Title: Declare Character Anathema
Summary: Allow religions to declare a character anathema, causing a semi-random chance of that character being mobbed by faithful peasantry when they are in areas with high follower amounts of the declaring religion.
Details:
Provide religions an option to declare a noble anathema. Cap the number of nobles who can be anathematized at any given time at the number of priests in the religion. Any elder can declare a noble anathema. Nobles who have been declared anathema shall have a chance of being mobbed by peasants loyal to the religion in question. That chance is determined by 1) The size of the character's unit (bigger unit, lower chance) and 2) the number of followers of the anathematizing religion(s) in the region relative to the number of followers of religions who have not declared the noble anathema
The relative calculation is important. If a noble is declared anathema by 3 religions, no religion's chance of mobbing the poor sod should be harmed by the fact that there are other religions who have also declared him anathema. In most instances this won't matter, but it could in some, especially if/when schisms are introduced. A mere "% of population following anathematizing religion" is not enough. It needs to be "% of population (less other anathematizing religions) following anathematizing religion." Though if that's hard to code, it's probably a marginal issue.
Whatever the case, it would follow the same mechanics as other peasant mobbing mechanics present in BM– random highwaymen, auto da fes and riots, etc, etc. I don't know which exact model would be best, but chance of wounding, gold loss, and soldiers being killed seems right.
If an anathematized person has a lordship, followers of the anathematizing religion should also have a decline in loyalty.
Benefits:
First, this fills a realism hole in the game. This is a very medieval feature. Second, this would create conflict between religions and realms with which they may be otherwise buddy-buddy. A politically useful but religiously inconvenient person would create church-state conflict even in religiously aligned states (see: Morek/Bowie Ironsides/Astroism). This would create a tool for pursuing that which is unlike other tools. Infiltrators are clumsy tools for such a task, and are one-hit wonders. This creates a passive force by which religions could punish individual evildoers. But, again, while it strengthens the religion game, it doesn't give it any superpowers. Anathematized persons could flee to heathen lands, where only wars and assassins can reach them. Or they can travel with soldiers in tow, and have satisfying opportunities to slaughter peasant mobs that rise against them. This is a feature which grants some clout, and individual, pointed clout, to religions, but, again, which is fully dependent on their own ability to pursue these actions (getting high conversion rates), and which does not replace, but rather augments, RP.
Possible Exploits:
My concern is not so much exploitation as fairness. We say you do not have a right to play wherever you want. But this feature could really test that proposition. In the case of Astroism, a player would have to change class away from any non-unit-accompanied class and always have a good-sized unit, and/or a player would have to go to Fissoa, Falkirk, or Aurvandil. Everywhere else has substantive Astroist populations. I'm okay with that, but the repercussions for such forced exile and negative pushing to soldier classes could cause some bad feeling. Especially if multiple religions started anathematizing the same person, they could find the continent very unwelcoming very quickly.
