Ok, so I know that this is supposed to be a ruined world and all that, but after several playthroughs one of the things that has really stuck out to me (aside from the stuff we all know and SD has acknowledged) is that it is REALLY difficult with some locations to not only expand, but to even know where you CAN expand.

So, yes, we can't see which areas produce food/materials unless we have a pioneer out. It's a poor system, as we should have a strategic overlay for that information available to us at all times. Still, I "get it" and if it has to be this way, then fine.

What really bugs me is that there is not even any visual indication of if an area might possibly be settleable.

While doing initial exploring and you find a cluster of gold mine, scenic outlook, and a shrine. All nestled up to a forest with some tufts of grass outside. Great! Let's break out the hiking boots and get some contractors over there. 12 turns of production and moving later... Ummm.... Can't build? Why? Is it the hill? The trees? This area looks not one jot different from the place that my starting city was founded except for the better resources.

To this end, we REALLY need several things to make the strategic expansion aspect of this game make sense.

* First off, there needs to be a clearly visible indicator either of where CAN be settled or where CANNOT. Additionally, there are areas of the world where these few settleable pockets are very few and far between (considering the 8 tile moratorium on additional construction). That means there is a random crapshoot before turn one which will have a massive impact on the ability of the player to be competetive with the computer, which will not be clearly apparent for a good 50-100 turns.

* Second, there are WAY too many resources out in places where they can't be settled and are VERY difficult to protect. I'm all good with that, but is it even worth loading things that wouldn't be worth the trouble? Iron ore in the middle of a desert 14 tiles from your nearest city? That is a pioneer, 10 turns, and then another 7 turns to get there to protect it for a measly 1 metal/turn. Alternately, you can station two units there and waste 4 gold/turn. Please either scale resource value so that if they are hard to protect they are worth getting (remember those old ventri mines?). Otherwise, these are things that are almost always ignored as not worth the time/trouble to gather and therefore really dont have any place in the game.

* Third, Please give us a strategic overlay for tile output that can be turned on and off so we can plan our empires without scouting with a pioneer.