I love the AoD too, I lost on Emperor: I was overrun by the French too, for the same reasons.
But I won with teh English on Deity (save on an island
). The AI fails to take the north
American lands fast enough but does colonise South America and Africa...??? Those gold and
Gem mines are worth a lot more compared to the furs and spices (and tobacco) but that is only
for the later game...
Anyway, I think this game is highly playable with 4 or 5 humans because you have so many
different strategies. You can go peacefull and for the tresuaries. You can stay aside and
build pirats. You can go for a homeland war!!! You can take the lands form the american tribes..., etc etc! I would really like to play this scenario with humans sometime...