re: Civ 5: Strategies for BNW

Started a new game on king last night. Went pretty well...I think I might be getting the patch down now.

Went Japan for Bushido to help with barbarians and super aggressive other Civs. Settled coastal on a marble tile (automatic luxury PLUS +15% production to first 2 era wonders) with 3 copper within my range. Also had 2 fish resources, 3 or so hill/desert tiles, few marshes and a couple of forests. Land to my right (about 4 tiles away) had a mountain range extending south with hills around it.

Kinda like this:

W W W W M H
W W W W W M
W W W W W M
W D C F F M

W - Water, M - Mountain, H - Hill, D - Desert, F - Forest, C - City center.

Ended up settling 3 more cities in kind of a diamond pattern. My science city had plenty of hills & desert and was adjacent to a mountain (for observatory). Built quite a few trading posts here. After religion and rationalism bonuses those tiles ended up being +1 Production +2 Gold +1 Science +1 Culture. That city is the bee's knees.

To my southeast, I had China and Greece. Greece had tons of cities and somehow China ended up with one city right between me and Greece by turn 120. I built Great Wall just to rub it in Wu's face, but we became franz. Around turn 200 my DoF with her ran out and Greece went for the kill. I placed a Citadel close enough to get within 1-turn distance of China's capital and let Greece do the dirty work. They got her within 1 hit of falling then I declared war vs. China, moved my unit in, and took her down. No hard feelings between us since she was out of the game, I get a new city in a great spot with 3 luxuries and like 8 flood plains tiles, AND a "common foe" diplomacy bonus from Greece...the most powerful Civ at that point.