I kind of like the surprise of what you guys will come up with, but two things I would wish for:

Fog of war:  After you make the initial pass through an area and have moved on, the second layer of FOW should conceal what is going on in the places you have passed.  My scouts have noted a few towns is their journeys and have marked my maps with the locations, but when I have nothing within visual range of the towns it bugs me that I can click on the town and see all the occupants and what they are constructing and what units they are training.  For me, if I did not know that it would enhance game-play quite a bit.

Unit/Location Halos:  You have these nice glows on the 3-D map, please make them more distinct.  My units could have a green glow, anything that is in a non-aggression or ally could be blue, everything else could be red.  Neutral locations could be white..  The colors could be whatever you guys deem works, but as much as I enjoy the 3-D map in elemental I find myself playing on the cloth map because it is easier for me to discern what is what.  (Just as a bonus, little standards would be awesome in my opinion)

Looking forward to FE

Cheers!