[Ironhawk]

I've never played Sauro but just from looking at the description you list, the Soothsayer is valuable in giving you scale points. Don't stop at misfortune 2, push all the way to misfortune 3 and then place the soothsayers in your key provinces. Of course it will not protect you completely, but from what I recall, these misfortune bonuses stack. So you can do a lot to offset a 40 design point gain just by choosing your researchers accordingly.