Sorry this took so long. On to the turn set!
Inherited, in no particular order:
GP farm is using 1f/3h mines. Only one spare food, though, so move one of them to engineer. More GP points, and GEs are always good. Switch build from market (huh?) to National Epic.
SE whale city has no defenders. Send our army over there.
Check diplo status. Hm. Charly and Mao want only edu. Obsolete wants nothing. Toku wants...tons of stuff. All of them have engineering and guilds, which we lack. Ow.
Toku hates us from our war. Charly hates us for our religion. So we can trade with Obsolete and Mao, and have already given Obsolete edu for filler techs. Alright.
Gift literature to Toku for +3. He still won't trade anything. Sad. Well, no harm done, at least.
Good news on espionage screen -- we're <100% cost on all opponents. Redirect all EP to obs/Mao. Will decide on one or the other this set.
Find a pretty good place for future national park. Mark it.
Do a little bit o' micro in the SW whale city. We had a unimproved whale...and a bunch of guys working 2f/2c tiles?
Turn 1:
Lib! Yay! Grab nat. Move on to constitution. I want spy points (easy way to grab tech from foreign powers), plus democracy (we have a lot of cottages) and emancipation (we shoudl put pressure on the buddhist love-in).
Cahokia: uni->research
Nottingham: Switch off settler to Taj.
Turn 2:
Finally get tech visibility on all our opponents. Obsolete is going divine right (for the wonders, of course) while Mao is going for PP. That elects Mao are tech-thieving target. Switch all espionage to him.
London: Caravel -> spy.
York: Uni -> Wealth. Not much infra we really want here.
Hastings: Uni -> Research. Same deal.
Start wishing I could build "health".
We meet Wang Kon. He's in last place. At war with Mao, Charlie, AND Toku. And hates us. Not much use to us.
Turn 3:
Do some worker actions. Will that be it?
NO! Call up Obsolete and get just the trade I wanted: Nat + 25g for Guilds + Engineering. Prereqs for banking and chem, respectively. Excellent.
Sadly, this sends Mao into WFYABTA. Also, we now must be careful of obs beating us to the Taj -- that would be saddening. Hopefully, some chops will make sure things come out in our favor...
Turn 4:
Hm. Mao, Charly, and Obsolete ALL cancel open borders. WTH? The power graph doesn't look TOO bad, but with London's spy done I start it on military, just in case something funny is being planned.
I start thinking if switching to free religion, solely for the diplo bonus, is worth it. Bring up the civic screen to see what we'd be giving up...
...HOLY HELL! We're PAGAN?! Free religion. Now. Screw turns lost revolutin', this is insane. Stick with bureau over free speech...for now at least. Lack of religion improves our diplo somewhat, but nothing remarkable.
Turn 5: Lighthouse -> courthouse in SE whale city ("Warwick"). Operations have begun on chopping up the Taj.
Charly is willing to trade. Woot! He has banking: double woot! He won't trade gunpowder: ugh. Wait on this one -- I wanna snag banking + gunpowder for nat or edu (neither is a monopoly anymore, but both are enough bulbs to make this work).
Really want Taj to finish so Nottingham can build a grocer. The health would be good for it, and we could use the cash.
Turn 6: London finishes a longbowman and starts a grocer. I just can't bring myself to skip this, as it will pull in 7 cash/turn. Back to military after it, but that's the next player...
Newcastle's courthouse comes in, which is nice. This could actually be a great production city, but it'll need some irrigation chaining. I sign as appropriate.
Our exploration is starting to get pretty complete.
Check up on our EP target ("Mao"). Researching sci meth. Sweet. Sadly, he's trying to counter our espionage. Not as sweet. Constitution will turn this in our favor. Democracy will make it crushing.
Turn 7: WK caps to Charlie. Woo. With a score of 560 to our 1769, I don't see him swinging the game.
More worker fun. Other than that, not much going on.
Turn 8: Obsolete finishes the Taj. And the Sisten Chapel. Holy crap. He then goes WHEOOHRN. Lovely. Drop Taj for grover in Nottingham.
I guess trading Nat to Obsolete was a serious error on my part. We have massive production in Nottingham, a 2 turn head start, and were chopping forests. We were still 13 turns (~50%) from completion when he finished it. Hot damn.
Turn 9: Harbor -> grocer in Chaco Canyon. It needs the health, and we could use the money.
Granary -> courthouse in Liverpool. That'll save 3.5 cash/turn. The Taj turns into a bunch of cash. Obsolete founds Islam...and has a GP born. Expect the shrine soon, I suppose.
Release a spy on Mao's land. Head for his capital, where we can start consider tech-thievery.
Turn 10: Consitution comes in. I hold off on rep, figuring we'll skip straight to universal suffrage. No one will trade us PP, so start researching it, sadly enough (no beakers yet, though, so we can change this if desired). Switch a couple cities that were on wealth/research to grocers/jails.
We will want jails EVERYWHERE. This will produce a ton of EP, with which we can steal techs from Mao.
We should get OB with Charlie/Mao ASAP. This will let us get our missionary into Mao's land. If we can convert him, that would rock.
Other than that, I think we're doing OK. We're behind in tech, but once Charlie is willing to trade gunpowder we should be able to get it + banking from him easily. Also, while we're behind, we have the fastest research rate, so we'll pull back ahead as the game wears on. One good thievery from Mao will be huge, too.
I think we're in fairly good position. The next question is how do we win. Space seems like the obvious choice, here, as the other continent is inconvenient and we lack religion. Between London, Hastings, and Newcastle, we should be able to pump space parts faster than anyone else.
Inherited, in no particular order:
GP farm is using 1f/3h mines. Only one spare food, though, so move one of them to engineer. More GP points, and GEs are always good. Switch build from market (huh?) to National Epic.
SE whale city has no defenders. Send our army over there.
Check diplo status. Hm. Charly and Mao want only edu. Obsolete wants nothing. Toku wants...tons of stuff. All of them have engineering and guilds, which we lack. Ow.
Toku hates us from our war. Charly hates us for our religion. So we can trade with Obsolete and Mao, and have already given Obsolete edu for filler techs. Alright.
Gift literature to Toku for +3. He still won't trade anything. Sad. Well, no harm done, at least.
Good news on espionage screen -- we're <100% cost on all opponents. Redirect all EP to obs/Mao. Will decide on one or the other this set.
Find a pretty good place for future national park. Mark it.
Do a little bit o' micro in the SW whale city. We had a unimproved whale...and a bunch of guys working 2f/2c tiles?
Turn 1:
Lib! Yay! Grab nat. Move on to constitution. I want spy points (easy way to grab tech from foreign powers), plus democracy (we have a lot of cottages) and emancipation (we shoudl put pressure on the buddhist love-in).
Cahokia: uni->research
Nottingham: Switch off settler to Taj.
Turn 2:
Finally get tech visibility on all our opponents. Obsolete is going divine right (for the wonders, of course) while Mao is going for PP. That elects Mao are tech-thieving target. Switch all espionage to him.
London: Caravel -> spy.
York: Uni -> Wealth. Not much infra we really want here.
Hastings: Uni -> Research. Same deal.
Start wishing I could build "health".
We meet Wang Kon. He's in last place. At war with Mao, Charlie, AND Toku. And hates us. Not much use to us.
Turn 3:
Do some worker actions. Will that be it?
NO! Call up Obsolete and get just the trade I wanted: Nat + 25g for Guilds + Engineering. Prereqs for banking and chem, respectively. Excellent.
Sadly, this sends Mao into WFYABTA. Also, we now must be careful of obs beating us to the Taj -- that would be saddening. Hopefully, some chops will make sure things come out in our favor...
Turn 4:
Hm. Mao, Charly, and Obsolete ALL cancel open borders. WTH? The power graph doesn't look TOO bad, but with London's spy done I start it on military, just in case something funny is being planned.
I start thinking if switching to free religion, solely for the diplo bonus, is worth it. Bring up the civic screen to see what we'd be giving up...
...HOLY HELL! We're PAGAN?! Free religion. Now. Screw turns lost revolutin', this is insane. Stick with bureau over free speech...for now at least. Lack of religion improves our diplo somewhat, but nothing remarkable.
Turn 5: Lighthouse -> courthouse in SE whale city ("Warwick"). Operations have begun on chopping up the Taj.
Charly is willing to trade. Woot! He has banking: double woot! He won't trade gunpowder: ugh. Wait on this one -- I wanna snag banking + gunpowder for nat or edu (neither is a monopoly anymore, but both are enough bulbs to make this work).
Really want Taj to finish so Nottingham can build a grocer. The health would be good for it, and we could use the cash.
Turn 6: London finishes a longbowman and starts a grocer. I just can't bring myself to skip this, as it will pull in 7 cash/turn. Back to military after it, but that's the next player...
Newcastle's courthouse comes in, which is nice. This could actually be a great production city, but it'll need some irrigation chaining. I sign as appropriate.
Our exploration is starting to get pretty complete.
Check up on our EP target ("Mao"). Researching sci meth. Sweet. Sadly, he's trying to counter our espionage. Not as sweet. Constitution will turn this in our favor. Democracy will make it crushing.
Turn 7: WK caps to Charlie. Woo. With a score of 560 to our 1769, I don't see him swinging the game.
More worker fun. Other than that, not much going on.
Turn 8: Obsolete finishes the Taj. And the Sisten Chapel. Holy crap. He then goes WHEOOHRN. Lovely. Drop Taj for grover in Nottingham.
I guess trading Nat to Obsolete was a serious error on my part. We have massive production in Nottingham, a 2 turn head start, and were chopping forests. We were still 13 turns (~50%) from completion when he finished it. Hot damn.
Turn 9: Harbor -> grocer in Chaco Canyon. It needs the health, and we could use the money.
Granary -> courthouse in Liverpool. That'll save 3.5 cash/turn. The Taj turns into a bunch of cash. Obsolete founds Islam...and has a GP born. Expect the shrine soon, I suppose.
Release a spy on Mao's land. Head for his capital, where we can start consider tech-thievery.
Turn 10: Consitution comes in. I hold off on rep, figuring we'll skip straight to universal suffrage. No one will trade us PP, so start researching it, sadly enough (no beakers yet, though, so we can change this if desired). Switch a couple cities that were on wealth/research to grocers/jails.
We will want jails EVERYWHERE. This will produce a ton of EP, with which we can steal techs from Mao.
We should get OB with Charlie/Mao ASAP. This will let us get our missionary into Mao's land. If we can convert him, that would rock.
Other than that, I think we're doing OK. We're behind in tech, but once Charlie is willing to trade gunpowder we should be able to get it + banking from him easily. Also, while we're behind, we have the fastest research rate, so we'll pull back ahead as the game wears on. One good thievery from Mao will be huge, too.
I think we're in fairly good position. The next question is how do we win. Space seems like the obvious choice, here, as the other continent is inconvenient and we lack religion. Between London, Hastings, and Newcastle, we should be able to pump space parts faster than anyone else.
& +1
I would suggest doing them one at a time, that way if he cancels one it doesn't cancel them all.
and +1
trade route until Economics comes in will help bring in some spy points.
/turn. When did that happen!?
By the way, I'm fairly sure the closing of borders was from an AP vote. From Obsolete. That bastard!
).
per turn and 31 
