Emperor Diplomatic/War - what to do?

[GeorgeF]

I'm currently trying to move up to Emperor, and I've been able to win several times while isolated, going to space race without significant wars, but I'm trying now to expand my game and try to include some wars.

I'm playing Julius, who I've found easiest to war with, and my current game is going ok. I rushed Pacal early and took all 3 cities, while I was still in my rebuild phase Alex attacked, I was ready though and razed 3 cities and took a 4th before accepting peace (down to only 1 front-line Praetorian). Alex is currently backward and without metals.

To my SW, next to old Maya, is Roosevelt, who is building wonders and REXing, but is not all that far ahead on tech. To my South, across the still-empty Jungle is Mansa, who has teched out of sight. I've inherited Hindu from Pacal, and Alex has got it too now. Mansa and Roosevelt are Apolistic Jewish buddies.

I've recently picked up CoL and Currency to patch up my wrecked economy, and was able to chop-build Pyramids very late after I finally hooked up stone, must be the only stone in the game. So with Pyramids I have some hope of doing some amount of tech-catchup, but Mansa is very very far ahead.

The thing is, I'm level on power with Roosevelt and Mansa, which means I think that I'm way ahead on hammers, which is good, but how to leverage that?

I can't war against them both, I think Mansa will have gunpowder soon if he doesn't have it already. So I think I need to bone up on diplomacy skills.

My current thought is to use a spy to get one of them to switch religions, then bribe them into cutting trade, getting Rooselvelt and Mansa to dislike each other. Then, when I go to war, its a 2-1. Since Mansa is so far ahead, I think its better to take him out.

I think I probably should finish off Alex as well while I'm building up, is this a good idea? What would the best way to get Roosevelt as a buddy and turn him against Mansa? Is there a better way? I think domination is my only shot at victory, but it looks like I need to war sooner rather than later to pick it up.

Any other suggestions? Save included.

[Sjaramei]

Your tech rate has been awful this game, catching up with Mansa is going to be a challenge
Your best bet should be crippling Mansa as soon as possible, him getting muskets when you don't even have catapults is going to be a nightmare. Or building peacefully up, which will be very hard given Mansas insane tech lead.

To be honest in this position i would have started over most likely. But who knows maybe with some canny diplomacy you might be able to pull some tricks i never use. (I'm more the brute force kind of player )

Some criticism, i counted 5 workers. Unless you hid or lost some of them you should have at least twice that number after 2 wars. (Capture them or build them! And use them to chop courthouses everywhere as soon as possible )

No Construction this late? Thats the biggest issue i think, with Cats and Praetorians you might be able to punish Mansa properly at this point for teching that insane
(Construction is my priority tech after getting CoL)