is pretty difficult to code
Sid managed to do it in 640k. But to be fair he had only one ruleset to consider.
are you ready to do it?
If I can write agents and advisors in Lua. The point being that one can customise the code for different rulesets. (The very reason for scripting.)
We could start by developing tolua interfaces for (AI) hut enter, Auto settler, auto eXplore, Goto, and goTo. eXplore would be a good place to start because it would be easy and have a huge payoff.
Selecting suitable sites for cities is not such a big deal - I do it all the time with a simple analysis of surrounding tiles. Can code do as well as a human? Maybe not but it can come close - Sid proved that.
Choosing a time to consolidate? This is just a numbers game. Six cities with two or three large is usually enough.
I
already have code to analyse the starting positions and the compensation needed to create reasonable equivalence so some times I have to make do (and win) with just three. In the opposite extreme (with plenty of territory) I never get enough time to fill it. Meanwhile the AI`s will build on every plains tile, most grassland, many desert, forest and hills; and even mountains if that means access to fish (suckers). These mountain cities are just waiting to be destroyed. All it needs is a boat to occupy the fish tile.
I don`t see a problem coding something better.
I might add one little comment about borders. Some of the cities stuff can be simplified if borders were
always calculated but only enforced by option.