Are you disappointed there won't be a proper Crusader Kings scenario?

[Pied-Noir]

CK I and CK II both had 1187 and 1337 scenarios, which meant various interesting medieval characters and dynasties were playable, and the Crusader states were established. I feel both of these bookmarks are iconic within the franchise and although I appreciate that far fewer people play 1337 than 867, it's still a fun scenario with lots of interesting history and famous dynasties to play as. It's always fun to play as the Plantagenets and yet they won't even be in CK III, which feels odd to me.

Are you disappointed at the lack of 936, 1081, 1187, 1204, 1220 or 1337 bookmarks? (769 was a horrible waste of time and I'm glad it's not coming back)

Would you like to see any of these return as DLC, and if so, would you be willing to pay for them?

 

[Fallofthepurple]

I hope to see a return of 936 and 1081 but honestly I rarely if ever played startdates later than that

 

[Elm0__]

Are you disappointed at the lack of 936, 1081, 1187, 1204, 1220 or 1337 bookmarks? (769 was a horrible waste of time and I'm glad it's not coming back)

Would you like to see any of these return as DLC, and if so, would you be willing to pay for them?

I sure will. At least 1187 scenario should be available.

 

[Ursus Mursus]

No. I always played only 769, 867, 1066 and 936.

 

[Tschobo]

I have mainly played 867, 1066, 769 and 936 in this order (even if I love the 936 starting date). A start date that is later than 867 is inevitable in my opinion. An earlier one would need many pre-sets and would only come at the end of CK3s life cycle.

 

[Rubidium]

I occasionally played 1204 (for the "Byzantines in tatters" appeal). But otherwise I rarely went post-1081 unless I was looking to play a specific character (and the Monarch's Journey starts have been fun for shaking me out of my comfort zone that way). My favorite start is probably sometime in 1077, for the "Byzantines down, but not out" and "Crusades soon" aspect.

 

[Woifee]

Since there are 2 proper crusader Kings scenarios I have no reason to be disappointed.

 

[Taylor138]

Yes I believe a 1187 start should at least be available.

 

[Ezumiyr]

No.
Crusades are part of the sandbox element of the game and I'm fine with it. CK isn't that great at emulating historical crusades anyway.
I think it's better to focus work on making sandbox scenarios more interesting than creating a dozen start dates with fixed scenarios.

And I think most players agree with me, since in all strategy games with both sandbox and scenarios, people overwhelmingly play with the most sandbox-y options possible.

I doubt many new start dates will be available later on, because releasing them later doesn't change anything about their main problem: they require work to be maintained with each new update.
It's entirely possible that it will be modded, though, and I believe it's for the better. Modders aren't obligated to release their updates on time, they can add features if they feel it's needed, they are allowed to focus on certain parts of the map and ignoring others, and modding new start dates should be fairly easy to do.

 

[Darrigan]

I would love to see a 1187 and/or 1204 start. And if I am allowed to dream, maybe a 1250 start with Mamluk government mechanics.

 

[JtW]

The only start I'm missing is 936 (since Poland's baptism was in 966 and I'm Polish so loved playing that scenario).

But honestly, the Devs mentioned that each additional start date increases the effort for each expansion exponentially (since they need to test any changes for each start date, and adjust things separately, etc.) Given that, I'd rather have two start dates but solid, well thought-out expansions to core mechanics than a hodge-podge of stuff that they don't have the time and resources to properly test and implement.

 

[vyshan]

I kind of prefer 1157 over 1187 but yes, I wish there was one start date with the Kingdom of Jerusalem around. I like 1157 more because it is right when the Seljuk's collapse into numerous warlords vying for power and you have Elenaor of Aquatine.

I would like to have for start dates eventually: 867, 936, 1066, 1157, 1215, and 1337.

 

[Zylathas]

I can think we might see 936 and a late start game (be it 1187, 1337 or something in between) at some point. But it should be worth the total investment.. and frankly, not many people play different start dates than the earliest.

And ofcourse, modders might create these start dates too.

 

[King Anund]

I miss quite a lot the other start dates as after 2000+ hours of CK2 I got bored of the first ones. I hope later start dates are introduced as I think they are quite better, as they are more historical (they have less fictional characters) and quite a lot of the mechanics of the game are more suited to those eras than 1066 and especially 876.

Also now you can't play as quite iconic characters of the Middle Ages like Richard the Lionheart, Saladin, St. Louis IX of France, Frederick Barbarossa, Genghis Khan and more or events like the 100 years war. Maybe with a start date per century (for example, 1187, 1226, 1337) the loss wouldn't be that big. I would even introduce a XV century start date as I think the 15th century is quite a very interesting period to experience in Crusader Kings' fashion (EU doesn't represent the dynamics of the century well).

 

[Fierabras]

Would you like to see any of these return as DLC, and if so, would you be willing to pay for them?

Yes and yes. 1081, 1187 and 1204 were some of my favourite start dates (together with the post-Hastings start, which I'd also love to see in a later patch). Sure, it may be the case that supporting more than two start dates requires too much work from the devs, and that is a substantial argument against their inclusion. Still, I would welcome their implementation (if possible) - not least because I'm also hoping for DLC that adds more flavor to the High and Late medieval period, giving more representation to the enormous economic, social and cultural changes taking place over the course of the Middle Ages.

In such an scenario, having a few more later start dates would certainly be fitting.

 

[Coldfire4134]

I personally hope these start dates get ported over through mods. The amount of work that needs to be put into them with every update isn't worth it considering how few people play them.

That being said I will slightly miss the ability to just look at the map as you go through the timeline. I showed my history professor this once and he was impressed.

 

[deConteville]

I understand the devs decision to choose 867 over 936 and some of the later dates given most of their userbases preference, and I'm infinitely pleased they didn't pick the atrocious 769 bookmark over 867, but it's still sad for me. 936 is a blast with some great characters and an interesting balance, while I find 867 to be quite tedious and boring overall if you're a Christian ruler, as you're basically just stuck picking a Carolingian of some sort - they literally control every major throne in western Europe just about, and it reduces the fun of the game as a whole for me. The date is almost exclusively interesting just for the pagans.

What I DON'T understand is why they didn't/won't do a bookmark for the aftermath of Hastings - we're going to be stuck with a drawn out war between Harold, Harald and William in all likelihood and in addition, we're going to miss out on the characters William inevitably brings along with him when he conquers England. It literally is basically two months apart from the date chosen and couldn't have been terribly difficult to include.

 

[Elm0__]

I personally hope these start dates get ported over through mods. The amount of work that needs to be put into them with every update isn't worth it considering how few people play them.

That being said I will slightly miss the ability to just look at the map as you go through the timeline. I showed my history professor this once and he was impressed.

I would again state quite an unpopular opinion: it's just an issue of marketing. 867 and 769 start dates for CK2 were advertised as a part of DLC. In contrast, other start dates where there from the beginning and didn't get comparable outreach. As a side effect we've never got any mechanics to simulate conflicts between popes and emperors.

If we could get additional high medieval start dates from DLCs, that would be absolutely great.

 

[Razmorg]

I don't care much. Extra start dates is a bit fun if you want to dip your toes into something different and specific but I never really cared much for them. The problem as far as I'm aware is that start dates is a HUGE workload for them to implement and keep up to date.

So a better question is would you rather have another start date or a major expansion that introduces stuff like merchant republics, guilds etc? Because for me I'd much rather have things that expand on the base game and improve it rather than the scenarios and the choice wouldn't be close in that case.

 

[cybrxkhan]

I'm going to really miss the 1307-1337 start dates, but I suppose it's a niche set of dates only a few weirdos like me played.

I do think an early Crusades start date such as 1081 (for the ascension of Alexios I Komnenos and the Crusades being around the corner), 1099, 1187, and so on might be done as a future DLC or free patch.

I also do hope to see a 10th century start date - 936 was fun because it had some of the unpredictability of the early start dates, thus catering to the ahistorical crowd who doesn't care if nonsense happens, but also the stability and established feel of the later start dates, thus catering to the more historical crowd like me who gets pissy if things fly off the rails too much. The perfect compromise date in other words. So whether it's 936 or 1000 or 911 or what not, I hope we see one as a DLC or free patch addition in the future.

I actually think a 10th century start date might be more likely than a Crusades start date as there would be a little less work involved in the history files since a decent amount would already be filled out since it's between 867 and 1066.

I understand the devs decision to choose 867 over 936 and some of the later dates given most of their userbases preference, and I'm infinitely pleased they didn't pick the atrocious 769 bookmark over 867, but it's still sad for me. 936 is a blast with some great characters and an interesting balance, while I find 867 to be quite tedious and boring overall if you're a Christian ruler, as you're basically just stuck picking a Carolingian of some sort - they literally control every major throne in western Europe just about, and it reduces the fun of the game as a whole for me. The date is almost exclusively interesting just for the pagans.

What I DON'T understand is why they didn't/won't do a bookmark for the aftermath of Hastings - we're going to be stuck with a drawn out war between Harold, Harald and William in all likelihood and in addition, we're going to miss out on the characters William inevitably brings along with him when he conquers England. It literally is basically two months apart from the date chosen and couldn't have been terribly difficult to include.

It's a personal preference of mine but I just can't imagine playing a later medieval start date where William didn't win and rules over England haha. Partly because I'm very interested in the guy as a historicla figure, it just doesn't feel right if he doesn't win for me.