A Noble Walkthrough

[nbcman]

You could take a chance when you have all 6 warriors there in two turns to attack Karakorum vs the archer and warrior defender. But if GK whips another archer, I'd try to contain him until you found the copper city (on the plains tile 1N of the copper if you immediately want to be able to mine the copper plus pick up the pigs, incense and oasis tiles in the BFC). If Amsterdam is close to another border expansion, you may want to settle either 2N of the copper or directly on the incense tile to get the fresh water bonus from the oasis.

 

[Kesshi]

With regard to losing settler production there's actually no difference between grasshill mine (1f,3h) and farmed FP (4f).

pigswill,

Settling on hills permits you to work more food tiles, permitting you to grow faster, which means growth and regrowth (after slavery) is faster. The Food to Hammer conversion of Slavery is better than Hammer to Hammer without a Granary. Add in a Granary and it gets ridiculous.

Edit: I'm actually quite happy with Amsterdam's long term potential because of the additional riverside grasslands, they get +1c all game, with a levee/dike they also get +1h.

I was once like you, settling cities in such a way that they would all have long term potental, and be awesome cities in 5,000 years. Then, at the suggestion of forum goes here, I started settling my early cities in a position that would be good for right now. Once I started doing that I was able to get more cities setup pre 1AD, permitting me to setup more "future" city spots.

It's 4000BC, don't settle your cities like it's 1500AD. Worry about 1500AD in the 1000ADs, as for right now, worry about 4000BC to 1AD.

In terms of exploration there's only so much you can do with one warrior and not many turns have been played yet, I've got warriors 2 and 3 out exploring.

You're exactly right there's only so much one Warrior can do, which is why it is imperative that you explore the surrounding land around you immedately.

I'm still not totally committed to a warrior rush at this point. I could knock out a settler in five turns (1 turn of anarchy switching to slavery, 4 turns for 40 hammers and a double whip for 60 hammers) and then build up for a later axe-rush.

I know it's late, but a Warrior rush is not advised unless you know what you're doing. (Letting the AI build a Settler, then attacking right after the Settler sets off with its escorts to build the next city.) Perhaps I've been playing Monarch+ too much, but a Warrior rush has too high of a chance of failure to gamble with.

Edit:

As not predicted, he also has an archer!.
http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/pigswill-2006/nw1y0000.jpg
Our lone warrior to the south east thinks 'blow this for a game of soldiers' and kidnaps a Mongolian worker.

2280. Check out the combat odds: unpromoted warrior vs archer <0.01%. Not very good. Pause for thought. Rumours abound that r-rolo1 has been sacked as secretary of state for war amidst unsubstantiated allegiations of receiving 'favours' from the Karakorum Womans Institute. What now?

Alright, you're in a bit of a pickle here, but here's what I'd do.

It looks like you can move one Warrior in that stack. Move him on top of the Farmed Corn. Hopefully the AI 1) will not have enough hammers overflow to produce another unit, and 2) will attack your lone Warrior with one of its units. Even if that Warrior dies, you've removed 1 unit from the city with 1 Warrior, which is as good as killing one unit in this case.

If he does attack, you might be able to take the city.

If he doesn't attack you, pillage the Farm, and using your eastern Warrior pillage the mine, and the switch to what is called "The Stasis Rush." If you need details on this type of gameplay, let me know.

 

[pigswill]

@ Kesshi:
i) Regarding city placement . As you know at the start of the game your city is happy capped (health is generally less of a problem) so there's a limit on how big it can grow (5 is typical) and you don't need four or five farms to regrow to the happy cap inside the 10 turn whip misery cycle so settling on the floodplain was not a drawback with three more FPs and a corn tile available.
ii) Regarding whipping. Its a good mechanism for knocking out expensive (high hammer) units such as settlers and workers but its actually pretty naff for building warriors (coz you get too much overflow which converts to gold not hammers). Having decided to spam warriors it's actually more efficient to build them direct. I reckon (as already posted) that I'll be switching to slavery very soon coz its now time to expand and build more cities (and the occasional axe).
iii) Regarding exploration. There's more than one way to explore. Warrior doing a close circuit is one way, having a couple of explorers going in different directions is another.

 

[pigswill]

To continue:

2280. Move a warrior to corn, east warrior pillages FP farm, worker runs away.

2240. GK does nothing. Pillage corn, move east warrior to mine, worker joins stack.

2200. GK builds another archer. Move stack slowly homewards, leave warrior on forested hill, east warrior pillages mine.

2160. GK builds a settler. Amsterdam settler>worker, still using same tiles for 12 hpt, settler heads east, stack moves west.

2120. Found Utrecht:

Built on top of desert incense, city catches pigs, copper and spices and 3 useless desert tiles, its also got virtually no production (apart from copper mine). Starts on a granary coz I suspect that I'll be swopping to slavery fairly soon. Got a worker improving the pigs.

Meanwhile GK builds another archer and sends it to threaten a hilltop warrior...

2080. GK retreats archer threatening the hilltop warrior. Reflect on the situation. I made a mess of the warrior rush, gained a worker and GK's undying emnity, slowed him down a bit, annoyed a couple of AIs in the process and its basically stalemate. Could try carrying on the choke indefinitely (fortified warriors each side of the city make an AI reluctant to send out settlers or workers so they don't expand and get 'choked'). GK would probably keep spamming archers, the other AIs would (eventually) grab the land he would have settled, and it wouldn't really gain much in the long term. Given our proximity I would have earned GK's undying emnity regardless so that's not such a big deal.
GK is willing to talk so agree an unconditional peace treaty. Not the end of the story but the end of the first chapter.
Warriors can venture into the wilderness and explore happily until they come to an untimely end (the usual fate of explorers). Worker can help improve tiles coz there's plenty of tiles awaiting improvement.

2040. Masonry>mysticism. Maybe predicting the future could help in this game so start to head towards the Oracle.

2000. Not much happens, pigs now pasturised, worker heads towards copper to build a road, worker heads towards marble to start a quarry, warriors start exploring.

1960. GK builds his second city in a spot guaranteed to achieve little except escalate hostilities (close borders). Because of William's creative trait I should keep control of the copper tile. Amsterdam worker>settler (9 turns), worker heads towards marble to help complete the quarry.

Here's the map:

Haven't yet explored enough for a proper dot map.

 

[pigswill]

Well, the warrior rush was a spectacular non-event and has put me behind the clock in terms of expansion so I need to catch up. As always there's so much to do and so little time at this stage of the game. Need to explore, get out more settlers, maintain some kind of army and think about heading for Oracle.

Played a few more turns:

1920. Utrecht's border pops to claim the copper at the same time it hits pop2, working the pigs (6f) and oasis(3f) it will grow to pop3 in 3 turns. Worker can now start mining the copper. Other workers are still quarrying the marble (good tile for a financial leader, it gets 1f3h3c).

1840. Mysticism>meditation (5 turns). Amsterdam workers finish marble quarry and start a road. Switching from grass hill to quarry gains +3c for free.

1800. Utrecht grows to pop3, copper is mined and connected, Utrecht works copper and pigs and oasis, grows in 4, still building a granary in anticipation of whipping.

1760. Marble is now connected.

1720. First barbarian appears. Workers start floodplain cottage (FPC) in Amsterdam. Utrecht's worker is building a riverside grassland cottage.

1680. Meditation> priesthood (4 turns). Warrior survives barbarian warrior. Utrecht stops working copper and works grassland cottage instead (granary currently has 26 hammers so can be double whipped, working copper would put it to 32 hammers next turn for a single whip (less overflow for same unhappiness)).

1640. Amsterdam workers finish FPC, start another FPC. Swop from plains hill to FPC, less 'hammers' for settler but more commerce. Revolt to slavery at end of turn.Anarchy erupts.

1600. Anarchy subsides. Double whip granary in Utrecht, pop 2 now, work copper and pigs for overflow.

1560. Amsterdam finishes settler. Priesthood 2 turns away for Oracle, start barracks as a filler (bound to need one eventually).

Utrecht is building a barracks before starting on axes. Got 39 hammers from overflow so it will finish barracks in 3 turns.

Our warriors have been exploring and the neighborhood is beginning to take shape:

Pretty much surrounded by AIs. On the one hand it means that barbarians aren't going to be much of a problem. On the other hand I'll need to get settlers out to claim some territory before I get squeezed. Genghis has some pretty naff tundra nearby, likely to produce a steady stream of barbarians which will hopefully keep him occupied.

Looking at resources there's ivory (hunting), gems (IW because of jungle), wine(monarchy), spices, incense and possibly dye (all calendar) potentially available for happiness. For health there's corn, rice (needs IW for jungle), clams, cows and pigs. There could of course be other resources still hidden in the shadows. Getting all of these will depend on how quickly I can get settlers out. I'm probably not going to get the lot but I could try.

Even though I haven't finished exploring the neighborhood and I'm not ready for a definitive dot map I've got a settler looking for a good home. I've provisionally marked out this spot:

It claims rice, ivory and gems. Rice and riverside farms will help to feed it. It does need some techs to develop its potential (hunting and IW) and it does overlap Napoleon's borders. I'm hoping that I'll avoid more close border diplo penalties. iirc you only get the penalty if the city radius/BFC overlaps that of an AI city. After 50 turns (100 culture with palace) Nap's city should be on its second expansion so the borders to the north should be outside Nap's city radius. I also need to get there before he does.

Need to think about research as well:

I certainly need hunting to claim the ivory. With copper and BW available archery isn't a priority. IW is another tech I need soon, but maybe writing is a higher priority. As a creative leader William gets half price libraries and running a couple of scientists to get a GS for an academy in Amsterdam would be nice. So in the immediate future its looking like hunting>writing>IW.
I'll go for the Oracle I reckon and try to nab CoL; confucianism, courthouses and caste may not be immediate priorities but it puts me on the road to civil service.

However I have been neglecting my military for the past few turns and its beginning to show:

I'm not too worried (yet) because I suspect that most of the AIs' military growth has come from archers and (cheap) barracks but Utrecht is going to have to knock out a couple of axes after its barracks. With Utrecht and Amsterdam both tied up I'm not going to get settlers out immediately but I can't do everything unfortunately.

 

[Shurdus]

Why did you go for meditation to get to priesthood?

What I always do is get poly. It is a prereq for monetheism which is a prereq for monarchy, both of which are very useful somewhere soon. Poly is slightly more expensive than meditation but just because it unlocks some useful techs I think it is slightly better to use as a route to priesthood.

I would have shadowed this one if I had the time. Right now I have to finish several papers so I have no time to play unfortunately.

 

[pigswill]

@Shurdus. Its probably a habit I've picked up from playing on Emperor where liberalism is often a race. Meditation + CoL are the pre-reqs for philosophy and a standard ploy is to get an early GS and bulb philosophy to give you a lead in the liberalism race.

Something that's becoming obvious to me is the difficulty of doing a noble walkthrough. A relatively experienced player will know some of the tricks and shortcuts and play more efficiently. However a relatively experienced player will usually be playing on Monarch or above and some of the strategies that are optimal for higher levels are not optimal for lower levels.

I think that a key difference is in research rates and tech trading. On higher difficulties tech trading is generally an option because the AIs can tech faster while on lower difficulties tech trading is less attractive because the AIs generally don't research as fast and have fewer techs to trade. This means that its easier for the player to get a lead in key techs (these key techs are dependent on the player's strategy which can vary from game to game) but harder for the player to acquire all the techs because there's much more self-research needed.

 

[pigswill]

Another short set (four turns).

1520. Settler and Utretcht garrison warrior head towards new site, recall exploring warrior to garrison Utrecht before it becomes unhappy. Amsterdam workers are building a road to the corn.

1480. Priesthood>Hunting (to improve ivory) 2 turns.

1440. Utrecht barax>axe.

1400. Hunting>writing (4 turns). Reduce research to 80% (breakeven point).
The Hague is founded, starts building worker, a worker starts improving ivory:

Until IW comes in the ivory is the only tile worth working and its always good to have another worker.

Amsterdam workers have connected the corn. Amsterdam grows to pop5. Starts to build Oracle.

Hammer output is doubled forOracle. I notice that if I chopped one forest Oracle would be built in 5 turns (5*22+40(20h chop doubled by marble)=150h). Writing would complete the turn before.

Utrecht now pop3. Grows in 6 turns.Whip misery wears off in 5. Axe finishes in 5. Could probably manage to get these all happening in the same turn.

 

[pigswill]

Another five turns:
1360bc. Nap, Monte and GK all have writing. Monte and GK are annoyed but Nap agrees Open Borders, in the longer term it helps a bit with diplomacy as well as potential trade routes.

1320. Napoleon completes Great Wall.

1280. Bod adopts slavery. Workers finish chopping in Amsterdam (+40h towards Oracle). Swop tiles in Utrecht (oasis to pigs) to grow in 2 turns.

1240. Ivory is now camped,start on road. Writing > IW (8turns).
Open borders with Ragnar, Bod and Alex.

1200. Oracle is duly completed in Amsterdam:

I select Code of Laws (CoL) as my free tech. Confucianism is founded in Utrecht (largest city outside the capital):

Utrecht now has 7 culture/turn (cpt) so its virtually guaranteed that we'll retain control of the copper tile and might start expanding borders at GK's expense. Utrecht has also built its axe and grown to pop4 as whip misery wears off.

Swop Amsterdam to completing barracks, Utrecht starts on a settler (will be double whipped asap). The Hague is still building its worker, otherworkers are building a road towards The Hague and will be ready to improve its tiles (rice and gems) once IW is discovered in six turns.

My army has grown to 46k soldiers (barracks, pop growth and axe all contribute) compared to largest army of 63k soldiers.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Meditation unlocks the cheap hammer:beaker multiplier efficient monastery, and these should go in commerce cities. Only the library is a more efficient beaker multiplier.

Intentionally spreading garbage religions that are otherwise useless into a commerce bureaucracy capitol can have a surprising impact on research. I'd go meditation to priesthood rather than poly any time that running a religion would be dicey for diplo considerations. You can make temples/monasteries regardless of whether you're running a religion, but OR is quite weakened by not having a state religion and both poly and mono are more expensive early on.

 

[pigswill]

Six more turns takes us to 975bc (turn intervals changing to 25 years after 1000bc).

1160. Got a confucian missionary in Amsterdam. Think I'll keep him in storage now to see how religions pan out. Judaism hasn't been founded yet (amazing but true) so I'd rather send the missionary where he can cause most disharmony (if I convert an AI to confu and they discover Judaism there's a good chance they'll swop to Judaism).

1120. Swop tiles in Amsterdam, working corn instead of plains hill to grow the city because the happy cap will grow once ivory is connected to Amsterdam.
An exploring warrior discovers Monte to the northwest hiding behind Shaka and Ragnar.

1080. Amsterdam barax>axe.

1040. Utrecht double whips settler. Max hammers to increase overflow.

1000. GK adopts confucianism (he's next door to the confu holy city).
Utrecht settler>spear (21h overflow), adjust tiles so it grows next turn. Ivory is now connected to Utrecht and Amsterdam. Happy people make powerful cities. Settler heads west.

975. IW is in. Switch to archery for now. There's iron in The Hague, there's also iron near Amsterdam (would have been in BFC if I'd settled on starting square).

The Hague's just finished a worker. Switched to granary. Now got entire workforce at The Hague (4 workers) who clear jungle from rice in one turn.

Utrecht's spear finishes in three turns, coinciding with its growth to 4 pop. The increased happy cap means I can switch to a settler straight away without waiting for misery to subside and double whip it.

Amsterdam could really do with another flood plain cottage instead of working the corn but I'll let it grow until I can spare a worker. Once gems are mined and roaded happy cap will increase again. The rice will increase the health cap once farmed.

Stae of the Union address to follow shortly:

 

[travathian]

Amsterdam could really do with another flood plain cottage instead of working the corn but I'll let it grow until I can spare a worker.

I was going to say, if you're planning on dropping 2 more cities you'll start getting some decent maintenance hits won't you?

 

[pigswill]

State of the Union 975bc.

Doing surprisingly well on demographics:

GNP looks good, but this can be deceptive as GNP includes culture/turn and a creative civ with a religion and a wonder gets a significant amount of culture. A more relevant value is that I'm breaking even at 24 bpt, hard to tell how this compares to the AI but its a reasonable start.

Financial advisor gives a different perspective on GNP. Research and gold and espionage add up to 34gnp, very different to 62gnp from demographics screen.

Keeping up with military so far so that's ok. Production is ok too (though not brilliant). Approval and life expectancy are low but that's probably not altogether a bad thing as it means that I'm fairly close to health and happy caps.

Still got a bit of space in which to expand peacefully but Napoleon's got a settler ready and I suspect the other AIs have ambitions to expand as well so that remains a priority.

Diplomacy at the moment is fairly unhealthy. Shaka, Monte and GK are annoyed with me, the others merely cautious. The AIs on the other hand are pleased with each other despite developing religious differences. As most people are aware there are hidden diplomatic modifiers. The most relevant one at the moment is 'warmonger respect': they like each other because they're all raving psychos. Hopefully as religious divides widen and they start running out of land they'll become less chummy. The other good thing is that many of them will attack their friends (or at least civs they're pleased with) if the price is right.

'Great People' is not yet a major consideration. The Oracle is slowly accumulating Great Prophet points and I would prefer to have a Great Scientist to build an academy in Amsterdam. However the Oracle produces 2gppt (great people points per turn) and will take 50 turns to generate a Prophet. A library elsewhere allows me to run 2 scientists (if I find the food) which produce 6gppt and generate a Great Scientist in 17 turns so I've still got time.

to be continued..

 

[pigswill]

@ travathian. City maintenance will indeed increase. This isn't necessarily a major problem because a city adds commerce as it grows and what matters in terms of research rate is beakers per turn not science slider. If I dropped down to 10 bpt at 500bc and then got up to 30 bpt by 1ad I'd be researching faster than I am now (and I suspect that this is a very cautious estimate).

State of the Union. Part Two.

In terms of diplomacy its very difficult to please everyone all the time. I'd settle for one (or two) friendly AIs if I could acheive that. Good ways of getting diplo points are open borders, supplying resources, fair trade (i.e. getting ripped off by the AI), shared religion (though get diplo penalties with all the heathens) and wise civics. If you and an AI are both running their favoured civic you get a bonus with them (and there's no penalty). In this game we've got:

This makes Ragnar the only realistic option, the other civics are way down the tech tree (particularly police state). If ragnar and I were to run HR he'd be happier with me. If we shared a religion he'd be happier still.

Another way of getting diplo points is of course mutual military struggle but that involves fighting wars with all the expense and dangers that entails...

Research path is the tricky decision. Here's where I am at the moment:

Lots of choices: In terms of diplomacy the option is likely to be alphabet followed by monarchy (good for happiness too). In terms of developing the civ independently then maths is a key tech, opening up currency, calendar and construction for cats (and elephants with Horseback Riding). A third option would be to go for aesthetics and literature for some wonders (Statue of Zeus, Shwedagaon Paya, Parthenon and Glib.

Pondering that one.

Final element is wonders; obviously dependent on tech path. My first priority is to grab the remaining sites, second priority is to maintain some kind of military parity so wonder building will have to wait a short while. On the other hand wonders have been going slowly. Stonehenge, Pyramids and Temple of Artemis(ToA) are still available. Its not one I normally build but ToA for the capital may be worth considering as it looks likely that this is going to be the economic powerhouse of my civilisation (I was going to say Empire but that's a bit grandiose at the moment).

Putting this all together I have some kind of plan for the next several turns. Build settlers to grab land, build workers to improve the cities and units (axe, spear, sword) to keep up with military. Build at least one library to run scientists to get a GS before the Prophet, tech alphabet and monarchy then mathematics techs. Try to befriend Ragnar (send Confu missionary and work on him adoptng hereditary rule).

Important Qualification: A plan is a statement of intent based on current knowledge and best guess on what the AI will do. Knowing when to stick with the plan and when to change it can be the difference between winning and losing (and sometimes its better to be lucky than good).

Here's a save:

 

[pigswill]

After all this strategising and the such played eleven turns up to 750bc.

975. Swop research to alphabet (13 turns). Confu missionary heads towards the Vikings.

950. Napoleons settler heading north. The Hague has 2 workers farming rice while 2 workers start cutting jungles in readiness for a gems mine.

925. Utrecht's border pops, pinching a tile from GK and revealing the city of Beshbalik.
Amsterdam axe>worker. Napoleon has beaten me to alphabet! Make a trade:

900. Now Monte has alphabet! The Hague finishes rice farm, a worker starts improving iron, another worker heads to Amsterdam. Utrecht hits pop 4, completes a spear and starts another settler.
Rotterdam founded: Working lake, starts a granary.

Reduce research to 70%: 27bpt +1gpt.

875. Napoleon makes an arrogant demand. William is in a generous mood and agrees.

Essentially its 90 or so beakers for +2 diplo (difference between -1 for refusing and +1 for accepting it) so not too bad a deal.
Meanwhile a confu missionary arrives in Nidaros and spreads his faith.

850. Ragnar converts to confu. William remains agnostic.

825. Amsterdam worker>archer. Worker starts FPC (joined by worker from The Hague).
The Hague has finished the gems mine and workers start its road.
Utrecht double whips another settler.

800. Kill a couple of barb warriors in the wilderness. Barbs have been few and far between so far.
The Hague grows to pop 2 and works rice and gems, still slowly building a granary. Gems spread happiness across the civilisation. The Hague's iron mine is also completed, swords can now be built.
Rotterdam pops borders, works corn instead of lake (grow faster, less commerce).
Utrecht settler>archer,grows in 2. Settler heads north. Amsterdam maximises food production to make use of increased happy cap, grows in 2 , finish archer in 2.
Now Shaka has alphabet! Blimey, they're very educated for a bunch of bloodthirsty warmongers.

775bc. Even Boudica has alphabet. Trade priesthood and meditation to her for sailing (no screenshot!).
Amsterdam workers finish FPC and head towards Rotterdam.

750bc. Shaka adopts Buddhism.
Amsterdam grows to pop7 and starts settler.
Utrecht pop4, swops build from archer to settler.
Nijmeigen settled and starts granary. Not an ideal site, but if I didn't pinch it then Napoleon would have done so (settler 1 tile away).

The map has been filling up:

Running out of sites fast:

The economy has been growing faster than city maintenance:

Still keeping up on military. Doing ok overall:

AIs research path is interesting. Judaism still not founded. Napoleon's teching well.

Religion is splitting nicely. Shaka and Monte are Buddhist, Ragnar and GK Confucian, Bod and Alexare Hindu while Napoleon is still agnostic.

 

[nbcman]

@pigswill

Unless you have plans to attack Nappy soon, it would be useful to spread confucianism to him if you can build a missionary. But I would spread it to Orleans instead of Paris to not give Paris another +1 . It is always good to have another friendly Civ at this stage of the game.

 

[pigswill]

Played a few more turns, up to 450bc. I'll try to get something posted tonight (or maybe tomorrow morning).

Looking through I've messed up the turn count and actually played up to 700bc in the last set. Can't remember the details but looking through the turnlog I discovered alphabet in 725bc and settled Nijmegen in 700bc. So I'm even slower than I'd realised.

@nbcman. Good idea and I'll follow it if I can get a confu missionary before Nap adopts a religion (it would be even better if Confu spread naturally but its not something I'm clever enough to engineer).

 

[pigswill]

Played a few more turns up to 450bc. Hope I don't mess up the turn count again.

675. Shaka sends a settler party (settler+axe) in my direction. Could triple-whip a settler in Amsterdam and race him for a site but wimp out and wait till I can double whip in two turns.
Swop tiles in Utrecht so I grow (next turn) before completing archer so I can start on a settler straight away.

650.Start to chop forest in Rotterdam to speed up granary.
Stonehenge built in a distant land (Azteca).

625. Utrecht pop 5, completes archer and starts settler.
Amsterdam double whips settler.
Rotterdam's corn is farmed, move to pasturise horses, don't need a road to corn at the moment (already connected at Amsterdam).

600. Amsterdam's settler goes west. Amsterdam starts axe.
Start chopping at Utrecht to build library after whipping settler.
The Hague hits pop3, now working rice, gems and iron.

575. Nijmegen's borders pop, start on copper mine.
Whip granary at Rotterdam (aided by chop). Horses are pasturised, start a road.

550. Napoleon's learned monarchy and revolts to HR (Hereditary Rule).
The Hague completes granary and starts barax.
Rotterdam completes granary and starts library. Utrecht double whips settler.
Maastricht is settled. Shaka did indeed get there first but chose an apparently naff site though he's pinched a wine tile. Maastricht gets cows, iron, clam and spice (some overlap with Amsterdam and plenty of overlap with Shaka's city)

525. Horses are connected at Rotterdam. Utrecht completes settler, overflow from settler and chop combine to give 66 hammers overflow for library (double hammers for creative leader). Library in 2, grows in 2.
Alex and Nap both have settlers wandering around the east.

500.Monarchy > maths. (7 turns). Research down to 60%. Gift mysticism to Ragnar coz I'm kind (and he needs myst and priesthood as pre-reqs for monarchy). Amsterdam grows to pop 6 and starts a chariot. Revolt to HR.

475. Anarchy dies away. Gift priesthood to Ragnar.

450. Monte demands copper. I refuse. I ask Monte if he'll attack someone and he says "we have enough on our hands right now (Wheoorn)" which means he's already preparing to declare on someone.
Utrecht has completed its library, allocate 2 scientists (GS in 17 turns; Amsterdam due to complete Great prophet in 23). Utrecht starts confucian monastery (only confucian city in my empire at the moment).
Buddhism spreads to The Hague.
Middleburg is founded to the east.
Ran out of space:

But at least I've managed to get 7 cities.

 

[dankok8]

575. Nijmegen's borders pop, start on copper mine.
Whip granary at Rotterdam (aided by chop). Horses are pasturised, start a road.

You mean Horse's milk?!?

You've expanded at a good pace and you're boxed in. This game will be a bloodbath. Can you post the power graph? I'd be very afraid of your neighbors; Ghengis has been building since your intrusion in the early game. If he has Horses, you may want to build a few spearmen...

 

[pigswill]

The game may well be a bloodbath but William, chastened by his dismal failure at a warrior rush, won't be so keen to start wars. At least not until he has a substantial advantage over his neighbours (cannon vs longbows for instance).
As for current threats Monte has his hands full (nothing unusual there) but everyone else is peaceful for now. GK has researched HbR but doesn't have keshiks or even horses by the looks of it. There is an unclaimed horse tile east of him and south of Bod so I guess it depends on who gets there first.
I've been just about keeping level on power so far: