Well, it was a bit of a mammoth job, reading that thread to date, but I'm glad I did. Some great ideas in there, particularly from Kaljamaha. Actually, his name sounds a bit like a spell that summons a motorbike. I'm thinking now of the picture on Meatloaf's Bat out of Hell album - sorry, I digress!
I particularly like the suggestion that evil/holy woods and fire barrier are changed to mana upkeep, instead of 3 goes duration, which severely restricted their usefulness
Soften earth and harden earth sound great, providing that makers of custom maps can make stone partitions underground that cannot be breached by the spell soften earth if they so desire. I heard it mentioned in another thread that there are 2 units in AoW that can pass through underground solid rock - can anyone enlighten me, please, as I was not aware of that possibility
Disguising your troops to look like independents is cool
Despite all the objections, I can still think of some instances when hiding a city might be useful. If not disguising it as an independent city, perhaps it could be disguised as a farm. Then it would still look natural with roads coming up to it
I have also learnt from this thread that dispel magic can be used to take out Dragons/Elementals. Presumably this is in TC. I haven't found dispel magic to be much use in games against the AI, where I usually use FC. Sounds as though it might be more useful in multiplayer games
I like the BattleAxe idea of a Tsunami, or giant wave, and the Rift idea is excellent, so long as the change is permanent
My main disappointment with the magic in AoW was that there were very few spells that radically changed the visuals of the game. Fire Mastery and Flood were probably the closest we came. Some of my ideas include:
GLOBAL WARMING: Ice starts to melt, icy countries flood, but steppe turns to desert, and near deserts the sea starts to evaporate. Things start moving in favour of Azracs and against Frostlings
NEW ICE AGE: The opposite
AIDS (perhaps PLAGUE would be more politically correct): Faces go blotchy in the affected country, abilities are drained, movement is reduced. Resistance to Undead is greatly reduced
VIRUS: Systems are slowed, visibility reduced. Relations with friends deteriorate when personal documents are emailed to everyone on your address list
TEXT MESSAGING: Lower productivity due to all troops repeatedly pressing number pad on their mobiles. Also a large hole appears in your gold at the end of the month
WORM: Your instructions to your troops may not be obeyed, as your server is being bombarded with messages
COSMAGIC SURGERY: I thought this spell could have been developed a little further, enabling you to send spies into enemy territory. Maybe disguising them as independents, to use another member's suggestion, would be a good idea
May your magic be marvellous