So you saying the game was not rushed? - Maybe, but it was not properly tested either.

You had this problem with all GalCiv releases but here it just was more visible. You really should invest in beta testing more and build some automatic testing tools. Crashes aside it's really hard to tell if some building gives bonus or not unless you automate the tests.

Another comment for a magic system. Introduce minimum spell damage. It's more then frustrating when spell that supposed to give 180 points of damage max does 2-3 as a result of chance. If unit had some protection against this specific type of magic then OK, but not as result of a chance, a dice roll....

I agree the magic system needs some work, but you're throwing the baby out with the bath water.  I'd say taking the spell books out of character creation is going in the exactly WRONG direction.  If anything, they need to be more expensive to pick.  Right now, there is little incentive not to pick all of them and that destroys flavor and uniqueness.  Players need to be limited to picking 1-2 books generally with the possibility of a third book at a cost of something else.  Each sovereign needs to have a distinct flavor.

Most people like the basic mechanics you have in place already for magic.  The biggest nuts and bolts complaints are that all magical attacks go against the target's defense rating and that magic damage rolls (all attacks for that matter) are a straight '0 to n' damage roll.  Change these two things and expose a bit more of the mechanics to modding, and modders can do a lot of the work to making the magic system less bland.

A Few Small Changes:

1> Put a minimum damage tag on spells and weapons.  <MinValue>4</MinValue>

2> Add tag for applicable defensive stat and enable calculations.  Mundane weapons should always go against defense, but magic?  What good is armor against a lightning bolt?

3> Add a <HitPercent> with calculation enabled so it can be based on defenders stats.

4> Expose range to target to modding so it can be used in calculations for To Hit and Damage.

1 and 3 add a lot.  This give the ability to have weapons that do potentially lots of damage but also have high percentage chance of a miss.  Add in 2 and 4 to the equation and you have tons of potential for variety.  The problem isn't so much what is there is broken.  There just isn't really anything to distinguish one from the other.  No variety and no tools to add variety.

Magic being defended by defense is a must in current system (spell max damage is essentially Attack Rating of magic spell), since otherwise there is big chance of one-shoting enemy heroes (if shard bonus to spell damage was working). There are already issues with true damage spells, like that demon ability that hits everything for 10 damage. Add several of them, and you have "hero slayer" company.

I think that taking the spell books out of character creation is a very good idea, because it makes the Magic tech tree more useful and it makes spell casting really an alternate way to complete the game, because you need tech knowledge to get the books and arcane knowledge to research the spells.

The player should research the (element) spell book in the Magic tech tree, that unlocks the improved (element) spell book in the Magic tech tree and that unlocks the greater (element) spell book in the Magic tech tree. Every spell book unlocks spells that can be researched with arcane knowledge.

Concerning the minor factions I think they should act as city states. It can only be one city. As it stands its kind of boring.  What if the minor faction cities could grow constantly, without being linked to food and other resources, both in the number of buildings and in military strength.  That means if a minor faction is still around later in the game it provides interesting and tempting target.  It would be a large valuable city to capture, but also be very hard to take.  This provides a different sort of adversary,  instead a large and expanding empire, there's just one very tough and rich city. Maybe to make it more interesting different minor cities would provide different unique bonus, like maybe 10% increased exp gained or faster mana regeneration.

In some ways I agree that changing the magic system too much could be somewhat detrimental to strategic play.  As it stands now, you actually have to make some decisions about the elemental shards.  If an opponent controls a shard that you need, well, you have to prepare to gain control of it somehow.  It sounds like with the new system you can just research for the shards that are handy and you don't have to worry so much about who has other shards or what kind. 

Personally, I would not just let the players gain full power in every element...  perhaps having them focus on a primary element and being able to gain limited power with the other elements might be the way to go.  Also, you might consider having heros/champions be attuned to specific elemental powers rather then just inheriting that of your Sovereign so that you'd have some choices to make in the arcane research. 

Just some thoughts.

The improvements sound good to me, and I have to say that I am having fun with the current version of elemental even though it has a few issues. It only crashes ocasionally on my system too (less than starcraft2 for example).

All the improvements outlined here sound good at least in principle.

and I can confirm that Stardock expansions are normally radical extensions of their games so very much appriciate the substantial jesture of offering the first update free.

I for one still rate stardock as my favourite developer and have not been put off either elemental or any of Stardocks future releases (GC3 hint, hint )

The improvements look good.

The magic system changes with the mana pool and maintenance also.
The teching up into magic fits into the story of magic comming back into the world.

But..
Now that you are making such significant changes it mihgt be wise to look at different magic dmg types and resistances.
For instance teching up into water would give you the ability to imbue your soldiers weapons with weapons doing waterdmg on top op their piercing/slashing/swatting dmg. Which would give a significant advantage if the enemy faction didnt research waterdmg resistance.

I want to see more rock, paper, sciccor type choices instead of more def to counter your more attack.

Also Global effect spells that take multiple turns to cast and such in the very high end parts of the tech three.

Its called Elemental: War of MAGIC, so ultimatly you should be able to split the earth, raise the dead, lay waste to all farmlands, sacrifice my population for demonservants, etc.

And magic can only be countered by magic in my opinion.

And teching up in magic shouldnt be about getting that bigger fireball or that bigger citybuff. 

But anyway good luck with the huge amount of work still waiting for you.

I agree with the idea that these city-state minor factions should be able to expand their city without regard to resources in their area (because, I'm assuming, they can get any materials they need due to the special bonuses they confer from being friends), but perhaps at a slightly slowed rate to compensate for the lack of need to expand the empire looking for materials, but I don't think a level 5 minor faction city would be too much when the highest major faction cities are in the level 3 range.  It would be tempting to take it, but you might not have the tech to fully utilize it yet - and if confers bonuses by you being allied with it (see my previous post) then you'd still have a tough decision to make.

I also like the idea of an entirely different AI strategy.  One city to defend, so they don't venture out, they just really really protect their home city and their leader so that conquering will be a lot more daunting than it is now.

I don't think minor factions should be able to conquer others.  I think they should have a different interest than the major factions.  Basically, be left alone, trade and if a major faction or the player tries hard enough and is willing to give up enough gold, become allied with major factions to confer their bonuses.  The major factions, I think, should be tweaked to not attack minor factions so lightly, so that it's a more even decision whether to try to become allied with a minor faction and destroy it, because right now there seem to be lots of major factions warring with minor factions in my games.  The minor factions, if they don't like a major faction, may offer alliance bonuses in exchange for another major faction or the player declaring war on the disliked faction -- but they only defend themselves, they don't attack.

Just some more thoughts on minor factions, which I think could be a great element of the game if differentiated enough and made to forece the player into difficult decisions and positions.

I only have a couple things to say on this, besides the obvious welcome back:

Where the minor factions are concerned, please, please don't make them into competitors. They may be right out of GalCiv, but they're an interesting feature. I'd recommend adding in mystical or martial Guardian units (this would help establish why none of the Kingdoms/Empires have just taken their stuff anyway) of significant power to discourage their early abuse, change the art style a tad, and then leave 'em alone. They're fun to trade with, and an interesting diplomatic presence.

Then there's magic...

This bit has me kind of concerned, Frog-b. Especially the 'global mana' idea. I think when people complain about the magic system (and I may be way off base here) they're lamenting that the -spells- feel generic, not the system of using them. Sure, everyone wants the shards to be more significant, but... I dunno. Personally, I'd look into some spell overhauls, myself (make Fire do more damage off the bat, give Earth some new debuff spells, add "flight" type movement spells to the Air repertoire) and let the pre-established system for casting spells stay as is. But that's just my take on it.

Well, for good or ill, I'm feeling inspired, today...

A small bug report to begin with: it seems that, like a lot of other games, Elemental don't read the saved games directory path from registry, and instead use a fixed "My Games" directory in the document folder. This makes two of these folders in some non English version of windows, or when its path is customised.

Next, a big thank for your frankness and honesty. You don't see this every day... Or year. Or ever, in fact: I think it's the first time I see one like that from someone selling things, only one week after the events...

Then I would like to remind people that the "quote" button is right next to the "reply" button... This help a lot when reading your post, so, please, make use of it.

Some ideas about magic:

• Each and every aspect of any spell should scale to the caster's stats. not simply the damage or the protection it deals; I mean, everything : the duration, the range, the area of effect, and even the cost (the better you are, the cheaper it is to cast): if it can me measured, it has to be scaled to the stats! Any spell parameter should be expressed in %.
• Spellbooks to research:
• Perhaps having the sovereign and dynasty stats help to gather mana would be a good compromise to global mana pool regard from the actual system. 
• The shards should not be a major source of mana unless you have many of them, to reduce the impact of luck over strategy; having many ways to gather mana should be the best way: mana through buildings, through population, through resources and/or special resources, through influence, diplomacy (in the way of the tech and research treaties, for example), mana through research, spells, channellers/skills/hero level, resource transformation (crystal/gold to/from mana, with technologies/buildings/skills to increase the transformation ratio)... The more the better. Some of these may also simply lower the cost of spells from a particular book. This would of course require spell cost balance. This would make magic a more important part of the game, as magic becomes less rare, if bound to your channellers.
• The sovereign and its children are the only real channellers of the realm, and so should be IMO the ones through which all magic is channelled, even if imbued heroes can cast spells; something about magic efficiency should be related to your "real" channellers, may it be spell power, spell cost, maximum quantity of mana spent with each spell or turn (for example make a spell cost more the farther from a real channeller the caster is, and/or depending on the channellers stats)... This would allow to find magic users in the world without breaking the background.
• Buildings enabling to spend less mana/increase magical power when using tactical spells in a city's defence
• Resource enchantments, like "increase the temple arcane production by 20%", "double the targeted fertile land yield"
• Expensive global spells, like in Master of Magic, that would affect the a whole faction, or even the whole world.
• Introduce spellbook/spell kinds proficiencies (kinds like direct damage spells/buff spell/ city spells...)  could help to diversify the uniqueness feeling about sovereigns, factions and/or heroes; On the map, increase the likeliness to have one shard of the sovereign speciality around
• Introduce special resources enabling to cast unique spells, that you could conquer and loose.
• Have some magic research paths close other paths, to further improve the uniqueness of the factions. Those would lead to spell specializations, like new spellbooks and enhancing particular spellbooks spells in both mana cost and efficiency.
• Spell level research should be related to each book (like level 4 earth book), instead of all books; maybe these should be used to enhance known spells; or maybe technology could be used to unlock higher spell level research. To balance the higher global progress cost, a higher spellbook level could lower the cost of researching the related spells of lower level.
• Arrange spellbook display to be ordered by level and book besides just tactical/strategic, and make the book scale with resolution: I'm tired of having a tiny book lost in the center of my screen, and having to turn the pages...
• Enable spending more mana to get more powerful effects, especially for summoned creatures
• Specialised studies, that can only research in a particular spellbook, but more efficiently; once built, you would always have a research going on a spell of this spellbook, even if parallel to others.
• Shards could help research its related spells
• Things (buildings/resources/skills...) that help maintain spells, i.e. that create mana that can only be used for spell maintenance, not for casting
• There should be damaging spells that does more than "your intelligence" in damage at higher levels.
• Magical towers that acts like galciv space stations
• Some spell ideas:
  
  • enhance speed/attack/defence/watever of friendly units in the area of effect/target town influence/unit/caster/unit group/x tiles around the unit/the town the unit is in...
  • A chain lightning that does not have a simple area of effect, but goes from random target to target until no more target in range/maximum damage dealt.
  • lower enemy speed/attack/... in the area of effect/target town/blabla
  • enhance/curse town/faction influence/revenues/research/... with a % (enhanced version of the existing +1 spells)
  • Health/Mana regeneration spells
  • I like the idea of portals that would spawn controllable creatures that would only attack your enemies
  • Spells to spawn creatures or teleport existing units to help protect caravan when upon attack
  • Universal target: every arrow or spell will be forced to attack that particular target; along with a warrior ability, to force enemy to target the warrior in melee
  • Enchanting spells that can't be cast, but once known, enable to produce enchanted gear
  • Spell to create/destroy forests
• Imbue spellbooks with more personality, like
  • Fire spells more focused in dealing large damage and long term damage (burning units or areas), associate it with damage bonus, destruction of things; link the fire shards with death and combat spellbooks
  • Earth spell more focused in definitive land / battlefield changes, associate more with physical protection of all kinds (including in particular cities and fortresses), slow strength, resources, with some offensive spells, and spells that prevent things; link earth shards with summoning and life spellbook (earth mother of life)
  • Water spells more focused in magical, ethereal things and creatures, enhancing equipment and units in the fields of protection from magic, counter spells, icing and slowing, regeneration of mana and HP, teleport, wormhole like portals; link water shards with restoration books
  • Air spells focused on speed in all forms, inspiration (quite literally, breath and air are in linked to spirituality in many cultures, including Judeo-Christian cultures), morale, temporary boosts (HP, attack), lightning, emotions (confusing/inspiring kind of spells), flight/levitation

Some ideas about adventuring:

I'm not sure if these are or are not good ideas, but bad ideas from a mind sometime spawn good ones from another one, so...

Completing quests  should give XP

It is the way things are done in RPGs.

Permanent special locations

The adventuring system as it is now is quite a bad one, in my view. I mean, some places in the wilds that act as adventure trigger, or some object you find in the wild, that's not bad; new places that spawn from nowhere with new adventures, that's more strange; There are quite a number of people that seem to dislike it.

Hence the idea: make these place stay after visiting them, like a resource (not like a bug, as it is now...). Of course, you could not build anything to harvest them, but once in a while, new adventures would be available at these places, displaying it with a glow, or maybe adding various animations depending on the available adventure. Likewise, the target places of the adventures could be spawn once and for all with the world (and some may be both target and sources of adventures).

This would also enable to make the world a more living and diverse, one of the complaint often heard throughout the forums.

Monster spawning

These places could become the places from which wandering monster spawn. It is quite frustrating to see them spawn from nowhere on the map to fall upon a caravan that had no way to avoid them.

You could even make it more subtle: if you fail to complete a quest in time the opportunity is lost and depending on its type, a new pack of monsters spawns with only part of the benefits of completing the quest (less treasure, or XP). This would not change the balance of the game, but would make it a lot more fun, I think. It would also make the quest level more important: as the world quest level increases, if you don't follow up, you will be unable to complete some of the quests.

Quest spawning buildings

One of the things that we casually see in RPG and not in the game is the fact that towns usually are the place quests are issued. You could have some particular building (like an adventurers' guild) in the town, that proposes quests; To have a real purpose for such a building, some of the quest targets could come to life, and letter spawn monsters without any point to get the corresponding quest other than the closest town's adventurers guild buildings. Several other buildings could propose such quests, linked to other benefits, like the tavern, marketplace or monastery.

Heroes spawning

The spawning of heroes could also be made through special locations, and the spawn rate could be grown with every nearby quest proposing building. Some (or all) quests could also be made to spawn new heroes (If it's not already done, as I could not advance any of my games enough to make higher than level 2 quests)

Random ideas

About minor factions with monster sovereigns :

About riding dragons . And what about giant spiders, drakes, and other things?

About minor factions giving quests, and about alliance with them giving special bonuses  . The enemies of these alliances would need to destroy such factions, of course.

About sea: it does not seem to exist any kind of sea monsters, nor sea battles... It would be nice. And sea resources, and special locations, too.

Have tooltips break down the damage and defence types would be both simple and nice.

I want to see undead armies roaming the land! It may be the very first fantasy game I see with no undeads... Especially with a spellbook called "Death"...

Ability to choose which resources are available around the sovereign/faction in the starting position, like always 1 fertile land, and two other resources among the possible ones.

I forgot to say, about the AI:

Don't make it like galciv 2 in the area of warfare: all you had to do was ignore the others factions while researching whatever strengthen your research and economy, and once far ahead, research warfare and crush them... As a global rule in any strategic game, building an army and not using it quickly is a waste of resources...

And also, I'm waiting for potions and scrolls crafting : you should never see any fantasy world without these...