The best thing for me is that coming back to the game I didn't want to make a custom race. It may sound odd but by that I mean not that I don't like custom races, I always enjoy customising things so I expected to want to do that, instead I was enticed into playing and actually enjoyed playing as each of the ingame races for many full games. I haven't actually stuck with a race of my own yet. Some of them still need a little love but I completed games as each, version 1.00, no major issues. My old buggy computer had struggled in the past but it all worked (a few minor graphics issues- eyes look weird, spellbook is ugly looking... but nothing big), the rest looked very pretty. Enjoyed it for hours.
Wildlands - great idea, beautifully done. Fun monsters and stories.
Quests - had the same quest hook that went in different directions, multiple choices and fun and powerful rewards
Art - every time I see a new piece of art, a screen, video, creature, building or icon I remember the video of drawing the dragon statue from ages ago and I have a smile at how pretty it all is.
Leveling up cities - also I like the fact that it's all editable in the xml, it'd be easy to change the requirements (conclaves producing/requiring mana or crystal for example)
Buying bread from a bakery and a potion from my conclave, there was something extremely satisfying about that. It made me feel like the world was real, things connected together as they should and as I always hoped to have in a game like this. Such a small thing, but it made me bore people with my praise for the game and what it wasn't just attempting to do but had actually managed to do.
For me personally, the game has gone from attempting to be a successor to MoM to actually being it. I look forward now to seeing what's next, I have lots of ideas for what could be done, but I don't know what ideas Derek and the team will decide are fun and complimentary additions. (item crafting, spell crafting, the two factions that are missing, diplomacy overhaul... or just more of the same, more monsters, more quests, more traits for champions and cities, more techs (unique tech trees) etc.
If any of the team are reading this... Thank you!