AI wins in early game: is this good or bad?

[marrow]

Short campaigns generally suck, I fail to see the point. In RTW on VH/M, playing as Julii I realised that chances of beating Egypt to it are very slim indeed. I never went as far as actually testing it extensively, but two short campaigns (Julii and Brutii) were enough to discourage me from ever trying again.
Then M2TW came out, tried a short campaign as France on H/VH and was astounded to find that Hungary and Milan were light years ahead by turn 60 in every term compared to me. I just gave up.
I fail to see the point, really.
Remember MTW's GAs? For some reason I loved that system, it was quite refreshing (if buggy at times...) and gave alternative to territorial conquest which (as any TW fan will attest) became seriously tedious and automated since the dawn of RTW era. I reckon short campaign only ever makes sense if victory conditions apply excusively to player faction. Otherwise it's almost impossible to succeed as, say, Portugal, or Denmark. Thoughts?

[diotavelli]

Short campaigns generally suck, I fail to see the point.

territorial conquest which (as any TW fan will attest) became seriously tedious and automated since the dawn of RTW era.

Well, here's a problem. Short campaigns can be problematic but at least they don't involve "tedious" hours of land grabbing, frequently against factions too punch-drunk to properly resist.

I've always preferred short campaigns as I simply don't get that much chance to play TW and don't have the patience to keep playing the same campaign for months at a time - which is often the case when I only get in one or two hours a week.

Also, I'm a bit of a stickler for historical accuracy. It's one thing England conquering half or even the whole of France but Spain, Italy, Germany, the Balkans and North Africa too? At least short campaigns don't regularly pit the Scots against the Egyptians or similar idiocy.

But this whole issue of losing on terms that I am unable (unable, note, not unwilling) to respond to is worrying. I like a challenge but I don't like a fait accompli.

[DVX BELLORVM]

Personally, I couldn't care less for the victory conditions. The situation described by the OP never happened to me, and I never lost a campaign, but even if it did, I'd continue to play as long as i chose to (unless, ofc, someone actually conquers me )

[marrow]

Ha ha, true, "what if" scenarios in TW can be a bit toe-curling sometimes.
That's exactly why I loved GAs so much - you didn't have to swallow the world to win, at the later stages of the game there would still have been 2 - 4 strong factions to contend with, maybe more so the competition was still pretty fierce and the game was generally gripping.
As it stands short capmaigns are blitz fests to me, because unless you've actually won, you won't know how close your opponents are behind you (don't even mention the graphs) and thus you very little idea how much time you have left. Or perhaps I'm just oblivious to more elaborate mechanics of the short campaign and my approach to it is wrong? Any ideas?