I think that making a good first impression is one of the most important things a game can do.  If a game fails to make a good first impression, then many players may never even give it a chance.  This is basically how WoM was for me, so I wanted to let you know about my first impression with FE.

Overall:  Much better!  While I found WoM initially confusing, FE felt much more welcoming.  Getting started was pretty easy, and the UI seemed much more intuitive. 

Likes:

1.  I especially liked how the game displayed a cool picture with text when I built my first city to emphasize its significance.  Stuff like this is great because it draws the player in.

2.  The descriptive text on all of the individual objects (caves, treasure, whatever) is presented nicely and is a very nice feature.  Makes the world more immersive and gives it a "pen and paper" feel.

Dislikes/Suggestions:

1.  I kept trying to scroll the map by either moving the mouse to the edge of the screen or using the arrows, but it seems like neither of these work.  I think that one or both of these options should be added...it will make the UI feel much more immersive.  As it is now, it feels kind of clunky to move around the map.

2.  I would make the "auto-end" turn option be off by default.  I kept moving my champion and didn't even realize I was taking turns lol .  It was just bit confusing.

3.  I would prefer if there was a "load game" button directly on the ESC menu.  Having to go to the main menu to load is just an extra step.

4.  I didn't see a quicksave/quickload option.  Definitely need this.

5.  I would like it if the ESC key would close the ESC menu as well as opening it.  I hated having to manually click on a button to close it.

6.  The city and empire building felt too simplistic.  After just a bit of play, I figured out that I could just build everything in every city and be done with it.  There didn't seem any incentive to specialize cities or halt growth for a while.  I also didn't see any real reason not to just settle a bunch of cities off the bat.  I would like some more tradeoffs here...city and empire building decisions should feel very strategic, but right now I didn't get that.

Final Thoughts:

I really think this game could be awesome, but it's not there yet.  Pleeeeease don't push it out too early...as we all know a game gets judged at release, and as a big 4X fan, I want this to be an awesome game.