First newbie game: first impressions!!!

[lillumultipass]

So, I have just finished my first demo game and here are my first impressions. First, I want to thank all those that have answered me in my previous post. Anyway, back to my game.
I was playing Jotunheim as I said; I took a Niefel Giant, 8W 5E, a dominion of 6, Cold 3, a special dominion Nifelheim, and I think Productivity +1, and a castle.
Here is a picture I took (hope you will see something!) just to show you the end of my game; (in the attached file)



All the marron provinces are mine. As you see I was surrounded by Atlantis ans Chtis (don’t know how to write it!). My final upkeep is 302, income is 496, population (in Jotunheim) is 29600. Ok, on to what I liked, what I disliked, my problems...
First, obviously, when you start the game, you are overwhelmed, even with the advices of the FAQ, the newbie guide, help from the forums...for instance, as I said before, I didn’t know how often I should search for sites, and with which mages...I was lucky to have a kind of “rainbow mage” that came to assist me, such that he became my site searcher late in the game...but much to late I think...at first I didn’t want to waste a turn searching with my pretender instead of attacking a province.
What I really really really really liked is the creation process of your pretender; I could just create one and let the computer play just to see how it works. Here too I didn’t optimize everything I think, but I was not too unhappy (I took advice from the newbie guide). Anyway, I really love this phase.
One thing that I didn’t really like (I guess it’s because I didn’t play long enough) is the number of units; I felt that you don’t have that much really different units to build; most of my Jotun were more or less alike (the soldiers I mean) and I can buld a priest, 2 magicians, the niefel giant, one scout...coming from the heroes series, I felt that you had more units, but that they were not very “sexy”, like when in heroes you recruit cyclops, dragons, phoenixes...they are all very different...ok, this is just my first impression, I might be wrong! I guess I am, I have only played once!
Another point is magic; I was rather lost here; I was researching schools rather aimlessly...and as I didn’t watch many battles, I couldn’t feel the impact of magic; moreover, I only understood rather late in the game that I could take some gems with me and cast some rituals, so I have only summoned a few creatures.
One problem that I got late in the game is when I started being attacked; as you see in the map, I am completely surrounded by atlantis, so he kept attacking my coastal provinces (and I didn’t know how to attack underwater...), and in the South, the C’this kept attacking also; so during the Last, I don’t know, say, 12 turns, I kept losing provinces, winning them back...without being able to do anything else; my pretender kept attacking, even some of magicians were attacking; so I found it hard to do anything else than wage war, so I never casted any rituals, or forge items, search for sites...
Another problem was with unrest, as some of provinces that were far from my capitole (like Loria, Shade forest...) had unrest in the 80’s; and I didn’t know what to do; I tried to patrol a little, but it was very efficient; so I built a castle in a nearby province, but I am not sure it helped...
Well, for the moment, I really enjoyed playing, I guess I am going to play another game, before deciding whether I buy the game!
Any comments are appreciated!