[akots]

I think prior to attacking Barbu, I have secured peace with IanDC and he had no objections against that. Robi and you seemed to be preoccupied there and had no much interest in interfering and I was probably able to handle a lot of weaker units including ships and knights/muskets with infantry and cannons. I was also very close to tanks, and while IanDC had some troops, there were a few frigates and SoL to give him a hard time to sail and land any force. Viking AI was also friendly to me and unlikely to do anything harmful.

I really did not need barbu's lands since there were a lot of free islands around which could have been settled and I had to pillage everything around his cities and build farms all over the place and considering the effort that went to this war and resistance of the cities, I would be better off just expanding into empty areas of the map. However, barbu was a threat in terms of diplomatic victory and cultural victory and this were the driving force of that war, nothing else.

Indeed, the AIs went corporation heavy for the last turns and founded a few, indeed as many as they had available to them apparently. I was in State Property, so could not found anything useful in any case and all great people were spent for Golden Ages.