The biggest problem with Dom III

[Xietor]

Well,

for the advanced player, you may want to play a MA race, and add some EA or LA empires to create more of a challenge. It would be an option, not a requirement.

So you play MA Pangaea, create a map and random opponents, and they will default be all MA races.

But, for those wishing more of a challenge, You can "select" empires from different eras to throw in as opponents for a greater challenge. So it would be completely optional. Also, you may have 1 player that is an "expert" and a friend who is a casual player, so you may want to let him/her play a tougher race to equalize things.

MOO2 had a race that was overpowered on large maps, that got to research every tree at once. Many times i would allow my friends to play this overpowered race, while I would play
a more limited race to balance out the game. There is nothing wrong in having some races be overpowered, as long
as it is intentional and everyone realizes that they exist to allow the more casual player to compete against more experienced players.

In Dom II, ermor was overpowered. And I often allowed a friend to play ermor while i played ulm or some other race.
It created an even game that would not have been possible if my friend would have played a race other than ermor.

[Potatoman]

Ahh, Moo2. The overpowered custom options of that game were great fun- the best race that I remimber creating was the huge production bonus one with Feudal, + a few other picks that I do not remimber. It could crank out colony ships so quickly right out of the gate that I would often control most of the galaxy before P2 even reached their 3rd world. Fun!

Also amusing was the challenge to create the worst Moo2 custom race possible, then have your friend try to last as long as they could in a small galaxy with impossible opponents. The creator of the most pathetic custom race was the winner!

[TirAsleen]

i have moo2 still installed i agree research race was insane so i looked for a more fun race and that was silicodis...

hehe and not using customization at all + hardest game setting was still too easy for advanced players, that know what to research first and so on.

[Archonsod]

Xietor said:
for the advanced player, you may want to play a MA race, and add some EA or LA empires to create more of a challenge. It would be an option, not a requirement.

There's plenty of ways to give yourself a challenge without actually needing to alter the Era system. Try imposing some rules on your own pretender build or similar (no bless, no SC and the like). I'd argue that this would be way more effective, since the challenge of another era nation depends heavily on other factors (for example, EA national troops tend to have lighter equipment, and would likely struggle to expand in a late era game).
The same applies to multiplayer games. Turn the site occurence to minimum and let your opponent pick a nation less dependent on magic (like Ulm) while you take one heavily dependent on it (Caelum).