While I am a fan of this game I am just now noticing some issues that are totally unacceptable I will number them out so the staff can easily see them and take proper action.

1. Novice difficulty is too hard, I keep get steamrolled by the AI within 20 to 30 turns, they have a huge military and many more cities than I can make. The novice difficulty should be easy, I mean its supposedly the easiest oppenent to beat. Therefore one would assume the Ai would be a push over, well its not.

2. I am starting WAY to close to other empires even on large maps, with in 10 tens I have seen 1 to 3 empires, that is also unacceptable, when starting out I dont want to encounter another nation for at least 50 to 100 turns on large maps.

3. The Ai is currently too aggressive, I have them declaring war on me almost the moment I meet them, this is unacceptable. Military strength should not play as big of factor as it does, and besides who walks up to someone they just met and punches them in the face for no reason.

 4. Start out positons, I keep getting shafted with those as well, with mainly just a patch of fertile land, while other games I get the jackpot, it would be nice to have more resources at the start location.

Well thats it for now... Im just sick of getting my ass handed to me by the EASIEST AI setting, if I wanted a challenge I would not be playing against a novice. Now perhaps if the novice AI would turtle for like 500 turn then become more nasty thats fine but not early game, it takes a lot of the enjoyment out of the game when I have to worry about getting steamrolled early on when my empire is not even ready to feild a basic defense force.