1560's France endless religious uprisings

[Streen]

Just curious if I missed something in the game. Googling didn't really help me. My religious unity was hovering around 75% when I got the notification asking me to back catholics, protestants, or french moderates because of the religious turmoil happening in that time period that eventually would require Spanish aid to be sent. I backed moderates.

Is there nothing I can do about these uprisings? This is my first playthrough, so I'm guessing I'm not understanding something properly. However in my religious tab, the tolerance of the true faith and heretics (protestants) was above 0. I enacted things that encouraged tolerance. I had uprisings in my African colonies (side question: in this game they're not actually 'colonies' unless in the americas right - having 5 countries will not create a colonial state and I will not ever get $ from tariffs?)

Due to sheer frustration (and a big big mistake on my part i found out later), after dealing with this for well over 4 years I converted to Reformed - not for the money offered, but for increased toleration of heretics. It seems like absolutely nothing is stopping the uprisings. I hover over revolt risk in the countries, and it's less than 10% - often 5% and below.

Is this just a 'historical' circumstance that I have no control over, or am I doing something else wrong? Side note, I do remember getting notifications from other countries saying they ended their religious turmoil. I thought I avoided it somehow by enacting toleration things, even standing up to the pope, etc (revolts are not catholic - they're Hussite/protestant).

[Crewmember 123]

Originally posted by Streen:

I converted to Reformed - - they're Hussite/protestant).

So.. why not Protestants?

[Streen]

For reasons I specified above. Before this 'event' (and even after), I was hovering around 75%+ religious unity with catholicism as the 'true faith.' A lot of the provinces were either catholic or protestant - those that were protestant had a positive tolerance raiting in my religious tab. I had no issues with religion prior to this - I opted to avoid violence, to boost tolerance, and enact edicts in favor of tolerating 'heretics.'

Why reformed? Because again, my religious unity was hovering around 75% and i am STILL afflicted with non-stop religious protests. Add to this the fact that if I had chosen full-blown protestant, I would antagonize the catholics in the country. Thus I opted for reformed - Reformed has the 2% tolerance to heretics - something I thought would help stop the violence. As I said above, it was a mistake I learned after because of course my religious unity plummeted since most of my provinces were either catholic or protestant. Now catholics are essentially considered 'heretical' as well. However again, my religious tab lists 'heretics' above 0% tolerance, so I don't see the issue here. I am not persecuting anyone - except Islam, but I don't have any of that anyway and I can't seem to find a way for that to get above 0%.

[Kagemin]

Tolerance of heretics and heathens is one thing, but you still get increased revolt risk (RR) etc for lower religious unity. And there are a lot of other modifers for local RR. Having ~5% RR in your core provinces is a lot, you should check if there are any other things raising it this high.

In almost all cases it's much better to just convert instead of trying to get the tolerance up. If you convert to Reformed or Protestant you will get a big boost to your missionary strength, try to convert all the high tax provinces first during that time, cause you'll have a tough time with them normally. Theologian enables some decisions giving bonus missionary strength, Inquisitor gives a flat bonus, and if all else fails you can build Cathedrals later in the game.

Personally I never care about tolerance for heretics and heathens. If there's a decision giving me bonus missionary strength but reduced tolerance I can't think of circumstances where I wouldn't take it. I got up to -8 tolerance of heretics as TO once, and never had any problems with religious rebels cause I just converted everything before it oculd cause any issues.

[Streen]

I figured it out. It had nothing to do with RR - it was an in-game event I had no control over. In most cases, the RR was 2% or 3%, but I was having 15 stack units spawn 3x within a given month. I was given two choices: stopping them or letting it happen and eventually having a massacre happen.

I opted to try and avoid the latter because it sounds pretty bad. However, if during this period of time you let the rebels actually take the region, you'll be able to negotiate with them afterwards. In most cases, the rebels were my own faction's religion and complained I wasn't harsh enough - so they demanded 'intolerance' of other religions. That gave -2, but I was high enough tolerance that it didn't really matter.

Then all the other christian groups were also showing up and demanding to be recognized - but I could only do it after they won the siege. I let them win the siege as soon as I figured that out, recognized them, and they suddenly went away. I could have settled this a long time ago if I realized that they would only make demands if they won the siege. I hovered over the demand bar and it was always greyed out while they were sieging.

This is in fact an in-game event. Most of my provinces were catholic - as I said above, my religious unity was 125% at one point. The provinces they were showing up were 'catholic.' There are plenty of historical circumstances tied to the French game - I have no doubt other countries suffer similar things, but I got a very particular 'history lesson' of what the French king did.

As far as converting your provinces before it becomes an issue. I don't understand really, because prior to this historical event, the protestants were 'green' - they had no issue. It was only when the reformation heated up and the 1570s historical lesson thing popped up that this became a huge issue for me. Converting your provinces certainly seems to be a more sure way of going, but after I gave into some demands, I'm back to having 'green' with protestant provinces because my tolerance is higher. I guess it's just preferance in the end.

[Streen]

In other news, spain and portugal used this moment to show their superiority over me. I got a nice popup saying 'france will now get retribution for all those who took advantage of us during this religious turmoil' ... however I found it just a tad bit hilarious because my army is next to nothing facing two stacks of 30 from spain and portugal xD

[ShadoWwolF]

you really should just convert all your provinces in the future. tolerance is nice and all but letting religious unity get below 100% and not doing anything about it is never a good idea. converting to protestant might make things easier because they have an easy time converting catholic and reformed provinces and theres a lot of national decisions you can take to increase missionary chance

[Streen]

Again, my problem stemmed from the fact that the protests were happening by the religion I was advocating for. They said I was being too tolerant. I let them siege my city, I accepted an 'intolerance' decree or whatever, and then they went back to their homes.

However, even with 100% religious unity, I don't think you can avoid this historical crisis. As I said earlier, with 125% religious unity (edict of nantes gives an additiona 25% which I passed and then converting a few more provinces when this crisis showed up), I was still having regiments showing up in all my provinces.

Looking into the history of France (and this game), I believe there is very little you can do - as outside foreign powers actually contribute to the chaos happening - England as an example. Prior to this, I was converting the extremely few provinces I had that were protestant. From this standpoint, I think this crisis was equally about politics as it was about religion. Hence why after this chaos settled, I got a nice notification saying "France will now give retribution to all those foreign powers who took advantage of the situation" - not unlike the war of the roses that happens fairly early on.

[ShadoWwolF]

Originally posted by Streen:

Again, my problem stemmed from the fact that the protests were happening by the religion I was advocating for. They said I was being too tolerant. I let them siege my city, I accepted an 'intolerance' decree or whatever, and then they went back to their homes.

However, even with 100% religious unity, I don't think you can avoid this historical crisis. As I said earlier, with 125% religious unity (edict of nantes gives an additiona 25% which I passed and then converting a few more provinces when this crisis showed up), I was still having regiments showing up in all my provinces.

Looking into the history of France (and this game), I believe there is very little you can do - as outside foreign powers actually contribute to the chaos happening - England as an example. Prior to this, I was converting the extremely few provinces I had that were protestant. From this standpoint, I think this crisis was equally about politics as it was about religion. Hence why after this chaos settled, I got a nice notification saying "France will now give retribution to all those foreign powers who took advantage of the situation" - not unlike the war of the roses that happens fairly early on.

i know. in this case it was from events and such but generally its just a good idea to convert provinces and avoid letting religious unity get low. some nations get unique events like this and some are good and some bad (like this one)

[Streen]

Good to know, if I manage to survive ill convert all of my provinces for sure. If not, I'll start a new campaign and make it more of a priority.

In regards to colonies, was my assessment correct? I read on the wiki that you need 5 provinces in a 'region' in order for it to become a 'colony.' To me it looks as though they become just like any other province - you can build buildings there, units, etc.. I have some sort of bonus to tarrifs, and this is why it's important to me - if i hover over my income, it says im not making any money from tariffs - because i technically don't have any 'colonies.' I settled them, made cores, etc. but no colonies.

I have 5 provinces in Africa. I have 3 in Canada. I remember reading somewhere that making 'colonial nations' is something specific to the new world though - so having them in Africa/any other part of the world will give no income in the form of a tariff ... right?

[ShadoWwolF]

Originally posted by Streen:

Good to know, if I manage to survive ill convert all of my provinces for sure. If not, I'll start a new campaign and make it more of a priority.

In regards to colonies, was my assessment correct? I read on the wiki that you need 5 provinces in a 'region' in order for it to become a 'colony.' To me it looks as though they become just like any other province - you can build buildings there, units, etc.. I have some sort of bonus to tarrifs, and this is why it's important to me - if i hover over my income, it says im not making any money from tariffs - because i technically don't have any 'colonies.' I settled them, made cores, etc. but no colonies.

I have 5 provinces in Africa. I have 3 in Canada. I remember reading somewhere that making 'colonial nations' is something specific to the new world though - so having them in Africa/any other part of the world will give no income in the form of a tariff ... right?

if you check your map modes (click the little button to see all of them) there is one for colonial regions. when you have 5 provinces in a colonial region they will break away from your nation and become a colonial nation as your vassal and they'll give you money in the form of tariffs. otherwise you just keep the provinces and gain money from them like any other province