If those northern peninsula regions were rogue, nobably would probably have noticed the Lurians land until too late. As it was, you almost took Nifelheim. And you could have created a new realm up there, with a little bit of creativity and some focus.
As you said, we could have. We tried and we failed; this is a game where failure can occur. This doesn't mean it should be made easier; the game already provides ways for barely held regions to be taken away. There is no need for the devs to do the player's jobs.
Riombara and Morek both take the nobles/region ration to the extreme, and both are bad for the game, overall. Neither on has any nearby enemies, and neither one likely will, until they collapse. They are simply too big and powerful. All those extra regions producing gold for the dukes provides crazy incomes.
If you want to reduce again the gold that can be extracted from lordless regions, I'd be fine with that - actually I'd be fine with making them cost money if need be.
Riombara isn't powerful because it has many empty regions - that's confusing cause and effect.
I do agree that we need to have motivations for war, and taking land is a great motivation. But when situations like Morek/Riombara arise, the absurdity of the situation is just shoved in your face. Something needs to be done about it. And the players need to come up with some other reason for lopping the heads off their enemies than "I want your land". Like maybe "Your god is evil. And your horse smells funny, too."
And we can thank Thalmarkin for creating for launching a great war in Beluaterra. Having more rogue regions would change nothing. In Dwilight I think it would actually stop the war - it would create space for the western refugees to create a realm, which they would probably do, and then all the fighting would stop for a while.
