So there was nothing in the distribution that guaranteed a semi well playable deck? Just the rare/common/uncommon cards?
Well, it's absolutely no different than hundreds of other customizable card games that have come and gone. A single starter deck (per person) is absolutely playable. However, you get 3 or so Rare cards in a Starter or maybe 2 per Booster, and there's a 121 rare cards out of 363 total cards in the set, so like every CCG, the system is set up for you to buy lots and lots of cards.
Of course, the Rare cards are generally awesome/fun, and the commons are relative filler, but there's some real good uncommon cards, and you just go from there.
If so what card distribution would you suggest for a beginner. eg: 20% Ships, 20% Actions, ... Just a rule of thumb.
It kind of doesn't matter? One person might go 20% ships and another person 60%, based on their strategy. That's why ever starter is playable. Like I mentioned above, the real meat of the game is in Luck, Maneuvers and Battle Damage. Just in rough terms, about half your deck should be those cards. 10-15% of the deck could be nav points/nav point modifiers/carrier/carrier/secret orders. The rest can be ships, or you split the rest evenly between ships, pilots and weapon systems depending on your strategy of throwing more cannon fodder out there or crafting elite tricked out fighter squadrons.
Probably though, you'd want something like half of your deck as fighters of various types, with the other half as modifier cards of varying types (equipment, pilots, etc.). As Chris Reid pointed out, your fighters are your basic units of combat, and in my experience if you have an opponent who's worth their salt you won't get anywhere near their carrier - if you're going to win, you should try to wear down their Power Points. A lot of fighters helps.
If you don't bring manuevers, battle damage and luck cards, all the fighter squadrons in the universe won't last long. A lot of fighters can also hurt, since it costs power points to launch them. A classic rookie mistake is to fill space with fighters, thus depleting most of your power points, and then get mowed down by a flight of highly maneuverable Arrows.