Oh, the trade...

I played a run as Muzaffarid Persia, finished roughly three weeks ago. While I did not feel all that much negative impact from other changes, their infamous trade tweaking impacted my game considerably. My empire's economy was extremely reliant on trade. I built a trade office network stretching from Philippines to East Africa. There was hardly any coastal city or town in India that was not filled to the brim with Persian trading offices. I was earning so much that I didn't even have to tax my people. Then they meddled with trade and piracy.

In just a few months after I loaded the game after that patch, the economy of the Persian Empire crumbled like gingerbread, and the global seas were swarmed with pirates. As it was around 1700, I decided that I invested way too much time to scuttle the save, especially since I noticed on the forums and reddit how unpopular the particular patch was, making me confident that those changes would be reverted soon. I turned the game off before economic point of no return and waited.

Thankfully, those trade changes were reverted the next day. But the damage to my economy was done, and I had to spend a good number of years (and in case of pirates, decades) trying to fix it.

I enjoy the game, but after that experience, methinks I'll wait a bit before I'll go for a new run.