But then, mightn't a smarter starting strategy for people who know they don't have the money to put out towards mercs (particularly without alchemizing) be just to not bid at all and instead use your money to buy national units?
I agree, though, that it's probably far too much of a no-brainer to hire mercs in the early game. Heck, given their relative cheapness, I tend to default to hiring mercs more often than not simply because of how quickly they arrive. It's perhaps something to be saved for Dom4, but maybe mercenaries should have a delay of a few turns before showing up when first hired or hired away from another nation. Maybe that'd counteract their element of benefit, as I know that I've often felt it a bit cheap to siege a castle and then begin hiring every mercenary band available into that province to quickly blow through the siege.
And hey! It can be up to 8-10 or so research lost, depending on eras or scales.
Okay, okay. You're likely right in that that's not at all "gutting" anything.