RNG, its a sandbox game.

I'm running into the same issues. No matter how many times I restart Empire just gets steamrolled, and on top of that I've been seeing some factions ignore other factions they're at war with to target my settlements in particular, be it from VC or Norscans ignoring even defenseless settlements from factions effectively left without armies on the way to siege Marienburg, joined by Thousand Maws doing the same thing. Even in a run where I made alliances and started the war on Sylvania first with everyone trying to gang up on them, they sent a full stack directly at me ignoring the two settlements Stirland had on the way. Thoughts on taking advantage of that by just playing defensive while the other elector counts and dwarves gang up on Sylvania ended up disappearing when I saw Balthazar get wiped by 3 additional stacks from a faction that supposedly has a strength ranking 50 positions underneath me who could barely muster 2 full stacks and a half.

On the south the same happens, with orcs ignoring all bretonnian factions they're at war with to go to Helmgart and either force me to keep constantly replaying a manual battle that could end up even with a 20:1 KDR or have an autoresolve end the same battle with a complete loss.

End result is you're effectively picking which side you'll die from. If you try to attack the VC, Norscans will eat you alive. If you try to defend against Norscans, VC will blob up eastward. If you keep Marienburg alive to not have the Norscans immediately target you, they'll just eat up the other elector counts and bretonnia before inevitably going for you. All this while you take constant breaks in the form of the hundredth forced manual battle in Helmgart since autoresolve does not like you at all.

I'm on N/N with the only mod being SFO. What am I doing wrong? Because if this is RNG, I'd probably be better off buying lottery tickets.

I can't say for sure, and I'm not experienced enough to guide you in particular.

But what I would say is to remember that in SFO Grimhammer, the AI will treat you as equal in danger as other AIs, it will not simply point out that you are human and go after you directly.

This can sound like a universal positive, but instead it really just changes how the enemy AI focuses on targets. It can be both a blessing and a curse, depending on how it views you now considering you as another simple faction.

Remember, also, that the more powerful a threat you become, which I'm guessing but the manual says how, is how many provinces you have, that then you are considered a greater power risk, and so get focused on.

This would suggest, that the various interactions with war and so forth, between factions, can now readily change compared to the base normal game without SFO. This being based on now the AI treats you like any other faction , whether AI or not, but simply based on threat and diplomacy benefits.

So, let's say that HIgh Elves normally go after Dark Elves in a certain region. That may change if now you are just another faction but not human. It might be that normally, the Dark Elves move at you first, since Human. But HIgh Elves normally go in vanilla after Dark Elves since enemy AI.

While in SFO, HIgh Elves may be semi positive to you if Empire faction but Dark Elves more neutral. If you become a big power, they might both come after you, but depends on their style in Diplomacy, your perceived power, and your diplomatic history, plus probable start power threat as start of campaign.

So, don't be surprised if the initial focus of good or evil factions now changes right at the start of the game, or if the Order Tide, or the Dark Tide, is not quite as clear or early, since the Vanilla get the human player bias, is non-existent.

This might explain a lot of it and require a new estimation of the likely start of conflicts at start of the map.

I agree with Tanya, that I believe that so far on Normal SFO, it seems as if the various factions of AI are more opportunistic, flexible, and ready to adjust. They seem to be more willing to come after the weak or those piled on by various other AI.

Basically, the preconceived mindset or bias against the human controlled faction is downgraded, but the rest in result is then accentuated by its absense. I've noticed this with both the early game with Hellebron and Morathi. It is rather shocking.

I don't know enough on what follows, but this suggests to me several things, that I noted in some of Legend of Total War campaigns. It would seem, then, that diplomacy or gifts, may be much more valuable to manipulate from the otherwise AI analysis of the situation.

It may also lend greater weight to the history the game builds into your current situations with AI. By that I mean, you will see even on game start, that there is a pre-created history of gifts or broken treaties, or trespasses, for your faction with nearby AI even before you started the game and took actual command, that make up their opinion of you. This is very interesting to see on the Diplomacy screen.

Complete opposite of what I'm seeing. Factions are ignoring weak undefended wall-less settlements of factions left without armies that they're at war with to walk further and siege walled player settlements with a stack in close proximity. IE, the Norscan factions, at war with the faction Marienburg, ignore it despite it having no armies and defenseless settlements in order to walk further and besiege the walled settlement of Marienburg that I had taken from them while I have an army in close proximity that I had to keep stationed there due to the constant suicide raids. Similar thing happens with Thosand Maws in regards to Bretonnia. Taking the settlement of Marienburg almost feels like I'm triggering a scripted war declaration rather than it happening organically, after which I just know they'll ignore all the other factions they're at war with.