So first we will start with graphical because that is easy, and can be chiefly logged as aesthetical value and secondary being performance.
Graphical:
Castle and Stone Walls
Number 1 is that castle buttresses or reinforcing stones need to either go further into the ground or curl back on themselves (corbel), right now it looks pretty ugly looking at a buttress that cuts off before it hits the ground, namely with a steep drop next to it, this goes for both castle and stone walls its just less noticeable on stone walls.
When I say curl them in I mean at an angle.
Another thing to add to this is the crenellations, we need way more different types of stone walls, namely ones with crenellations at right angles, opposite sides and a standing block with no crenellations for both square and rectangle.
Blocks without crenellations should be halved or have quarter the HP as they are there as more a standing block, that way players couldn't just put a bunch of these as walls, however they should still cost roughly about the same.
Which brings me onto hoardings, hoardings are an additional system added later to an existing castle wall, I think an opportunity here was missed because during peace time and war a castle would look a lot more different.
Deploy-able hoardings would be a really awesome addition to the game, and would allow the crenellations to remain intact behind the hoarding, it was a dangerous place to be to sit in the hoardings because one stone from a treb or catapult would shatter it and whom ever was in there would fall to the ground.
This also means we never see castle wall bastions at the joining part of two walls, which is a shame because they add a nice touch to castles, and ontop of this we don't see machicolations, which are basically stone hoardings.
I also think draw bridges that are separate from a wall would be a nice addition, you could use them in the realm claim and it would act as a way of stopping bandits rather than an army, and still allow for easy access into and out of the area for allies without any need for picking up stuff.
We need stone towers too, singular towers by themselves, we have wooden ones so why not stone too
Trees and Logs
This one is mostly about performance, and on top of that applying real world logic to the game, heres the thing right now in the north it lags to all hell whenever you are running around and on top of that people actually grow trees like a wall.
And when they finally do cut their trees down its to leave the logs strewn all over the place like a death trap to cavalry and a lag trap to infantry.
This is neither practical nor is it realistic or even worth trying to optimise, there would be a lot of wasted man hours in this particular case for a really set of simple fixes that would make sense AND look decent, on top of that it would also mean silly tactics couldn't work except on a smaller scale.
So first lets take a look at trees and how they actually work, at the moment you can plant them right next to each other, anyone who's done forestry in real life will know you need to give trees a lot of space to grow especially big trees like oaks, this is for multiple reasons but namely lack of resources and sunlight should you plant them near each other.
This means at least a 1 tile radius around each tree so that it can grow, this would also stop those ridiculous oak walls, I think anything that grows more than 3 meters should stop anything growing around it.
This would then represent a real forest in my eyes and allow for less clutter on the screen meaning better FPS, it does mean a slight change in the way resources work but honestly I don't think wood is a problem as an infinite resource.
On top of this I think more should be done with logs, personally I don't see a reason why logs should stay in the game world any longer than 1 in game day, in both the world at large and claims, to me it would be better to make a singular place-able object such as a wood pile which you can drop wood into and pull out of as needed.
I do understand that people could just leave log piles all over the place in the same fashion, but just make them have a limitation radius to other log piles, if another log pile is nearby it will not allow a new one to be placed within X amount of tiles.
And outside of a claim they will have the same degradation mechanics as any building slowly disappearing from the game world.
I know some people think about logs and how they take up more space as you have more, however I think personally that a better frame rate is more appealing than logs littered everywhere.
Permissions
Gates should have their own permission set, personally while we wait for the more elaborate permission systems to come, I think a quick tweak to the system would be nice in that regards, I know a lot of groups that prefer the high quality stuff only be used by their top crafters so they keep the town claim locked to newer members.
However it would be nice if they could at least get in the gate
Materials
Copper/Bronze
Copper should have far more uses in building, and bronze should be craftable with which can also be used to craft building parts, I know that the devs aren’t trying to cover the bronze age which is fine but giving copper more uses would suit most people, and also make sense (remember we are in the age where iron rusts easily).
Nails, brackets, locks ( and keys maybe :P ), hammers, axes, saws etc all can be crafted from copper/bronze ( more likely bronze ) and would be a fantastic way of using up the lower Q copper.
And to add tin to the game you would just need to make it a rare material which would be randomly dug out of rock, similar to jewels now.
Repairing/Recycling
This should happen far earlier in the game than it does now, and each group should be responsible for crafting repair kits for their own craft, I have no idea why but the building class makes repair kits for everyone.
Anyone ever heard of a whetstone? Or bow string wax? I know that would make things a bit more complicated but it just never made sense to me, and it would at least add some more depth to the game.
Trading
You should be able to trade materials for materials also in the trade outpost, the thing is because coins don't really add much value right now and because you can sell to the crown easily with infinite resource items (like hats), you don't really get much from selling the other more expensive items which is why most people sell them via discord or trade partners.
Seems a waste of a building to me, would be better if you could also trade mats for mats too in the trade outpost.
On top of that it would also be nice to have a "looking to buy" part in the trade outpost, traders could then surf the outposts looking for a buyer as opposed to just looking for a seller.
Random Issues
Digging
This one is pretty simple, I think we should be able to shovel deeper than 2m if the soil is on a mountain face, as it stands those of us doing mountain design bases are nearly always caught out by building mechanics.
I am not saying that we should be able to layer it higher than 2m just shovel deeper than 2m, I have parts of my castle that I can never layer up without massive issues and I also can't dig it down because two of the tiles are connected by soil, its infuriatingly annoying and there's nothing I can do about it as if this was a normal world I would just shovel till I hit rock thus separating the link.
Wildlife
Would be nice to hear more wildlife around the place, birds flying up high in the air like eagles which we can hear every so often, little rats and mice which you can hear scrabbling around the castle.
It would also be nice to hear long distance calls of wolves, deer, foxes, owls etc just something to listen to other than the sound of wind
Lights
Well to be precise when I say lights I mean lamps/candles, would be nice to get wall lamps similar in how we have pigs heads etc, and some craft-able tables with candles on them.
Signs
Just some simple one word signs with either a flat board or an arrow like sign (with the same word on both sides), which say a variety of words like Blacksmiths, farm, windmill, town, castle, village, trade outpost, armoury, mine etc.
PvP
I am actually not going to make any suggestions or provide feedback here, as things are right now with the recent updates it's too soon to really say anything of value.
The only thing I might say regarding the new banners is that they should be wearable with tabards, and that there are far more impressive and less Japanese ways of doing coat of arms
Armour having a coat of arms painted on it for one, horses with the colours draped over them, spears and lances with pennons with the significant colours, the much smaller tabard which covers just your shoulders, the sash which goes from shoulder to waistline, the waistcoat tabard (open at the chest), helmet crests/plumes, and some knights wore a waist tabard like a dress, ailettes were also a good way of showing your colours, a knights jupon would have also been a good fit, and dear I say it a mantle but that would be a last resort as it was coined by the Knights Templar.
No offence to Japanese people but I think seeing people running around with those new banners just looks completely silly, and seeing as we still haven't really been given options regarding the many different types of European battle dress I see as a bit wasted jumping straight to such an iconic piece of Japanese culture also known as the Sashimono, for a quick fix.
