Regarding a more continental world generation, I've been thinking the same thing since coming back to the game two days ago. As Hazzor said, the world gen at the moment comes up with something very much like a strange infinite and marshland almost devoid of any real landmarks or shape. I would love to see a world that added a tiny bit more geography to the game. Namely identifiable seas and oceans, and mountains that ran in ranges. It would really help people identify with the land and draw natural borders between territories. No longer would you describe your location as the "kingdom of grid reference 60,-36" but could instead say "the kingdom beyond the northern mountains and east of jimi hendrix bay". (assuming someone funky was put in charge of naming the bays :V)
This fictional map is a reasonable example of what I'm thinking.
http://i209.photobucket.com/albums/bb12 ... aFranc.gifThis world map from Dwarf Fortress is a nice example of mountains running in ranges, which adds a good feeling of shape to the world.
http://www.wuphonsreach.org/Games/Dwarf ... lfsize.pngIdeally those kinds of changes would also very much benefit from extra transport methods. Having larger boats such as primitive galleys or longships for practical group trade and travel (or raiding parties! :o ) to make use of these seas would be brilliant. Adding extra water depths such as "sea" or "ocean" and making it impossible for normal rafts and rowboats to cross these rougher waters (Like the Civ games) would make these large vessels quite special.
http://www.turbosquid.com/HDView/index. ... 46/r/3/i/9If mountain ranges were also added, it would likely have the side effect of limiting over land travel a fair bit instead by reducing quite how intricate the network of rivers normally is. Which would make that long desired addition of horses ever more relevant.
I realise it's all a rather ambitious thing to ask of the devs, but the thread was here, so I posted. Longships would be awesome ya?.