I favor smaller realms, generally... but really I just favor dynamism. I have no beef with big realms if they keep things in flux. But Atamara's big realms have basically been in stasis it seems like for as long as I've been playing. Eston has had some shakeups at various times, like when Darka took Massillion.... but Talerium and CE are virtually untouched. Tara's size doesn't bother me so much, because I can easily recall when they had 4 regions. But it will bother me in a few months, most likely.
To me, it's not a question of size, but time. CE's time has come. Talerium's time has come. Not necessarily to die, but to change their place on the continent. Carelia is changing its place, and if they are victorious they will continue to inhabit a new place as well.
Talerium could do something interesting (for the first time in the existence of that realm) and betray CE, for example. CE would begin to lose the war quite swiftly. Or Tara could betray CE. The Carelia/Suville/Caergoth alliance is already a deviation from old alliances, as is its alignment with Eston. I'd like to see other realms adapt as well.
