Interesting, I didn't feel that Rome is actually that hard on 1.17.Completely disagree with your examples. There are some very difficult and random-reliant UHVs (like China/Rome technological goals which can be ruined by AI randomly deciding to beeline them), but ones you named are certainly not among them.
1) English UHV is much easier than the 1.17 one (at least on paper), Drydock, Trafalgar Square, Colonialism, settled Great General(s) and Meritocracy let you build level 3+ ships without them having to fight once. And it wasn't hard in the first place (just very tedious and boring).
2) Spanish and Austrian UHV are pretty easy if you don't forget to use spies to force religion change and (optionally) religious civic to Theocracy to make Protestantism slowly die out. Bonus points in case of Austrians because you certainly won't mind Great Statesmen from Statesmen spam.
3) Ending 12 wars in the age of cascading defensive pacts shouldn't be any difficult, especially with crazy Canadian modifiers allowing to gift/sell lots of technologies.
4) Russia is already probably the strongest civ in the game. Haven't tested them yet (but trying new gulag meta is definitely on my list). Turbowhipping 30 ICBMs sounds like a small footnote of your ordinary 5-Turn Plan.
I agree that more often than not you have to reload particulary unlucky results (my spies failed to convert Prussia to Catholisim 4 times in a row with 75%+ chances as Austria, after that i simply savescummed the last attempt), but it's mostly true for early civs where one bad roll can break your entire game plan (like losing the starting Hittie Hulaganni early). None of your examples can be botched by a single roll.
As a side note to Leoreth: i found out that Greek AI dies to Sea People invasion extraordinary often, so far in around a half of games. This also causes a butterfly effect of Persia not being invaded and remaining a major power at least until Middle Ages. Probably they should be weakened a bit, or Greece should spawn after the Bronze Age collapse, with early indep cities representing Mycenean civilization.
May I inquire what difficulty level you play on? Because on Monarch/Emperor it's quite hard to end wars or be a tech leader as Russia most of the game, when focusing on the UHV (1.17).
Building level 3 naval units with England directly is actually quite clever.
As for Japan, you need to generate great artists constantly and you can't ensure 100% rate for them. Feels a bit bad to reload each time a 70%+ chance doesn't materialise.
Well, then my post is not to you. There are other people in the thread.I am looking for feedback based on actual play experience, thanks.
The goal is so I can get others' opinion and maybe to also spark a discussion, also for my own entertainment and interests.
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