[Hoplosternum]

I agree with Lupus that the ability of Overlords to take Indies early will radically change the game. Few Normals will get past 10 or so lands before the borders are closed, unlike in this game where 20+ before wars was possible for many of us normals. That on it's own is going to radically change the game as the Overlords will retain their large income and power leads.

I agree with Squirrel that having asymetric attack abilities is not good. And I like his idea 2.

I don't agree that it is essential that Overlords (or anyone else) be able to take out 50% plus of an enemy in the 'first strike' turn of a war in mid/late game. Regardless of how desireable it is to cripple your enemies economy in one turn, if you don't have astral or air Thugs/SCs (or serious stealth) it's not really an option anyway. So it isn't the only way to fight.

So simply the ability to attack several territories a turn later on in the game should be fine. This could simply increase as time goes on. Be that one extra per game year or whatever is considered reasonable.

Especially if all nations are bound by the rules as squirrel suggests. So normals can neither overwhelm other Normals or Overlords as they can now. You could possibly ditch the dom rules in that case too as it forces a certain sort of Pretender on everyone.

Add in some rules to formalise alliances (which multiples up the number of attacks in any case) and hopefully a wrap around map and I think that should do it.