The real people behind the scenarios
Of the 25 scenarios in Crown & Plough, a free history life-sim browser game, 24 begin in the place of someone who really lived. From Alcibiades, the Athenian general of the fifth century BC, to Franz Marc, the painter killed near Verdun in 1916, each of them gets one page on how they actually lived and died.
Every page opens with who the person was, followed by a year-by-year summary of their life, a family table, what you go through in the game if you start as them, and frequently asked questions. The remaining scenario, a young Theban noble in 431 BC, is a fictional character and is not on this list.
| Person | Dates | Era | Scenario |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alcibiades The Sicilian Expedition; the Athenian general who changed sides three times | c. 450 BC – 404 BC | Classical Greece | The Night of the Herms (415 BC) |
| Xenophon The Anabasis; a general of the march of the Ten Thousand | c. 430 BC – c. 354 BC | Classical Greece | The Return of the Ten Thousand (401 BC) |
| Demosthenes The Philippics; leader of the anti-Macedonian cause | 384 BC – 322 BC | Classical Greece | The Last Speech (346 BC) |
| Hadrian Hadrian's Wall; third of the Five Good Emperors | AD 76 – AD 138 | Roman Empire | Emperor of the Wall (122) |
| Marcus Aurelius The Meditations; last of the Five Good Emperors | AD 121 – AD 180 | Roman Empire | Winter on the Danube (167) |
| Constantine the Great The Edict of Milan; founding Constantinople; the Council of Nicaea | c. AD 272 – AD 337 | Roman Empire | The Edict of Nicomedia (303) |
| Ragnar Lothbrok The raid on Paris in 845; the Viking said to be father of Ivar and Björn | Dates unknown | Age of Vikings and Coronations | Ragnar's Ship (844) |
| Alfred the Great The Battle of Edington; the burhs; England's only “Great” king | 849 – 899 | Age of Vikings and Coronations | The marshes of Athelney (878) |
| William the Conqueror The Norman Conquest of 1066; the Battle of Hastings; the Domesday survey | c. 1028 – 1087 | Age of Vikings and Coronations | A Crown Across the Sea (1065) |
| Enrico Dandolo The doge who led the Fourth Crusade and the fall of Constantinople in 1204 | c. 1107 – 1205 | Middle Ages | The Galleys of Venice (1202) |
| William Marshal “The greatest knight”; regent for Henry III; the Battle of Lincoln, 1217 | c. 1146 – 1219 | Middle Ages | The road to Runnymede (1213) |
| Danylo Romanovych King of Rus' in the Mongol age; founder of Lviv | 1201 – 1264 | Middle Ages | Winter in Kiev (1238) |
| Bertrand du Guesclin Constable of France in the Hundred Years' War; “the Black Dog of Brocéliande” | c. 1320 – 1380 | Middle Ages | The Black Dog of Brocéliande (1337) |
| Cosimo de' Medici The Medici Bank; patron of the Renaissance; “Father of the Fatherland” | 1389 – 1464 | Middle Ages | The Ledger of the City of Flowers (1433) |
| Lucas Cranach Saxon court painter; portraits of Luther and the imagery of the Reformation | c. 1472 – 1553 | Renaissance and the Age of Discovery | The Printer of Wittenberg (1517) |
| Albrecht von Wallenstein Imperial supreme commander in the Thirty Years' War; Duke of Friedland | 1583 – 1634 | Renaissance and the Age of Discovery | The Prague window (1618) |
| John III Sobieski The Battle of Vienna, 1683; the charge of the winged hussars | 1629 – 1696 | Age of the Sun King and the Baroque | Winged hussars (1683) |
| John Churchill (Duke of Marlborough) The Battle of Blenheim; 1st Duke of Marlborough; ancestor of Winston Churchill | 1650 – 1722 | Age of the Sun King and the Baroque | The Wind at Torbay (1688) |
| John Law The Mississippi Bubble; the Banque Royale and paper money in France | 1671 – 1729 | Age of the Sun King and the Baroque | Rue Quincampoix (1719) |
| Camille Desmoulins The speech on the eve of the Bastille; Le Vieux Cordelier | 1760 – 1794 | Age of Revolution | The Table at the Café de Foy (1789) |
| Joachim Murat Napoleon's cavalry marshal; King of Naples | 1767 – 1815 | Age of Revolution | The Horseman in the Plumed Hat (1796) |
| Giuseppe Garibaldi The Expedition of the Thousand; Italian unification; “Hero of the Two Worlds” | 1807 – 1882 | Victorian Era | Redshirts (1858) |
| Florence Nightingale “The Lady with the Lamp”; founder of modern nursing; the rose diagram | 1820 – 1910 | Victorian Era | A ship to Scutari (1853) |
| Franz Marc The Blue Rider; The Tower of Blue Horses and The Fate of the Animals | 1880 – 1916 | Victorian Era | The Guns of August (1914) |
The person in the game and the person in history
If you start a scenario “As the character”, you take over that person's age, rank, family and realm as they were and begin the first year. The family and the great events follow real history; among the companions, rivals and lovers around you there are also fictional people who could plausibly have lived in that age.
Each scenario has a turning point where history can go another way, and depending on your choices it can lead to a world and an ending different from the real ones. In the year the person really died, a brush with death comes; survive it and you may live longer than they did.