First off I would like to say that this is my first post ever supporting a game & only do so now because I believe this game has the possiblities to provide modders the ability to make 'my' perfect medieval fantasy game, an AOWSM beefed up on steroides with all the bells & whistles.  (But I have been playin the game non-stop and reading the journals/forums as is to get a better idea of what to ask for) I love to sit back & watch the world go on around me.

0.  Any thing that helps those that mod

1.  Minor Factions=  More minor faction's (I would go so far as to say 2-3 per major faction with bigger maps to hold the 100+ factions - which could be a good place for other races to appear in the game like goblins, trolls, minataurs, elves, dwarves, and such), I would love to see them be able to strengthn, and at some point get strong enough or have the population to grow and expand if left alone for a considerable amount of time, be able to ally w/ them, pay them to leave ya be, hire them to attack others, recruit them, be able to support them-&-theres with gold and/or items (heh, a small tribe of 100 goblins including leader & guards= whimpy but give them food to flourish or gold or even just a simple ammulate of summon stone golem).  I havn't read the book but this world I believe has many fantasy creatures whose tribes/villages/kingdoms/lairs were devestated by the cataclysm, well in enough time they would most certainly rebuild as well (Under different leaders or what have ya).  In AOWSM I had to take one of the few (like 8or 9) races & split them up around the board to accomplish having a bunch of 'independant minor nations', served it's purpose to some degree but this game can take it further & host an entire world of different factions trying to rebuild.  I strongly believe that if a poll was taken over 90% of Elemental fans would support fantasy races being more involved (Hell even one of tha producers of the game is half frog half boy, one would think there might be a little more sympathy for those that like demihumans & such;)

2.  AI=  For any 4x game to last the test of time the ai must be able to challenge those that have put 1000s of hours of playtime into it.  AOWSM's AI was fair at best, I had to spend 100s of extra hours making my maps around the ai to keep my friends challenged & happy.  All aspects of AI need a good dose of steriods, from diplomacy (between ai members) to where & when to attack to changing methods if said attack strategy isn't working over & over (My archers are currently wiping out everything that attacks us without getting hit unless they have archers to & go first).  I would love for people 20 years from now to be sayin how they wished such & such game had the AI of elemental. 

3.  Much Better Tactical Battles=  AOWSM's battle system was pretty darn good, used initiative (I think, been reading the forums soo much don't remember), obstacles to block arrows & magic, city walls, you would pull in adjacent units to the unit you were attacking, flanking, and the all important hit the sim battle button & sit back and watch the fun.

4.  Better map making capabilities (AOWSM had a really good map maker but still wasn't perfect)

5.  A way to build custom weapons & armor (Simular to heh, ya one more time- AOWSM's item forge)

Side note: I don't understand how this game isn't more along the lines of D&D's overall structure but I'm here & loyal none the less,

Rikazema:  Well thought out -and very effective.  I agree wholeheartedly with with your ideas (reply #25, preceding).

  This is a great thread!  I could do much worse than just making a project plan from this thread and working hard to get it all implemented.

  I'm glad to report that many of the things requested in thread are coming, some in 1.1 (sovereign/hero hit points increasing per level), some are speced for later (more distinction between the races) and I've stolen a few requests from you lists to add to future design docs (game option to set early monster frequency).  Thanks for taking the time to write them up.

Thank the stardock gods! This is great news! 1 step closer to perfection.

Here's my list......which is pretty much the same as alot of people's I'd imagine. I will probably make plenty of mentions about MOM, but tbh thats what was the inspiration for this game.

1) Magic - Lacking as it currently stands. All the spell books are far too similar and lack varity, lack unique feels and do not give the player a unique style of play due to the nature of the spells. Id like to see magic being similar to MOM in how spells could make a huge impact to a game. Also I would prefer that it was not possible to take all the spell books without diminishing the power of each schools magic or restricting the number of spells, or limiting the spell level maximum for taking mutiple books. Just like picking your empire or kingdoms, then picking your faction, selecting spell books should be an equally important choice and a limited one. This way the replayablity of the game is increased alot and each school should hopefully give a unique style of play to it. Spells are the next issue; all the schools share the same spells in a diffirent coat of paint. Boring and deminishes the diversity of spell schools to near zero. This needs to be thrown out the window. The higher tier spells are jokes; so much research to reach level 9 and only a few worthless spells that don't do anything new. Thats something I'm going to highlight, higher tier spells shouldn't just be bigger fireballs, THEY NEED TO LET YOU DO NEW THINGS that you couldn't do before. They should let you play god with the world and the higher the tier the spell the greater the level of playing god should be. Think time stop from MOM (Baldurs gate 2 also has some of the best spell designs ever), think the spell that banished all summoned monsters in the world, think the spell that attempts to block all global magic being caste. This is what level 10 spells should be like, godlike and game altering.

2) Tactical battles - Just far too simple as it goes atm. There is no great level of depth to the tactics, just simply bring a bigger sword to the fight, end of story.

3) Heroes - A whole list of problems, but it's now 1 shorter thanks to 1.1 introducing HP increase per lev up. Some of the skills are worthless, such as 1 gildar per turn, 1 tech per turn, 1 lore per turn. Other skills are nice, but could be even better, and it makes sense that they should improve for the hard work of keeping a hero alive and leveling them up. Ideally I'd want a full hero skill tree to allow us players to fully customise not only stats but hero skills. Failing that I'd be happy with skills improving per level up. For example a merchant should either give 10-20 gilder per turn @ level 10. I have a massive problem with the research tech for better heroes; they start off at higher levels, meaning if you wanted to build them up specifically from scratch u cannot do that anymore the way you would want to. I think it would be much better if the tech made heroes with much higher starting stats @ level 1 enter the world. My other issue is that I don't like the random wondering heroes thing. There should be 3 additional ways to aquire heroes; a specific quest building (Like a tavern) that remains in the game permanently and a city structure you can build. This method would be for aquiring a hero at any point when you want one. Next would be aquiring FREE heroes from quests, imo the best heroes in the game should only be avalable from high level quests. Lastly there should be a spell to summon heroes to you.

4) Magical forging - The enchanted/magic weapons/armor and accessories (at least partially, they are done better though then the rest) are pretty much the same old things that any regular unit can use. Allow players to make their own items in a way similar to MOM. Let us customise our heroes to suit are needs and give heroes unique items that are actually special (Specific effects and powers, ect).

5) Cities and economics - This is not as bad as I once thought it was, however it still needs work.

1. Terrain should matter more on the strategic map.

2. Tactical battles could feel better with improved unit footprints / tile selection (allow friendly units in tactical battles to enter tiles with other friendly units IF they fit: Let one tile hold up to e.g. 12 friendly human-sized units or 1 large squad, 4 mounted, 2 giant, 1 huge unit like dragon).

3. make city spam less of a no-brainer with brad's original idea: founding a city should cost something (I like: cost essence).

4. More variation in the research tree.

5. Make unit statistics matter more (e.g. charisma for hero leadership; wisdom for hero charming spells & all unit's spell resistance; dexterity for stealth; intelligence for hero casting of and all unit's disbelieving of illusion spells; etc. etc.)

6. A lot more options in Game Setup (example: Advanced Options opens screen where you can select amongst a large portion of drop-down lists, e.g. from Sovereign Starting Essence (from very low to very high) to number of shards etc. etc.).

7. More variation in factions.

thank you.

As a buildmonger the part of this game I enjoy the most is developing my cities as the game unfolds into progressively more powerful, impressive-looking metropolises by endgame.  With that in mind, here is my list in order of importance:

1. A change to the restriction on building cities, including city improvements, within 5 tiles of each other.  Devs please allow this to be modded at least; or maybe change it to be calculated from the actual city center, rather than the outermost city tiles.  In the end it doesn't really matter to me how it might be changed as much as wether it is changed at all, although my first choice would be to simply make it moddable.  I run into this restriction constantly and it's driving my enjoyment factor way down. 

2. Make city improvements rotateable in city build mode.  Objects can be rotated in the tile editor, seems not unreasonable to imagine this for city build mode in-game; simplified of course to one axis and say, 8 directions.

3. Do something with forests.  Make it easier to get rid of them, chop them, mash 'em, smash 'em, stick 'em in a stew...anything other than how they're treated now.  Making a  faction special ability to be able to build in forest would be neat.

4. City-oriented quests.  Yeah I totally swiped this from Kael Little stories that unfold in your cities would enhance the immersion of the city building part of the gameplay.  Have quests that trigger based on what you do with your cities and/or conditions in your cities. Maybe have the guilds give out quests. Visit the tavern (after you build it of course) just like the shop, complete with background art like the shop and a barkeep, look on the bulliten board or ask the barkeep about "jobs."  

5. Oh yeah kinda related to the one above (only because I mentioned the tavern) make the shop only available after you build a merchant. Make it upgrade into several (or more) after you build a bazaar -- one specialty shop for each "species" of lewt:  one for weapons, one for armor, one for potions, etc.  Make it upgradeable again when you build a trade center. Make some really cool rares available from the best shops.

5a. I'm really liking the idea of buildings you can interact with after you build them, as in talk to people, get quests, etc. Maybe make certain buildings the reward for completing a quest-line, such as an enhanced palace (Mage Tower!)

Ok I'm in danger of going from a "top 5" list to a simple brainstorming session, but all the above ideas are aimed at helping to enhance the builder part of the game, and I don't even think they're that hard or complex, since they all involve elements that exist intact elsewhere in the game.

One last thing:  If any idea, not just mine but anyone's, is passed over for whatever reason, and is not currently moddable, please consider making it moddable so at least those who would like to can incorporate it into their games.

Thanks for reading!

After playing this game and enjoying parts of it, this is my own list of things I want considered along with some suggestions. Sorry if it sounds demanding, I do not expect anything other than actually reading it. =P

1. AI; 

• Speaks for itself

2. Cities; 

• Has no needs or requirements
• Terrain affects very little

3. Terrain;

• Can't create farms, relies solely on food resources
• No effects on units or cities (ie slowing unit speed, damaging units)
• Add workers who can remove forests

4. Oceans;

• Has no game play impact apart from unit transport
• No water resources (water shard?), sea monsters etc
• Too many cliffs

5. Events;

• Adventurers only ever release monsters
• Not much impact (worldwide bonuses - ie meteors spread valuable materials as quests)
• Not much variety (could trigger in cities

6. Tactical battles;

• Little tactics applied
• Environment has no impact
• No navy battles

7. Characters;

• Individuality lost when equipping armor
• Better character creation

8. UI;

• Needs improvement
• Cursor should select what it is pointed at, difficulty in selecting cities
• Hovering over a city in the unit tab should display a name

9. Resources;

• Food should not be static, ie can be grown in restored land through irrigation (think Civ 4)
• Populace resources like silk or shrimp

10. Dynasty;

• How can you give birth when a couple is not directly together throughout a match?

11. NPC Civilization Units;

• Make more interesting units (apart from caravans), maybe adventurers?

I totally agree about oceans, I think it's a missed opportunity.  I'd like to see proper coastal cities with ocean resources.

In regards to children, my #1 wish is that your first born becomes the sovereign when your current sovereign dies.  It seems like this was the direction they were headed, because on your first child's picture it says "first in line for the throne".