Just got the Charlemagne DLC, i started to play as Carloman, Charlemagnes brother, to get abit more of a difficult challenge. Revolts in Charlemagnes kingdom appears, Charlemagne dies in battle and i inherit all of his titles. Since i got his titles i might as well steal his wife, so i married her after Charlemagne's death. Then my first son dies of illness, and before i managed to make new heirs, a sudden plot notification appears, i got murdered!

And then at the end of the line, i saw who the plotter was, it was my mother Bertrada. Its now obvious what son she loved the most.
Game over. 10/10

Charlemagne killed The Old Gods.
R.I.P pagans

THIS REVIEW IS BASED ON PLAYING PAGANS IN CHARLMAGNE!!!
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I have well over 1.1k hours into CK2 and before you become judgmental with my negative review, here is my positive review of CK2:
http://steamcommunity.com/id/wlapre/recommended/203770/
See, I do really love the game :)
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If you loved playing as pagans, forget it as the process involved to get you back to pre-Charlemagne / TOG status (in regards to holdings & stability) is nothing short of a major nightmare.

First, PDS introduced a new succession law; Elective Gravelkind. It is so buggy, that if you hold any land outside of your de jure Kingdom, the game will magically create a Kingdom (out of nowhere) and give it to one of your family members upon your ruler dying. This is frustrating as hell, if you created a custom Kingdom.

Second, as a pagan in pre-Charlemagne, once you reformed your religion, you had better access to succession laws and crown authority. NOT ANYMORE!!! Now in order to get both of those, you need to not only be reformed, but now you have to go through the process of going Feudal (or MR once it is working and not broken), which is suicide. Why is it suicide, because of the following reasons:

1. For all of your other holdings within your realm, you need to manually upgrade them all, which means a ♥♥♥♥ ton of money is required.
2. You will receive a -30 "wrong government type" penalty for all your non-upgraded tribal leaders.
3. You are very weak, as you have little to no levies while going through this process.
4. You are an easy target for your neighbors & factions within your realm.
5. You will became fustrated with the process...

If you love playing as a reformed & stable pagan, you will find Charlemagne & the free patch that came with it, not worth it. For the other features, it is not too bad, but not worth €15.00... more like €10.00.

If you want to play non-gimped, reformed & stable pagans, I would highly recommand rolling back to the previous patch (via the "Beta tab in steam) and playing it until PDS updates things... (assuming they will update it, so that reformed pagans are fun again).

Not worth the $15. The earlier start date is a plus, but the rest can be overlooked. If you want the full Crusader Kings II experience, get this, but if you prefer to have the essentials, don't.

Very satisfied with this DLC so far. Having played EU IV, it's nice to have changing seasons here too. It's also nice to have another hundred years to conquer the world.

Seriously though, i'm glad to see my favorite grand strategy continue to grow and evolve. Countless improvements, lots of new features, keep up the good work, Paradox! And for the love of Zun, do theocracies next please!

Good addition to base game. Enjoyed the earlier start date.

Chronicles is okay, though I think the expansion is a bit too expensive considering the content it added.

As Charlemagne's brother Carloman, I fought off a combined Bavarian-Lombard invasion early in the game, saved France from the Waldenstein, Germanic, and Slavic uprisings, assasinated Charlemagne without anyone noticing, and reunited the two halves of France, only to be killed by an uprising of peasants who wanted lower taxes.

11/10 would Carloman again

Totally unbalanced.. Just got 5 religious revolt in a row in the same little county. 5 x 10k rebels from a single count. Played hundred hours before this dlc and it's the first time i had this sort of "event".
Ridiculous.. Frustrating. And game over.
Dont. buy. It.

Amazing work as always! ->Next Constantine and the Tetrarchy! that would be a killer!

They elminated Assinations which makes it very hard to divorce. Also they removed monetary banishment which would be fine if they fixed the lower vassal improvement issue. Now you have lords with 10,000 gold and never upgrade the city or church.

Great DLC, the only problem i have with it so far is the lack of free concubine / prisoner casus belli. My daughter was taken by viking and theres nothing i can do free her. I find it hard believe that an english king would just sit on his hands while a Norsemen has his way with his sweet 17 year old catholic daughter.

Tried to create my own kingdom as a tribe in Russia, got captured during a raid. Regent, wife and spy master all in one embezzles the kingdom preventing a move to a feudal state. Unable to be released she informs me on plots to claim my lands but will not arrest them because she likes them.

Die alone in prison, son is killed by a maid within a month. Game over.

10/10

Crusader Kings 2 is the only game I love for its relentless DLC releasing, because these DLCs actually seem to add something real and new and interesting to the game, while leaving the base form the game the same. So with this DLC. I can finally make Essex the powerful Saxon kingdom it deserved to be as the distant heir to Aella.

A quick breakdown of the new DLC-specific content: custom kingdoms and empires possible, regency overhaul, timeline backshift, dynasty chronicle.

Custom Kingdoms/Empires: This particular feature is kind of a let down. You cannot name the new state without the Customization Pack DLC, and if you do have that DLC, it kind of rends this feature redundant. You also cannot customize the coat of arms or the kingdom/empire's color on the map. The one advantage is that this frees the player from territorial restrictions if they want to climb to the top, as you can merge any three duchies/kingdoms into a new kingdom/empire.

Dynasty Chronicle: Reminiscent of the chronicles in Europa Universalis. Not all that riveting.

Timeline Backshift: What's not to love about delving another century into history, with Germany still largely pagan and the Slavs still free of Christian influence? The chance to play as Charlemenge is also pretty awesome, as he gets his own unique event chains.

Regency Overhaul: You can now designate your regent in the event that your fiefdom needs one. The designated regent gets a large opinion boost to you. The ability to pick a capable and loyal regent instead of randomly being assigned an unknown, malicious, halfwit hunchback from across the sea is a HUGE boon and a long-awaited improvement to CK2.

Summary: Most of the primary new content that has been added is well-done; however, some of the best content, such as the new tribal mechanics, came for free with the patch. The primary attraction for this DLC is the timeline shift, which pagan players will absolutely love. The regency overhaul, of course, is another drawing point. For 15 dollars, this DLC is somewhat expensive, but it does compare favorably to its timeline-expanding predecessor, The Old Gods, one of the best CK2 expansions which was also 15 dollars.

This is recommended for any devoted CK2 fans, particularly players who often play pagans or who have dreamt of playing the legendary Emperor of the Franks!

I played CK2 several times and finished the game as Ireland. I am already busy in Old Gods DLC playing the Kingdom of Sicily. With about 400 years left in that game, developers released another massive content. Thanks to this Charlemagne DLC, i have now option to conquer vast pagan eastern Europe as the ruler of Bavaria, as a marcher lord and with a style!. Thank you Paradox!

Once again the gang at Paradox have made a massive, worthwhile update. On par with the amount of content in Old Gods, this brings some much needed updates to the game play.

Well done. Very well done.

Quick Answer? Do you like Paradox and their stuff? Are you a CK2 fan? This will be a must buy. But I don't need to tell you that, you already know.

There have been plenty of DLC packs for CK2. Some have been excellent (The Old Gods), some have been "go home Johan, you're drunk" (Sunset Invasion)...but this one is the best of the lot. A much earlier start date, plus pagans get nerfed so that if you're trying to play as a Catholic kingdom on the fringes of Northern Europe, you don't get stomped by Vikings who inexplicably have High Middle Ages feudal government organization. Tribes of this era relied on light infantry rather than the men at arms we think of when we think of peasant-in-a-can warfare. It was the more "civilised" groups that had heavier infantry and cavalry.

Realism, a good setting historically, and more of the CK2 you know and love? What's not to like? Absolutely, completely recommended.

Dammit Paradox, why can't I quit you?? You are like smoking, except my wallet is my lungs.

I enjoy the CK2 series, obviously, I have nearly 1k hours on record (apparently I need a life). I do NOT recommend this new DLC .... yet.

Full of bugs.

A few bugs that render the game unplayable right now (note that a few may be only for Mac OSX)

1. FIXED - REVOLTS! This is a common theme with CK2 expansions .. dear God, if you had the misfortune of play the Indian expack when it was released, it's quite a bit like that. Peasants will revolt, and revolt, and revolt. I think this has something to do with the new Vassal system. A current game of mine I am the Emporer of Scandinavia yet I have 0/43 vassals and revolts all over the place.

2. FIXED - Clicking on empty building slots as a Tribal holding will crash the game to the desktop.

3. Christians get their Holy Orders earlier, and the way tribal settlements work make them exceptionally weak.. get an AI with an attitude and they can run you over with ease. Thinking of stealing some Scottish, Irish or Welsh land?? Doesn't matter that they are tribal, with Holy Orders they instantly have 20k+ soldiers to crush your pathetic attempts.

4. Speaking of easy conquest .. the largest duchies at the start will flourish conquering little settlements, the map in a few years becomes a few exceptionally large states. I became Emperor of Scandinavia with ease, every settlement is essentially a little city, easy and fast to conquer.

5. FIXED - There seems to be an issue with "NoCulture" permiating the map .. I'm pretty sure Iberians had established cultures, and anyone of Scottish blood will be enraged to see Scotland is cultureless.

6. Norse religion is now called "Germanic" which seems rather vauge.

7. The Franks are unstoppable.. which seems obvious, it is the point of the DLC afterall. However historically this empire was exceptionally weak from internal struggles (and only lasted 88 years). Maybe the few games I've played with this DLC was just unlucky and I got a bunch of Karlings that liked each other.

There's plenty of good stuff, especially the overhaul with crown laws and such. But as usual there are also a lot of bugs and imballances created.

8. New bug for OSX -- game crashes to the desktop.

Paradox does a great job of keeping its players hooked by giving them new experiences within the game. Charlemagne is no exception. Starting in 769, it feels similar to Old Gods, with a large amount of pagans and a smaller reign(Although still massive) of Catholicism in Europe. The new features for pagans can brighten your day if you play as them. There are a couple, neat new religions,but they will probably not affect the grander scheme of things. One of the things that I like the most here, other than a new, earlier start date, is the ability to create your OWN kingdom. You dont have to follow the de jure boundaries of historical kingdoms/areas. It may be a bit tricky, but is reasonable and doable. Same applies for your own empire. Its a wonderful touch. Lots of positives for this DLC.

However, about 60-70% of these positives require other DLCs. Since only around 10 or so important countries are Christian, you almost need to have The Old Gods,Sword of Islam, and/or the Rajas of India DLCs. Your amount of gameplay here is quite huge, but you can be hampered without some DLCs. It almost forces you to have the others.

IS IT WORTH BUYING?

If you have gameplay affecting DLCs:

Yes. 9/10

If you do not have gameplay affecting DLCs:

Most likely not. 5/10

The zunist religion is absolutly the best pagan religion they aren't stuck in the two types of gavelkind instead they can choose ultrimogenetiture succsesion and the have there own sun festival thing. The religion can be reformed to get a relgious head and great holy wars. Oh and there first ruler has a claim on a independent nearby duchy. ZUN the justice giver.10/10