Building my new religion

[Archer the Bowless]

Wanted to see if anyone had any insight on a few tenets I was thinking of trying for a new Christian faith.

I was thinking of have priests be either Only women, or possibly both. Would be interesting having more to have a specific holding only controlled by females.
If I choose Only women, but then choose Recruitment in Clerical Function, would that make female bishops able to be used as knights and commanders? I've only used the Control Clerical Function so I don't know what battle bishops would be like, especially if only women are bishops.

Wondering if female bishops will cause any wackyness though, I thought of perhaps even allowing marriage between bishops. I'm a little scared of it but would be cool to have a high war priestess for my queen.

Meanwhile... What about Monasticism? Without it I cant force others to take vows cause no monks. Would I still be able to force people to join a holy order if one is formed? Will that disinherit them?

Astrology... Says tell the future. What does it mean by that?

[Zortex]

I'll try and answer the best I can, not 100% sure but nobody else has jumped in, so I'll try.

If you choose recruitment that will allow clerics to serve as commanders. However I am reasonably confident this will also check the "View on Gender" doctrine. If that is set to male dominated, female clerics won't be able to be commanders... because they are female.

In regards to females as knights/commanders in general, it's pretty nice. I'm currently playing a game with equal and suddenly I can marry off all my male courtiers to get high prestige female knights! Basically if you have equal you just straight up have a lot more people to choose from (councilors too). Do note that if you change this, it will immediately change your inheritance law to equal as well, that can be a pain and you need (from memory) rank 3 control from feudal to change it. You cannot change it at all as tribal.

Marriage for clerics is ok. You have to be a little bit careful with it though. The time I had problems was when my cleric became my head of faith, then suddenly she appeared to become "landed" and suddenly I couldn't use her husband as a councilor anymore. Can't remember exact details but I think it was something like that. Should be fine but be wary.

Not sure on forcing people to join holy order sorry. I did notice that when I made my heir my cleric, suddenly she wasn't eligible to inherit titles though. Was actually a pain as I didn't realise that would happen and it screwed me over! This may depend on what you have for clerical tradition, not sure (I had Theocratic).

The wiki says astrology enables a new decision. Can't tell you what it does unfortunately, it's called "Divine the Stars". Probably gives you some learning experience or something?

Hopefully this is some what useful. I tried my best!

[Kayeka]

"Divine the Stars" decision gives you a random modifier that lasts a decade. Nothing too incredible, but enough to be helpful.

[Sol]

1. Astrology isn't useful. You got ripped off. Next time, pick one of the warmonger ones. It makes you have Ambitious Vassals and makes content a sin, but it's nice being able to declare wars.

2. Matriarchies are a little different. For one, you don't have to worry about being the real father of your heir. On the other hand, the AI does NOT engage in Matrilineal Marriages on their own. And very few AIs are willing to accept one, so using marriage to expand the realm is much more difficult. You do NOT want any daughter or granddaughter getting caught in a patrilineal marriage!

3. While everyone is equal under equal, you should consider if everyone's equal, and priests are allowed to marry, you won't have a lot of ways to deal with unwanted heirs. Nonequality lets you take a whole gender and stop inheritance issues on that side. Inequality has some functional advantages - which might explain a LOT about history as well. I think Equality makes the game harder, though more fun.

I always set deviancy, homosexuality, and adultery as "Crime", because after many games of setting them as Accepted, I realized I wasn't getting very many hooks or secrets. Having these things as crimes allows you to get more hooks on people, and who knows which of your rivals might have or acquire one of these "doomed" secrets or traits. I find myself playing against my ideology for in-game advantages, but modern morality is quite privileged and is only possible when various securities and resources are stable. When those are not stable, morality is the first thing to go (except the morality of those who own the securities and resources, those moralities become the supreme moral law of the land until power changes).

[Archer the Bowless]

Thanks
Did plan on staying Male Dominated, so maybe I'll make it so only Women can be priests and that can just be their thing. Save battle bishops for another day and I guess go with something else for Clerical Function.

Hmm, I hadn't thought about the Head of Faith being landed or not. For some reason I assumed they would treat whatever holy site you have as their own Vatican State. Are they not landed normally? I'd like to land them I guess, I'd like a Popeland for my Pope.
Speaking of cannibals. If I choose Ritual Cannibalism for a tenet, does that simply make it so that anyone with the Cannibal trait isn't a criminal? Or does it actually play a part in the new religion, like reference to it or anything?

[Archer the Bowless]

I was considering Pursuit of Power for the conquest CB. I'm afraid of getting to big for my liking. However, I could just let them break away.

[Zortex]

I think Pursuit of Power will be fine. It basically gives you free claims against neighbours, but you take a hit in vassal opinion. If you're happy taking the opinion hit, go for it. It doesn't force you to war all the time or anything like that (Warmonger does though, opinion hit when not at war).

The "landed" head of faith is probably not worth worrying about. She didn't actually have a county or anything, from memory she had a title but it pointed at my capital when I double clicked on it. Not really sure on this part, how it works.

Cannibalism tenet looks like it will make it non-criminal (and a virtue) but I don't think it will immediately make you a cannibal? Not sure if there's any new events or anything with it. I'd imagine not, just standard cannibal ones (if you get cannibal somehow). Might make it more likely to get an event to make you a cannibal?

[Twelvefield]

Although it's a nice idea to have male/female equality in your religion, for practical reasons is better to just keep males in charge. The AI has a hard time dealing with matriarchy in a standard game.

I like Pursuit of Power, but honestly, I've only used it once. I have enough reasons to go to war without it.

One thing you really do have to watch is where the money goes. Any faith has its own internal economy that operates within your realm's economy. Look at pre- and post- Reformation England as a good example. Giving the head of your faith too much power to collect funds on their own can make them too powerful to handle or siphon off tax funds you need.

One last bit of advice is to tend to keep your religion conservative rather than liberal. The fewer sins you have, the fewer criminals you will see, which makes it much harder to imprison or murder people you want to go away, and harder to gain hooks. Kinslayer is problematic. If kinslaying is a sin, it's hard for you to murder your rivals unless you can maintain secrecy much makes the left-hand branch of the Intrigue tree a must-have. On the other hand, if you make kinslaying acceptable, your family will be decimated and likely you will be the victim of a plot.

[Sol]

It will click on your capital if you have direct control over temples.

I usually reform with Temporal Head to be my own pope.

[Gespenst Gaming]

Equal and maybe female inheritence makes it super easily lose land to a foreign power. because the women will marry off to join another faction, but inherit land, and it's no longer yours.