I agree that fame is totally useless right now, save for henchmen, for which 20 fame is a negligible cost. The main problem is that Champions themselves are not terribly useful.
Here is how I would fix it.
- brutally lower the Attack values of trained units and their weapons. This way, Champions keep up in damage.
( the idea being that, at comparable experience levels (loot included), a single Champion has roughly the same Attack as a top-of-the-line unit. More for Warriors, less for Mages, of course).
- also slightly lower their per-level gained HP. (What, exactly, is moddable, as far as level upgrades go?).
- mostly eliminate automatic fame-based champion acquisition. Instead, put some Champion-summoning spells in the grimoire, as in MoM. Make these spells have a Fame cost. If auto-champion is still in, make it cost much more than the spell. For example, you could summon a Lv. 3 hero for 100 fame + 50 mana, or a Lv. 9 for 500 fame + 250 Mana. You still get auto-champions at 1000 fame (and in linear progression, instead of exponential: 2000, 3000 etc.)
(Also, is it possible to give the AI a hint about these spells?)
- ideally, get rid of Henchmen and Scions. They are a poor replacement for the fact that mundane units do not gain new capacities at level-up. (For example, any unit equipping a Fire wand could get the Fire spells at level-up).
Now, I did not yet try modding this game, but I'm half-serious about implementing the above. Are there any modding guides, besides the thread posted by Frogboy