Comment by NickC25

Ironically the starting position that I've found to be the most balanced for black and white is just swapping the starting square of the bishops and knights.

It turns normally-sound opening moves like 1.d4 and 1.e4 into liabilities and emphasizes the knights as blocking material to occupy squares like d2 and e2 , but the tradeoff is that a early-developed bishop can get a lot more active centrally via an open wing.

Such a layout makes for a very cautious opening phase where neither side really feels comfortable giving up much material. Really a fascinating setup.