Re: Technology Fast
Lumer0, the trick is to make contact with as many of your rival civilizations as possible. That way, you have more chances at making trades for technology. If not, you can always use your knowledge of where they are to go to war and force them to give you technologies in order for them to survive.
Remember - Never and I mean ever trade anything other than gold to an AI when it's not your turn. If you do, they will turn around with that technology or map and trade it to as many other AIs as possible. Not as much of a probablem in multiplayer, but sometimes people like to play with the AI.
Generally speaking, you're probably going to forge alliances with players that don't necessarily border you. Why? Because there's little impetus to ally with your immediate neighbours -- that's what war is for! In a game, Tribe A and Tribe C would be more disposed toward alliance with eachother, especially if Tribe B is getting powerful.
A lot of MP strategy is simple Games Theory stuff, you may want to start reading about that particular subset of Logic.
- Rep.