Can't help but grin at all of you guys, veterens and newcomers alike, getting so heated up on this SE vs CE topic from time to time. First of all, I agree with DaveM that one should try all strategies. I used to only cottage spam exclusively in vanila & warlord because (i) cottage is a new feature from CIV II & III, (ii) it is powerful, (iii) i didn't know how to do SE then...
Come BTS, I find SE (i) fun to play, (ii) my addiction to slavery, (iii) flexibility, (iv) I gotr a shot of getting those shinny thingy. Allow me to explain. I play my own oversion of mixed-up SE, which go like this:
a - wonderspam on capital. buero for its 50% hammer bonus
b - rex like mad & war like mad. slider goes 0% after a few libraries are built
c - extort tech from war, espinoge
d - bulb or settle GPs, depending on situation
e - slavery rush all cities except capital to get as much infra built as possible
f - when the option of rushing and running scientist is in conflict, prefer the former
The goal is to make my empire 2x as large as the next best AIs pre-liberalism. Trade routes, riverside farmed commerce, beakers from settled GPs, bulbing, etc are the means to get there. Post-liberalism,
g - switch to caste, let cities recover from rushing, start running as much scientists as possible
If I can get my empire (land + pop) 2x as large as the next best AIs, I would have won the game by then.
Dealing with falling behind tech post-liberalism
I would not have fall behind in tech pace eventhough I don't have a single cottage in my empire (I farm over anything less than village gotten from early war) simply because I got so much cities running so much scientists. Late war, I keep the mature town.
Dealing with the conflict between slavery & caste
What I do is to slave rush as much as possible first to get the infra up (science, commerce, happy, health buildings). Only switch to caste around liberalism time. Post biology, I can regrow my pathetic pop 4 cities back in no time.
This is of course, my perfect setup. It is very flexible in term of victory condition, I can go space or domi, whichever suit me. But I have to admit that so far I have only done this on philo leaders, up to emperor. Again, I admit that on a random player with most of the conditions, a hybrid with emphazise in CE will probably give you more consistent win-rate.