Still working on that 1st maya game (sorry guys, I play huge maps, I play slow AND I'm one of the lucky ones who still has a job and must spend 7 hours a day doin it ;-) )
As
@Mr Jon of Cheam has mentioned in another thread, choosing Maya with Apocalypse activated, so disasters set to 4, is a no-no. The civ is simply TOO dependent on tile improvement for housing, So I feel like I'm spending half my time micro-managing builders for fixing or re-improving tiles ;-(
As a side note, I now remember why I chose to always set disasters to 2... I really think there should be a lens or a 1 turn highlight of tiles that have lost improvements because of disasters. At least, when they're just pillaged, you can go on strategic view and identify them with the fire icon, but
when the improvement has just been wiped, you have to visually find them. Annoying as hell, especially on luxuries.
Another mistake was taking continent map. Another I dislike, but this time it's even worse as we have 5 civs on my continent and 7 on the other one. And since the beginning of the game, it's been Aid Request galore on the other continent, like one every 5-7 turns, and I was never invited to them until I got to cartography and made my way to the other continent. During the same time, not a single aid request on my continent. Anyways... I just don't like continent map, there's always a runaway civ on the other one.
I'm around turn 185 now (huge, immortal, normal speed) and frankly, my science has been catching up and is now taking over everyone, as is usual with my play style, so I,m not seeing much slowdown there. But from the look of things at the moment, I don't think there's any chance of me winning this game without going aggro
on the runaway civ on the other continent (Gran Colombia, of course). They already have double my score points, and are leading in every single aspect. So my hopes for a pacific game are pretty much dashed, unless I get the feeling I can beat everyone to a science victory. I'll wait and see when I get to aluminum and bombers ;-)
Finally, another problem I foresee with MAYA is Strategic resources. Already, I've had to adjust one city placement for Iron, now I got James Young GS so I got to see oil before the others, and I'm having to go and build a bad city outside the 6 tiles radius on a very bad tundra tile because it's the only oil that's even close to my region.
I was lucky on niter I got a lot of them, but hoestly, it's almost certain that there will NOT be any of either niter, oil or aluminum on your map zone, and that's just too crippling in this game. Too many units depend on them, and they're pretty much all can't be replaced by an equivalent unit needing a different resource.
In my mind, the aim of the CIV, which was pretty much to play tall and turtle and peaceful, isn't something that can realistically be reached, at least not of immortal/deity on a regular, steady basis.