The greeks and romans shared the same continent. It was a giant '7'....the romans had the northern part of the continent, and we (the greeks) had the southern part. The colonial phase had passed, and most of the habitable earth was owned by somone.
On my side of ther border, I had rich iron deposits and plentiful horse supply. When gunpowder was discovered, I had one source of saltpeter. The romans had massive supplies of it.
The romans had attacked me earlier in the game and took a city, but it revolted and came back under my fold. Peace was delcared, and we lived peacefully since. I was afraid, however, that if the romas learned the secret of gunpowder, I would be in for it. I acted quickly.
Fortunately, the saltpeter was near my northern border, and settled around small, border cities. I knew that If i struck fast and in a hurry, I could cut his empire in half, secure and fortify the saltpeter and the local towns, and then sue for peace. At least that was the plan.
I had been cranking out a steady stream of cavalry, cannon, and musketmen. I had my workers build roads connecting myself to the roman border cities, and built forts and strategic choke points along my northern border. I solidified my defenses by building walls along my border cities and reinforcing them with muskets and cannon. My cavalry began to arrive in huge numbers along the border. the time was now. I demand that Ceasar relinquish control of the cities I wanted, to avoid a bloody conflict. He refused of course, and I launched my attack.
The first roman cities fell with little effort. He had them defended only with spearmen and warriors. Quckly I cut his empire in half, and took out the stranded settlemnts. I had secured the additional saltpeter, and more importantly, denied my age old advisary of his supply. Now to sue for peace.
What I was not expecting, however, was his counter attack. Allow me to rephrase...I was not expecting how well planned and executed his counter attack was ! The border was about 10 squares wide, with 2 cities on it. inbetween those cities where castles, fortified with cannon and muskets. my attacked was launched from the Eastern city and cut north west thorugh his emipre. His attatck was aimed squarely at the western city, which was not as well defended.
A few bowmen first, then a few horsemen. followed by warriors and spearmen in countless numbers. To my surprise, he never directly attacked the forts or cities, but rather attempted to storm the breach between them. With the bulk of my mobile army, the cavalry units, to the north I found that I had to counter attack his armies with my muskets.
As his units poured thorugh, I slowly eliminated them with cannon bombardments and musket counter strikes. I diverted my cavalry reniforcements to the breech.
I eliminated the units that broke through. and bottled up the remaining force. Both sides of the roman advance were flanked by my cavalry. After a feirce battle, his foprces were on the run.
My requests for peace were ignored, however. So I began a more extensive campaign into the heart of his territory. I took more cities, this time some of his major ones. As I pushed deeper, I severed his spice and horse supply. It was not until Hector and his army where at the gates of syracuse that he finally listend to reason.
After the war had ended, I gave back some of the cities I had taken, mostly due to corruption issues. I kept the cities that were near the saltpeter, though. I had acheived victory, but at a costly price. I commited more resources and men to this war than what I had planned . I learned a valuable lesson.
I would never thought that the civs in this game would play so intelligently. I was totally unaware that he would counter attack at a totally different part of the border than where my attack came from. I was also impressed with his choice of targets. he rushed the breech between my walled city and my fort and began to attack my other settlements. It is funny how a large scale war errupted off of a small scale engagement. And the great part about it is I could see something like this happening in RL.
I love this game.
It really kind of sucks to have to let a game go because the turns are just *way* too long. I turned off the movement animations 5 minutes into my first game 
