AHC/WI : Make the Comtat Venaissin an independent state.

[LSCatilina]

The challenge is to make the Comtat a distinct state from France and Papal State up to nowadays.

For the AHC/WI, there's some paths

-What about the "papal Jews", and an eventual Jewish influence on the Comtat?

-The main issue of the comtat was the lack of wheat : each time the French king wanted to make pressure, he blockaded the trade.

-The population wanted an union with France, because of the issue with wheat, and traders because of the custom taxation on foreign products

-Carpentras was traditonnally favourable to independence, if in french sphere of influence, at the contrary of Avignon

[Falastur]

The problem I see with this is that the Comtat Venaissin was a very small state, and an inland one at that. At some point, a French King or republican government is going to seek to consolidate its land and borders and tire of the state's existence. As you yourself say, the population themselves wanted union with France. When it comes up against a France which has decided to annex it - and I view that as essentially a certainty - it doesn't have a prayer of surviving.

Really, there are a very limited number of ways small states can remain independent. The best way is for them to exist in an area where a handful of small states exist - a la the remnants of the HRE, but even that is touch-and-go when greedy neighbours start eyeing up the area. Secondly is if they are coast-based, and can use their wealth and influence as a supplying port to barter their existence. Finally is the "Andorra precedent" - when a country is just too small and economically barren to be of any use (and when it's small enough that anyone sent to conquer it thinks they're just marching through a village in a bigger state. The Comtat Venaissin, especially with its prestigious city of Avignon, long since surrounded on all sides by France (especially after the French annexed the lands of Orange) basically doesn't even come close to meeting any of these.