Did another test run on latest SVN. This time, 3000BC Portugal OCC space.
Migrated to South Africa to largely not interfere.
-I wanted to confirm it, and I did.
Portugal and the Netherlands do play a balancing act with each other.
They will basically claim all the Trading Company areas and colonial spots
that the other one would've competed for in their absence.
As a result, the Dutch were the #1 superpower for most of this game.
Just a reminder in the future, should you ever decide to tweak either of them;
it will most definitely affect the other, for better or worse.
-The Russians basically did what the Ottomans did in my last game,
Collapsed on the winning turn in spectacular fashion after sprawling across Mongolia, Tibet, Iran, Mesopotamia, part of Arabia, Pakistan and northern India.
After the Dutch collapsed, it was the Russians and the Americans competing against one another;
very historical, and it was the cherry on top that Russia collapsed in the 80s.
-I do not know what triggers this behavior, but I've noticed a trend where
large civs start going on wanton rampages in regions where they do not have war maps, before the time they're about to collapse.
The French were one of the dominant superpowers mid-late game, and decided
to collapse themselves by going on a conquering spree in the Middle East, similarly to what I described the Russians doing.
It's actually a nice balancing factor to ensure the top civs eventually collapse and give newcomers a chance to shine.
It unfortunately, comes too late to be of any good use, but it's an interesting phenomenon.
-Mongols do seem nerfed now; both Mongolia and China seem weaker now though.
China's military is quite lethargic after their rebirth, which I think I can attribute to Hongwu.
While I think Mongolia maybe got nerfed a wee bit too much.
My suggestion is to perhaps increase Hongwu's tendency to build troops very slightly,
as well as to give Mongolia a small foreign core impact reduction of 5-10%, as opposed to the former 33% that used to push them over the edge.
Although I must comment that Mongolia now collapses around 1500-1600 now,
if this was the desired effect.
-America feels like its sitting in a sweet spot right now.
The balance feels very good and the AI understands its UP effect now.
They remained The United States of America for much of the game (I don't think they ever switched).
It was the #1 civilization on the scoreboard when I ended the game,
and it didn't seem as Cheney-ish as my previous game.
-Macao for whatever reason changed hands like alot throughout the entire game.
It was obviously swiped from the Chinese, in the hands of the Mongols, back to China, then captured by a succession of Thai, Prussian,
back to Thai again after the Prussian collapse, Mughal, Russian, then back to Thai again on the eve of the Russian collapse.
The odd thing about this sequence, is that usually, the ownership changed during a war between the subsequent powers, but they typically had a better avenue of attack elsewhere.
For some reason, the AI liked to go out of its way to capture this city, which was farther away from the nearer cities within its immediate striking range.
In the cases where they were taken from the Thai though, I think that's attributable to the jungle impeding entry.
