Crusader Kings II: The Reaper's Due Content Pack Review (B3RyL)
I've played this DLCs for a good few hours now and so far so good. The DLC brings a wealth of things to do (and worry about) during peacetime, not only making peace more palatable for impatient players, but making it even desirable in many instances with bonuses to prosperity, the need to build and maintain hospitals and take care of your health and well-being. This coupled with the Way of Life and Conclave DLCs and you'll soon find yourself frawning at the prospect of having to fight another war - there's just so much to do during peacetime.
The plague mechanics are awesome - the ability to track the spread of a major outbreak sends chills down your spine as it creeps up on your realm, and the chaos it leaves in its wake is the best status-quo-breaker since the mongol invasion. Many alliances break, many dynasties die out, many opportunities to chase those weak claims arise. Also, it gives you the chance to eat one of your courtiers and become a cannibal. Yum.
The reworked death, punishment and illness mechanics are great. I can't stress enough how fun the game is with all the additional ways you can become maimed, disfigured or bedridden, and the treatments your court physician comes up with are... interesting. And the sounds... man, I'll be having some weird dreams tonight, that's for sure.
The much awaited options screen, which allows you to customise your game before start, is a welcome addition. This completely fixes many grievances people had with the previous patches, and brings more replay value to the game.
I haven't come across any major bugs either which is amazing for a first release version of a CKII DLC. The only thing I noticed is a couple of portrait glitches and that's about it.
And all of that for just £7.50 - less than any other of the recent CKII DLCs. It's a must-buy as far as I'm concerned.