I've been wondering - how do you evaluate if a map is good - number of cities, the shape of the road network, what commodities are being produced?
There's a whole number of factors. The one's you listed are pretty major. But also:
1. North-South dockyard connection. I like to have at least 3 docks connecting the north, the middle and the south, and if there's a 4th one in the far east then it's perfect.
2. Distance of the nearest city to wilderness. I wouldn't say the amount of cities matters so long as you have a couple that are positioned well for mid/endgame.
3. Hunter's cabins, unless poacher origin.
4. Mountains and river forks fucking up the road system, rendering escort missions, which are bad on their own, even worse by making them longer, but also prolonging general travel time.
5. It's been a while since I've played a non-peasant militia origins, but I've read hedge knights are rarer now apparently. Having easily accessible citadels for recruitment is important.
6. Starting bros traits and talents (not an issue on most origins though).
7. As far as trading commodities go, with the addition of Blazing Sands it's one step forward two steps back. It's really difficult to get your rep with the south up. But you can still make a profit if you sell incense, spices and silk to northern cities. Ideally you'd sell gems and dyes in the south. It's a really good way to earn money early on, but by the mid game I only trade if I'm already passing through settlement A to settlement B. The important bit here is that the settlements are in close proximity, or you have two groups of settlements with commodities that are accessible via docks. Dock prices scales with distance and number of bros, so you could make a lot of money trading with fewer bros while using docks.
8. More importantly I'd say, are cities/villages with workshops for tools near the wilderness and citadels with armor/weapon smithies. For late game anyway.
9. It's better if the cities are more tightly placed obviously. I've seen some pretty nasty spreads.
Probably also other stuff I've forgotten. Point being you'll almost never get a map that is excellent in every single factor. Most important are the docks though, if I don't get good docks I reroll the seed.
And of course, all of this is modified one way or another by the origin and retinue you choose.