discussion on founding fathers
minuit is pretty useless, he doesnt prevent the indians getting angry about you using the land, just about you taking the land in the first place. If you use minuit a lot, you'll have a lot of indian raids. Better is to find spaces between the native settlements, or take them out anyway.
de soto is great, with the alway positive rumours. fountain of youths and one of the seven cities really make for a good start. Washington is a good help for training your soldiers. The two i like best are stuyvesant and Franklin. One allows trade with the home country even during independence war and allows for custom offices (trade without ships), and the other means that everybody offers you peace and european wars dont affect you. All the others depend on your playing style. However, hernan cortez works great with de soto. You find a treasure, move the scout, build city, free transport! And afterwards, you abandon the town, resurrect the scout, and off you go again. You'll go through a lot of city names though
starting places. Well, in random games, you'll see for yourself. In america, up north is great, as is down south. The islands are a bit tougher but you can make a lot of small towns and get a fast hit in the sugar market, plus your towns are usually safe from natives. You are much more vulnerable to other europeans though, so get Franklin!
Dutch are good to play with, since their market holds better and you start with a bigger ship. The english colonies grow faster, and the french dont have to worry about the natives too much, especially not if they also get pocahontas. Since attacking natives earns you penalty points and is usually too much trouble compared to the rewards, the spanish make a convincing 4th place