I don't think it will work the way you say, NTJedi.  A powerful channeler hoarding his essence may indeed be very powerful personally.. but that's essence which isn't used for expansion.  It didn't make lands habitable, it didn't provide your nation with special resources, it isn't inside buildings which are creating magical equipment, it isn't in the hands of a spellcaster working to expand your nation.  There is no reason to think that it would be best to not spend your essence to pursue early expansion.

Also, it is wrong to assume that a powerful channeler must be powerful in the same way.  A powerful channeler could be a great lordly figure, capable of commanding great armies and protecting them under his aegis of powerful magic, while not being capable of offensive action.  A powerful channeler could be a wizard locked in his tower pursuing ever more powerful magic, fighting with slaves and assassins, while dooming his foes from afar and cursing them with ill magic.  A powerful channeler could be a combat monster, capable of destroying armies alone.  A powerful channeler could be an earth mage, provding great bounty over his lands and enriching it with his magic.  A powerful channeler early could be a drain on your expansion, not a boon.

I don't know what possibilities elemental will have, but it isn't like in Dominions, where lands exist for you to conquer.  The assumption that you need to keep your channeler strong to expand early is almost certainly incorrect.

As for the matter at hand, I don't see why the game must continue if your avatar is killed.  It's perfectly reasonable to have the game end upon your death.  Providing a saftey net is up to the player, not the game.

I have played both Dominions and MoM.  I've seen a guy use a magicless supercombatant awake god where death merely limited his dominion spread and wasted a few priest-turns.  I've also seen more than a few rainbow mages where death would be a severe penalty.  Both those games handle that unit dying in a certain way.. Elemental is not either of them, and I see no reason why character death is unacceptable in this game.

WRONG...  a powerful channeller is used for expansion because he can conquer cities from independents as well as other players during early stages.  No need to essence the land when you can steal from your neighbors.   The powerful channeller is also able to conquer any building structures such as a moderately guarded gold mine or mana node which would otherwise take many turns in building an army and/or magic research required. 

I simply meant powerful in the fact that all essence was poured into the channeller himself for supercombatant reasons.  Don't fly off in different directions.

I don't expect Elemental to be like Dominions or MoM or any previous fantasy TBS game.  I would hope the most fun aspects of previous fantasy games are being considered for Elemental. 

I agree the safety net for channeller death should be a game option.

Myself and others are merely suggesting what we've seen work for other games.   There's no reason why the channellers death can not be included as a game option.

Dunno.  Seems to me any kind of military force could do this, not just a powerful supercombatant.

Indeed.  I don't know enough about this game, though, to judge any approach wrong, and I like this idea, especially since you start the game with only him.  Another game that did this was Total Annhiliation.

For it to be an option, though, you would need some other victory conditions.  What would they be?

I think I'm going to have to agree to disagree on this one.  To take it instantly, the supercombatant needs to be there, and he's only one unit, and would be wandering the map to explore these things.  It would certainly be a significant jump ahead, but the stay-at-home channeler could get more heroes, and even the supercombatant needs a good number of turns to gain experience.  Further, you don't necessarily need any large force.. only more force than your opponent has at that point.  If you have four slingers, that could be four more than he has.

Again, though, I don't KNOW this.  and I don't think you have direct knowledge either.. but I've got it pre-ordered, and will be perfectly happy to fight it out with you in several months when MP testing is ready.

But you're making assumptions about how quickly an essence-hoarding channeler will gain power. For all we know, a channeler who spends his essence immediately might be nearly the equal of the channeler who hoards it at the beginning of the game; maybe it'll take time for the advantages and disadvantages of hoarding vs. spending essence to really manifest in significant ways. And presumably the defender will have some sort of advantage, as well. But even if that's not true, the point is we don't know how any of these mechanics are going to work so it's premature to make broad assumptions about what kinds of results they'll have.

Meh. I'd rather die outright if I manage to get my channeler killed. I don't fancy the idea of becoming weaker and weaker as the game goes on because my channeler keeps dying. If you're playing the type of channeler that is likely to be in combat situations, then dying will set you back and make it more likely for the new channeler to die as well (he will be weaker, but his enemies won't be unless they also died). This could just spiral to the point where losing your channeler would result in a long, slow death...

I think there should be methods of safeguarding your channeler, or getting around death (imbue an item with part of your soul, construct a spell ahead of time to teleport yourself out of harms way if you're about to die, etc). Having the option to set up a magical mechanism for your essence to pass into an heir if you die would be fine with me, though. I just wouldn't want it to be automatic...

It all comes down to game balance in regards to an essence-hoarding channeler.  Anyone who's played dominions knows starting a game with a supercombatant is a viable strategy and it's neither too powerful nor too weak.  I'm sure with the planned beta testing Elemental will also be able to achieve the same gameplay balance.

You just argued against yourself

If there is a significant cost of casting that spell or creating that item, then there is no need to lose stats or anything when said spell/item is used to bring back your channeler. They can make so much variety in this one aspect alone. There could be expensive methods of avoiding death that bring you back with no postmortem penalties, cheap methods that incur severe penalties if/when you actually die, and anything in between.

If you think your channeler is likely to die, for some reason, the former would probably be preferable; while if you don't expect your channeler to be in harm's way any time soon but want to protect yourself against unforeseen eventualities, the latter might look appealing. All comes down to play-style and strategy.

And I love the idea of being able to take the risk that if your channeler does die and you hadn't set up some sort of safety-net, instant game over.

Actually the original discussion was regarding whether a channeller should be allowed to respawn after dying which leaned towards the discussion of channellers being a supercombatant as not a viable strategy.  My posts have referenced dominions which shows it does work and my last statement merely says it will need beta testing.