SP, MP, LAN Level of importance to you

Hard to tell really. Usually I prefer MP over SP, but in Elemental, I will enjoy both, mainly because of the endless modding possibilities. That being said, if a high fantasy TC mod will be released, I will focus on that. [Very different races - AoW II. style for example...]

It really depends. I prefer singleplayer overall, but it greatly depends on the level of complexity. I enjoyed games of Civilization 3 in multiplayer immensly (I have never played Civ4 in MP) but I would never ever even have attempted playing Galactic Civilizations 2 in MP, even if it had had it.

I'd pour just about every possible resource into singleplayer, because that's primarily what I play, myself. But if I were a developer that had decided to make a game with multiplayer, it would also be extremely important to make that part of the game work. And the enjoyment of a singleplayer game doesn't lie in inherent complexity, but the enjoyment of a multiplayer game (or lack thereof) do - at least in my opinion.

I suppose that this is a long-winded way of saying "I'm not sure". I think the decision to have multiplayer in E:WoM is a good one and I suppose that in my vein of thinking, that also means pouring a good amount of resources into that to make it work.

MP-first/primary

SP-secondary(still quite strongly felt)

LAN- ... I could care less

I'm an SP guy. I will almost certainly never play most games in multiplayer. There are exceptions for games that were designed and built to be multiplayer, like L4D, but only where those games largely manage to eliminate the competitive mentality that dominates most MP games.

Single player almost exclusively.  I generally only play in Sandbox mode -- I've played a lot of GalCiv2 and expansions and have yet to play any of the campaign/pre-defined scenarios.

I don't understand why Stardock is putting any time into multiplayer other than it's expected these days.  I play a TON of multiplayer; battlefield, demigod, etc.  Recently i've put over 300 hours in LOL.  But I will not play one minute of multiplayer in Elemental.  How are you supposed to keep people from rage quitting in a game that lasts hours or days when they won't stay in a game of Demigod or LoL that lasts 30 min.  No one will stay in a game for hours so you can enjoy beating them up.  At best you'll get to clean up against the AI that took over for them.  Maybe Stardock will surprise me but I just don't see how this is going to work.

You gotta be kidding. It's all about the playerbase, and fantasy TBS games are usually popular amongst decent/adult/serious online gamers. Take a look at Dominions 3. I've played many "blitz" games when it was released, and some of those games lasted for 2-3 hours. Also, we gonna have a save/reloaded mp game function as well.

My wife and I used to have fun playing AoW:SM, and I'm actually playing Civ 4 with a friend right now. Coop is a beautiful thing.

Multiplayer is used for things other then deathmatches against random asshats.

Yes, a coop option would be a blast. My best memory of a multiplayer game is Rise of Nations and the coop play. It was so good.

Huh? Option? Just ally with your mate/wife/whatever vs. AIs or other players.

Players will enter into elemental from the Single player experience.

Afaic I play SP these days, however an alied/coop game with my best m8 would be a treat, preferably on a lan.

Even if it didn't had any MP I would still buy it. I hope the developers don't get too caried away into MP like blizzard did with starcraft 2 a game that's been ready for SP over 2 years now.

MP- Zero interest, I was actually hoping that Elemental would follow the same MP path as GC did.

Campaign- Probably zero intrest if it follows the GC campaign style, but I play through them once, or for a bit until I decide it's just not that interesting.

Mods- well if you mean user scenarios then zero interest, if you mean tweeks to game mechanics then it depends on the tweeks, but for most games I do find a particular mod which 'fixes' things I disagree with and use that, though I have to say that I think SD does a good job of not making those kinds of mods as necessary as they seem to be in many other games.

In particular I will be very disapointed if concessions to the SP game are made to accomodate various MP requirements.

I think the campaign should use only one map, one game, and be a series of game-changing quests and events which can bring you from positions of great power, to positions of great distress, increasing the strength of your personal sovereign the entire time. Probably an elite cadre of questing buddies as well. There should be options to recruit various NPC heroes, tame various magical beasts, and raise armies (other than the cities you may or may not own on the map at any given time). Sometimes your empire would be Goverened by an NPC AI, as that particular focus is all on questing, and you can request Aid at the cost of fame or prestige. Invading armies could arrive by boat, or whatever. A particularly important nation can be rebuilt if it had been previously defeated, particularly with larger armies

Other nations should be able to change leaders, if a charlatan takes over for a particular time, or something. Maybe an heir takes over, especially if that heir is a channeler. The campaign will probably have royal Channeler births, but much more rare than royal champion births, and potentially hard-coded by the events and such.

Additionally, if one of the later quest/events is the rise in strength of Nation X, and you prematurely attack Nation X, Nation X shoud get premature bonuses, premature bigger cities, and premature bigger armies (ect). Basically you will have triggered that event early and now have another thing to deal with, but maybe it wont be TOO aggresive until its actual time to shine. That is, if you don't steal a city from them ...

Unlikely that I'll ever play a single game of MP.

OK i'll regress.  A well though out Co-op would be great.  I'd like to see a Co-op campaign (with two kingdoms) and have the ability for two people to share control of a single kingdom.  Think husband and wife sovereigns or two brothers.  But Stardock is talking a lot of players in a semi-persisent setting.  This will require a lot of play balance and a decrease in random events.  In multiplayer you want player skill to reign supreme.  Which is balanced but less fun.

Agreed, and fun > balance.

  klaxton499, take your idea one step further and give a multiplayer game option of each player getting their turn at running the Kingdom.  Maybe a mod idea.  Flow of game would wander so interesting and unknown gameplay elements would develop over a course of a single game.  Not knowing in what direction your Kingdom would go in would make strategy more difficult to predict.

I play a fair bit of multi...but I have limited interest in Elementals multi, co-op with my partner is about it...she's in the beta already, but I have a feeling in the end we'll play far more single player than multi. The only thing that worries me about multi is if the diversity gets ruined because of the ultimately boring quest for balance, which will turn the game into lukewarm drivel the way it does to every game it locks onto to feed upon. Where all the hardcores can masturbate with delight that they get to use the words like "broken, OP, and buffed" to mash the once bright spectrum into a pooh brown paste they can decorate their avatars cheeks with.

man i will probably end up playing a lot of single of this... but the real fun part will be playing with friends and maybe playing with them online with other people.

This is more playable then gal civ 2 so far mainly because its fantasy. Multiplayer will add more life to the game the AI can only do so much so well and players can screw up or get lucky more often.

Single player is kind. I don't give a whiff about multiplayer. LAN is lovely, but nowadays me and my friends have video and videochat, so we can pretty much do it in game... actually would be really cool if the game included video chat capabilities. but eh, I am just getting worked up about something I will probably not use

.

This game has been promised to be both turn-based and epic.  Do you really think focusing anything less than 95% of the development resources on single-player makes sense?

Definately SP first and foremost. Outside an occasional MMORPG I never play MP, however I do know that their is a sizeable population of folks who live for player vs player action. I would like Elemental to focus on the SP experience with a secondary objective of providing a fun MP for those like to mix it up with human opponents.

A great SP experience generally has a following traits: A great storyline/campaign, highly moddable, A map/game Editor for custom content, and a challenging AI.

I can't wait for Elemental.

has no one ever tried playing a TBS with there best mate?

I think focusing anything more than 0% on MP doesn't make sense, but apparently SD wants to give MP a shot.

Hopefully the only downside is a delayed release.