So first off, this is looking very nice. More music, more sounds, more entertainment all around. Magi. Yay for magi. Content. There's more of it. Good! GREAT! The AI even does non-stupid things. As in, it actually looks as if it's trying to run its Empire.

Opposition: Uhm... yes... am I doing something wrong here? I set the thing to challenging, large map, 9 opponents. I got a crappy starting place. I had a 4/2 city... one hero, who had a little uhm, soul-stealing accident ( that's bugged btw, her spell level was not given to me). In effect, just my sovereign and me. I upped to spearmen and 5-size units, stacked up to 6 and went northish, where a horde of monsters was conviniently keeping my borders safe. I killed all the monsters, then proceeded to declare war on some purple-colored empire (triple my rating even), took over two cites  in short order, made peace with em ( good that you fixed that pop wipe bug), and then settled down for some serious money spending research. I'm now up to chainmail and such, and size 7, and have re-started that war because Mr. Purple over there had gained 40 more rating than me ( he's the highest empire on the list, and as such the most juicy target).Now this time, I plan to annihialate him, take over the rest of his cities and forge my sovereign-only ( Screw heroes, who needs em anyway, I have pointy sticks) empire in Blood.

The AI has improved. Its combat tactics are much better. It casts haste, burning blade and heals. It tries to burn my resources. It also fails to recognize a massive army moving towards its city, fails to understand that I can trash its sovereign and the city defenses piecemeal ( should have put the sov in there to defend) and uhm, well, it squirms and squiggles, but thats about it. Admittably, I have a map to conquer that's fairly large. Will keep posting in here, and screenshots will come in here too. Hopefully later on we will have empire-spanning wars and massive combat. If I see it pulling off anything vicious, I'll be sure to let you know