So I just started up a game as Hausa and gave everyone in the region (except those who I've ignored so far, like Mali, who I haven't even discovered yet, or Songhai, who's been sphered by Mali) a nice old beating.(it's not actually that old yet though, it's only 1401). Among other things, I annexed Oyo and rereleased them as a muslim vassal. Normally, nations you release as vassals will get your government, I've even released some american natives I had no real interest in but didn't want anyone else to annex as absolute monarchy before. However, Oyo is still a Tribal Democracy, not a Despotism. Why, is there an exception to this for tribals releasing others?
Also, these sub-saharan rebels are far worse than I remembered, must be because in my last sub-saharan game I had mountains and predictable rebel walking paths. I have a 4k pretender stack and there's nothing I can do, they shred my troops to pieces no matter how many I send, they recover 400 troops a month and they have already completely drained my manpower. And I can't collapse because the country is divided and they just patrol between two provinces... However, if I get another revolt, and in Benin that's pretty likely, I'm screwed. What can I even do about them? Other than waiting until the pretender dies on one of his endless marches through the desert, which is what eventually happened, that is.
