2nd this, I want to spread my enemies out!

Honestly that basic rule seems a little stupid. If there are 4 players, and 6 systems, why should only 2 of those start out populated? From a gameplay perspective it seems obvious that anyone playing with few players and lots of systems wants to have plenty of room to expand before encountering enemies, otherwise they'd have more players or less systems. From a story perspective it seems incredibly convenient that only 2 of the 6 nearby systems were populated, and each with 2 species...

Maybe it's just the turtle in me but that does not seem like a good rule at all. A much better one IMHO would be to place 1 player in each system, then if some are left over place 2 in each system, then 3 etc. Seems like there's too much of a 'New World' situation when traveling to other systems, like it's a place where no one lives and your old system is overpopulated by too many species...certainly interesting but not that much fun IMHO.

What is really dumb is that even with 2 players, 10 systems, and 10 planets per system you still start out with the AI in the same system as you. I'd love to be able to set it up so I could start in one system, the AI in another, and have multiple systems between us. To me, that would feel a lot more like a war between 'Solar Empires' than the current situation where it feel like a couple of upstarts who barely deserve the name of Empire at all, and much less Solar Empire since they each have only 5 or so planets when they start fighting.

I hope your not referring to the exploitation of the Americas by Europeans, where there were in fact many people living here, and they just got shoved out of the way by the Europeans who divied up their lands without so much as a "howdoyado?". Some of the most shameful, despicable, and horrid acts in history lie in that particular POS attitude.