Good point. Hopefully both sides are not crowded. It appear we are close to the northeast corner of the map. Usually that area has a whole lot of room to grow. But if the situation is dire, and it can be if the barbs are founding cities so early, claiming land is better than workers. After the building warrior(s) untill grawing to 2 or 3, each city can build a worker and a settler while it make sense to do so.
I am more concerned about barb axes if there are no horses nearby.
I was thinking of something much more aggressive
Such as capital building worker, settler, GW, settler while at size 1, and stone city building warrior, SH at pop1, then warrior to pop2, and then settler, worker, worker, worker.
This would give med four cities soon after 2000 BC. Economy will crash, but I can then cottage the capital to recover. Capital pop-cap will be size 6, so capital will become a monster commerce site.
Early game focus will be quick expansion, running cottages to finance more cities. City #3 will probably break even, while city #4 will be a drag. With four cities, there is room to chop the pyramids without hampering the growth of the empire. I doubt that building the pyramids with only two cities is worthwhile.
I will not trade tech with both my neighbors, perhaps with neither, so that I can steal their land when I have tech advantage. Identifying suitable tech parters will be key to early finish, and getting courthouses up quickly will help me gain intelligence on what they are researching (espionage points). It is not unreasonable to have a tech lead in the mid game given enough land and cottages.
After the alphabet, I'll go for CoL => Civil Service. No girlie Drama for tech trade this time
Then I have to get the GPeoples for Mining Inc and whatever-the-food-corporation-is-called.
Does anyone have any advise what to do with a Great Spy?
Well, there's only one way to find out if this is a good strategy
See you in the first spoiler
