Which world settings (other than all balanced/moderate) are worth/fun playing?

I play on hard/hard, large map size with 5 opponents.

Above avg wildlands.  Dense monsters.  Normal resources and magic.

I actually modded in a 'Ludicrous' monster setting (which is included with my Rise of the Magi mod) that really kicks it up a notch!

I find most settings fun, the thing I learned from my own experiences.

Map Type: random
 I find that this increases my "excitement" about each new map, as each game will be created in a much different manner.
Wildland freq: none
 To my experience, wildlands are bugged, I usually end up being charged by the biggest and baddest wildland monsters around turn 50 on half my games, and in general I don't think the wildlands add much to the game.
Magic Strength: Moderate to dense
 I just find that on "Sparse" there is not enough shards of the type of magic that I like, moderate is the one I run with and I get around 1-2 shards at some point, towards the element that I like... during the common game, before it is really decided who won.
Resource Frequency: Sparse
 I prefer this, just to parse out crystals, iron, horses, and wargs, I feel these are the key resources and I like the feeling that each separate of them are important, and viable to go to war for.
 So I feel that putting resources on sparse gives a much better incentive to "hunt" iron and crystals fiercely.

The rest of the settings I usually leave at moderate.
I find it funny to play with "Dense" quests, but feel Altar gets too big an advantage on this (So I only turn it on when I am not playing Altar).
I Also prefer to crank random events to the max, gives a nice change of pace sometimes when random stuff is thrown at you.
But really, most of these options are depending on the player.
I usually play on medium sized maps.

Edit: Edited for clarity and grammar

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

I like large map, maximum everything, challenging world and AI player difficulty, AI surrender often.

I've been having quite a bit of fun in the 1.3 betas, in my latest game Gilden took over most of the map, almost built the Magic Towers, lost them, but then the The World Becomes More Dangerous came and spawned a Dragon Camp in my territory.  I held on with just one big conclave and one fairly big town, lost the town at one stage then got it back within two seasons.  I solidified in my two cities until I got a Fell Dragon (playing as a Custom Empire Sov) and that allowed me to survive and start eating into Gilden's massive Empire.

I have picked up the Potential and Trainer skills for my Sov and Custom Henchmen, and my champions are now high level and the Fell Dragon is Level 26.  I lost the Fell Dragon Camp a certain time after I built it (I'm not sure whether rebuilding it gives you another Dragon, may be an exploit) but the Fell Dragon stayed with me (this makes sense, I don't think they should desert, but maybe instead of getting another Dragon you have a ceiling on number of dragons - you can lose camps and still keep your dragons, but rebuilding Dragon Camps should not give you additional Dragons - not sure whether this happens or not).

Btw: is it possible to include for LH the ability for Henchmen to have Death Magic Adept skills (instead of Life Magic Adept Skills) for Fallen Altar Blood Sovereigns?  Altar Blood Sovs can have Empire allegiance, but their Henchmen have the four Adept elemental skills plus Life Adept rather than Death Adept skills, even though they are Empire.

Thanks for your answers

I just took a look at the XML files, seems that "Wildlands" settings does not have an effect at the momento, as the number of wildlands is determined by the map size regardless of what you choose.

For my first 1.3 game I tried a setting with dense monsters and Ravaged land. Increases the RPG feeling a lot! BUT it really feels like "Strategy in a RPG world"

Thanks so much for your answers Kongdej

I just checked the XML and seems that each map type enables or disables terrain types (Generic, Mountains, Desert, Chasms, Rugged, Fertile, Swamps, Forests). Random just enables all of them. I suppose that for a game with less city spots you have to go for map types that disable the "Fertile" type.

Doesn't "dense" make too easy to cast high cost spells? On the other hand shards still have to be built, so it is limited by city materials or gold. I suppose that using Sparse resources prevents from building shards too fast.

According the XML, Sparse gives 2 shards per sector (there are 42 sectors in a large map), Moderate gives 3 shards per sector and Dense gives 5. So Sparse is a 33% less of shards and dense dobules the number of shards.

In this case Moderate is one resource per each 25 tiles, with Sparse making it one per each 50 tiles and Dense one per each 12.5 tiles. Seems very interesting and enjoyable to have limited resource points that really have to be fought for. My question is, can it result in situations where some factions don't have enough resources are have absolutely no chance to survive? Or can it be compensated somehow?

Well, if I want to cast high-cost spells, I can find other solutions than putting the shards on dense.
While it is true, it is still up to the player to decide, I find most my mana comes from Conclave cities, when I am aiming harshly after mana.

Edit: It does help though, I only turn it to dense when I "Crave" that high-magic game

I have seen these situations on moderate amounts of resources, of course sparse might increase the chance, but I don't mind that too much, chances is its gonna be me too
I only reroll maps if there are no settleable spots (I consider that a bug), or... When I crash... (latest patch increased my crashing to somewhere around 1 crash per hour)
I enjoy sometimes having the "lesser hand" in these games, since it makes me work harder for the win, which is also why I use random type maps, and sparse resources. All these settings will be dependant on the player, each player to they're own settings.

Edit: I will sometimes force a lesser hand into a win/lose though, if there is nowhere left for me to "out-grow" the lesser hand, I will force a war I see some potential of winning.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

I usually go with all random, but stopped since it sometimes made me be in a world with plenty of both magic and resources. Since then, I play on moderate or sparce... I like sparce even more, because then you are really constrained by the very few resources you find and tend to struggle a lot more against an ai for the few resources you might compete for. Plus, it really gives a sense of Cataclysm! (In plenty is like "What is this? A Cataclysm occurred? Why is everything so nice and green?.

Other than that, I always play with dense monsters and above average wildlands, because I like them a lot... Even if now and then they just go and kill a city of someone. 

I like playing with dense monsters, above average wildlands, and above average random events.  Dense monsters means more of a challenge in the early to mid game, with more opportunities for leveling up champions & sov.  The wildlands are fun as I enjoy the feeling of being threatened by hostile lands when I settle on the border.  And random events are just awesome, as they can dramatically change up the game and keep things from getting stale.  So the more of those the better!