yup, india will need to be leaned on, no doubt. i think what we need to do is sim out a start similar to ours and work out what our economy looks like with 4 cities, the same tiles hooked up (gold etc) and a couple of riverside cottages. we certainly have enough gold to get HBR @ 100% with plenty to spare but i'd like to see what our finances look like 20 turns down the road when HBR completes. i'm not sure i'll have time to do this today 
diplo thoughts:
i think we're in a very strong bargaining position as far as naming our next tech. it really doesn't look like most teams have the rsch to knock out those "expensive" techs quickly. the main obstacle to us choosing CoL and rsching it at a leisurely pace is egypt; we need to, not lean on him, but point out we're acting intelligently and moving with the interest of the Cartel in mind rather than just ours.
egypt doesn't know about the Alliance (and it looks like Carthage at the very least also wants in). i think if you asked egypt and india at the moment they would say we're the ones they want to work with. we need to leverage that - particularly with egypt as at the moment it is NOT in our plans to work with him long term. i'm sure egypt is immensely frustrated by the whole coordination effort, and i'm equally sure our ability to knock out HBR while everyone else has driven their economies into the ground elevates us in his eyes. i think this will make him willing to work with us, particularly when we send him a nice email saying HBR is being rschd at 100%, ETA x turns.
i'm not sure we can coax him into giving up confucianism - again, i've been convinced all along he wants to run the tables on religions + control which ones spread and which don't - but i do believe that being a smart guy he'll see that the upside in letting us have it outweighs the downside. he may well find himself painted into a corner on it. have we tried to gather any diplo support for our position? i still believe it's a good idea, although not as pressing as when i thought we were required to rsch an "expensive" tech to uphold our end of the bargain.
also, let's consider what he's rsching - writing, for alphabet. meaning he can't even start mono until the oracle is built on T62. so we MAY be able to beat him to it outright.
more generally, i'm somewhat concerned by how the alliance is shaping up in terms of expensive techs, i.e. 1 of the 8 might not be around and 3 of the 8 (us india egypt) seem like they won't rsch "expensive techs". so if we were to say to the other 5 teams hey guys, egypt and india might not pull their weight in terms of teching but we want the alliance to succeed, we'll rsch CoL and trade it to you, that'll make us the good guys in the eyes of portugal/carthage/england/ottomans/aztec.
i'm going to do a very rough ballpark estimate of what our empire will look like when HBR is rschd from an economic perspective.
edited to add because there's SO much happening:
1) ilios i know the above is stream-of-consciousness but i hope it conveys my thoughts at least kind of clearly
2) great great news carthage outright says they want to work with us and ottomans
3) what's the situation with inca, that's a concern. i know we're being aggressive, but i don't have access so have no idea what's going on? have we also declared on them, because if so we need to keep to the first half of the timer + coordinate with aztec and ottomans.
diplo thoughts:
i think we're in a very strong bargaining position as far as naming our next tech. it really doesn't look like most teams have the rsch to knock out those "expensive" techs quickly. the main obstacle to us choosing CoL and rsching it at a leisurely pace is egypt; we need to, not lean on him, but point out we're acting intelligently and moving with the interest of the Cartel in mind rather than just ours.
egypt doesn't know about the Alliance (and it looks like Carthage at the very least also wants in). i think if you asked egypt and india at the moment they would say we're the ones they want to work with. we need to leverage that - particularly with egypt as at the moment it is NOT in our plans to work with him long term. i'm sure egypt is immensely frustrated by the whole coordination effort, and i'm equally sure our ability to knock out HBR while everyone else has driven their economies into the ground elevates us in his eyes. i think this will make him willing to work with us, particularly when we send him a nice email saying HBR is being rschd at 100%, ETA x turns.
i'm not sure we can coax him into giving up confucianism - again, i've been convinced all along he wants to run the tables on religions + control which ones spread and which don't - but i do believe that being a smart guy he'll see that the upside in letting us have it outweighs the downside. he may well find himself painted into a corner on it. have we tried to gather any diplo support for our position? i still believe it's a good idea, although not as pressing as when i thought we were required to rsch an "expensive" tech to uphold our end of the bargain.
also, let's consider what he's rsching - writing, for alphabet. meaning he can't even start mono until the oracle is built on T62. so we MAY be able to beat him to it outright.
more generally, i'm somewhat concerned by how the alliance is shaping up in terms of expensive techs, i.e. 1 of the 8 might not be around and 3 of the 8 (us india egypt) seem like they won't rsch "expensive techs". so if we were to say to the other 5 teams hey guys, egypt and india might not pull their weight in terms of teching but we want the alliance to succeed, we'll rsch CoL and trade it to you, that'll make us the good guys in the eyes of portugal/carthage/england/ottomans/aztec.
i'm going to do a very rough ballpark estimate of what our empire will look like when HBR is rschd from an economic perspective.
edited to add because there's SO much happening:
1) ilios i know the above is stream-of-consciousness but i hope it conveys my thoughts at least kind of clearly
2) great great news carthage outright says they want to work with us and ottomans
3) what's the situation with inca, that's a concern. i know we're being aggressive, but i don't have access so have no idea what's going on? have we also declared on them, because if so we need to keep to the first half of the timer + coordinate with aztec and ottomans.