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BattleMaster => Helpline => Topic started by: Thelyn on July 11, 2017, 10:15:47 PM

Title: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Thelyn on July 11, 2017, 10:15:47 PM
Hey people,

I'm still rather new to this game – having signed up only a few weeks ago – and I have a few questions about it. They mostly revolve around two topics: religion and Lordship. Let's start with religion.

First I'd like to know more about choosing a religion for my character. Most info about religion on the official wiki is about how to play a priest, but I want to know what choosing a religion entails for me as a normal, non-clerical noble. For example, once I choose a religion, can I switch it again or am I stuck? Do I have any obligations towards my chosen faith, be they financial or not?

My second question is about temples. I've been recently assigned as Lord and I have a ruined temple in my region. Can I as ruling lord do something about it? I do have an option to close it, but I seemingly can't rebuild it.

Regarding my Lordship, I'd like to know if it is normal that production, morale and realm loyalty slowly fall on their own or if this is because of various other factors (like me being a pagan or my region being plagued by anarchists). I know that I can up those values by doing civil work or holding court, but it looks like I'd need to spend most of my time in my region should I want to keep its production high. Is that so?

My last question is about taxes. Strangely, I've gotten quite a lot more taxes than I should according to my estates/region page. It's actually quite a substantial amount of money that I unexpectedly got (roughly 50% more than I expected). Is that a bug or is the 'Estates' page of my region only displaying a rough estimate?
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Foxglove on July 11, 2017, 10:48:47 PM
First I'd like to know more about choosing a religion for my character. Most info about religion on the official wiki is about how to play a priest, but I want to know what choosing a religion entails for me as a normal, non-clerical noble. For example, once I choose a religion, can I switch it again or am I stuck? Do I have any obligations towards my chosen faith, be they financial or not?

Religion is largly roleplayed and doesn't involve any real game mechanics for a noble who isn't a priest, except that if the lord of a region shares the same religion as many of his region's population it can make the region a little easier to control. Yes, you can change your religion at any time. There are no penalties for doing so, but members or priests of your old religion may not take kindly to it. There's usually a small maintainance fee you pay to your religion to help maintain temples. You pay that in at a local temple, and the level of the tithe is decided by the priests.

My second question is about temples. I've been recently assigned as Lord and I have a ruined temple in my region. Can I as ruling lord do something about it? I do have an option to close it, but I seemingly can't rebuild it.

I believe only priests can enlarge temples (although lords build them in the first place). I confess, I can't recall whether this is entirely accurate as I haven't done much concerning temples for a while now.

Regarding my Lordship, I'd like to know if it is normal that production, morale and realm loyalty slowly fall on their own or if this is because of various other factors (like me being a pagan or my region being plagued by anarchists). I know that I can up those values by doing civil work or holding court, but it looks like I'd need to spend most of my time in my region should I want to keep its production high. Is that so?


The latter - it's due to various factors. The most common reasons for regions being unstable are: taxes are too high; and/or, the region is considered to be a long way from the capital city; and/or, the people are either starving or have a food shortage or just feel there's not enough food in the granary; and/or, looting by enemy forces or attacks by rogues (monsters, undead, and daimons on certain islands). But no region should ever require constant maintainance just to keep it ticking over. Lowering taxes will often help a region be easier to maintain.

My last question is about taxes. Strangely, I've gotten quite a lot more taxes than I should according to my estates/region page. It's actually quite a substantial amount of money that I unexpectedly got (roughly 50% more than I expected). Is that a bug or is the 'Estates' page of my region only displaying a rough estimate?

I've always considered it to be an estimate that can go up or down due to various factors.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Wimpie on July 11, 2017, 11:00:10 PM
Hi Mike,

First of all, welcome to the game! You've came to the right place to ask questions. Wiki is a bit outdated here and there and surely can be improved.

Let me try to answer your questions.

1. Choosing a religion is basically up to you and how you roleplay your character. There might be more than one religion in your realm. They might play nice with each other or be at each others throat every day. It's part of the game. My proposition would be to contact a priest or an elder of the religion to hear them out. They usually also refer to a wiki page they have about the religion. Find the religion which suits your character best.

Choosing a religion is not final, nor is it mandatory. You don't have to be in a religion, but it's part of the roleplaying aspect of the game. You can join any religion when being in a region with a temple, just like you can leave them the same way.

When joining a religion (or guild for that matter, they work the same way), you'll get a rank. You can raise your rank by paying gold or being promoted by the elders. Every rank has a monthly fee to pay or a grant to get. Your 'balance' in the religion/guild will be adjusted. If you have a monthly fee of 10 gold to pay, it won't force you to pay it. But if you want to withdraw gold from the temple treasury, you'd need to not have a negative balance etc. Also if you want to leave the religion/guild, you will need to have your balance cleared. This is not really an obligation as such, and you have no other.

2. The ruined temples are a bit awkward. It means it has been destroyed before. The only way to rebuild it is by closing it (mind you, if they have many followers in your region, they can attack you), and rebuilding it once you have joined the religion. Recently I have added the feature that ruined temples can be 'rebuild' without having to close it. This feature, however, is not live yet.

Only Lords can build temples or guildhouses in their regions. No elder or priest can build such buildings in your region. Hence you could find religions trying to 'recruit' you to have their temple built in your region. Once a level 1 is built, they will be able to upgrade it (as a Lord, you won't be able to do that).

3. Region stats are affected by numerous factors that would take too long to sum up here. You get a daily report about your region and what is affecting moral/loyalty/production etc. Be it taxes being too high, enemy troops in your region, being too far from capital,.. It's important to know that no one expects you to keep your stats at 100% each. It's normal they are a bit lower (hence why they are indicated with words to describe the situation instead of purely %). Find a way to stabilize your region so you don't have to be there 24/7. Ways could be to recruit militia to deal with surprise monster attacks, lower taxes if they complain, have a courtier pass there once in a while, have a priest or diplomat change the views of the people,..

4. I am not entirely sure by what you mean with getting more taxes. Feel free to PM me with screenshots (if you don't want to make the details public) so I can investigate better.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Thelyn on July 11, 2017, 11:39:39 PM
Thanks for the quick answers! They pretty much answered all my questions already.

I understand that religion is largely a role-playing tool to establish my character and I think it's a very interesting way to do so. I was just wondering if there are any game mechanics attached to it that I don't know about. It's a pity to hear that I can't (at least not yet) 'repair' the temple in my holding. Seeing that it is the temple of a majority religion in my region, I don't really want to close it down.

Regarding the production and loyalty values of my region, I guess anarchists are to blame. My region is infact quite far from my kingdom's capital city. Obviously I could never hope or even expect those values to be on 100% all the time, I'm a bit of a perfections and would like to try and keep it as high as possible.

That said, I'll make sure to take a screenshot of what I meant exactly and send it to you, Wimpie. I'm pretty sure that it's not a bug, but I guess it won't hurt to regard it as such until further confirmation.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Chenier on July 12, 2017, 03:51:25 AM
For the taxes, I suspect that you only considered your estate's income, and failed to consider the tax you levy on your knights' estates' income. Just a guess, though.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Nosferatus on July 12, 2017, 08:03:49 AM
Have you tried asking these questions in character?
Its a great opportunity to forge bonds to help and get helped by other characters.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Thelyn on July 12, 2017, 12:05:30 PM
For the taxes, I suspect that you only considered your estate's income, and failed to consider the tax you levy on your knights' estates' income. Just a guess, though.

No, I did take into consideration the taxes I get from my own estate as well as the taxes I get through my (not yet existing) knights. I'm pretty sure that the 'problem' I'm facing has to do with two of three estates in my region being empty. To throw around some numbers (none of them are exact as I toyed around with the tax setting since this happened, but they aren't far off either):

Under the estates page, I see that I can expect to levy around 25 gold. Being the ruler of the region, all of that gold belongs to me. The other two estates in my region - both being empty - each expect a tax income of ~15 gold, from which I as the lord get half (Lord's Share of 50%). That would leave me with ca. 40 gold (40 + 7,5 + 7,5).

Now, when tax day comes, I'm told through the tax report that I managed to collect 54 gold in taxes on my own estate alone. Added to that are the taxes from the empty estates, both collecting 13 gold. All of that gold goes into my coffers and leaves me with a total of around 80 gold instead of the expected 40. That's quite a difference. Now I do understand that the numbers on my estate/region page are not final - it even says so - but getting roughly double the amoung I was expecting is indeed a bit... fortunate.

Have you tried asking these questions in character?
Its a great opportunity to forge bonds to help and get helped by other characters.


I did think about that in regards to my question about religions, but unfortunately I didn't find the time to visit a temple or otherwise contact religious authorities.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Nosferatus on July 12, 2017, 12:09:46 PM

I did think about that in regards to my question about religions, but unfortunately I didn't find the time to visit a temple or otherwise contact religious authorities.

Finding the right contacts is important, but usually you can find characters in your characters realm that can tell you all of these things.
Sometimes they can't tell much about the individual religions because there isnt much to tell.
Many religions in BM arent that well worked out.

http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Religion_Pages

this is a list of all religions, it's quite out of date though...
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Vita` on July 12, 2017, 06:16:57 PM
Under the estates page, I see that I can expect to levy around 25 gold. Being the ruler of the region, all of that gold belongs to me. The other two estates in my region - both being empty - each expect a tax income of ~15 gold, from which I as the lord get half (Lord's Share of 50%). That would leave me with ca. 40 gold (40 + 7,5 + 7,5).
You get the full share of empty estates, but empty estates only produce 50% of the income they'd produce if they were occupied by a vassal. So halving the ~15 gold is probably throwing your estimate off.

Also, the estimates are based off the current regional stats (production, tax rate, population) that day, extrapolated for the week. Every day, gold is collected and added to the vault. On tax day, its distributed. So anything affecting those regional stats will affect the estimate you see that day.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Wimpie on July 14, 2017, 03:28:58 PM
Like I just told Thelyn in private, this is probably caused by a known bug that's still in place. The display reports wrong numbers while the actual tax report is correct.

I just fixed it and will do some more tests. Then it'll be ready to be merged on live when there's another update.
Title: Re: Various beginner questions about Religion and Lordship
Post by: Chenier on July 15, 2017, 02:28:20 AM
Another thought; if there's a TO on tax day, will this gold come on the next tax, and is it displayed in the estimate?