I've not really done a critique of some of the major decisions in this game.
FWIW, I think once we decided to move the starting settler and settle on the plains hill, most of this game has been decided by the map. I don't think moving was the only reasonable choice: settling in place would have been fine, because with the pig second ring it could have been easily split off and the capital stagnates at size 5 with the two sheep, fp and two mines, rather than the convoluted route to Pottery we took for a capital granary and cottages. But once we did, we had to spam out the cities and settle for Hunting resources, we had to settle city 4 on the coast rather than at Kalamazoo because the capital just couldn't give up the pig until it had the granary and was at max size, then there was no choice except to rush for the only happiness resource available within 10 tiles of the start location (Actually that's a lie: it was 11 tiles from the start location).
I don't think it matters what leader/civ combo we picked for this start (except CHM, which would have blown this start to pieces). Because you have to spam out settlers to even reach a happy resource you go bankrupt, so you have to run scientists, so you have to get an Academy, settle the scientist, or go for a GA way too early. Religion first would have been viable for Hunting/Myst, so maybe ORG HRE could have gotten an early religion and still played for a shrine, otherwise an early religion strat would have fallen on its face. The Academy was the right choice. There was no stone or marble which is why we lost every wonder we went for (except MoM, that was just AGG giving a tech edge to OT4E). Staying small and limiting horizontal expansion doesn't help tech much given we would have reached Alphabet, and then not been able to build research and expand at the same time, and we didn't have cottageable land outside the cap, beyond what we did, and no happy cap room to work them. If I hadn't taken the chance of settling 3S and grabbing the sugar and gems sites, we'd have had one calendar, and one none calendar happy resource, with limited trade bait. We'd have also been in a position were OH could have attacked us and been able to take all the land we had (ie, if he attacked even now, we just have too much land for him to capture, but if he had 3S/ATAT/SA and ST then he may have been able to attack in a two stage war).
We had the one none coastal start, so we had no way to compete for Circumnavigation either. So the more I look back on this game, the more I think strategically I've made the right calls. The last major one was to spam those last 7 settlers out because those cities are going to be ready for Medieval era warfare and will probably be what let's us win (if we do). We know have a food and land lead of all other players. MFG is slightly inaccurate: it doesn't show the double HE that we have built, which right now is worth 28hpt so I don't believe we are actually behind Gav at this point (He may have a HE unit, but the point holds, both HE are worth up to 40hpt, so that's 40hpt he can't have.
I do know that a lot of the micro I've done has been a bit naff though. Definitely wasted a good 20 worker turns through stupidity.
FWIW, I think once we decided to move the starting settler and settle on the plains hill, most of this game has been decided by the map. I don't think moving was the only reasonable choice: settling in place would have been fine, because with the pig second ring it could have been easily split off and the capital stagnates at size 5 with the two sheep, fp and two mines, rather than the convoluted route to Pottery we took for a capital granary and cottages. But once we did, we had to spam out the cities and settle for Hunting resources, we had to settle city 4 on the coast rather than at Kalamazoo because the capital just couldn't give up the pig until it had the granary and was at max size, then there was no choice except to rush for the only happiness resource available within 10 tiles of the start location (Actually that's a lie: it was 11 tiles from the start location).
I don't think it matters what leader/civ combo we picked for this start (except CHM, which would have blown this start to pieces). Because you have to spam out settlers to even reach a happy resource you go bankrupt, so you have to run scientists, so you have to get an Academy, settle the scientist, or go for a GA way too early. Religion first would have been viable for Hunting/Myst, so maybe ORG HRE could have gotten an early religion and still played for a shrine, otherwise an early religion strat would have fallen on its face. The Academy was the right choice. There was no stone or marble which is why we lost every wonder we went for (except MoM, that was just AGG giving a tech edge to OT4E). Staying small and limiting horizontal expansion doesn't help tech much given we would have reached Alphabet, and then not been able to build research and expand at the same time, and we didn't have cottageable land outside the cap, beyond what we did, and no happy cap room to work them. If I hadn't taken the chance of settling 3S and grabbing the sugar and gems sites, we'd have had one calendar, and one none calendar happy resource, with limited trade bait. We'd have also been in a position were OH could have attacked us and been able to take all the land we had (ie, if he attacked even now, we just have too much land for him to capture, but if he had 3S/ATAT/SA and ST then he may have been able to attack in a two stage war).
We had the one none coastal start, so we had no way to compete for Circumnavigation either. So the more I look back on this game, the more I think strategically I've made the right calls. The last major one was to spam those last 7 settlers out because those cities are going to be ready for Medieval era warfare and will probably be what let's us win (if we do). We know have a food and land lead of all other players. MFG is slightly inaccurate: it doesn't show the double HE that we have built, which right now is worth 28hpt so I don't believe we are actually behind Gav at this point (He may have a HE unit, but the point holds, both HE are worth up to 40hpt, so that's 40hpt he can't have.
I do know that a lot of the micro I've done has been a bit naff though. Definitely wasted a good 20 worker turns through stupidity.