Deity Challenge 1 - Russia, Pangaea

I saved it on t20. I can see a good bit of the land to the south. I met askia, japan, ethopia. I am about to lose a scout because I made a stupid move.

I would have to pick a social policy next. I did scout scout monument, borrow money buy worker on t18. I got nothing good from huts and dont expect to get any more now.

AH>pottery>writing. No horses in the immediate area, but 3 calandar resources. Better get to work selling those.

I guess there is room for several cities. Perhaps liberty would be a good tree? There is not much food though and the Moscow site isnt that great.

Yeah, only 2 horses nearby, and I almost missed those too. Had to buy a tile before Ethiopia grabbed it. Maybe we have iron at least.

I settled on hill across the river, started with Pottery, followed by AH and Calendar. Picked couple of ruins, pop, culture, some cash and scarcher, who stole a worker from Zanzibar and then cleared the camp to bring it to neutral again.

Met Ethiopia on turn 6 I think and Japan about the same time.
Moscow built scout, monument, granary worker and double settler at size 4. Another settler and worker were rush bought. My mind was pretty set on Liberty at first but after some scouting, I realized, that this won't work too well, so went for traditional Tradition. Haile Selassie offered a DoF very early, which I gladly accepted. Hopefully I'll be able to convince someone to attack him soon. This guy enhanced religion on t38 (with quite useful beliefs )! And if you let him do his thing, he'll eventually crush everything on his way. But with two warmongers Askia and Oda on his doorstep, maybe he'll encounter some troubles. In the worst case scenario they will suicide a good chunk of their armies.

I expanded to 4 cities (3 mountains), currently building libraries and researching Philosophy. Need more cash to rush a library in coastal low production city. Pretty safe starting position with lots of mountains and defendable hills. That's why I got Archery just recently and don't rush Construction. I really don't want to turtle here, although given the map this may be the best choice. But I'm so fed up with turtling, I can't imagine another bunker game. So for now the plan is to get Machinery fast and I will see from there.

The north military CS gives berserkers.

Settled on the hill next to the mountain. Went full Tradition as there clearly was not much space for cities (after Japan and Ethiopia both spammed cities toward me). I waited until pop 6 in my capital then settled 3 more quick cities (rush bought one settler) by turn 70. Japan DoWed me T75 and luckily I had 5 comp bows and decent production to build walls fast. I managed to stop his first push and then he came back with 40 strength(!!!) musketmen, trebs and crossbows on T105. I'm still managing to hold him off on T125 largely because of good defensive position and poor AI play, but its only a matter of time before he brings something I can't handle. I did finally manage to build the NC. Also, picked up the quarries pantheon but didn't get a religion (I now have Ethiopia's religion of course).

I don't hold out much hope as Japan is really strong (point leader, Great Wall and Himeji Castle so far, plus his ridiculous strength units). He is also 13 or so techs ahead of me already. I don't see how I can keep up with only 4 cities (and inability to improve the southern cities due to constant war).

Time to watch the GB/SF game instead.

I was going to go for some early warmongering, but being pinned with Japan and Songhai(who had Mandecavs by like T85) made it evident it was a bad idea from the start. Austria FINALLY has Borders available so I can go explore everything after she cut everything off even by coast

I was able to nab the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus during the Representation Golden Age and The Oracle later in my 2nd city because it had TWO 6-rion Plains Hill tiles that are 6 Hammers with Russia's UA. Why doesn't the AI go for this wonder?! Anyway I used the finisher to open Commerce. Planted a GS with the Liberty finisher.

Think it's pretty clear I'm going to have to nail Songhai at some point; they ran roughshod over Japan and took their capital out(and someone got wiped before I could even MEET them ). I think I'll be coming after them once I get Muskets and Crossbows.

Amazing how different mine and Red's games turned out, wow.

Japan took my second best city on T130 with the 40+ strength musketmen plus cannons and crossbows. I didn't have enough firepower with just comp bowmen and pikes to stop him so I gave up. Best of luck to the rest of you.

Yeah start may look decent, but it's not really.
And there is an extreme lack of good settling options elsewhere that are not very near other AI.
I'm already effed in this one, badly.
Waited too long to settle secondary/tertiary cities and the spots available disappeared fast.
I went Tradition as very quickly i realized there would be no space to expand without provoking war.
The lack of food and rivers has made growing really painfully slow though.

Got pretty lucky and got the CS north and west allied/friends for quite a long time early on. Several units given to me by Militaristic one

I stupidly figured i could build cheaper archers and worry about getting construction for composites later...of course Askia attacked me before i could get there, an i've lost almost all my archers and both warriors.

I've no doubt this war will never end, and with Ethiopia and Japan circling me like dogs, if Songhai doesn't manage to drag me down to death, i'll be eaten up by the other soon enough. This will not end well.