What could we steal from other fantasy games...

[SsSam]

....There are several basic UI improvements that would make the game more accessible to newer players.

The first one that comes to mind is allowing the user to see what you can build in your national capital during pretender construction. Yeah after playing a game with a nation I won't need this, but that doesn't help me when I start. (What paths are available to my mages? what units are sacred? What kind of commanders/scouts do I have? What are my unit's strengths? What are capitol only builds?)

A system to save not only diplomatic messages, but maps and battle images for future reference. This would include messages to self as a reminder of what it was you were intending to do.

An editing system for in game diplomatic messages would be great for those of us who type like foo.

My mage has found a gem producing site by spell X. On a large map I now have to find my way to the nation screen and find the province and then mouse over what that site is. Ordering that province list would be a start. Hypertext from the message list would be even better.

I want to find that province that can produce wind riders....uh oh. Similarly, I want to find the non-castle provinces where I can build scouts. oops.

Simple path finding to move your stack/unit to province 31 would be a great boon, but I understand the objection, it would require some real coding.