I think it is more fun to wait until someone achieves their third actual meeting.
Are we denying / permitting / encouraging actual warfare until the alliance is established ?
It seems that eventual allies could start off actually damaging each other before realising that turned out to be a bad move ? - or is that possibility part of the fun?
I think it’s part of the fun. If I see an opportunity to kill/capture Japan, I’m taking it. Also, there is a chance (very slim chance) that I kill Japan, then meet another civ and declare war on them, then meet another civ and become their ally. It will then be 2v1, but the 1 should have done a better job of scouting and gone out to find an ally quicker.
In the, admittedly unlikely, chance that someone is killed off before an alliance is formed, then do we simply have a 3 way ?
Well, I haven’t had a 3 way in… oops, bad joke.
Ya, I think a 3 way would be the most fair thing if that does happen.
We have our first alliance. I became suzerian over a city-state which gave me a large view of the world. I met both Ozy and Dan on the same turn. When I hovered over the first “you have met a new civilization” icon it was Ozy, so I declared war on him. The next icon showed I met Dan so I offered him my friendship.
So in the end, Japan and Spain are allies. Persia and England are allies.
Let it be so! Japan welcomes ally and wishes prosperity to the Spanish people!
はじめまして
Oh shoot…I just re-read this thread and took in the ‘declare war on all ai’ bit.
I have not been doing that, so will next turn.
Apologies…
Something went wrong … When I try to load the save game, my game crashes. You can’t make a move - I think zarquonwhereare you need to go back and make a move again.
OK. How do I get access to the previous save again?
I reverted the turn to Ozy. Let me know if that fixes it.
I had forgotten about this, but there was something weird in my turn, which I had needed to replay as a farewell window from one tribe was morphed with a trade offer from another. This has now reappeared.
I suggest you make another revert to player before me.
I think you have to revert the turn to me
aha
And again the same thing - immediately after loading the game crashes. 
Let me try one more thing.
Please revert it to me again.
Departure again. The system message is different, but the result is the same.
What are we doing/planning currently ? It is with me again.
Do we want to revert for a whole round or two or?
I will revert back to my turn, 2 turns ago.
I think we are stuck in a loop. I reverted back to my turn and played it. Then a few hours later it was my turn again, but it was the same exact turn. So I played it, but then a couple hours later it’s my turn again and it was the same exact turn so I played it. I just got my turn again, and it is the same exact turn. Not sure what is happening. I will play it again, but if I get my turn again and it’s the same turn I will see if the admin can bump it forward. Very weird.