It may not be fun for them, but the result for them must be fun else they would not bother to go through it. Its not fun for me when my tiny 1 Duchy realm is beset by 3 larger neighbours (hypothetical) , we certainly can't compete with them, should we change that too? If you can't compete with them with the sword, bring them down using other methods. If you character fails to excel at any of the areas that would provide a means to do this, then just like in RL grit, bear it and plan revenge.