I've found setting the affinity to a single core helps with the slowdown I, and some others, experience near cities and such. It doesn't completely eliminate it, but it improves the framerate. It's a bit tedious to have to do that every time I start the game, though. Does anyone know how to set it permanently?

Oh, for anyone who has this problem and doesn't know what I mean, while Elemental is running, hit Ctr-Alt-Del, start task manager, the r-click "Elemental" under the Processes tab. One of the options near the bottom says "Set Affinity". Now, just uncheck all but one of the boxes. (I'm not sure if it matters which one you leave or not.)