Just about anywhere we want it to, presuming we don't misstep at any point and lose a couple of our cities to some sneak attack or by entering into the wrong war at the wrong time.
The English are the only ones who have us over a barrel, and that ENDS once we have rails by which to shift reinforcements to wherever they may be needed.
Only if? Heh heh. Now you sound like Diablo players talking about how they can accomplish XYZ Feat, "only if" they have a certain item, or use a certain skill, etc. You know better than to box your thinking into a corner.
I'll go as far as to suggest that, yes, somebody who builds no courthouses (and isn't used to playing Commercial civs?) isn't going to secure the kinds of tech leads to put them in the driver's seat. If you take our civ back to despotism at any point, there will surely be a massive popular uprising the moment your turn ends, and many UNkind things will be written about you in the histories.
Many many many, including vile epithets.Rails and factories can massively increase production. The draft allows for much less painless "buffering" of the military than the whip. Cavalry in particular is so strong, it can run over almost anything, even some infantry if properly supported. Our elephants will give us a golden age, and damn if we're going to waste THAT in despotism, whipping our cities to no useful end.
There are four scenerios, and I don't know that we should pick ahead of time which will be best.
1) We remain neutral, attacking nobody offensively. Downside: we may risk missing out on our Golden Age.
2) We side with the Persians and attack the French, swallow them, stay buddy-buddy with Persia and stand with them against the world.
3) We side with the "allies" and attack the Persians, making them the hated civ of the world by whatever means necessary. This one COULD backfire if they crumble, allowing some new threat to emerge, but who knows.
4) We side with nobody, attack judiciously JUST to get the GA, and then seek peace quickly after getting some small gains.
A whole lot is going to depend on resources. If we don't have any saltpeter but someone near us does, well, there you go. We can't build cavalry or much of anything until riflemen without saltpeter. If we don't have coal (quite possible, although I am HOPING we do at Bombay, and get the Iron Works there) then we'll have to bend our whole civ to acquiring coal and holding it, or else lose our edge and pay through the nose for it for the whole game. If we don't have any rubber in that huge jungle, this game ought to be shot. Plain and simple.
The AI is stupid. People are not. If we can keep Cy from automating every worker, we can gain a further edge (above and beyond our current edge) when we get to steam. Rails in the right places do wonders, and we can surely get to rails first by skipping most of the optional techs in the middle age -- and by LOWERING CORRPUPTION, with courthouses and the SBI (FP), and not overdoing the military. Can't underdo it either, but we don't need masses and masses of elephants. Six or eight should do, for starters. See where it goes from there. The golden age will propel us greatly forward!
Diplomacy is the least likely. We're too much in their faces already, and chances are, that's going to get worse. The thing is, we already have just about all the land that's ever going to matter to us. Maybe a couple cities directly to the west of Delhi could be made useful, but they'd still be two lengths away, or more. Taking over France, with the FP at Bombay, will leave all those cities somewhat productive, but we'd either have to eliminate France entirely, or starve the population down to minimal and regrow our own citizens. Revolt is a nasty deal.
Everything else, landwise, is completely useless to us. The only reasons to conquer or settle past that point would be to hurt a rival or to acquire vital resources -- or to milk the score, which frankly doesn't appeal to me much. Milking just for more points starts looking too much like work to me. I enjoy building, and conquest, but I'm no milkmaid.
Can only have one leader at a time. If we get one early, I'm certainly NOT going to save him through my turn. We can get another later, or not need one at all, if we play well. Playing no reloads ups the value of armies, as you get an assault unit that can beat down strong defenders -- especially prior to tanks. Or a defender with triple strength, that can't be taken out. Using an early leader on a middle age wonder can help ensure you don't NEED one later to build the UN. On Monarch, the AI's aren't all that highly advantaged. It's a good sign that the AI's are ganging up on bully Persia. If they all get into a warring mood, and go Communist, they're complete toast. The game might as well commit harakiri as to go Communist. The AI is just SO woefully inept at managing combat once units with three movement points enter the picture. They're incapable of defending well.
We can't upgrade TO elephants, but we can upgrade them to cavalry later on. Fairly cheap, too. So it won't hurt us to build plenty of them, they are NOT use-or-lose units.
You put that whip away, Charis. You hear me? It's wasteful. It's useful on enemy cities, take them over and whip them hard, you can churn out longbowmen and pikes, and some knights, but this isn't a pangaea map. We're plenty large enough and strong enough to do what the AI won't do: reduce corruption, increase production.
We're probably too late to get the Sistine Chapel, which would have been really really nice for all our cathedrals, but maybe the French will build it for us.
Whipping is the great loophole of civ3. It would be interesting to see if Firaxis ever closes that loophole by swapping priority on content faces, such that too much whipping overwhelms temples and martial law, and sends cities into hopeless unhappiness, where you end up having to turn everyone into taxmen, and starving the city down to size one, where it sits thereafter. Right now, you can whip whip whip whip a size one city and never worry about it. That's neither historically accurate nor sensical. Take that away, and what do you have left?
Whipping as many as three population will go away before too long, once the whipping stops. Two or less is usually no problem at all. Whipping five or more and it's going to last and last and last and last, as the effect seems to be geometric, increasing both the length and degree with each extra whipping. Whip ten times at a city and the whole unhappiness seems to last for simply ages. I've seen it take over 200 turns to settle down. That's FOREVER in practical terms. Bombay, in our game, is quite nearly overwhipped. We're going to lose a lot more production off that last whipping or two than we gained. I am only glad I could come save it from more abuse while it's still in decent shape. I know I was the first to whip it, and all the blame falls on me because leaders "were just following Sirian's example". But if the trade-goods luxuries dry up, it's going to be in some trouble. Three wheat, and it's still growing slowly at this point. Might as well, as more mouths to feed are just more unhappy people. So I left it on maximum mining at the end of my turn.
Believe it or not, with a religious civ, those temples come out so quickly, I don't always whip them. If a city can muster two or even three shields, it might be able to build it on its own, and let the population build up so I can whip out a courthouse or something else pricey.
Courthouses also help resist cultural takeover. You and Cy have been worried about that, but I've not yet had any of my self-built cities defect to the enemy. Ever. I don't even lose many captured cities, although I have lost some. (How can you not? The game is harsh about that). The whip does NOT always come down to a matter of one pop for forty shields. Shields and trade lost because the pop is lower can mean a net LOSS for whipping, and even in just a few turns. I whip colonies far from home pretty harshly -- I traded THREE pop for a courthouse in Calcutta -- but that is only because more pop at those pits of crime and vice go to waste anyway. Closer to home, you've got to let them grow more, ESPECIALLY if they are on water and don't need to pause for an aqueduct.
We'll also have to see where Skan goes. I gather that he's not tried anything but the ancient war rush, and word from his aborted turn spoke of war and losses. I'm curious to see how his turn will go.
The ancient war rush would only allow what? One or two turns per player? A building game lets us build history as well, and the shared history we've written is probably the best part of our game. You, Hocus, and Jaffa have all tried a few bold things I wouldn't have dared, that have paid off, or at least worked out. It's been a lot of fun for me because, as for Cy, the situations I've been handed have been quite different from my usual fare.
If we happen to get a leader in time to build Sistine, that should be our priority with him. If not that, well, it will be up to the winning player, but either use him to rush a wonder (in a place where not many shields would be lost, which is also SECURE) or to build an army, stick a unit or two into it, make SURE it wins a fight, and build the heroic epic. Whatever you do, do it right away (or as soon as possible, in the case of moving him to rush a wonder). Don't have him sit around doing nothing much besides preventing us from any chance of earning another one.
- Sirian
. There are probably 2 Pikemen in there, so a little care is called for in the assault, but you have overwhelming force. Remember Archers die off with Longbowmen 
And who was it gushing over those whales way back when?
Had he noted it was NOT in fact where he wanted it, he would have razed it immediately.
