No, I agree, ermor has probably an 80% or greater chance to win this game at this point. However, I don't really think that gath being the victor in the battle between the two of them would really make much of a difference in the long run. Gath is sort of ridiculously strong right now and growing stronger. And ermor is the only nation bordering him that has even the remotest chance of killing him 1 on 1, midgard is a shambles, and MAN is the only other nation bordering him.
Ermor is bordered by just me (jomon) and gath, and together we could probably kill ermor and divide the spoils, so to speak. Then gath would proceed to walk all over me/everyone else and win the game, unless someone has a magnificent trick hiding up their sleeve (I am not this person). I don't think I'd be able to defeat either gath or ermor one on one at this point, and I think finding help in killing either of those two monsters would prove to be a near impossible task this game, as there are just not many people who border them and the few that do really don't have much opportunity to harm them.
Then there is another reason that ermor is going to win, and that is that I am playing this game very, very casually and can't really be bothered with the normal sorts of details that help win games. Such as attacking ermor when he's weak trying to kill off pythium (and then being ravaged by gath once he finds JOMON living in an ermorian wasteland...) or attempting to expand into neighbors and creating a powerful, single state instead of a collection of three modestly powerful nations in the same space. Whether I won or not, someone would have. Instead, being a peace-loving hippie at heart, I organized the Alliance to Save Lizards from Fishmen and ruined the chances of another would be power that could have possibly united the northeastern quadrant and formed a powerful enough nation to maybe stand up to ermor or gath. And like me, no one else up here in the northeast seems to be much of a warmonger
.
So, ermor or gath. And I am betting on ermor as he is at the point already where he should have near-limitless chaff, even if his research is not so hot.