I agree. I wiped out 4 lairs and got no level ups as a result. This combined with the healing nerf had added a lot of "skip" turns.

im playing right now and my sovereign hardly got lvl 5 but its viable

b4 i could too soon steamroll everything, now i lose some fight, and i few i dont even try

there are more drops it seems, i saw more things for casters and a few new weapons i think

still the main problem is ai weakness

i just wonder with heroes and do quests/kill enemies leaving the cities TOTALLY unguarded

beasts and neither enemy sovereigns never attack me, so i can freely roam with heroes and dont even need to build troops

I seem to get at least one army after my cities at some point in a war. It didn't really feel like much of a war though. 

Just because "this" nerf might be too big, doesn't mean that a nerf wasn't needed.  With any balance issues it can be that you go both sides of the problem before you get a workable solution.

I haven't got a chance to play yet...and I unfortunately won't tonight, but I would be interested to know how a more "troop" oriented strategy works in 0.76.

Sovereigns and champions were so overpowered with the old exp gain that I think a lot of players used them as a crutch.  So I'm a bit leery about all of the outcries against this nerf.  Sometimes you just need to shift your strategy...

Now, if NO strategy is really viable, or if there are LESS options now then there were before...then yeah something is wrong .

Sigh.  Note to self-righteous forum jerks.  If you want your suggestions to be taken seriously, try not to sound like a spoiled child who's been asked to share his toys with others.

im playing on hard and im leveling up my sovereign i close the game is lvl 9 and heroes 7 8 i think

its a bit harder, 1 melee i have is very badly injured cause he died often and there was really no way to prevent it

the feeling is better now, you need to think a bit, but not too much, you can still explore and adventure successfully just need to play careful cause its much less safe than b4

also the balance to monsters seems ok, i had a hard time with a big enemy camp now 

also a close camp in this game after a bit attacked me and destroyed my capital my fault finally i get punished for mistakes, this is how it should work

might is nerfed but there are still all other dex/lvl str/lvl too much op i think

maul is nerfed but still too much op for a single ability

i think maul is fine on some strong enemy like a big  bear or some ogre or something

but maul is bad as a single propriety of a weapon, its kinda like having a x multiplier on weapn dmg, where x depends on accuracy and with enough high accuracy x become too much high

feels better for now

I think between the XP reduction and the champion wounding the early pacing is a lot better - at least its harder/ more focused to grab a champ stack of doom, or you have to be luckier.  I recruited a few normal troops to supplement my stack, which is a big move in the right direction.

Might be a touch too far for level 1-5, I wouldn't mind seeing those levels a touch faster (5-10%?), but have drops a bit less amazing.  Just feels a touch too luck based, those.

If you get unlucky on champs/drops, especially if you build your capital on a 4 food/2 mat or something, the beginning game can drag a bit.  Had one start  like that.  It might be good to let faction leaders give a good boost to troop production if stationed in the capital, just so that players in that situation can build up some bodyguards and level a bit.  Or have a mechanic to spawn very low leveled quests if stationed in the capital (% per turn chance?).

But ya, definitely liking the fact that it at least feels like there's more choices that are good early on, rather than one easy win strategy.

I found the beginning game much more exciting with the new XP levels. It is easy to get to level 4 but level 5 is a real accomplishment. I think the next step is to have some better or more unique traits at level 5. There should be a chance to get some pretty good stuff for all that killing you have to do to get there. I would really like it of you could choose a path every 5 levels. That way you can choose to continue along the path you already chose or cross classes to give your hero more variety. 

i think you are just playing wrong

i never stood still a single turn in my actual game

sure i didnt *farm* free all time along (which is a GREAT improvement in .76) but i could still kill many things and do many quests, i just had to be cautios, i used lot of time to explore and find the best camps to take, used few units for that too, and escorted my pioneers since the monsters appeared to wonder a bit more than b4

you just have to do DIFFERENT things which is the point of a rpg strategy game

b4 it was going around with heroes WRECKING everything on the pat no matter what

now you can still fight a lot, but you wont win *always* like b4

if you want to steamroll everything i guess you can, just set easy difficult et voila'

I must be encountering some sort of bug then, because I am literally getting 1 or 6 exp from many tough fights. I've started 3 new games today and each time I get stuck because I can't level fast enough to deal with the crap around me before it gets too strong. I haven't even been able to hit level 4 all day. And this is with a new custom sov with high (20) int supposedly give me +40% exp.

Out of curiosity is anyone else playing with high int characters (perhaps it's subtracting exp instead of adding it), or is it known if wither reduces exp gained? I'm playing on ridiculous and have been wither stacking a lot.

I play on normal and everything is giving me 5-20 XP. I am still fighting weak creatures and it is early in the game. Maybe start one on hard or normal to see if it's a matter of difficulty. 

The game difficulty and the encounter difficulty are more important now. If my level 4 sovereign fights alone against a bear and a bear cup (strong encounter) on hard she gets around 50 xp per fight.