Enemy faction keeps getting to pick the next tech even when I have more points invested

[sadoeconomist]

I'm on the 0443 experimental branch. I haven't played in quite a while, is there some new mechanic that allows this to happen or is it a bug? The last global tech I researched, I was a couple hundred points ahead of the Protectorate and far ahead of the other factions when an event came up that said the Protectorate had taken the lead. I checked on the research screen, I was still listed as leading there, and I was comfortably ahead with only a couple of days left to go, it was no longer possible for them to catch up to me. Then when the tech finished researching, the Protectorate was shown as the winner and got to pick the next tech. This is the second time in a row this has happened - have the aliens come up with some new way to manipulate humanity's research efforts, or is this an experimental branch issue?

[Ericus1]

They got an event that gave them a large lump sum of RP. You can exceed the cost of a tech, and for early, cheaper techs those big lump sums can swing control of the global in your favor. It drops off dramatically as tech costs rise. In this case, a "comfortable" lead doesn't actually sound like it was actually that much of a lead, and when a tech costs 2500 RP, it's 95% complete, and an event hands you 500 RPs that can significantly change the calculus.

Not a bug, nothing that didn't happen in 0.4.41, but the AI is more aggressive about trying to global slot swipe now so it just may happen a bit more often