1.3 will still be bland, it's just minor mechanic fixes no real content revisions.
I seem to recall Frogboy saying this blandness was "by design", and that it was a mistake, and that they would have a different approach in FE which is more content-driven.
I for one agree with the op, the world is literally empty between the swathes of cities. Okay, not empty, because there are forests (that don't do anything once they're in your zone of control) and world resources.
What about monster camps spawning in your territory? What about meteors falling, devastating the surrounding area? What about floods, what about draughts? What about sunken temples rising from the depths, releasing terror on the world? What about unexplained fires, lightning storms, what about acid rain, exploding magic shards, roaming champions seeking your aid/demise, unholy statues spreading corruption through the lands, unstoppable gods that walk the land and conquer all only to disappear leaving a new faction behind, plagues, whirlwinds, forests growing and dying, volcanoes erupting and the mountains shifting, singing trees, weeping stones, mazes, revolution, floating islands, explorable dungeons, once-in-a-game units like battlewagons, horrible deadly traps, the fae breaking through, population mutations, the long dance and the old dark, prisons sealing part of the world away for a year, bad moons rising, termites eating your cities, illusions, mad scientists, living lands, shadows escaping from their owners, artifacts that control you, priests granting blessings walking across the land, slavers, shapeshifters, a phoenix that cannot die, demon possessions, forests of crystal/glass, leeches sticking to your guys as they walk through swamps, DEMON leeches, disease (okay I said plague already), magnetism making armor-wearing units unable to move/leave, dead heroes resurrected, arena fights between champions, non-hostile creatures like camels and horses roaming the land, walls of ice disrupting your roads, a fountain of youth, backpacks that eat your items and purses that eat your gold, ghost ships sailing the oceans, extradimensional creatures that require things to leave, time paradoxes, language issues between nations, fogs swallowing all who enter. How about just some plain old fantasy?
The world is neither alive nor interesting. Why do I have to walk on a bloody quest tile to "make something happen"? How about things happen to ME for a change, instead of me happening to other people. Why not remove the "okay, let's do this" button and replace it with "if you don't do it, we'll take your city and your kid and your magic sword and also we will take your dreams and your hair and five years of your life".
