That is, the variance between the quality of starting positions. Played about 25 full games; another 25 or so started but abandoned early for various reasons.
Sometimes you get a rather weak start town location, low on essence with only 6-7 total pips; sometimes you get a strong one.
Sometimes ther'es piles of settleable new cities nearby; sometimes there's barely any (recently had one with no valid settlement locations for quite aways in al directions. Is there any pattern or reason to what kinds of places get better essence/food/material yields? and i'm not playing random so that shouldn't cause it.
I'd suggest a standardization to start locations; at least as an option; while dealing with randomness to some degree is fun; you're first city is so essential, and every turn you spend wandering to find a location is a turn your entire economy and gameplay is set back. It's quite common in games to have a more fixed start, or at least, some well-defined local requirements [e.g. the square you spawn on must always be settleable].
In civ5, while it did some things wrong, one thing that's good is that you ALWAYS spawn with 2 luxury resources in range; while the numbers of others you get when you explore farther may vary, you're guaranteed at least a reasonable base to work with.
In moo2; you're home planet properties have a default, and can be adjusted with points in race creation; again this helps ensure a reasonably equitable start, though people can still get lucky with other habitable planets in thier home system.
Not sure what the best defaults would be for FE; 4/3/2 seems a bit high, maybe 3/3/2 default on the spawn square, with a guaranteed 1 or 2 bonus resources of some type in adjacent squares?
