General Dominions 3 comparison...

[thejeff]

For all the complaints about the AI, it's not really that bad.
It can easily make for a challenging early game, especially on crowded maps. There are some mods that help, mostly by changing the independent troops. Mostly it doesn't handle SCs and thugs well, either building them or defending against them.
Late game gets very complicated and you really need an overall strategy which the AI doesn't have. And the ability to change that strategy to cope with changing opponents.

As for multiplayer, it generally breaks down into 2 types: blitzes, which are played in one sitting for hours at a time . And the regular MP games which usually start at one turn per day and slow even further down later in the game. Early turns only take a few minutes, later ones may take hours of planning. You can do your turn whenever you have time and submit it to the host which usually runs the turn when everyone's ready or at the deadline.

There are usually a dozen or more games running at a time over on the Multiplayer page.