Sorry for posting here, but a mod I use called Nere's Rebalanced Secret Society adds a mechanic to every Secret Society that adds a Mallus to every Society, for example Owls of Minerva cannot declare surprise war against city-states. Could you add a compatibility in your mods with this one by adding Malus to her when you have this mod active? I even have a suggestion for each of them.

I think a good balance for the trade route thing would just be to put a cap on it, like the cap for xp and vampire strength units can get from barbarians. So after clearing, say, ten barbarian outposts you'd stop getting extra trade routes from them. Or perhaps it could be proportional to your number of cities? Just spitballing here.

I'm under the impression that the phantom flagship can boost the range of your naval units. Such being the case, it'll serve as a powerful support for a frigate bastion, allowing them to keep out of range of cities while still being able to fire upon them. It's also important to note that they seem to be more so about making money rather than military conquest, although a military is a path to making money.

While money can be used to fund a military, it can also be used to get buildings, civilians and military engineers among other things.

I do not like your new balance. Leveling up is too sloe so it really doesn't give an incentive to take this society. Perhaps a cap like was suggested or a trade route for every 2 camps cleared. Or perhaps a 50% chance to get a route. Any of these would be better than basing it on experience.

i recently played two games with this secret society and i completely agree with Moxys assessment of the new balance. Moving the Trade-routes capacity from barbarian camp to the flagship level feels like a hard nerf to the Brigand Court. The leveling up process does seem excessively slow, making the Brigand Court the worst secret society unless u have a coastal neighbour that can be raided/conquered for exp. besides, in my opinion, the special building is the worst of all secrets society. Besides, in my opinion, the special building is the worst of all secrets societys.

To sum up, the Brigand Court now feels like the worst of the secret societies, especially from an economic point of view or in multiplayer, where your flagship just gets sniped.

Re: Phantom Flagship's slow rate of promotion, I implemented a -50% xp debuff for it a while back before I had made the sharing of promotions with adjacent naval units into a promotion in itself.

Would a -33% or -25% debuff be preferable? I do still want to slow the rate of promotions somewhat, but with the introduction of the sharing promotion it may be less necessary.

That would be a nice change, but it kind of misses my point and I don't think it would be enough.
In my opinion, the secret society as it stands is only viable on island plates or archipelago maps, and only for a small selection of civilisations that do not benefit from one of the other secret societies.

The main problems in my opinion are:
1) The Flagship in its current state is the only strong aspect of the secret society, but it is heavily reliant on getting the right promotions early, (+1 attack per turn and movement after attack) and (+1 range +5 attack) is very strong, sharing promotions with adjacent units is good as 2. or 3. promotion if u got one of the first two, +2 movement is debatable, capturing a naval unit is unreliable, and the others are just bad. (In my opinion).
If you do not get one of the first two promotions immediately, you are not really stronger than a standard galley rush early on and cannot compete with the economic bonuses of other secret societies in the long run.

2) The special building (Outlaw Cove) is significantly weaker than any other special building, all it gives is +2 gold per era compared to the Light House. Owls of Minerva (Gilded Vault) gives you culture equal to its gold adjacency bonus and an additional trade route capacity for cities with a harbour compared to the bank.
So if you have well-placed Commercial Hubs, this will be somewhere in the range of +3 to 6. With the Town Charter Policy (100% bonus), this is doubled to +6 /+12. (Enough to rely on as your main source of culture!)
Hermetic Order (Alchemical Society) +2 Production, Gold equal to the adjacency bonus of the district and (+1 Great Engineer Great Engineer point per turn) (+1 Great Merchant Great Merchant point per turn) compared to the University

3) An early aggressive naval strategy is the only viable option. However, the flagship promotion mechanic gives you a dilemma where on the one hand you want to use your military advantage to conquer one or more cities quickly to gain the benefits of having the additional cities, and on the other hand you want to drag out the wars as long as possible to maximise exp, gain for your flagship and to unlock traders.
Hunting barbarians was a fun little side Quest that gave you the trade routes (economic benefit) that is needed to compete with other secret societies in the long term.
Alternatively, you could buff the Outlaw Cove…
First Mate: (Your naval units gain the ability to perform coastal raids. All units pillaging improvements and districts earn double the yields.) comes in too late to really be an important factor. (imo)

could we have a chose on with version of the court we can have. the old version may not be the most balanced but so is many mod and even some nonmodded things in this game. But it was fun and i think it should be up to the madders which one they want