Each AoE game lasts several hundred years of in-game time, adding day/night cycles and weather phenomena would seem weird.
I’m not against day/night cycles though, because night raids are common for medieval warfare. But I feel that the effect of having nights should be extremely mild. Maybe reduce the units line of sight by 1 and that’s it. But given unit line of sights in AoE2 is typically 3-7, this may still turn out too much.
Another thing to keep in mind is that RTS games, while benefit from being realistic, is still a simulation, and should not be exactly the same as real life. Ideas like wounded units aren’t able to fight, units get afraid and flee, rainy weather slows down units, building placement not strictly following map grids, etc., are realistic, but will not make a fun game.
I’d rather have it affect gameplay as well. Empire Earth did it ages ago, no reason why it can’t happen now.
Rain, snow could affect sight and movement; roads could mitigate the movement penalty on bad weather
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Just isn’t my preference, I’m afraid. I’m not looking for AoE to be a real world simulator, and I’d probably disable any nighttime graphical possibility. I already immediately quit out of any snow maps because I don’t like the bright snow and feel it’s boring visually compared to non-snow maps. I just don’t want my maps turning dark. I’d probably find it graphically cool for a time or two, but then would steer clear after the fascination wore off.
Gameplay-wise, negatively affecting movement speed or vision would feel to me like a fatigue meter in Fallout when you run for too long. An annoying, gamey handicap to make your gaming life less enjoyable 
not unless you take its strategical advantages into battle. Right now AoE battles are all about “target the enemy unit with your units that have an advantage against that prototype”. There’s no bonus for being in specific formations, there’s no bonus for flanking, the only terrain related bonus is a damage increase if you sit higher on a hill, which irl makes no sense and that’s only in AoE 2. Have mounted units be faster when going downhill, give mounted units a damage bonus on the first attack after a charge (i think empire earth did that if i recall correctly, or it was imperium) all units be slower when going uphill, would already make terrain usage more strategical. The reduced los at night/heavy weather conditions would be a double edged sword: you can try to raid and the enemy would only notice too late, but at the same time your troops would notice enemy reinforcements too late as well
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I think having more terrain-related bonuses/impacts would be cool. Units in a forest getting some sort of cover defense bonus (maybe archer accuracy or shooting distance could get negatively impacted at the same time?)… or like you say, mounted units getting faster downhill speed. I’d be cool with a small handful of terrain-related stuff like that.
Weather or day/night cycle impacts, on the other hand just don’t do much for me for some reason. I’ll try to keep an open mind, considering the devs may very well implement something like this… but on the surface, I’m not currently too eager to see it in-game
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