-Maybe in this patch, you could remove the hats for the Captains and other nautical-themed artifacts? It would make the game harder, but you can sacrifice something, right? After all, it's harder to get a Mage Utopia, and the reward – in the form of mediocre nautical artifacts – is not worth it.
And one of them was a maxed-out Utopia.
P.S. I agree with you about the timer.
As for the templates, three basic templates is not enough.