Yes, AI go up in world power very fast in normal level, it's can be bad, now if that hard level. maybe its' ok, but not ok for normal level.

I think the problem is that the AI gets none of the hassle or monster attacks but the player gets everything thrown at them.

Just wanted to say that this time you hit the spot.

Last time I fetl this way playing the game was when I played original Master of Magic.

The original "Elemental" was "OK" but no more than that. This game ... it's just fun to play.

The balance is right I think (played normal).

Noticed one thing - the smaller the landsize - the easier to play, this need to be balansed a bit since on normal "tiny" size is too easy, "small" is pretty well balanced and bigger than that is becomes rather hard.

 One negative comment related to diplomacy - it still sux:) (same as it wqas in all GalCivs and original Elemental). The main problem with it is that other players do not care about their own interests - I almost finished someone and he still wants a lot of money for a peace treaty - God! He should be paying me for it or at least accept my proposal right away and for free! (I finished him few turns after )

The AI doesn't seem really aggressive the first 100 or so turns, I made WAR with 3 factions and none of them sent an attack.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Hi

Just played about 70 turns and tried to check on what i did...

Setting: Large swamp(without seeing a single swamp), challenging; Left out Krax in favor of a custom Umber sovereign with Beastlord and Brilliance.

After about 10 turns, owning my own hero, a champion and a bear cub i meet the Oracle, Ceresa. I declared war, then demanded surrender without leaving the diplomacy screen (declaring war should imo close that thing and suspend diplomacy for some turns); She accepted(which she shouldnt immediately or not?), so i got another champion - and being a caster she is amongst the best broken spirits you can get...

Met Pariden, followed her with a rock spider. The queen was hunting down empire champions with a one champion escort for quite some time. She picked all the easy lairs she could find and didn't attack heavy things. Refreshing. Attacked her for the fun...

One note, both Ceresa and Procipine didnt use shadow warg. Not on strategic map and at least Procipine didn't in battle. Especially the queen should cast that beast on strategic from day one, it makes quite the difference...

Next, Magnar. Within about 20 turns i saw 4 scouts, a bunch of pioneers and one champion. The Champion attacked a Demon with a short sword(the demon was NOT blocking a passage, it was out of every path), the scouts ran around and the pioneers... well, they dont stop and stand forever on one spot if you "steal" their spot for founding a city. That seems to have changed

Instead, they ran to another spot. There they found several outposts blocking it, so they ran to the next place. Every time there was one more, since magnar sent new ones to all nice places within one screen around my starting city just before i began building them myself. When i stopped playing there were 5 standing around one outpost where they all wanted to build a new city.

Should Magnar build scouts at all? I dont know, didn't play it yet, but if i did, i guess i would found two high production cities just to mass produce militias until midgame. By the way, can one still migrate hundreds of people into other cities by disbanding units? would make that tactic worth even more...

One bug(or so i would guess): The Oracle had Tireless March on her when i met her. She kept it, and it didn't cost me anything! Three Moves in turn 11, with the scout-trait of Umber, for free???

Another Bug on Tireless March: it works in tactical battle. And it stacks. If you cast it on 3 Champions and put them together in one army you end up with 5 moves a turn (without mounts and boots) and get 3 extra moves in battle, which is about the whole tactical map...

So long!

The AI doesn't seem really aggressive the first 100 or so turns, I made WAR with 3 factions and none of them sent an attack.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Just because you declared war on them doesn't mean it's a good idea to attack you.

I've yet to test 0.913, but I plan to this weekend. To all the people complaining about hitting not being able to level their sovereign very high, I think that is a good thing. Now you have to make MEANINGFUL CHOICES, which is what a lot of complaints around here have been about. Instead of loading up on Potential traits, now maybe that's not such a good choice. Now instead of becoming uber-godlike sov, you have to pick and choose what the sov will specialize in. This is all good news to me.

Do you want meaningful choices or not??

I've got my hands full with the Hard AI.  Kudos Brad!  Time to get serious.

1. Some was tottaly not a threat. Like spiders, butchers, bandits, ignys, etc. That feels right, because they dont give nothing usefull, just basic braipain. Some was right, like giant dinosaurs, dragons, shrills - because they are not so easy to defeat, but give admirable reward. Some was like "free farm" like air elemental. Once i defeated 1 at level 3, and get hunter shortsword, that made my game to fast win. This is obviusly bad. Some was too hardcore - bosses. They simple dont cost so much. If u can kill them - you actually can defeat any player on map.(And also, they dont feel competetive. If they were like Nashor from LoL or Roshan from dota - u actually cant defeat your enemies, but if u defeat that boss u will get epic adventage, that maybe allow you to.). Also there are very strong mosters but unrewarding. Like ophidian. Thats bad too, but maybe they supposed to be that way - like spiders are basic brainpain, those are more brainpain.

2. I played on normal. They seems right overall, but do some stupid moves. Like declaing war on me, when i got x3 better army. I'd understand that, if i get some gamewinning conditions, but it was midgame. Also AI seems to not understand magic. He uses bad magic, and also dont understand for example that i might use firrebal and 1shot whole army.

3. Always normal. Because this supposed to be most balanced choice for fair game.

4. I played many of them. Altar one seems stupid. Thats because of his "Adventurer" skill. It is useless when creeping is so easy. But he got nice synergy perk - natural leader. But why not create more usefull soverign with that skill? Lady Irane is very good, but "hunter" is, as i think, not very good trait. maybe if combined with beastlord... Also anyway i think Lady Irane must have some assassin type of job, because she i very good for that role. Pariden leader is just fine. Also Emprero Kraxavox have "wealth". and i think its waste. I also created my own soverign, diplomat+water2+death2+autment+brilliant+clumsy - was vey good, disbales, curses, very good mage. Also - impulsive in creation is imbalanced. maybe it will be mroe balanced if picked as proffesion.

5. Heroes+cheap soldiaers. Magic if heroes were mages. In end i add some hi-tec troops.

6. dont have yet. Only autosaves i got.

Overrall i think game needs more varity. More options. More interesting city managment. Less random in heroes(more straightforward skills must be offerred, if u have some basic skills(potential 1, vital strike 1) - game must offer to levelup at least one of this skills. Less random equipement, i dont want to get epic swords from pile of stash. Less useless magic, i think death 5 is useless(almost any magic 5 is very situative). In other ways some magic is musthave. Air can be leveled only for 4, for clous walk.

And more balance in proffessions of soverign, some are meh(hunter, adventurer, bandit lord).

Just finished playing about 200 turns on a medium world, all AI players and custom faction on Challenging difficulty.

1. The AI is much better and much more challenging. Monsters are more of a threat and seem to be a lot smarter about both attacks and using magic. The monsters were much better at taking out undefended outposts and Arcane Monoliths as well as attacking nearby units. Kudos Brad!

2. Met Magnar early in the game and he almost immediately declared war on me. His first attack took out my 2nd city and a nearby undefended outpost and then a mana shrine. I was able to counter attack and recapture my city because of his losses taking the city to begin with. Neither of us were real powerful at that point (I was a 14 and he was something like 30). However, I was able to attack and destroy his recently placed 3rd settlement with my soveriegn and then was able to heal up enough to take on his capital city. The difference was that I had a lot of mana for spells because of using Arcane Monoliths to capture mana points while Magnar only had the one (I had 5 when he had attacked). The reason I was able to wade into his city and take them out was because I had just researched leather armor and had a lot of mana to bulk up with. Even then, it was still a battle that came down to the last blow. I had 1pt remaining and got the last swing. I was then able to get Magnar to surrender. 

Quick Observations

Arcane Monoliths should have a 1 mana per turn upkeep. As it is, it's too easy to use them as a quick land grab. Once you get some shrines going, you can build up enough mana to grab land left and right.

Stores should offer Salted pork right from the start of the game and it should be only 30 instead of 60 because the AI is much better now and you need that cheap healing.

Also, 10% of the value to sell your items is a bit too little IMO. Either that or offer a trait that allows you to get better prices when selling to the store.

Great job on this version!

Oh, I like the achievements too! 

Well, I'm playing 374 turn a normal level, a small map (not tiny or medium) my power rathing 178 while Khex had 800 or so was 1,100, He keep wave, after wave after my city, and I keep send mana (i'm a playing as mage) even I had 5 shire of mana, my mana ran out, I don't think Arcane Monoliths should had 1 mana per turn, 40 mana is lot even lot than damage spell. I'm playing single city and builder, though, now I had 3 city. My biggest problem is for level up my sov, he been 12 level like forever, after battle too many time, yet no reward to level him up after 12, it's get bored and meanlessping, I think I like .912 leveling better, it's much more reward, you fight so many level and still 12 level, and what for? no reward for that.

Ok now it's 13 level and way more than 374 turn, you could lose or win, but still http://dl.dropbox.com/u/71094645/Saved%20Game.zip

I dont' know why some think Arcane Monoliths useful and think it's should "nerf", but I don't see Arcane Monoliths useful, even I clear enemies out, but there is still a.i and new monster raze resouce in zone of Arcane Monoliths and Arcane Monoliths's outpost, it's just more annyod me and not that useful, in matter of fact, I think Arcane Monoliths should be buffed, maybe cheaper mana or something. Or any emeines can't raze Arcane Monoliths for 40 turn if it cost 40 mana.

I played another game... And groups + basic weapons technology is the key to win. Get those, produce best units you can, and you will most likely win. There are a couple of items causing this (squads below mean any 3+ figure unit).

• Squads do a lot of damage with advanced weapons. The damage scales too much with weapon technology.
• Armor (even full leather armor plus shields) stops a lot of damage. It seems that if the AI units were armored up this could mitigate the first issue.
• +health spells are very effective when cast on groups or larger. Cast aura of grace and courage, and you have extra +20 HP for the unit. If you happen to have a couple of life shards, and some level-up technology you have almost 100hp to start with. Remember the armor effects, too...
• level up makes squads too strong. It is pretty easy to have near 200HP units on a leveled up squad (with the spells above). Add in some armor and only overpower units can hurt these squads. 

So, I would try to restrict the level-up bonuses for squads, and limit the spell effects on squads. I think heroes scale up pretty nicely currently, but squads are still a bit overpowered. Reduce the effectiveness of squads and I need to invent a new strategy...

This save game shows what happens with groups: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/77548146/PreviousAutoSave.EleSav

The strategy I used in that game was pretty straightforward: research basic civ tech, shard harvesting and then weapons technology so that you have the basic weapons and, command posts and groups (up to logistics I think). Build up a killer stack and win the game. Actually, in this game I would have lost if the strongest AI player had invested in weapons technology.

In the above game I didn't play seriously, I just tried how the above mentioned strategy works. So, no additional cities built, just some mana outposts. The save above is unfortunately a bit late of the game. I had already won when I got my main city buffed with spells and the ability to build groups in a city with a command post. That is the point in the game when I knew I had won.

EDIT: forgot one key ingredient. Always start on taxes == None. Use this setting as long as possible. Sell items, don't recruit heroes (apart for the first one). Avoid building too much troops in the early game, so that you will not get slowed down.

Just got my ass kicked on challenging AI.  I was playing as sloppy as I previously would, and got took to school on the short bus. 

Kudos Brad!

3. What difficulty did you play on?

challenging

4. What faction/sovereign did you play (if you made a custom sovereigns, what traits did you pick)?

Tharth with Lady Irane

1. General feedback on if you felt the monsters were a threat (were they too strong, too weak, or about right).

82 turns into the game. And as you will see in my savegame i haven´t expanded much. The monsters were a real threat, but not too strong. I had to take them out step by step and very carefully. Sometimes it was neccesary to unit Lady Irane with Svedd.  I found a tokken for a sandgolem very early and short after one for wolf Ana. That helped a lot. Even with this two extra units it was not easy. Only Anas deadly bite felt overpowered. Often 17/18 dmg. I think this is too much.  

Overall i really liked it...much better than 0.192   

2. General feedback on if you felt the AI players were a threat (were they too strong, too weak, or about right).

Can´t say much about the AI. But i met Queen Porcupine and declared war on her. Lady Irane doesn´t like her. Just a Catfight! Anyway... the battle was strange. Porcupine had a pioneer and casted Haste on it.   And she poisoned my units and i don´t know how she did this. No poisoned weapon and no spider venom sack. But i got no dmg from the pioson. And porcupine is only lvl. 3. I would say this is not very good on turn 82. But ok, i don´t  know her starting position. And she already choosed a path (with lvl. 3?). Path of a WARRIOR. As porcupine? Path of Mage would fit better imho.

Here is the savegame to play this battle if you want.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12734598/tarth%20pariden%20war.EleSav

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