A couple.  I tend to agree for the most part, but it's not like they won't implement something if it's needed...  Though, that's common sense, so...  I guess I'm just saying the obvious there.

I think stability should be more like 90-95% too, but it is the Beta after all.

Stability also has to do with being able to finish a game, which I still cannot do.  I generally make it to something around 200 turns, barring anything especially wonky.  (Like trying to build a 4th city for instance.)  Again, stating the obvious...  I must not be in my right mind today.

I dunno what you're talking about...  This game feels plenty tight, just unstable, almost no graphics, and no intelligent AI to speak of.  And two out of three of those qualms are for the far future, so they don't even factor into this.  And despite only having had the Beta for 6 hours now, even Mechanics-wise, I can feel, literally feel everything beginning to mesh together.  I will agree that it definitely needs some tinkering though.  But Stardock is very good at tinkering.  =P

MagicwillNz's story there also brings up a point.  It sounds to me like the AI was retreating over and over again for fear of being squashed.  Even at this stage, it's probably necessary for the AI to know they should try to defend their cities...  So there's something to consider.

One more thing I think needs to be tweaked before Beta 2 is the broken Stack-Mechanics.  It's not entirely broken mind you, at least not in my experience, just whenever you try to exit a city with more than one unit selected.  Already put up a Bug Report for it with SS's, so hopefully that'll help.  But I feel like forcing players to move their army out one unit at a time is already tedious in SP, forget having to do it in MP...  For Multi-Player, that really is a game-breaker.

Edit:  One MORE thing, the frequency and uber-ness of Trolls.  Trolls make getting around the map annoying sometimes, nigh impossible other times.  Seeing Six Trolls across Four Stacks also tends to tell me that there are too many or that they're being created far too frequently.  They like to push your units back far too often, and really, without a small - medium sized army, or an Uber Sov/Hero-Party, taking them out is...  Well, quite literally impossible.

The remainder of Beta 1 will be about stability.  Making game mechanic changes or making it "fun" isn't what beta 1 is about.  

The criteria we will be using to determine whether we believe it's ready to go to beta 2 would be:

1. Reasonable stability. Defined as the typical beta tester able to complete a full game (win or lose).

2. Robust saved games. Defined as saved games being capable of perfectly reproducing the game state (key for debugging in beta 2).

3. The ability to run a new game from within a new game.

4. Basic game mechanics in place. Defined as meaning that two people playing each other multiplayer can effectively start and complete a game.

Beta 1Z fails items 1 and 3.  Item 2 seems acceptable. Item 4 is acceptable.

Regarding the AI. There really isn't any AI yet (I haven't written any code yet).  The way the AI is developed is that I specify a series of APIs that the AI will need access to (example AIFindNearestEnemyUnit() ). Once there are enough of these worker functions implemented, I can start.  I don't expect to start coding the AI until Beta 3.

3. Does that mean to start a game, exit that game, and start another game and have it run without exiting the Program? It sounds like that's what that means.

When it comes to the AI (I know it might be too early to theorize this) but, how will you handle the AI being able to raise and lower the land and the player being able to block them-selves off by creating a water barrier between themselves and the attacking AI?

I only ask because in a thread I made a while ago (Here) I blocked my-self off from the attacking AI and they couldn't get to me. Of course with no "AI" in place at the moment that's understandable. I'm curious to know how you'll solve this though. Will the AI be fully aware that it can raise and lower the land? And if so, won't it just be able to "cheaply" make a bee-line to where-ever it wants to attack? All the various spells and abilities and units in Elemental will give the AI a lot of options to use and if it's "too good" at it that might be considered "cheap". I think it will be very hard to balance the AI between being too smart and too stupid.

Note: Before anyone goes there, I'm perfectly aware there's no such thing as a Real "AI". If you think there is you've seen one too many Sci/Fi movies. We don't have the technology to make a computer that can actually think on it's own at anything higher then a insect's intelligence. Even that isn't real "thought" but rather it emulating instincts.

@Rishkith

Agree with the city updates : the icons onthe right aren't different enough from one another. Or some of them should be flashing the round they are created

Disagree about spider : create a custom sovereign like that : best equipment, 20 in dexterity and strength. Dex and str will get you double bonus from weapons and armor. At the moment, armor is way more important than attack, because you can be invincible against a lot of enemies that strikes for 1 or 2 or 3 points of damage.

AI isn't looked at at the moment.

Disagree about training : when you try to build a unit you can't, you'll see in red the resources needed.

I got quests. Even without researching the techs. But it can come from the fact I used a workaround to make them work in 1G.

Disagree and agree with limited abilities from buildings : being unable to train peasants or pioneer without a command center is a good idea: you'll be able to create cities without them, without workshops etc. Those cities will be big cities, with lots of population, or research cities, whatever suits your strategies. So we have choices. But ! Each city should be able to train at least some kind of milicia and the pioneer, even without a command center.

Square Towns : Remember you can create chokepoints. If you build a non-square city you can deny access to some area of the map. Frogboy showed it in it's beta 1Z walkthrough. What I don't like about the square towns is that i can't build in a straight line. I have to wait the first building to be built to sart the second.

If I want something like : ABCDEFG, I have to wait A to be finished to start B, etc. And that's a lot of micromanaging, and a lot of lost turns (because you didn't notice A was finished). I hope we'll be able to easily plan buildings that are not adjacent to already existing buildings, but that are adjacent to planned buildings.

I can't say at the moment about global economy, it's too early to give a solid opinion. I can just say that it's both more interesting that before, and that some things already annoys me. Only time will tell.

Then I assume they'd want the same data as if you were reporting just a normal crash, else you wouldn't point me to that.

I asked because I checked that thread, I've actually used it in the formulation of two threads today...  It just wasn't made clear if that's the data they need for failing to load...  Got my answer now though, thanks Raven.  ^^

Nice!

I take back the statement of "almost ready". I'm still crashing in the early game, even with the patch just released. This must be maddening for you guys.

Good for you Frogboy. I am having random lock-ups [I've started 3 games so far -> 1 CTD & 2 lock-ups] after ending turns in 0.299

I had no probs like this in 0.298

Here is the topic btw https://forums.elementalgame.com/379934

I'm still getting the crash when invading enemy cities

Did they disable marriage and dynasties for this release or is it just me?

Well well, I haven't had time to play Elemental with my new job , so I loaded up 1v4 and damn! I was impressed. Two games I played 500+ turns that were completely stable! I'm very happy with the work, and in my opinion 100% playable, even if the game is a little... uh... dull... right now...

I'm ready for Beta 2! What about you guys!

Just wondering are we going to need random maps to move to b2?

Agreed.