Desert folklore is banned in this game for a good reason 
I agree Azza has the weakest start, although he does have one extra fish still hidden in the fog, so that's 4 food resources in total (two requiring work boats). Both of his land based food will benefit from granary, which is slightly positive. Lack of rivers is what pulls his start back from the rest. Though having a seaside capital let's him use the powerful seaside trade routes to ship foor & production, if he goes that route.
Caledorn will need a lot of effort to be able to work those mining luxuries, so he probably would have benefited with moving his capital a bit. Without desert folklore his start isn't that great.
The map is generated randomly with the exception of filtering out the most unbalanced maps. In civ 5 that means rolling and checking maps for multiple hours, since 19 out of 20 starts contain marble or salts for one of the players, el dorado next door or are otherwise ridiculously unbalanced.

I agree Azza has the weakest start, although he does have one extra fish still hidden in the fog, so that's 4 food resources in total (two requiring work boats). Both of his land based food will benefit from granary, which is slightly positive. Lack of rivers is what pulls his start back from the rest. Though having a seaside capital let's him use the powerful seaside trade routes to ship foor & production, if he goes that route.
Caledorn will need a lot of effort to be able to work those mining luxuries, so he probably would have benefited with moving his capital a bit. Without desert folklore his start isn't that great.
The map is generated randomly with the exception of filtering out the most unbalanced maps. In civ 5 that means rolling and checking maps for multiple hours, since 19 out of 20 starts contain marble or salts for one of the players, el dorado next door or are otherwise ridiculously unbalanced.

@ Ichabod for wanting to restart with Brazil. That's like shooting yourself in the foot, why? Three words: Jungle Start Basis
![[Image: russia_zps2a39ae06.jpg~original]](http://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee37/Meiz-/Civ5/russia_zps2a39ae06.jpg~original)
![[Image: brazil_zps1f3c0997.jpg~original]](http://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee37/Meiz-/Civ5/brazil_zps1f3c0997.jpg~original)
![[Image: spain_zps05eb47f3.jpg~original]](http://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee37/Meiz-/Civ5/spain_zps05eb47f3.jpg~original)
![[Image: carthage_zpsc49e0d39.jpg~original]](http://i234.photobucket.com/albums/ee37/Meiz-/Civ5/carthage_zpsc49e0d39.jpg~original)
He says he had to do something but I'm going for it.