JudasIscariot: Perhaps it has less races due to the fact that some races might've been far too similar?
For example, let's take MoM...again :)
You have how many Elven races? Dark Elves, Wood Elves, and I think High Elves? For me, they're
almost cookie cutter. They all have an innate magical attack but the graphic for it may be different, their units until you get to the later parts of their tech tree are almost the same technically (correct me if I am wrong :) ) and, well, they're all Elves :P
I can definitely see your point about losing unique races in a series but I also don't see the necessity of having three races do pretty much the same thing.
(please don't take this as me ragging on MoM, everyone, I still like the game but it helps to step back and try to look at tit critically :) )
No. There are two elven races and only the dark elves have ranged magical attack. You know, the myrran plane elves with the doom bolt magicians and the nightblades/nightmares?
The high elves (on arcanus) have the longbowmen and elven lords + pegasi.