Every age, changes boost and nerf. A race gets played a ton in one age, then very little in another. Another race gets played little one age, then gets a boost and is suddenly a top choice. This racial roller coaster has been going on forever, but why? Why not, instead of nerfing anything next age, just bring other races back to the states in which they were played heavily and give everyone an actual full selection of viable choices to play with?

Offhand...

Avians - return ambush immunity

Dwarf - now that they are leaning towards T/M, give them a better offensive spellbook

Elf - no need to add anything

Faery - return +1 mana in war

Halfling - return +2 offspec

Human - obviously needs nothing added

Orc - return 13/2 elites

Undead - return +3 offspecs and stronger elites


and put Dryad out of its misery... I realize you wanted to make a race specifically tailored to low activity, but it's really a waste of a race because you're catering to only a relatively small handful of players and not supporting the majority of your kingdom-based team-based players. Not to mention, what kingdom would want their biggest offenses in the hands of their least active players? Dryad is too specific and does not fit in the mold of Utopian races and their ability to fill several different roles. It's an awkward anomaly that will never really get much use as it is designed, while changing the design defeats the purpose of the race in the first place, so it's a lose/lose.


But back on topic... the racial roller coaster doesn't need to keep happening. Giving every race a worthwhile status puts their usage levels back in the hands of kingdoms and how they want to fit them into their setups. Every age it seems as though there is always "one or two obvious attacker choices" and "one or two obvious T/M choices" and the rest just get scattered usage across the game. Why not have all four attacker choices as equally viable and all four T/M choices as equally viable, while maintaining the usual hybrid viability across several races?