With the dynasty system just around the corner and the information that while our sovereign is immortal his children are not, i thought about the lifespan of our heroes/troops.
We know we can spend essence on our heroes to give them spell casting abilities but i think it also would make sense to be able to spend a part of our immortal essence to also make them immortal. This way we can have some core units to rely on throughout the game. It should cost enough essence to make it an important strategical decision - do i weaken myself in order to strengthen my heroes or do i maybe even weaken myself further to obtain a regiment or two of immortal knights as my super elite troops.
Since we (hopefully) can promote our descendants to heroes this would also be possible for them, maybe even at a reduced cost since they already have channeler blood in them, but even if they are "only" administrators in a city -without a hero promotion- an immortal administrator has his merits.
In addition to it i think it would be reasonable to have a spell of longevity - a possibility to prolong the life expectancy of an unit through magic - but true immortality should only be obtainable through spending essence.
What do you think about these ideas?