Yea, I was surprised by how weak the factions were in 1.29, and obviously they are much weaker now after the estate rework. I tried asking about factions in the livestream Q&A, but no surprise, they wouldnt answer it and instead answered questions like "will you add more formables/missions/etc". And some weird question about prussia's flag colours.
Another fundamental flaw is that there is no peaceful way to dominate trade, you have to go full warmongering to seize COTs because there are no peaceful alternatives. Light ships barely make a profit protecting trade till you get a flagship with the trade power modification + caravels and its impossible to compete with COTs unless its late game and you have 500 light ships in a single node or something stupid.
Lubeck cant even afford the sailor upkeep to have light ships at sea at the start of the game, and they are the leader of a trade league. How can you be the leader of a trade league if you cant even afford to have light ships at sea? Thats like being the HRE Emperor when you cant even afford to have an army to defend the empire. Merchant republics should be able to put out some of the largest merchant fleets in the game, its their whole focus, like how Prussia has strong infantry.
And if you need to go warmongering to seize COTs to dominate trade, then theres no reason to play a merchant republic really, because everyone else does it better and factions are a huge disadvantage. The main appeal of republics is that you can switch your leader's focus whenever you want, but that goes out of the window because you cant keep electing from the same faction or the other factions get mad at you.
The way trade is represented ingame is really frustrating, because its supposed to be a huge part of the game and a key part of your strategy, but it just boils down to warmongering for COTs, using one giant lightship fleet with the trade power flagship modification and using a few merchants to steer to your home node. You cant even ask someone to give YOU trade power in exchange for something else (be it a military alliance or whatever). Even the Civilization series has more complex trading where you can offer X in exchange for Y.
You dont even need trade ideas to dominate trade. You can easily get infinite money just by using your 2 free merchants (3 after global trade), warmongering for COTs and steering it to your home node. I think its a kind of a joke that its easier to dominate trade via warmongering with military ideas than it is to actually play a merchant republic + trade national ideas + trade idea group. No, really, ive tried this, and its way easier to just play some country with strong military ideas like PLC and go warmongering for COTs than try to play a merchant republic and manage trade leagues/trading cities.
You can only invite OPMs to your trade leagues and they quickly self destruct after the start date because the members in your trade league make dumb alliances, answer sucidal CTAs and then get annexed without the rest of the league being able to intervene (free cities in the HRE have the same problem). I tried playing as Lubeck once and when the league did get attacked....the members refused to group up and all those small stacks just kept getting picked off one by one, and then everyone started seperate peacing out...the league is pretty much useless in an actual war. The AI hates protecting trade/hunting pirates so the other members in the league are basically dead weight, trade wise as well, and they didnt upgrade COTs in 1.29 (i heard they do in 1.30 though).
Trading cities are fundamentally flawed, since you only get half their trade power, while a regular government can just seize the COT and get the full trade power + tax + production + manpower. Not to mention the massive amounts of bugs associated with trading cities, like how they can accept tributary requests and then leave your league. I mean really, its just fundamentally flawed, if you had a choice between getting FULL benefits out of a province or getting only half the trade power in the hands of a stupid/buggy AI, why would any sane player pick the latter? Its like asking players to choose between keeping control of a colonial region or getting a buggy CN AI and half the trade power. Theres a reason you dont get to choose that and are forced to use the CNs...
I mean, the whole "trade focused game style" is a cool idea...but the way its implemented, its just better to ignore that and just war monger like usual because, well, you dont have any choice if you want to dominate trade, you HAVE to go to war to seize COTs...and if you are going to do that you may as well just play a regular monarchy and stack absolutism...