So I started a new game last night.  Actually got off to a great start, good starting location, good resources, fairly easy expansion.  Things are going great.  After I cleared out every visible monster I placed my third settlement.  It was starting to advance, my second city was actually pretty isolated and doing well.  There was a monster den pretty close by so I built some extra defenders "just in case".  Back to my third city.  Ceresa decided to place a city just north of mine, which is how we introduced ourselves.  Then she spammed three outposts on the east, west, and south side completely enclosing my new city.  After the third outpost was placed the world decided it didn't like me.  A cave bear started wondering around and destroyed and outpost, then it walked past all three of Ceres's outpost, ignored her city, and marched into my little fledgling village and completely destroyed it.  The very next turn, the second city I had settled was attacked by 4 crack monsters (the black and green humanoid monsters) and 3 earth shrills.  This is still fairly early in the game, needless to say my defenses were not up to par.  After the destruction of my second city, Ceresa went ahead and declared war on me and marched into my first city.

Why do these monsters, completely ignore the AI cities and outposts?  Ceresa couldn't have formed a better plan then if she made the monsters do it.  The loss of both cities in two turns, in a random creature "coordinated attack" was devastating and needless to say my first city fell soon after.  The loss of the second city was because I did not have the strength to kill the original monster den and the city grew to close, that is my fault and I tired to protect it--not sure why the extra 3 earth shrills joined the party but that is besides the point.  I really do not mind the random wandering monster, but the cave bear literally had to weave its way into my city and actively avoid Ceresa's outpost.