What map settings do you use/what do you look for in a SP map?

[Buster's Uncle]

In my case, I play Gaians, so capture - and EC for the ones I don't.  I generally play with research cranked as high as possible without losing EC -or losing much- and make up the difference on worms.

[Lord Avalon]

Most of you seem to choose abundant native life. Why is that? Is it to farm mind worms or for some other reason?

Farming, sure, though for me it's more about making things a little harder: you're constrained in base location and moving around the map (but build Xenoempathy Dome, and you're zipping around).  There's also the 25% bonus to score.

[Green1]

Abundant life adds to the richness, difficulty, and danger. No game other than Fallen Enchantress can covey a world that is out to get you. Particularly early game.

[Kirov]

Most of you seem to choose abundant native life. Why is that? Is it to farm mind worms or for some other reason?

It's one of the basic ways to increase difficulty at least a little, together with high rockiness and high air moisture, so that the AI benefits more from its pathetic terraforming.

[Green1]

I am also quite a fan of tech stag and I have also altered the alphax.txt to get rid of the stupid mandatory retirement year. Time victory in any Civ game has always annoyed me. I could give two cruds about score.

[Pickly]

Large maps, generally leave everything else about average.  I like to expand a lot and builld very large empires, so big maps are better for that.  Otherwise, I've just never thought to try other climate conditions for the world.

[JarlWolf]

I like playing abundant planet life because it presents more of a challenge. I typically play more industrial factions and seething swarms of mind worms make it even more survivalistic and gritty.

[Menelaus]

Huge, abundant, dense, 50-70%, no pod scattering, average erosion. I like to build a bit before running into neighbors. I have a minor naval focus so water is not a big deal. I play Spartans so too much isolation is bad for research in the absence of pods. I like to harvest worms for cash/free units. I self limit to the named bases so ICS is fine, but only to a point. I limit my use of crawlers to one per base (keeps me in check) ex if I have 10 bases I should have 10 crawlers or less on the map. No crawlers are cashed for secret projects but it is ok to build extra projects and switch before completion. In the end the only real reason is that I enjoy the game more this way and it supports my hybrid style. The no pod scattering is a recent tweak. I would prefer some of the lost monoliths and resources back but would rather not have the Easter egg hunt even though it favors my faction.

[Alfapiomega]

I almost always play on huge map, transcend, 50-70% oceans, abundant life forms, sparse rainfall, tech stagnation and so on

I like the big conflicts too. Now even more when I learned about the unofficial patch that helps AI to gain more from teraforming (the difference in difficulty is imo huge).

[Green1]

I will say there IS something to be said about tiny planets, too. One of the tensest games I ever played was on a tiny planet, agressive AI, tech stag with all Alien Crossfire factions with Miriam replacing the Pirates. I steamrolled through the Aliens till Free Drone air power stopped me in my tracks. Then, a nuke or two on Morgan later, a brutal two way war with Aki and the Drones with nukes going off and scrambling to build pressure domes to cope with sea levels. At the end, it was Kevin Costner time.

[Buster's Uncle]

"Kevin Costner time"?

You pissed away your career being a bad director?

[Green1]

"Kevin Costner time"?

You pissed away your career being a bad director?

Well... Waterworld was a decent premise, if not poorly acted and directed.