Where should I expand?

[silver 2039]

I'm Egypt, I've crushed and annexed Ethiopia and Israel in that order. I'm looking for some more expansion and I've decided that Babylon looks weak and easy so I'm bulidng up to take them.

However I'm suffering from lack of iron, the closest neighbour to me which has iron is the Ottomans but I'm loathe to attack them because they have Siaphi's and Jassinaries. My other neighbours are powerful, Arabia, Carthage, Persia, are all quite strong. So after Babylon where to expand and how to get iron?

I'm a bit late in the African colonziation and South East Asian colonization, Arabia is the premier colonial and naval power in the region. Africa is mostly carved up, and there's no chance of me getting any of South East Asia what with Japan, India, Korea, China, and Arabia all colonizing it. India has discovered and begun colonizing Australia and Spain has discovered and begun colonizing the New World.

I could possibly try to jump in with the Australian and New World colonization. It would net me various resources and luxuries I need and relieve my population pressures. Or I could just build up my army, and conquering but it would be long and bloody and I lack productive capabilities. Settler are expensive too though so I guess both paths would be roughly equal in terms of cost and time.

Spoiler :

 

[Kumquat]

When I need a resource I look around for a coastal city that has it. I make a list of them and way the odds (The further away the better, colonial holdings have no immediate reinforcements, and how long will take to get there). I cannot tell if you have wines or not but there are wines right above you, declare place a city and defend it till you get peace. Is this Rhyes scenario? I played it once as France and got a big colonial empire but the game ended so soon

 

[silver 2039]

Its the Babylonians who have the wines I've already attacked them and am besieging their capital..and the iron... the Ottomans have that.and the Jassinaries and Saphi's. So don't want to attack right now. Yeh this is Rhyes mod.

 

[Kumquat]

I was talking about Greece Crete has 2 tiles 1 forested plain & 1 wine plain. The Island should be easy to defend unless Greece has amphibious units and to prevent them from sending any significant forces against you just sigh an alliance with 1 of there neighbors (I would do this after Babylon is dealt with). I would making colonizing the New World priority 1 after the Babylonians (Spice & Fur Colonies) then conquering Africa itself. Thats my 2c

 

[Hasdrubal Barca]

You need more cities and a lot more workers to mine hills/mountains, in a desert/floodplain society you can grow fast but need to spam a lot of workers to mine around in order to compensate for lack of shield tiles.

Place new cities where the red circles are:

Persia seems to have iron....try to trade for it...taking out the Arabs would seem better then Greeks, they are in desert so i doublt they can put that many units in the field and with a galley/boat and a couple defensive units landed on the horses square and pillaging it and declaring war they couldnt do much at all...

You have some gold avaiable, rush some granys/improvements or make units for upgrading.

After taking out Arabs you could be tempted to go for the Otomans...

 

[Kumquat]

Desert, Tundra, Forests, and Jungles cannot support cites and settlers cost 120 shields and 3 pop in this mod

 

[silver 2039]

4 pop at this point actually since I'm late medevial. And by industrial it will be 5 pop which I'm currently 2 techs away from.

 

[Kumquat]

Forgot about the era changes...ouch!

 

[Hasdrubal Barca]

Interesting mod, i have ancient med from tanis but haven´t tried it yet...is this one better? which one do you recomend