I really like the ideas in this thread.

Best regards,
Steven. 

Some great ideas.  I'd like to see some more of a Keep on the Borderlands vibe (AD&D module), particularly in the early game, with more depth to wilderness encounters in the early game.  Having people tell you about those sorts of "quests" mentioned above would be like adventuring tech level 0.  Additionally, for adventuring, if one goes that route, I would like to see the ability of a sovereing and party to sneak across the borders of other realms and move about in an unnoticed way, both using that as espionage, but also being able to claim adventuring quests and goodies elsewhere on the map in case your kingdom happens to be small or choked off.

In general I get no "reclaim or revive the land" feeling from Elemental in its current form. It feels like any non-space 4x game. Expand your civilization by founding new cities and the influence of these cities will keep monsters at bay. A game concept that could be already observed in CIVILIZATION ... no number needed. It's the first one.

I even liked Stardocks initial idea, that you had to spend some essence to found another city (beta 3?). That felt at least a tiny bit like there is acutally some reclaiming / reviving done. And there are so many more possibilities to expand on this idea. Like e.g.

Magically altering the landscape - Make the sovereign actively involved in the expansion progress. Have him cast revive or reclaim like types of spells (maybe with upkeep) to be able to settle new regions or make resources ready for exploitation. Right now, your sovereign does not feel special. There is absolutely no representation of his "revive the land" agenda in the gameplay ... apart from the automatic change in the coloration of the tiles within your zone of influence. *sigh*

Have your subjects work - Here I get the basic idea from a very old game called Dune, based on a novel by Frank Herbert of the same name. And no, not Westwood's C&C predecessor and RTS-game Dune II. In Dune you had to terraform Arrakis by sending out terraforming crews. Here is how the Wikipedia describes the ecology aspect of this game, commented a bit for easier understanding:

Ecology

As soon as Paul meets Liet-Kynes and drinks the Water of Life, Arrakis can be terraformed by having Fremen [i.e. the player's] troops specialise in ecology. Since it only happens late in the game, the northern sietches [i.e. map regions] are usually barren (but any spice [i.e. the game's source of income ... as tiberium in C&C] remaining will disappear), and by moving ecology troops there, they can assemble a windtrap, and provided they are equipped with bulbs, vegetation will always grow to the north.

Vegetation raises the morale of Fremen. In addition, planting the vegetation south to the Harkonnen [i.e. the AI opponent] controlled areas, so it will grow north and reaches them, will lower their spice production [i.e. their income base]. Moreover, if enough vegetation grows north into Harkonnen fortresses, they will abandon them. A military unit must still be sent then to take over such fortresses, but there will be no one to fight with.

Nevertheless, it is generally agreed amongst players that ecology is of a lower priority than both spice mining and military, hence most players tend to deploy lesser amount of troops to ecology. However, by having enough vegetation growing north into the Harkonnen Palace, ecology is actually one of the ways to reach the end game.

In summary there needs to be more to reclaiming and reviving than just different graphics that are automatically applied.

Rabenhoff