This game presented some problems with initial decisions for me. I really like BW for the pop-rushing, but not having Mining would mean researching 2 Techs to get to it. The remote scout revealed some nice territory on the nearby island (before getting killed within a few turns of the start
) but I'd need to research Fishing AND Sailing to take advantage of that territory. Being Deity I knew I'd want Alphabet fast, so I decided I could research Fishing (for the Clams) then forget about Sailing or the BW path, and go straight to Alphabet (through AH).
I built Workboats for the clams, and eventually a Worker. Workboats also did scouting for me. Washington, the Khmer, and Rome made early contact with me. I found Mansa Musa with a Workboat; Mongols found me later, and Korea much later. So all contacts by around 0 AD.
One gut check moment early on - a barb Warrior attacked while I had a single Warrior, but he did little damage. Random events were unkind early on - a Barb city popped up about 6 spaces to the East choking off my expansion, and the first 2 random events caused me some extra disorder when converting to Slavery, and emptied out my grainbox after building a granary.
I got to Alphabet by around 1700 BC (for some reason the first session did not store dates in the log file). Only Rome had Writing already, so I was able to use Writing to get most of the initial Techs. Alphabet got me BW and Math, and most anything else already learned that was tradeable (except for Theo which Mansa Musa got for the Oracle.)
I have 3 cities - my capital founded in place, Prague founded NW of the Stone on the coast, and Vienna founded on the Iron to the West. A barb city 3 moves NW of Prague has been putting some pressure on the city, but the Archer bonuses have allowed the city to hold its own; I eventually expect to use Iron-based units to eliminate this problem.
I continued on a Currency - COL - CS - Paper route. I've traded for MC, the religious Techs, Const. and Calendar along the way. I'm missing Aesth, Machinery, Theo and Feudalism vs most, I'm up Paper (except MM), CS and Paper vs Rome, and Rome has Phil, Korea has Compass. I just got my first GS - Philosophy would have been a great trading Tech, but with Paper, the GS goes to Education and I wouldn't want to trade that away. So I plan to learn Phil, trade that for most of the missing Techs, and use the GS for Education to get a jump on the Liberalism Tech.
I've managed to keep out of any wars up to 520 AD, and have given in to about half the demands along the way. I gave COL to Rome when Julius demanded it, but recently the Mongols demanded 210 Gold and I said no - he was at war with Rome, Korea and Mansa Musa so I didn't think he wanted a 4th. Rome vassalized Korea early on, so currently Rome and Korea are at war with the Khmer, and separately with the Mongols. MM is also at war with the Mongols. America and I are the only peaceful civs at the moment. The Khmer captured the barb city just to the East of me, so I expect at some future time I must capture it from him, with help from America.
Long term plans - I don't really know. Perhaps a SS attempt, but I will need more space and have to take at least a few cities, so I'll see if I survive that attempt.
Don't we have like 9 months to make up our minds about that? 
. I have 8 cities, all but the fiirst on the pennisula to the west. A barb city popped up almost immediately to the east and about 4-5 warriors almost put me back to one city (I had settled near the gems an stone at this time. The city was taken not much later with Praetorian which pretty much made me wet my pants. Prets around 2000 BC. But JC did not attack me, but the barb city and hisw troops blocked the eastern expansion. I kept my economy affloat using swords to take barb cities, and kept a few. and have colonized the best spots on that western pennisula and the pece of land south of it that it connects to. 
. I've played enough Deity to know that isn't going to work, pretty sure this will end up a loss.
). But for some reason it's very difficult for one to elaborate on details beyond ten words? For example, did you occasionally hit hit some of hte other buttons in the lower right too, like the ones that let you trade with the AIs?
