TeamM

I'm quite sober and I like all the stuff mentioned in the OP, especially the removal of tech-spawned resources, good riddance.

great to see all of this stuff being seriously documented and hopefully worked on.

@ scratchthepitch thanks for your response. i did ask the question whether the fear is about the tech itself or about the way it is being used, so your response was basically on target. you seem to be saying that your concerns are rooted in how the technology is being used in some ca

I regularly hear people say that "messing with nature" is a bad idea. However, I am not sure what people think they mean when they say that. Apparently these folks are able to create a clear distinction between what is natural and what is not natural... I would love to know where that line is exactly. Could someone please explain their reasoning to me? My understanding is that it is perfectly natural for nature to change and modify itself. Humans, being a

I don't consider it a flaw at all. If all standard units could be upgraded like champions, then there would be no difference between standard units and champions. I like the way the game is currently set up. Champions are special upgradable characters, while standard troops are limited use, but can be recycled. I personally don't want this to change.

heavenfall, that's pretty hilarious. the summary is a good one for life in general...

they look great. and it looks like the work of the same art team to me... the art work for elemental consistently looks good.

This list contains some very welcome changes, looks good. Since the subject of Janusk was brought up, I would really like to have variable "Janusk" characters for each faction. Having the same dude appear as your adviser and beginning champion whether you're Tarth or Magnar is weird and annoying... a faction specific version of "Janusk" for each of the factions would add to the immersion and help to make each faction feel unique when you play as them. I think Heave

In regards to the discussion of when/how to spawn new resources. Maybe all the resources should just be spawned at the beginning of the game and be fully viewable from the get-go... then researching the techs simply let you build improvements on the resources... isn't that the most simple, realistic, and strategically fun way to do this? Why have hidden resources at all? Civilization has hidden resources (horses, coal, oil, uranium) and lets you just build whatever in thos

These changes look great. I'm very happy to see all the fixes and the general trimming off of the fat, of which there was quite a bit. The changes to the spell books are excellent. I'm curious why only a few fire spells are mentioned as having shard bonuses...? surely, the other elemental spells should have some enhanced shard effects too, right? are they just not listed? Also, is the only remaining summonable Elemental creature going to be the Earth El

i'm all for a good implementation of multiples types of physical damage. I was expecting it all along. Brad was talking about this system being used quite a bit prior to release, but when the game finally came out, it turned out that there was no clear evidence of damage types for different weapons, nor strengths and weaknesses of different armors. I'm still not clear on what happened to the plan for damage types; and I haven't heard anyone from SD talk about it recently...&

Thanks for the history lesson. I enjoy having a thorough background to the game. Although, it has left me with a number of questions about the Shards: - Apparently the Shards were scattered across the universe at some point. Did Elemental have Shards on it prior to the arrival of the Arnor, or did they bring the Shards with them? Also, did the Arnor bring ALL of the Shards to Elemental, or are some Shards still spread throughout the universe? [qu

the changes sound promising, thanks for the update. I am particularly happy to see the elemental spell books get moved to research options, I've been hoping for that change. weapons and amour re-balancing would be excellent, really hope that makes it in too.

I would also still love to see this fixed. Like Heavenfall, I feel like it completely ruins the game when it happens. Since it seems to be such a persistent issue, it would be great to hear an in-depth explanation from the Devs about why it is still happening and what is being done to fix it.

according to the devs hands-on video, roads in neutral territory still incur a maintenance fee for the civ that built the roads.

Whatever method used to fix this issue is fine with me, as long as it stops happening. As has been noted many times throughout the forums, this issue is a "gamebreaker." Either the AI needs to behave appropriately based on the risks involved, or if that can't be done, then the risk of total empire destruction needs to be removed by changing the rules/mechanics of Sovereign death. Plenty of ideas have been thrown out there already in other threads as to what those changes cou

why not have the sovereign age at the same speed as the kids? old-age doesn't have any effect on the sovereigns does it? why can't the sovereign age at the same rate and be 50 or 80 or 120? an ancient, yet magically youthful sovereign makes a lot more sense than unexplained shifts in time passage for different generations... that's just weird and obviously unintuitive. even fantasy worlds need to be internally consistent in order for players to be able to immerse

I also really like the idea of having a visual display of hit and damage estimates. This is a great help in Civ 4 when two stacks are battling; you can select each of your attacking units and see exactly what their percentages are compared to each of the enemy units before you make your first move. Being able to see the variety of bonuses that are coming into play and how they affect the percentages is also really helpful. It's really hard to develop strategies when you don'

I really enjoyed that video. Thanks for the link. I thought it was quite interesting to hear Soren's answer to the question of what he would have changed or added to Civ4. He said that he would have liked to make each Civ/Leader more unique and individual. I think that is a great direction for Elemental as well. I would love to see each faction behaving very differently from each other and also have unique units, buildings, techs, etc... I think Civ 4 ben

I also find the auto troop design extremely annoying. I would love the option of turning it off.

I have the same issue. the light streaming upwards from the shrines is blocked by many different map objects, such as trees, water, and the roofs of buildings. it is a constant issue, as in it doesn't change from game to game and it happens on all the shards. here is a water shrine with it's light beam nearly totally blocked by trees: http://screencast.com/t/NDhjNjdj this is a clos

these are fantastic improvements. thanks so much.

"Note that a fix for 'shards respawning on reload' did get in for 1.07..." Oh wow! the shard issues have been the main thing keeping me from playing the game. this fix should really be mentioned in the Patch Notes! if the Shards are also now properly affecting spell damage in manual tactical battles that should totally be mentioned in the notes as well! shard spawning and lack of an increase to spell damage from shards have bee

Actually, Brad has mentioned a couple times that they will be making DVD updates every so often that will include all the latest patches. These DVDs are being made for people like the poster who don't want to update via Impulse and/or don't have internet access. Stardock hasn't given a specific time-line on when the first one will be available, but Brad suggested it would be sooner rather than later. I'm not sure how one orders a "Patch DVD" or if it costs any money. I

This is a very useful post, thanks. these additional character levels are definitely not explained well in the game or manual. So, if I understand this right, when a player researches a tech that raises either the Quest or Notables level, that basically means that the player gets one point added to his/her Quest and/or Notable level, which allows that player to access the next tier of Quests and/or Notables. Is that right? Does researching the tech also cause the cor