Why can't we play Muslims or pagans?

[Jestor]

I'd like to point out, holier than thou snippy folks, that I was very much aware of what CK1 involved. :P My sig might kind of give y'all uppity peeps the clue to this fact. :P

And yes, the bug/exploit in the demo did make me thing pagans and Muslims would be playable in the full game. Frankly I quite enjoyed subverting Catholic vassals to Norse paganism. One of the things I was most looking forward to when I got home was cheerfully taking a pagan leader, ideally one of the two Low-Born Cuman Counts as I did endless demos of, and Norseifying the desert, then assailing Catholic Europe under the banners of Odin, Thor, et. al. So for that to be taken away did surprise me.

See, here's the thing. I didn't follow much, if any, of the hype and pre-release and all that. Why would I? I knew I was getting anyway so there was no sense being anticipatory about it. The demo was the first time I really paid attention to the prelease hype.

[phantom6700]

Tbh I'd rather they fleshed the game out a bit more and release Muslim/Pagan factions as a DLC or Expansion, rather than just as a reskin of Christian factions or something.

[thebigj_a]

Pay attention next time, problem solved.

It's called "buyer beware". If you can't be bothered, any surprises are on you.


Basing anticipation of features on a bug or an exploit is silly, too.

[Stigblue]

i would like to play as a norse pagan character in denmark aswell.. or atleast be able to change my countrys religion somehow...

[Galle]

Every dev studio (every organization, period) runs on time, cash, and staff restraints. The larger the project the more resources consumed. Changing the game to accommodate Muslim/pagan characters would be a very large project in every sense of the word.

Paradox has made plenty of major expansion packs for EU3 that have more or less completely rebuilt the game over the years. I don't think we necessarily need to choose between "better Byzantine Empire" and "interesting playable Muslims." We might have to choose one to get priority over the other, but there's no reason to declare that one shouldn't be made. It's not a zero-sum game.

[Lord Vamp]

Paradox has made plenty of major expansion packs for EU3 that have more or less completely rebuilt the game over the years. I don't think we necessarily need to choose between "better Byzantine Empire" and "interesting playable Muslims." We might have to choose one to get priority over the other, but there's no reason to declare that one shouldn't be made. It's not a zero-sum game.

Everything involving time and money is a zero-sum game.

[Werther]

A post on playability: AGAIN???? How it's possible that nobody read information about a game before buy it? How it is possible to write the 50th thread on this question in the forumn and think: yes im the first to talk about that?

But more! First CK have the same character! It's CRUSADER KINGS not JIHAD SULTANS or ARMADA DOGES! You have certainly the best game on feodality, and you want to play muslim?! There is so many characters who are playable in the game, but it's not enough? Sorry for Para but they are just a little cie, they represents 10% of the Creative Assembly Budget, and 0,00001% of a Blizzard budget; nevertheless they create a game without big bugs problems!
More important: Paradox made the games that i have always wanted. The day where Paradox will disappear, we maybe understand the chance to have a cie who make grand strategy games like EU3, Vic2, HoI3 or CK2.

I'm angry

[Mars82]

I'd much rather they devoted resources to fixing or enhancing what they've already made available than embarking on a wild deviation from the original intentions of the game complete with "compromises" (shudder). They've already made many compromises to make even Western Europe work. If they are going to extend the game mechanics beyond Western feudalism, the first thing that needs a major overhaul is Byzantium and even other Eastern European nations.

Hear! Hear!

Every game decides on the scope it wants to cover, and like every scope changing, the price will come in attention to details.

I would love to see, and would buy for sure, a Paradox game going deep in to the Muslim world. But I would like that game to go in to THE muslim world and not some TW slap dash that assumes that a Jihad and a Crusade are 2 words for the same thing, or that a Caliph is a pope, or sometimes a king, depends what the game needs.

[Olaus Petrus]

I'd like to point out, holier than thou snippy folks, that I was very much aware of what CK1 involved. :P My sig might kind of give y'all uppity peeps the clue to this fact. :P

And yes, the bug/exploit in the demo did make me thing pagans and Muslims would be playable in the full game. Frankly I quite enjoyed subverting Catholic vassals to Norse paganism. One of the things I was most looking forward to when I got home was cheerfully taking a pagan leader, ideally one of the two Low-Born Cuman Counts as I did endless demos of, and Norseifying the desert, then assailing Catholic Europe under the banners of Odin, Thor, et. al. So for that to be taken away did surprise me.

See, here's the thing. I didn't follow much, if any, of the hype and pre-release and all that. Why would I? I knew I was getting anyway so there was no sense being anticipatory about it. The demo was the first time I really paid attention to the prelease hype.

Or maybe people made those CK1 comments exactly because they thought that you would be familiar with this thing already, having played CK1 and all. Officially there's only 4 playable factions in the demo and while it was possible to use the exploit to play as Muslim and Pagan that was also possible in CK1 if you modded the game a bit to allow playing. I haven't read much hype either (just developer's diaries), but Steam, Gamer's Gate and shops which sell the disc version have on their sites description of the game, which says that you play as Christian dynasty in this game.

[balrog1987]

I think that it is only logical that these factions will be added in some upcoming dlc or mod..

[Knives]

I played the first Crusader Kings. I didn't play it a lot, but I played it, and before Crusader Kings II. I held little expectation that the sequel would introduce the option of playing non-christians. However, I maintained Hope.

I realize, the game relies heavily on the feudal system. I realise, the way it handles it, is unique to christendom. I realise, they chose to emphasise this. However, even with those realisations, I did not lose hope of them covering this.

Why? Many reasons.

1# They have an active community now. In the last few years, Paradox Interactive has grown substantially. They have a larger community, and thus pleasing particular demographics of such has more incentive.
2# I had hope that they'd not hard code it, thus there would be potential for it to be handled by the mod community. Paradox Interactive games are famous for their comparatively easy modification. This hope was admittedly dashed when I heard it was hard coded. Maybe they'll change that, maybe they won't I don't know.
3# This is, as far as I know, the only series (of theirs) that covers this time period (maybe theres a few modded exceptions). At least, the only game with a format similar to Crusader Kings (that we love). To leave out the non-christians like this, feels like setting a goal. They're gonna focus on one part, and do it right. however, they have time to flesh out the setting and show multiple sides. It is 'Crusader Kings' I get that, I do. However it is also a period of history and it has room for fleshing out. It has room for expansion.
4# Multiplayer. For a long time, protagonists and antagonists have fought within video games, players have assumed both roles. The faceless AI can have an added threat, an added flavor when a player is in charge. This undoubtably, would enhance the experience of those fighting as Crusader Kings. Players are every bit antagonists to each other as Christian kings, but this can take it a step further.
5# You can technically play pagans without cheating correct? I believe someone verified this before, but I havn't verified it myself, but being a vassal to a lord of another faith, can allow you to be a pagan. If they allowed such a thing to remain in the game why not go all or nothing? You don't want people playing with pagans, yet accessing the same incomplete pagan/islamic experience is there within the play. If you can allow that to happen through player action, why not allow them to grab that by choice at the start? Ofcourse, maybe they've changed that since the demo/beta, I saw it on youtube.

For all those reasons, I maintained hope, and still do, and I think they more then legitimise the hope, even if individual desire alone did not. It is of course, Paradox Interactive, and theres no guarantee, no condition, no valid demand that they implement this. Its their game, its their right to do or not do it. Their right to leave it out, or put in the effort to flesh it out. However, complaining that people on this forum, would have the audacity to want to play a non-catholic faction, in this game, this engine, is ludicrous. They can desire it all they want and theres valid reason to want to play a norse, a tengriist, a sunni, a shia, a whatever.

Edit: Though I also realise on the opposite side there has been good points such as expanding whats there rather then compromising on new additions, and that people should not be so quick to complain that a feature like this wasn't implemented from the start.

[Kyoumen]

The demand is obviously there for such an expansion, and hopefully the fact there's a new thread on it every three days will show Paradox that, despite the previous comments from some developers that they didn't think there was a need.

Although, really, the oft-quoted excuse that "Muslims shouldn't just be reskinned feudal Western Europeans" is kind of silly when the Byzantine Empire is just reskinned feudal Western Europeans.

[Tanzhang (譚張)]

Question: why would anyone want/pay to play as Pagans? I mean they're almost the same as Christians gameplay-wise, they just have more gods.

[Kyoumen]

Because pagan religions are nifty, and a multireligious Europe is more interesting?

Hell, I won't be happy until I've had a game that reconverts Persia to Zoroastrianism (which isn't in the pagan group, and kudos to Paradox for that).

[Knives]

The demand is obviously there for such an expansion, and hopefully the fact there's a new thread on it every three days will show Paradox that, despite the previous comments from some developers that they didn't think there was a need.

Although, really, the oft-quoted excuse that "Muslims shouldn't just be reskinned feudal Western Europeans" is kind of silly when the Byzantine Empire is just reskinned feudal Western Europeans.

Pretty much agree. Orthodox/Eastern European nations could have gotten a bit more love.

Question: why would anyone want/pay to play as Pagans? I mean they're almost the same as Christians gameplay-wise, they just have more gods.

I'm surprised someone asked this.
#1: Neo-paganists might want to live out fantasies of fighting for their religious agenda.
#2: They're flavorful and kind of tribal. They're not the rigid european society with the monotheistic requirement of christian factions. They're something different, spiritually, and in theme.
#3: Taking a faith that died out an trying to reverse it is similar to players who pick small nations or nations in really unfortunate positions. Its like people playing the Saxons and trying to hold together under the threat of norwegian and norman ambitions. They're trying to change history and defeat the adversity that defeated their play choices historically.

Probably quite a few others, that appeal to different people.

Edit:

Because pagan religions are nifty, and a multireligious Europe is more interesting?

Hell, I won't be happy until I've had a game that reconverts Persia to Zoroastrianism (which isn't in the pagan group, and kudos to Paradox for that).

Like that.

[Tanzhang (譚張)]

Yeah but gameplay-wise how are Pagans different to their Christian brethren? Shamanists (you know, Tengrists) and Zoroastrians I can understand, but Norse Pagans?

[Olaus Petrus]

Question: why would anyone want/pay to play as Pagans? I mean they're almost the same as Christians gameplay-wise, they just have more gods.

Because they are interested about those tribes and nations. I believe some of my countrymen wish that they could play as Finnish tribes and recently in another thread there was a Lithuanian person who wished he could play as pagan Lithuanians. Personally I would play as pagans to get some challenge, I would love to create great Samoyedic empire, but luckily there are obscure and difficult Christian nations to play. One of the best things in CKII is that I can try to create great Abyssinian empire (I expect it to be more challenging than playing as Nubia in CK1).

Personally I think that it would be easier to make pagans playable than muslims and naturally I would wish that pagan rulers could convert to other religion, like many did historically either to Christianity or to Islam.

[makif130289]

I will wait for a mod-dlc-expansion that will make muslims playable and then buy CKII. For now, I will stick with MTW2 Stainless Steel.

[Werther]

Come on! We have enough for now. 2 days after release and you have play all the game? With all characters? With all the possibilities? You just complaint all the time guys, never happy. You don't like the game because you can't play non christians? So don't buy it!

[3Form]

The thing is that the Islamic world really didn't work like the Western Christian one.

The Iqta, whilst comparable to the Western Fief, is too dissimilar. It's not hereditary, meaning the Sultan can appoint and revoke as he pleases and more importantly, your son isn't necessarily going to get it after you die. There was no "subinfeudation" - You couldn't pass bits of the Iqta off to your friends and allies. Finally it didn't necessarily involve the administration of the land - it was principally just the tax revenues so perhaps more like a "money fief".