Took me months of perusing the faction list to decide on my first 1212AD faction...Brabant!
Launched today and after several crashes and file verifications, got 1212AD up and running and played through about 20 turns. Declared war on my northern neighbor Groningen (Upstalboom League) early and destroyed them just before my peasants started to get annoyed, food started running out and soldiers started deserting. Good times!
Ended today's play in 1222AD, destroyed Groningen after some back and forth and the Kingdom of Scotland (!!) declared war on me.