A fascinating debate on CBM and vanilla. Some of which is related to our game, some may not be. Civil discourse is always nice, though probably won't be resolved here.
You know the first MP game I played (Faltering Steps) we had like 70-80 provinces each. I was able to handle the MM pretty well and rather enjoyed it myself. I didn't quit either, but got my butt kicked by one of the vets, my old friend Lingchih. If people want to play with large numbers of provinces, that is certainly up to them. If the game had a way of directing production via the setting of waypoints and so forth, it would make things a lot easier, seems to me.
But you must all remember I am a rather casual player and certainly unskilled player. The minutae of the balance mechanics between various nations and the micro level details don't concern me that much. For me it is sufficient that the developers took the time to give certain nations certain strengths and certain weaknesses. To provide counters for this, that, and the other thing. If things were completely, utterly, and totally imbalanced between the nations, then even a skilled veteran, playing any of the available nations, who knows that nation and the game well, would not be able to beat a noob or lower level intermediate player in MP. So I am glad things are not that bad.
Game note: I am contacting Captain Nymph to find out the status of the players behind Helheim and/or TC and whether or not Algae wants time to look for subs or whether they should be turned AI. And the status of the team for that matter.