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sometimes your at the edge of the mountains, other times your in deep (keep the world from being repetitive) exc exc but yeah it might be getting too sparse at its worst.

That makes perfect sense.  In my head that's what the small hills and large hills regions are for with mountainous being the "you're in deep"  which is why I was surprised by the wide variety. 

After generating a perfectly good map I decided to try one more yesterday and I got another really sparse Mountainous map.  This time I'm sure it was mountainous but this looks too sparse to me.

Then I generated 10 more.  Most of them are fine but I did get a couple more that had a lot of tiny mountains leaving the vast majority of the map wide open.  Since it looks like the majority of the maps are generating well it may not be worth your time to address.  It isn't hard to just reroll a few times.  But if there is a way to reduce the spread between the lots of little mountain masses and few big ones it could be nice to stabilize the generation a bit.

I admit, I am happy to realize that I wasn't in fact imagining the sparseness though getting so many like that must have been pretty hard to achieve!

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So... I'm kind of at a loss, especially if you rerolled 10 times.

It was probably a combination of clicking on the wrong map tile (though I'm picky about stone type so I do usually look) and yesterday just really not being my day.  I just generated a new one and while there is definitely less mountain mass than vanilla because it doesn't block out an entire side of the map, there is a lovely large 'C' shaped mountain that is plenty big to work with.  Apologies for sending you on a wild goose chase because I can't click. 

I absolutely love the way things look so far.  It's nice to have the biomes be actually different beyond temperature and which tree you see. 

I don't know if I just had some serious RNG fluke but it looks like the amount of mountain on Mountainous maps has been drastically reduced from vanilla generation.  I generated 10 or so mountainous temperate forests yesterday and they all had roughly the same mountain prevalence as the vanilla large hills maps.  I like having the great big wall of stone to build in and that definitely wasn't there.

I've been building a bed out of silver as someone suggested earlier in this thread and it has saved Engie more than once.  The huge mood boost from a good build (current one is Superior) but even a lesser one helped her immunity/bleeding heal.  After a bad fight she ended up infected and bleeding but she overcame both with 98% on the infection when immunity hit.  I think that was the most intense moment I've had in this game.  So, with a good bed, bleeding is not 100% death.

For raiders I've been building a few little single post walls around and putting roofs over them to shoot from behind.

Couple interesting notes/exploits:
The communication console even unbuilt acts like a wall. I use it for the back of my house to allow for quick expansion without resource loss. Not sure what other buildables work this way but ill need to experiment. Similar to what some of the other players have been doing.

The comm console and the paste dispenser both work that way.  Also unbuilt walls (materials loaded but work forbid).  I've used it a bit but it just feels too cheesy and I don't anymore.

I haven't had any problems with plants dying from opening the doors, are you using double doors?  If you are and you're still getting that much heat loss you probably just need another heater or a smaller space as you're hovering to close to too cold.  My starter hut is big enough to hold the research bench 1 heater and engie's bed with the only open space the interaction spot in front of the door (not a perfect rectangle).  Stuff that falls far from home just gets ignored until someone brings her a warm parka.

Something I've been wondering now that I finally have a dedicated hydro room is how batteries/windmills work.  Since the windmill has down time and super high output at others is there an optimal number of batteries per windmill to catch as much power as possible during the high times?

I tried solar at first too until I discovered the days get drastically shorter in the winter.  I'm finding wind with lots of batteries as buffers to be working all right as I expand.

The new save with the improved Engie is going WAY easier than the old version.  Partly because I have a clue what I'm doing but the quick turnaround on the smelter (I think I had it built on day 6?) makes a huge difference in speed of play.  I'm in late spring year 1 with a nice hydro room and am getting started building real defenses.  This despite not getting my first bulk goods trader until midwinter (then two more during spring).

She's still all alone but so far a simple flu and the loss of her sister is all that has ailed her.  I'm almost ready to welcome another colonist should a decent one come along.

Day 61: Engie is struggling to overcome plague and missing her right foot. Another bulk goods trader comes buy with more components and takes all our leather armchairs without asking what kind of leather they're made from.

Day 64:  Back on her feet and working with Jupiter to clean up the base all three rally together to fight off two scythers.  Tom takes a headshot and goes down.  Engie takes two to the chest and dies. Jupiter takes out one scyther but the last one kills her instantly with a shot through the heart.  Tom lays there and bleeds out while the scyther destroys all they built.

Turns out food wasn't the issue.  The number of traders on this run was crazy high compared to my other ones but in exchange I had very few cargo pods and only 1 single ship chunk.  I was happy with the tradeoff but it was interesting.  I'm getting way better at the combat mechanics but I'm still pretty terrible.  It's been so tempting to turn down the difficulty to accommodate but so far I've resisted. 

I think I'm going to take a little break before starting again with the new and improved Engie save. 

I've been playing this challenge since a few hours after it was issued.  I think it took me 5+ tries to even get the first structure built (I was WAY too ambitious at first).  Previously I'd never played on a difficulty higher than rough and mostly on basebuilder with Phoebe so this game has forced me to actually develop my non-existant combat/defensive skills.  I'm loving it!

My first run that made it past the first day actually made it to early winter.  Had some warm clothes and a generous thrumbo kept the cannibalism to a minimum and then I got my first bulk goods trader!  I was so excited I probably took half an hour trying to decide what Engie needed most.  Then, before the goods were even put away a Scyther came through and killed her.  I lost two more good runs to scythers before I got combat figured out. 

Run 18 (old Engie 0 research save)-  Day 5: Bulk goods trader!  At the same time Engie's brother wanders up and dies so Engie ends up with a few more precious resources and a 2 season long mood penalty.

A lone raider came and donated a camelhair parka and muffalo wool tuque just in time to help survive a solar flare.  Toasty warm.

Day 12: An exotic goods trader came and takes all the raiders clothes off my hands.

Day 14: Another Bulk goods trader!  Sweet!

Day 16: A kid wanders up, not good at anything but willing to do everything and Engie's feeling good after the traders so she gives him a shot.  Roman joins the colony.

Day 17: Scyther gets lucky and downs Engie with a shot to the leg. Roman picks up Engie's charge rifle and takes out the scyther in one shot.  Good thing she kept him around! 

Day 19: Patched up and back to business she notices Roman isn't inside and rushes to rescue the fool who got stoned and forgot he doesn't have warm clothes yet. After warning him off drugs and patching up his frostbitten toes she locks him inside.

Day 21:  The desperation of starvation has set in.  Engie butchers corpses to give them a chance to stay alive and while the food is welcome to both Engie snaps halfwaythrough the grisly task.  In a panicked attempt to block her outside Roman barricades the door, but with himself on the wrong side of the barricade.  Quickly realizing his mistake he manages to fix it while Engie punches him in the face.  While hiding inside and listening to Engie scream obscenities through the door he realizes he should have seen it coming when he saw Engie's last snowman holding a club.

Day 22: Eventually calm, Engie spends her days watching the sunrise and going for long walks trying to figure out how she got where she is but unable to reach any satisfactory answers she breaks again and wanders in a daze until she collapses from exhaustion. 

Day 23: Roman has a terrible time in his single player chess match and goes on a rampage.  It takes him a while but he eventually finds Engie as she drags herself home and they proceed to have a fistfight.  Despite her state Engie's experience serves her well and she knocks him out.  A feeling of peace and hope comes over her and she patches him up praying tomorrow will be better.

Roman and Engie are both still on edge and mending when a pirate raid charges.  Two succumb to the cold before they even got close, one finally went down after Engie shot him 6 times and the last fled.  Still bruised Engie crawls into bed for some much needed rest.

Day 24: While she's sleeping Roman is left with his dark thoughts and he snaps again.  He throws her out of bed and starts punching her over and over.  She goes down quickly but he just stands over her waiting for her to get up so he can knock her down again.

Day 25: Salvation!  Engie's lover, Tom, arrives and charges to her rescue.  He knocks him out and leaves Roman out in the cold getting some satisfaction seeing his rival die. 

Day 30: While very grateful for his assistance and research expertise Engie is a bit gunshy after her experience with Roman and still can't decide if she really wants to keep Tom around until a big pile of eggs and nutrient paste fall from the sky and she decides to give it a go.

Day 36:  Things are looking up and Tom proposes.  Engie supposes that even if she does have to do all the cleaning and hauling it is pretty nice having another warm body around so she accepts.

Day 40: A bulk goods trader!  While Engie sits on the comm bartering for their supplies a mercenary wanders up and hands Tom his muffalo wool parka and then walks  back out into the cold without a word.  A bit confused but far too grateful to refuse Tom is happy to be warm again. 

Day 47: Wedding Day!  Spring is here and life is good after that dark dark winter.

Day 49: Tom leaves the smelter running when there's no wind for the generators draining the batteries and killing all the crops.  He decides it's time to face reality and that if he wants to keep his new bride alive it's butchering time.  Still unhappy about it Engie finds cannibalism easier to bear with Tom by her side and even finds a little mean happiness eating her Roman burger.

Day 51:  A pirate merchant swings by taking all the raiders ratty clothes.

Day 54:  Tom once again proves his love for Engie when 2 scythers charge.  One takes Engie down with a shot to her bad leg but Tom kills them both before they can do any lasting damage.  While he's rescuing Engie a bulk goods trader arrives.  Tom doesn't know what to do with himself, he never could handle himself on the comm and while standing there flustered Jupiter waltzes in and starts barking out orders.  She sends Tom to tend Engie and talks down the traders to an excellent price on some desperately needed components and materials.

Day 60: Neither Engie nor Tom has mustered up the courage to send Jupiter packing.  She's just been SO useful Tom feels a bit sidelined and very glad he's married to Engie or he probably would have been sent packing in her place.  After the last trader it seems like there might be enough materials for an expansion.  Supporting a third colonist is risky though...

And that is when I went to bed last night.  One full year in and possibly enough materials for sufficient food and power production but so much risk... I ended up here making a forum account and sharing the story rather than play it to the end I know is so rapidly headed my way.