Is it possible to make it so that certain cities have a naturally difficult populace? I remember in the first MTW that Portugal and Ireland and some other provinces had a natural unrest factor at all times making it more difficult to keep them in line than other provinces. This would help to keep certain areas from being expanded into too early. I know that the Hebrew provinces while under Roman rule were especially unruly, and I'm sure you guys can think of a few others that I can't remember at the moment.

Another thing I'd been wondering is if you were thinking about using the permanent fort feature. If it's possible you could keep the regular fort that would cost nothing to build, and maybe add the third option to build a permanent fort (at a considerable cost obviously) in order to help represent long-term border garrisons.

One last thing I'd thought I'd ask is if its possible to make it so that city garrison, town watch type buildings could be made to reduce the frequency of brigands arising in the province. I sincerely doubt it would be possible but that would be great seeing as that's is the sort of thing the building is described as being for in the first place and all.