Well I just "finished" my first multiplayer game of elemental (a 1v1 via the matchmaking system, ended due to out of memory crash),  there was some good there, some bad. First off I am wondering if the multiplayer is still running on the previous patch as some of the 1.08 changes don't seem to be in multiplayer (or at the very least aren't displayed, such as the food cost for merchants), or is multiplayer supposed to have completely seperate values? I also encountered a bug with a notable location (equipment cache I think), told me I was getting armor, got nothing in my inventory.

Below are my observations/feedback/suggestions about how to improve multiplayer.

1. Map size - There were only two players (myself and my opponent) but matchmaking placed us on at least a medium map, if not large, we didn't even find each other until near the end of the game.

2. Useless/worthless tech - Some of the techs seem to do nothing in multiplayer; advanced archery for instance, which unlocks longbows in singleplayer, is pretty much worthless since there apparently are no longbows in multiplayer (that or this was an annoying bug). This was also the case for a few techs in the adventure path (first monster/notable location tech neither released monsters nor upgraded my notable location level, infact all of the techs that claimed to bring more monsters into the game didn't seem to do so).

3. No tactical battles - This is probably what is harming multiplayer most in my opinion. I understand the reasoning behind not having tactical battles for sake of time; but the autoresolve as it stands is not that good and even if it were, it feels like a large portion of the game has been ripped out, not to mention how worthless this makes most of the non-damaging tactical spells. As for how to fix it, I'm not entirely sure. Perhaps keeping autoresolve only against npcs/ai but having tactical between players? Still have potential time issues there, but it would be better than no tactical battles. I would also suggest that tactical battles use traditional turns rather than simultaneous, should they be implemented.

4. Inability to declare war - Why can't I declare war on my opponent? I actually assume that I could trigger war by trying to walk into their land without a non-aggression pact, but never got to test that in the time before OoM crash; but assuming that is true, I still would like an ability to declare war outside of trespassing as I can stand my vastly superior army right next to their lone sovereign and be unable to do anything against him simply because the only methods of declaring war either require you to find their land and trespass into it, or speak with them long enough to declare war (which either doesn't work, or may require both players to click that option (I wouldn't know given how my opponent would have to have clicked the option and let me declare war on them/kill their sovereign )). This causes further issues if I find your land before you find mine as I can then send a steady stream of troops to key positions that you can't stop simply because you can't declare war on me to fight them. I would suggest a simple option for a right click menu with "Declare War" as an option in the foreign relations screen.

5. Turn timer - very very short turn timer currently, I do like the idea behind it though, basing the time off of when the first person ends their turn is great as we can both share a longer turn then; the problem arrises when one person needs a long turn and the other person is finished in 5 seconds. I'd say increase the time given throughout the game, and have a minimum time for each turn, say a minute or two; so that if one player is done in 5 seconds its not instantly "you have 10 more seconds" it is instead "you have minimum turn time - 5 seconds", if both players take longer than the minimum, then it will work like the current system (only with the increasingly longer time based on number of turns into the game).

6. More options for setup - It would be really nice to have more preferences/options before starting the game. Let me choose to have more players in the game (1v1, 2v2, 3+ player ffa in matchmaking), let me determine if I want to play with a turn timer, if I want simultaneous turns or traditional turns, if I want to allow custom sovereigns/nations or not (as long as there is a rule system backing their creation with limitations I see no reason to prevent people from having them in multiplayer), and then match me to people with the same options (or of course just host it for me if its a custom game ), give me an option to play in multiplayer with everything singleplayer has (as far as I can tell from the custom game setup the only victory option in multiplayer is conquest?)

7. Give me some clear multiplayer GUI. I would never have figured out how to speak to my opponent if they had not done it first, there is no button for it that I could find. Also show me a list of network connections and pings somewhere.

8. Inability to save - The second most harmful thing in multiplayer. Why can't I save a multiplayer game, friend my opponent, and continue it with them later if we both want to? Should auto-save as well. This is especially bad with the current game crashes, but even without those I know how long tbs games can last, and there is very little chance of every game being completed in one sitting.

9. Multiplayer specific rules - Only one victory condition, no quests, and possibly more I have yet to run into. This is not a major issue, but it definitely is one. I can live with the victory condition limit (though really spell of mastery would be a great addition to multiplayer and master quest could be reworked to fit nicely), but the complete and total lack of quests really takes something out of the game. As for the currently unavailable victory conditions, while not a necessary addition, they most certainly could be great so I'm going to give some examples of how I would alter them to fit into multiplayer. First, we need a victory screen similar to civ's which lets us know how close our opponent(s) are to victory (what spell level they are at for spell of mastery, how many pieces of the forge they have for master quest). Now, I think spell of mastery would actually work fine in its current form since (if i understand it correctly) you have to have one of each shard + all the necessary arcane research, meaning that, if we show progress in research and the number of shards of each type players have in the aforementioned victory screen, other players should be able to act to prevent this victory (by preventing control of all shards/taking out large sources of arcane research).

For the master quest victory, the solution is simple. Make the forge pieces into units instead of items. Allow an army to have only one forge piece in it at a time (though allow a city to contain multiple pieces), and make it so that there exist only one set of pieces (so if we both start the quest of mastery, you may get a piece, and i may get a piece, each piece is unique, there is no other like it, so if either of us wants to win we have to take the piece we need from the other). To achieve victory, have the player bring all of the pieces together in a city they own (possibly counting down a set number of turns in which the pieces are put together, allowing other players to destroy the city during said time, in which case you might scatter all of the pieces again essentially resetting the quest).

10. And now just a tiny nitpick; in the custom games list, let me double click on a game to join it.

Overall, I'd say the multiplayer has a very long way to go, but if, in the end, it plays anything like the singleplayer it should be a great experience to have.