Originally Posted by
Tommyknocker
The strategy map is realtime, including the movement of armies, while you can do other stuff as they move across the land. If the player chooses to personally command battles, the game will pause until it is over. If not, the battle will take several in-game days. Naval battles can also be controlled.
Borders are dynamic, Cities can be founded anywhere, and an area will not officially belong to your faction just by controlling it. You should need to completely annex the original faction or demand the land in a peace treaty. In the meantime it is simply 'occupied', with a high revolt risk and low income.
Colonies, trade routes and places of worship can all be made independantly from Cities, even in another factions area. These can be destroyed by said faction, provoking war.
Resources actually have direct effects, so the player is forced to trade or expand if they want certain commodities (such as iron to make steel weapons and armour). Production of buildings and units is limited by the amount of materials you have, but doesn't cost money if you use slaves. Inflation is a problem.
Attrition affects armies, so logistics have to be taken into account, but they can be automatically be replenished providing you have the manpower (and want them to be). It should take longer for the reinforcements to reach long distance armies, and they may be engaged on the way. So no more trapsing across deserts with no ill-effect.
Units are of realistic size, so losing 10 men is no longer such a big deal.
All this could take place in any timeline, though I would like to see it in the Roman, Rennaisance and Napoleonic periods (the map being the entire globe). It would be nearly impossible to travel to the Americas as the Romans or something though, the naval crew would suffer massive attrition and eventually mutiny.