Heresy and Archery

[Sllhouette]

heretics have been too strong. 600+ turns in the game and i have not seen HRE/italy get rid of its massive heretic problem. insane to see the italian peninsula have sections of under 50% catholicism. early on in scotland, i had one heretic in my england territory, i threw priests at him, they all converted, i ended up with 10 heretics in the end. theyre excessively strong. it makes no sense that an assassin would have a better chance of getting rid of them than a state-sanctioned bishop. makes no sense why the killing would have to be secret, and they could actually fail and die, when a monarch could just have men march in there and kill the heretic on the spot. anyways, even a maximum faith priest will only have a 35% or so chance of killing a regular heretic. that would be ok, if they weren't nearly guaranteed to convert into a heretic too. its like a rat problem. if you have a mass of priests standing in one region, even one heretic touching them will cause some to convert, each turn. you have to run away from them like viruses because you can't even fight them with your christianity, the heretics are supposed to run and hide from the state.

i like to make sure i have skirmisher/archer superiority. in the opening exchanges, i tend to trade blows better and end up having free shooting space after i kill their archers. the problem with the AI though is that even if they're just 12 peasant archers alive, they will stand there and keep firing back at me, not allowing me to defeat them. when there is a lot of units in a mass, its a good target, but after theyre less than 30 or so, you start to waste your arrows because they can't hit such a small group. its better to change to another target. but that first target will keep shooting at you, and killing your archers. like the genoese crossbows at agincourt, after they start losing a shooting fight they should lose morale and run. it makes the skirmishing feel worthwhile if i can run off the enemy. nobody would stand to the last man shooting if they were the losing side

[Radosław of Bielitz]

I have experienced similar annoyances to those you're describing and additionally, the reasoning behind you provided is convincing, flavor-wise

The heretics being able to convert your priests that easily make the game a bit unplayable for people who are playing without the help of the save-and-load. Maybe the game parameters could be changed so burning the heretic should not be achieved that easily (requiring a few or several attempts), but the critical failure of a heretic converting a priest should be much more rare than it is now?

[Sllhouette]

yes, the critical failure is extreme. i have not seen one instance of a priest surviving a failed condemnation. the heretics must have it right, if they're so popular and successful

[Macaras]

yes, the critical failure is extreme. i have not seen one instance of a priest surviving a failed condemnation. the heretics must have it right, if they're so popular and successful

What I usually do is to leave the strong heretics alone, they just die out. By the way, that is how you recognize the Truth - it may be only one and it will stand the trial of time (like 20 centuries). Those who have ears let them listen.

[Gaku]

I smother the heretics until late in the game when I have disposable high-level assassins.
I've made similar requests recently. A max piety cardinal should be almost a guaranteed win against any heretic. A low level bishop should have a fair shot at even a middling heretic. There's no other viable way to use the intended game mechanic, as useless bishops/cardinals necessitate the use of workarounds.

[a Dictator's Cigar]

I prefer to keep them away to not give my generals bad traits. that until my assassin pays them a visit with a 35% success chance, 1 out of 5 attempts of that should knock down the Alex Jones out of that heritic.

[Sllhouette]

What I usually do is to leave the strong heretics alone, they just die out. By the way, that is how you recognize the Truth - it may be only one and it will stand the trial of time (like 20 centuries). Those who have ears let them listen.

i'm sending my max skill assassins after you.