Good job on taking the highest possible position. I was thinking about it last night and realised I didn't really want 5-6 after all. So I'm happy with how things turned out. Means it was entirely pointless doing this whole extra process though, since we just ended up with the same order. 
I still very seriously think we should pick Khmer, not just because of all the other benefits (guaranteed Ivory, Hunting to hook up Deer + Ivory and get to AH quick, Mining to get to BW quick)... but because the UU continues to be useful far into the future. So far we've only been talking about the early game, where Elephants are certainly very strong units. However, a key point that's been missed is that Elephants continue to be strong into the age of Knights and beyond. Having the only Elephants in the game will be an amazing way for us to defend ourselves against Knight stacks - because don't forget, our UU also targets mounted units first outside cities!
So Ballista Elephants are not only handy if we want to go on an offensive campaign, but they pretty much guarantee our defensive security through a large part of the mid-game (Construction through to Gunpowder/Rifling/Military Tradition). The sheer length of time that our UU would be useful for is immense.
Of course, I'm reasonably sure that other teams also realise this, and that Khmer will be picked by someone else before us. But if it's not, we'd be silly not to take it.
(Oh, and Inca are usually good, but their starting techs are anti-synergistic with our land, so we'd be off to a much slower start if we picked them.)
I still very seriously think we should pick Khmer, not just because of all the other benefits (guaranteed Ivory, Hunting to hook up Deer + Ivory and get to AH quick, Mining to get to BW quick)... but because the UU continues to be useful far into the future. So far we've only been talking about the early game, where Elephants are certainly very strong units. However, a key point that's been missed is that Elephants continue to be strong into the age of Knights and beyond. Having the only Elephants in the game will be an amazing way for us to defend ourselves against Knight stacks - because don't forget, our UU also targets mounted units first outside cities!
So Ballista Elephants are not only handy if we want to go on an offensive campaign, but they pretty much guarantee our defensive security through a large part of the mid-game (Construction through to Gunpowder/Rifling/Military Tradition). The sheer length of time that our UU would be useful for is immense.
Of course, I'm reasonably sure that other teams also realise this, and that Khmer will be picked by someone else before us. But if it's not, we'd be silly not to take it.
(Oh, and Inca are usually good, but their starting techs are anti-synergistic with our land, so we'd be off to a much slower start if we picked them.)
, and even for that very reason they will not bother covering mounted units with anything, even if for some reasons they wanted to do it before 
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