[Tom_Scudder]

Abysia is a bit of a snare and a delusion, on account of all those nifty fire mages never HIT anything with their spells. (And to make much headway with Abysia I had to go into blood magic, which is complicated). I do like Jotunheim/Niefelheim (or Iron Woods) for an intro to summon spells, since they have the really wicked kick-*** longdead giants available early on.

Machaka and serpent-cult Pythium are also nice for giving you some kick-*** cavalry units to play with as you wean yourself off of full-time steel dependency.