On heresies

[MordredDerby]

I don't know what dev's policy regarding religions/heresies is, but I'd like to indtroduce some points regarding this topic.

First of all, some heresies are just redundant. Currently we have Patripassianism and Sabellianism which are actually the same thing (also called Modalism), Adoptionism and Monarchianism, which is umbrella term for the previous three. The same applies to Islam (Kharijite and Khawariji), but it was said that there will be major update dealing with Islam anyway.
Some others are out of place or misinterpreted. For example, Sethianism was about patriarch Seth, not desert god Set and Wahhabi is heavily anachronistic.

Secondly, I believe that Nicene heresies must be given new parent religion once schism happens. This will help to "preserve" them (instead of being rapidly replaced by plain cathar/waldensian/whataver) and prevent unwanted revival of pre-schism Nicene faith. Going even further, it is possible to remove "dead" heresies after certain date by setting already non-existant Nicene as their parent religion, as well as introduce new heresies with time (no bragging about Pope's corruption right after the schism).

And my last suggestion is just about flavor, dynamics and streamlining. Since differentiation between heresy and denomination is kinda vague and some heresies in mod are "regional" to various degrees, I propose "heresy emancipation" (can't make up better term) mechanic. Basically, it's ability to split from parent completely and become full-fledged religion under certain circumstances. For example, Ebionites with established True Rabbi and fully converted Israel; Donatists surviving Rashidun era with enough provinces and so on.

I do not intend to diminish anyone's work and eager to help with implementation if approved.

[loup99]

I do not intend to diminish anyone's work and eager to help with implementation if approved.

No problems, you can criticise the content as much as you want as long as it remains constructive! 👍 I don't think anyone takes any particular line of code personally (or at least I don't, would be far too time consuming), but nonetheless we can't expect all others who contribute to refrain from commenting on particular code parts,

Redundant heresies

• Patripassianism was the nomination in the Western church and Sabellianism in the Eastern church, from what I understand.
• From my understanding there is a difference between modalistic monarchianism (Patripassianism in the West and Sabellianism in the East) and dynamic monarchianism (Adoptionism).
• For Kharijite and Khawariji I honestly don't know, someone else (I think @EmperorEnlil ) would have to justify

Misinterpreted or out of place heresies

• Could you point out where the desert god Set is referenced? That should definitely not be in the mod.
• We know for Wahhabi, but again, it is a consequence of Islam not being finished. I'm in favour of a removal personally if it can't be justified.

Great Schism heresies

• Isn't that what we do on line https://github.com/loup99/WtWSMS/blob/master/WTWSMS/events/WtWSMS_schisms.txt#L248 ? I can review how that ties into other material though. Fully agreed with you on this though!

Remove dead and add new heresies

• Yes, definitely, although introducing new ones require a bit more work.

Heresy emancipation

• In the mod as in vanilla the main goal for a heresy is always to overtake the main parent, although this could be altered I'm not entirely convinced.

[MordredDerby]

Okay, I see the point of Partipassianism and Sabellianism being separated, but Monarchianism seems odd anyway since it includes aforementioned teachings and is general term.

Maybe I'm wrong here, but "Fanged One" in Sethianism suggests something like that. Can't be totally sure, though.

The part about changing parent religions is kind of rigid about conditions. In my last playthrough the great schism happened during three chapters controversy and everything screwed up. Maybe it must fire whenever post-schism religions appear.

IIRC if you set a heresy as a parent for itself it will become normal religion. I'll test it, but I'm still interested about your thoughts on the concept itself. I think some of them deserve that possibility due to being too different from mainstream (some gnostics) or tending to be regional and not really competing over global dominance (like aforementioned Ebionites).

[loup99]

• I think that is a reference to Yaldabaoth as a Lion-faced serpent
• Or within the proper event, currently it is done elsewhere. Going to review that.
• Heresies definitely had regional connections, and should be based upon that to determine where they appear and how they spread. But when it comes to splitting from the parent I'm a bit unconvinced. It depends on whether the nature of the heresy is about converting away from the main faith or if the main focus becomes to proselyte beyond it, but also on some basic recognition, as existed between for instance Catholic and Ortodox even after the Great Schism.