Stole three workers to open the game, which was great fun. My Warrior went SW and grabbed one from Mehmed, but was killed by an Archer the next turn. Both Gallic Warriors were successful, one against Ramses and one against Mansa. My intention was to go all-in on a fast start and get far enough ahead of the AI in tech and infrastructure that those -3 penalties wouldn't matter. Ramses and Mansa signed signed peace shortly after the Workers arrived home, but Mehmed stayed at war with my for about 3000 years,
After researching BW I noticed no religions had been founded, so I decided I had a shot at the Oracle and maybe even a religion. I snagged Buddhism around 2000BC, founded City 2 near the Oasis in order to ensure it was a net positive for research, and started slowly building Oracle while working the Gems. I thought I might even have a chance at Civil Service the way things were speeding along, but once the Barbarian floodgates opened my improvements were needing constant rebuilding. I lost one of Gallic Warrior to an unlucky roll of the dice and the second city had to send lots of Warriors to fight off the barbs. I ended up teching CoL the turn Oracle finished and took Philosophy - getting Math first for CS slingshot probably would have resulted in the getting beaten on the Oracle the way things played out, but actually might have been possible if that Gallic Warrior had lived and given me a few less turns where a Gem was offline.
As the barb siege started lifting thanks to AI expansion, I finally got Horses and Iron hooked up, and settled the FP/Ivory/Pig site to the NW and a Jungle Cow/Spice/Sugar site west of the capital.
Around 1000BC, Mehmed showed up on my borders with a Chariot and Archer, but they were merely escorting a Settler. He took the spot on the coast with Wheat, Fish, Ivory, and FP that I wanted for my fourth city. This was actually a good thing, because the Barbarians started attacking that city and weakened his CGII Archer enough that the trusty old Gallic Warrior was able to slay him and capture the city. As a bonus, this finally made Mehmed sign peace after our 3000 year war.
At 1AD I have 6 cities and have teched up to Machinery, Civil Service is next, eventually working towards Military Tradition for Cavalry. I skipped by Alphabet assuming one of the AIs would get it reasonably quickly on this level, but only Peter has it so far - I backfilled most older techs from him. Should be going after some Mali and Egyptian border cities in the next few turns with a stack of Swords.
