[Suggestion] Redo the merchant screen

Yeah, what you see now is basically the first iteration of that screen (all the parts are in to let you buy and sell) but it definatly needs polish. We'll keep your post in mind when we revisit it

Would be nice to have item categories too, like "armor" or "weapons."

Also the ability to see the basic stats (how much attack or defense an item adds) in the list without actually having to click on the items.

Yup - item categories, your curerent inventory displayed at all times, showing how a peice of equipment would affect  stats, different atmosphere based on city, etc, etc are all on our todo list.

Goooo~ star dock!

Did you guys consider making a sub-tree sort of categories, for example if you click on armors (lets assume there is an armor tab in the store)

lets say under this tab initially all you see there:

(I assume all of this has been researched)

leather armor

light armor 

steel armor

and thats all you see in the armor menu, until you click on the specific type and then it would pop up a little sub menu under it.

leather armor

  - leather armor

  - leather grieves

  - leather ect...

It might be a good way to save on space and such.

:-/

Will all cities of a given Kingdom/Empire have the same wares in their item shops?  I remember there being dev journals on how the developers wanted cities to be highly differentiable and unique, it seems to me that some cities having special inventory items could aid this perception.

I'm not sure what could make one city have different items available; maybe swords forged near a city that has a fire node will occasionally impart added fire damage upon the blades?  This effect of course wouldn't occur often enough for the weaponry forged in that city to be standard issue for your army, but it will happen on occasion and when it does you can buy the unique sword for a champion at a premium price.  I could even be an event that says "Soandso in the city of Suchandsuch claims to have forged a unique sword far more powerful than the common blade!  Soandso is currently selling this amazing weapon to the highest bidder."  Of course neutral champions, and champions of other factions which can enter your borders, could also head towards this city in order to buy it before you get the chance to.

Speaking of item management...  looking way back at Master of Magic, you had an item vault & all heroes shown on one screen, and you could drag & drop gear all around.  Since we can drag items between far apart heroes, it would be nice to have one separate screen, with the ability to store items in a town vault or trade.  This would make it easier to swap gear around, and also to get it to town to sell at the merchant.

Another thought - why can't we use all those spears & swords to equip our military units?  Maybe once we have an Armory researched & built, we can drop looted equipment in, to reduce the cost of the next unit trained.

I thought you could design units which used anything available in the item shops?

Or do you mean changing the equipment load out of old units?

I mean, once you research Longswords, you can train a swordsman unit that costs, IIRC, 20 gold, 20materials & 2 iron.  But if I have looted a longsword from some dragon bones, I should be able to use that to reduce the cost of training the swordsman, because I do not have to make the sword for him.

Plus, you cannot design a new unit with a weapon until you have researched that weapon tech (I think - 2nd day with the game).  But if I have looted weapons from caches, why not be able to design a military unit that uses is?

Also, there is not enough difference between weapons.  The one research gives you 3 swords; the Longsword has 4 attack & 0.25 combat speed, and the Bastard sword has 4 attack & 1.0 combat speed - both for the same price.

Ah, I see what you mean.  The only thing that could be said, perhaps, is that the given unit wasn't "trained" to use the particularly piece of equipment.  Champions and Sovereigns are exempt from this because they're badass.

Nice to know it's a first shot. Thanks BoogieBac.

I like this idea, this would add more spice to Elemental and would be a very nice reward

I would love to see 'Item Shop Inventory' be somethign that placed buildings affect (Healers Hut adds 'Minor Mana Potion', Armory adds some special items, etc).

BoogieBac, a thought.  From my limited (2 days) playing time, I've been razing parts of the city as I upgrade.  When I build a Marketplace (6 gold, 4 spaces), I raze all Merchants (1 gold, 1 space).  Now, how about allowing the Merchants to upgrade once a city has a Marketplace?  They still produce 1 gold, but could also specialize, based on any special resources near the city.  Or perhaps allow us to choose from a list, per Merchant.  This would add variability to the cities, and give us a reason to hang onto the 'minor' upgrades once we get the newer ones.  (EDIT: I mean, specialize in a type of uncommon merchant goods to carry, such as potions, etc).

A similar mechanic could be used for Studies - once a School is built, perhaps the Study could specialize in a certain type of research.  Perhaps it would give 1 generic research point, and an addition +1 in a given tree, when that tree is researched.  Again, choose from a list based on what is built in the city.  If there is a minimum of military structures, then the Study could be upgraded to give 1 general + 1 military research.

I'd be even more keen to keep like buildings together so that if I had a level 4 city and I had 4 studies forming a perfect square, they automatically upgraded into a school. Same for merchants/marketplaces, same even for workshops/lumbermills.