It is a lot of coding but if chadz wants ideas how to improve the game he could also steal mechanics of Europa Universalis 3.
First necessary thing would be a totalwar like map with many provinces. You dont conquer citys anymore you conquer provinces.
Problem of new and probably bigger maps is that there are not enough maps. If chadzs plans on expanding maps etc. he
needs to get in mappers to do the work. there dont have to be villages citys or castles in every province. You also could introduce
forest, mines, rural areas. would be much faster to add those then adding villages etc. But if you dont want to do this i suggest to
add more villages. those are quite easy and fast to be made.
Back to the eu3 suggestions:
- distant overseas not as good as fiefs at your continent. make multiple continents and
make penalties if you make "colonies".
- smaller countries tech faster then bigger => could be translated into: you get 100% - number of villagesx2 for example.
If you have 20 villages you only get a x0.6 multiplier on everyting you do.
- vasall system: you can vasallize smaller clans getting 0.25 of their production/income. You cant attack them as long they are vasalls.
- declaration of war to attack someone. Warscore to determine how much you can get at peace negotiations. big countries cant be killed
by one attack. after peace is made there is a truce for some time where you cant attack again and cant merc against them.
- war exhaustion. if you stay to long at war you will get negative multipliers. 1 week x0.9 2 weeks 0.8 etc. wars now have goals you can
achieve but you have to look that you dont want to much at once or your empire will be in serious problems.
- you only can transfer troops inside your own faction. if you want troops from other factions they are mercs. upkeep for mercs would be a lot
more expansive then your own troops. you can get them if you are rich or really in danger but you wouldnt hire them for longer time.
- troop limits. say you can get 5000 troops upkeep free. every further unit will cost upkeep if you get above 20000 troops it will get more
expansive again. it would limit clans in size of their armys while for short time you could get big armies if you need them.
- you could store troops for free in villages castles and citys for example 500 in villages 1000 in citys and 2000 in castles.
if they are used to attack someone they have to be removed from castle and then count to the troop limit.
Just play Europa universalis 3 chadz. rogue will give you a tutorial for sure if you want
there are so many great things
someone could implement in strategus.
Most important thing would be to change map in a province-style map like eu3 or total war.
I offer myself to do a big amount of mapping if you decide to do this. there are probably enough other people who would love to help you.