One thing i really liked about Masters of Magic was how different each of the Heroes were.  Each hero not only had different attributes available, specific to them, but the same hero would spawn different attributes from the ones available to it each game.  i find the heroes, or champions, in Elemental kind of boring and the level up system seems very limited.  i would suggest not only making the leveling up system (to some degree) scalable so that going up a level raises all traits to some degree and doesn't just add to one category, but also making the inherent skills to each champion more diverse just so its not "+1 gilder" of "+1 tech research".  At least make that skill increase with leveling maybe? maybe just assigning random talents / weaknesses (the same that sovereigns have) would help..  it would also justify paying more money for one champion over another with the same trait (+1 tech research). the slight differences in starting stats don't seem to be enough justification considering the equipment one can buy can more than compensate for them.  currently i find myself wondering why i would pay 300 gilder for someone who only gives me +1 gilder a turn, especially since my average game only lasts 400 turns before it crashs...