Btw, our start was realy realy impressive! if we went for the gold city, i think we could have gotten to 4-5th place.
Good analysis, fizban! I thought our second city turned out very well despite missing gold but scouting would have revealed the surroundings and we'd have had an even better start.
dima mentioned our enthusiasm to analyze the opening city placement and I thought that was well done but later in the game our interest dwindled. We/I should have insisted building on the copper but without a lot of discussion, we missed that.
I think 2metra's first war set was very exciting even though it required a strategic retreat. We could have had a worse setback. I am not the best warmonger by a long shot but I think once we got the right units and civics, we did well bringing down our neighbours.
Ragnar had built SH but I can't really remember it helping our culture. 
Realizing that might have spurned us to get it earlier, too, and try to avoid astronomy. Vikings -> Moscow.
Oops! My mistake it was Willem in Amsterdam and therefore too late for SH.
One of the mistakes I made was to 3 pop a library in Elba.
There were already a turn or two of hammers towards it and there were 2 unhappy citizens so I gritted my teeth and whipped a dubious build. I must admit, I dislike unhappy citizens and wasted hammers but that was no excuse.
If we'd have found the GLH, the most desirable wonder for this game, we might have, with a 50% movement advantage, gone after Cathy earlier, which is what the Ducks did to their advantage. We knew she had it but didn't know where she was.
As a Captain, I should be a more knowledgeable player. I'm still learning a lot of things, details that most players know that leave a lot of room for improvement. If I lead by example, my example is to say dumb things that show up my novice ability.
I usually don't finish games I start mostly because I don't choose a victory condition early enough and the game languishes into oblivion. However, I usually have a 'winnable position' unless I overlook something.
In a way, for a new team doing a succession game for a first time, and a first time for many years for me, I think asking dumb questions and being prepared to do so is a bonus. You can ask a dumb question or remain dumb but the key thing is participating in the discussion.
When you read other threads, you know the experienced players by how they set about discussing the strategy. The Ducks made extensive workboat exploration plans, right down to where the wb ends up in a position to net the seafood for a new city immediately. Little things like that make for winning play.
I still haven't read every thread but the
replay facility is pretty cool to compare team's play. This way you can cherry pick the discussion related to a decision, look it up in their thread and save a lot of time reading. Had we finished earlier, we would have been able to follow along in real time.
None of us had the experience with Emperor level archipelago maps,
Actually, justjohn was our archipelago expert and offered great advice about how to approach this map. Our war timing was behind schedule as we all agree but jj's advice helped us from floundering too far from the path.
I would think that our start kept our interest high to begin with but once we began losing our edge, the avid discussion faltered. We need to agree to participate in decision making right to the end, put our biases on the line and learn by cooperative success or failure. I know that in my tournament chess playing days, I usually remembered the games I'd lost and rarely the games I'd won unless it was something special.
I hope we hear some more analysis and game replays. I'm going to continue reading threads when I have the time. It seems many of us are looking forward to the next game and that is the best news!
It makes catching up a lot of reading....
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Hip-hip hooray for the captain!
And the Captain salutes the team! 
