Spoiler :

You are forced to pick a fight with the Ottomans so early because of their placement, or you have nowhere to expand. However, once you have done that, you're really isolated. There's only the Celts nearby, but that's no help because they're a really strong religious Civ, spreading to them is really hard. Even when you can start spreading Missionaries more widely across the map, Ethiopia and Russia will have had time to completely entrench their religion because you couldn't reach them early on. Because it is Immortal and they all have super high pops, you can't hit enough pop solely by yourself to get your reformation belief. So you have to target France, which is the point I've reached. Right now I'm in an utterly vicious religious war with France, but I'm on the losing side. Might just have to give up on TtGoG and focus purely on the finishers from Authority and Fealty. Map needed a few more non-religious Civs to let the Byzies really shine, IMO, or at least better access to Russia and France.



Still, good challenge, that's for sure!