It's extremely well-balanced, automatically penalizing or rewarding players based on their ranking as of the previous turn. That prevents players from falling too far behind, and also adds an interesting timing dynamic to the strategy.
Agree. But it doesn't reward bad players (e.g. over-bidding centrals, or not paying attention to the map expansion costs), just don't destroy them in the first rounds so they feel they are dragging the remaining game. Everybody feels the illusion they can win until the last couple of rounds, but only if you played well you win. Only after you lose you rethink your mistakes and how to avoid then in the next game, which makes you want "revenge" instead of hating the game.
It's extremely well-balanced, automatically penalizing or rewarding players based on their ranking as of the previous turn. That prevents players from falling too far behind, and also adds an interesting timing dynamic to the strategy.