
correspond very closely to those that prompted
Luther, Zwingali, Calvin, and others to initiate
the historical Reformation. Once started, the
Protestant and Reformed religious subtypes
of Christianity will be enabled and are likely
to begin spreading throughout any parts of
the Catholic world that are ripe for religious
change.
If it is possible for your realm to voluntar-
ily convert to a different national religion, the
“convert” button beside an available religion
will be highlighted in gold. This won’t happen
until your realm has a fairly high level of stabil-
ity. As you would expect, officially adopting a
new religion will result in a period of extreme
social upheaval. Before converting, make sure
you are ready for the immediate drop of -5
nation stability levels and the possibility that
some of your provinces will revolt.
Keep in mind that changing your official
realm religion does not cause the conversion of
any of your country’s provinces. You must send
a missionary to convert any province that does
not share your new faith. In the interim, you
will probably need to carefully manage your
religious tolerance settings to avoid too much
internal rebellion.
Voluntary religious conversion is limited
to the few religions where nations historically
made a relatively peaceful conversion. You will
only be able to convert between the Catholic,
Protestant, and Reformed subtypes using this
interface. The only way for realms with any of
the other religious faiths to convert is as a result
of a forced conversion or a special historical or
random event. Forced conversion is a term that
may be imposed upon a country as a condition
of peace, and can only be used to force con-
versions within the same major religious group.
We’ll leave the historical and random events as
a surprise for you to experience in the game;
they provide the only means for a country to
convert to a different major religious group.
Defender of the Faith
Each religious subtype may have one country
that is recognised as the “Defender of the Faith”.
If there is currently no country that holds this
title, the “Declare Sole Defender of the Faith”
button on the Domestic Religion interface will
be highlighted in gold. The 1000-ducat cost of
making the declaration is high but the advan-
tages may make it worthwhile considering:
• The Defender of the Faith gains an auto
-
matic casus belli against any country that
is at war with another member of the faith.
You will not suffer the usual damage to
your reputation for declaring war if you
do so in support of another member of the
faith. This applies even if the country you
are declaring war against also shares the
same faith.
• The armies and navies of the Defender of
the Faith receive a modest boost to their
morale, making them far more likely to
emerge victorious from battle.
• The Defender of the Faith is a prestigious
position. The realm will receive extra pres-
tige on a monthly basis for holding this ti-
tle.
• The revolt risk due to war exhaustion will
be much lower for the Defender of the
Faith. A country's subjects tend to become
tired of wars that last for any great length
of time, and will only slowly regain a will-
ingness to enter into war again once peace
has been achieved. This reluctance is less
for the Defender of the Faith, as the popu-
lation expects a certain amount of blood-
shed to go hand in hand with the country's
responsibilities.
Beyond the exorbitant cost, there are two
possible disadvantages to declaring yourself
the Defender of the Faith. Your realm's focus