Well, I gave it a shot. I've only played one previous game on Warlords (Noble difficulty), I rarely play at slower than Epic, and I've never tried an OCC. So, this was always going to be a tough one...
I finally gave up c.1550ad, having failed to settle or capture a single city (although one AI city would definitely have culture-flipped sooner or later). I did manage to keep up with the AI in tech until about 1300ad, and I successfully fought off one fairly pathetic invasion from the south (tech-bribing a powerful neighbour to join the war probably saved me from further attacks).
Ultimately, however, I just couldn't raise a large enough army without going into total tech stagnation. There was one civ that looked vulnerable; but, just as I was preparing to strike, it became a vassal to the toughest civ on the block.
In the end I put together what forces I could and took a shot at a weakly defended border-city (housing two wonders) which belonged to the tech-leader, who was already loosing cities to another civ. The Hwachas did a fine job, but I just hadn't enough troops to overcome the last defenders before their reinforcements arrived. Defeat would surely have followed, so I decided to call it a day.
In terms of development, I decided early on to run an SE, despite being Financial. I reasoned that with only one city, and having no need to build settlers, I could prioritise the wonders needed to make it pay off. I chopped the Great Wall, built the Pyramids, GE-rushed the Parthenon, built the Great Library, and GE-rushed the National Epic. I lightbulbed and traded several techs to keep me in the race, and used the Rep/Caste/Pacifism combo to keep me teching whilst I built my army.
Unfortunately, I had a run of bad luck in the GP-generation stakes, picking up an Artist and three Engineers in succession, which would only lighbulb techs the AI already had. Consequently, although I was able to keep up in tech, I couldn't divert enough attention to military production without loosing ground.
In retrospect, I would have been better off letting myself fall behind for the sake of getting my army ready more quickly. If I had done so, then I could have launched an attack before the vulnerable civ became a vassal, and hopefully taken a city or two. In any case I don't think I could've pulled off a win, but I would probably have been able to survive into the later stages.
As it was, I ended up getting left behind in the tech-race, and utterly outnumbered on the battlefield. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the challenge; the pre-BC constraint makes for a very different experience, and I think I might give it a go on a noble game to see if I can sneak a victory.
