Regarding suggestion 1, I think a few of them could be improved in different ways. Before I address specific lines, I'll address one of the problematic situation - talents that would be most useful for characters that don't satisfy the conditions for them, like Skilled or Hardy.
How do I address this issue? How about making it so that getting the stat-boost talent allows the player to activate any talent that has a condition based on that stat? So, for instance, if you get the Learned talent, then you can activate all of the Skilled line, even if your after-Learned Learning stat is less than 9 (meaning, definitely less than 15). Similarly, if you get the Tough talent, then you can activate all of the Hardy line even with a tiny Toughness stat.
I also want to note that Silver Tongue should become more valuable once the Casino exploit is closed - that is, once gold becomes less trivial to obtain. I don't think it really needs any improvement.
- Skilled line: I can see three other options except the "boosted dice" option. First, there's the option of extra skill increases - perhaps it could be one extra skill increase every third level for Skilled, every second level for Very Skilled, and then either two in every three levels or every level for Extremely Skilled (depending on which works better for balance, etc). Second, there's the option of randomised boosts - they can be very small, if necessary, but the obvious option would be, say, 1d2-1 free increase to skill points for every skill on each level up (meaning, about half of all skills will get 1 free skill point on a level up) for Very Skilled, as an example. Third is the option of modifying when the skill dice values are changed.
- Weapon Affinities/etc: Perhaps they could increase with weapon skill points? They would each need to be tweaked right, but for instance, perhaps for swords, you get a +1 to-hit and +1 damage for a completely untrained skill, increasing to, say, +4 to-hit, +4 damage and +2 DV for Grand Mastery. It would add more value to the idea of training up your affinity. Ambidextrous could perhaps, rather than simply boosting to-hit a little bit, also negate the left-hand penalty for anything where it cares (notably rings). Perhaps it could also grant an extra +2 damage for two-handed weapons (increased strength in your weaker hand = more total ability to control the hit for greater damage).
- Hardy line: First, see note about alternate method of accessing it early if you have a low initial Toughness. With that made possible, this doesn't look so bad... I'd just slightly balance the numbers of HP you get for each talent - +4 for Hardy, +6 for Very Hardy, and +8 for Extremely Hardy. I'd like to actually choose a value for this that goes well with the effect of Tough - that is, how many HP you typically get for the toughness increase that Tough gives (at least early in the game) - but I don't know where to find an estimate of that amount.
- Aura line: Same as Hardy line - tweak it slightly to make it give +4 for potent aura, +6 for strong aura, and +8 for mighty aura. Same net result, slightly more value to the lower ones.
- Pious line: What if it also reduced the rate of increase in cost? Currently, the cost is a quadratic function given by the triangular numbers, which I assume is implemented by adding the number of prayers of that type so far to the previous multiplier (so the multiplier starts at 1 on first prayer, then adds 2 on second prayer to make 3, then adds 3 on third prayer to make 6, and so on). What if, on getting the Pious talent, it only adds n*4/5, rounded to nearest number? So on second prayer it adds 2*4/5 = 8/5 = 2 (rounding). On third prayer, though, it adds 3*4/5 = 12/5 = 2 (rounding down, now), which means the multiplier after three prayers is now only 5, rather than 6. Added to the 5% decrease in total price, it's not too bad. For Very Pious, it might only add n*3/5, so the second prayer would add 2*3/5 = 6/5 = 1, and the third prayer would add 3*3/5 = 2, so after three prayers it's now only 4. For Saint, it might reduce it to n*2/5, giving an increase of 2*2/5 = 4/5 = 1 on second prayer and 3*2/5 = 6/5 = 1 on third prayer, so it's now only 3. In fact, I'd assert that, even with the 5% decrease removed, this would be a more beneficial talent.
- Mechanically Inclined: Two ideas, here - either make it also do something similar to Sixth Sense (but not as much), or have it also benefit other skills, etc (I'm thinking Bridge Building, Pick Locks, and Detect Traps, and also boosting crossbow loading speed?).
- Strong Legs: In addition to its affect on kicking, it should have a small impact on movement cost... say, reducing it by 10 (so, from 1000 to 990 for regular situations)? After all, strong legs should make you a faster walker.
- Healthy/Charged: Perhaps also increase by one "stage" the skill increase dice for the Healing and Concentration skills?
- Learner line: +10% for each is way too much, in my opinion. +5% for each should maintain a reasonable balance. This gives a 10.25% increase with both, which is reasonable in my opinion. If the stat-boost talents get improved to +3, then each of the two could grant a +1 to Learning, as well - this would help to solidify it as a learning-oriented talent line, and give it a little more value without excessively altering the experience rate.
- Book Learner line: Perhaps also reduce time required to learn from a book? +10% to spell knowledge learned and -20% time required to learn it for each talent would work well, I think - useful for when you need to learn a spell fairly quickly.
- Durable Magic: Also reduce the chance of a bolt spell being shrugged by, say, 20%, and this should become a valuable talent (durable can also mean more "solid", making it harder to shrug off).
- Extended Magic: Add one to ball spell range, and this should be more valuable.
- Immune to Pain: Reduce negative effects of sickness as well.
- Wealthy line and Boon to the family: Assuming that stat-boost talents get boosted to +3, these could each give a +1 to a stat. I'm thinking Wealthy gives +1 Appearance, Very Wealthy gives +1 Charisma, Filthy Rich gives +1 Learning (best teachers that money could buy), and Boon to the Family gives +1 Mana.
Can I also suggest a few class-specific talents, to go with the "elite" category? They could include talent pairs where you get one at Level 1 (with a class requirement), and then, if you have that one, you can get another one from the "elite" category later on... or get access to an "elite" talent earlier... perhaps with a few other talents required along the way.
For example, I could see a set of Wizard talents, something like this:
Starting:
- Focused: Requires Level 1 and Wizard, adds 20+5d4 skill points to Concentration skill (grants it with 20+5d4 points if not given it already).
- Booklover: Requires Level 1 and Wizard, starts with extra spellbook, spellbooks have 20% lower chance of being destroyed due to destruction effects (fire, shock, ice, acid, runes, etc). Literacy also guaranteed to be at 100 (assuming it isn't already).
Regular:
- Tactical Caster: Requires Wizard and Careful, aggressive tactics increases power of offensive spells (by appropriate amount), DV boosts of defensive tactics increased by +2 when casting spells (meaning, on the turn that the spell is cast).
- Fast Reader: Requires Booklover and Good Learner, reduces time required to either cast from book or learn from book by a third (bringing bookcasting time down from 3x to 2x).
Elite:
- Solid Aura: Requires Focused, Mighty Aura, and Level 42+, absorb 50% of damage from any attack (rounded down) using PP rather than HP when in defensive tactics (when PP at zero, normal damage to HP, of course).
- Warrior Mage: Requires Focused, Tactical Caster, Grand Mastery of at least one weapon, and level 48+, grants the ability to simultaneously cast a spell and attack in melee (only with weapons you have Grand Mastery in, though). Used on casting, asks you to choose direction to attack - choose yourself ('5') to not attack.
- Staff Magic: Requires Focused, Affinity with Staves, Grand Mastery of Staves, and level 36+, combines effects of Durable Magic, Strong Magic, Extended Magic, and Strong Healer (doubles up on each if you already have them), but only if wielding a staff.
- Wizened: Requires Wizard, Long-Lived, aged to Old, and Level 39+... OK, I'm not sure what to do with this, I'll admit. But the idea of an "elite" talent based on age (thereby giving a new value to unnatural aging, and potentially giving "younger" races and longevity more value) is just too interesting for me to ignore.
Those are just ideas, of course, and I'm sure there's a balance issue somewhere. Keep in mind that Elite talents with a lot of requirements should really be relatively overpowered compared with others - the requirements should help to prevent it from becoming overly unbalanced. Note that I came up with Warrior Mage as an idea for an "award" for playing a wizard with more focus on melee rather than heavy dependency on casting.