Beyond that, I also think that not having easy "point based" fixes
is a good thing. It makes you think and come up with truly elegant
solutions to problems instead of kludges. Anyone can come up with
a quick and dirty pbem. It takes skill to do an elegant one. Look
at the simplifications in Atlantis and what is lost because of it.
The economy was one of the biggest problems in Oly I yet is seems
pretty tame and adjustable in Oly II. Combat can be fixed. What you
need to do is look at the effects you want and don't want and then
work backwards. There are TONS of possible solutions to the combat
problems as presented.
If you think peasants and sailors are too effective, you could easily
implement a "moralle" check. It would kick in whenever a side either
(A) looses men or (B) is outnumbered and outgunned. There are two
ways to handle this.
1) Make a moralle check for each unit based on it's fighting value
each time a person dies on its side. If the unit fails the check,
it will leave the service of the "crazy noble" that dragged it into
combat.
2) Make a moralle check for the entire stack based on comparative
combat values with a chance of fleeing based on how "outgunned"
you are.
In other words, don't toss in the towel until all options are
exhausted.
John Morrow