[Morkilus]

1. I like Early Age because it has more magic. I suppose if you wanted to prepare for multiplayer, Early and Middle age would be best. According to the Victorious Nations post, there have been 22 each finished Early and Middle games, and 13 Late Age games. I'm sure there are "undocumented" big multiplayer games, though. Most of mine have been early age; perhaps Late Age has the specter (haha) of AE Ermor that drives people away?

2. I'm not sure what you mean by a "balanced" god. Pretenders have very specific uses depending on their design, as you well know. I suppose a "balanced" pretender could be a dual-blessed cyclops, which could fight, cast impressive rituals, and well... keep your Helhirdings alive through the bless.

3. There is no danger in renaming units... besides what happens when you have a game full of players with so many mages that they name them "3N1S1F" and stuff like that. This isn't as useful now that paths show up in the F1 screen, in my opinion.