So I have a two front war to fight, again.
t125 - Sign peace with Monty to move those troops to the French front, because we don't have enough troops to make progress on three fronts at once, two might be manageable. The Helsinki situation is obviously annoying, but there are just too many forces to deal with right now and there is a city and about 15 troops in the way. Can't see how to kill the wounded elephant at Genoa without losing units, I make our units hold our ground. That city has 29 defence anyway (curiously, the city state appears to have a great general) and shouldn't fall in a hurry.
We have a couple of universities in production which I'm not sure about but don't have strong feelings about, so I leave them alone.
On the computer's turn: Monty wants a pact of secrecy against Napoleon and I accept, war between these two would be very helpful. Rameses wants a research agreement, but also wants us to throw in an extra 100 gold... I simply won't trade 2-for-1 or throw in extra gold for a research agreement that benefits both sides equally because it offends my sense of fair trading. So I tell him where to stick his research agreement.
That new Egyptian city is now shooting at some random Siamese troops, hopefully they'll take it out and I can get rid of the city that way.
t126 - 4 outdated French units are killed, quiet on Siamese front, 1 elephant shows its face up north and I send our pike that way. Hired an extra scientist to speed physics by 1 turn from 4 turns to 3. I sold the monument in Neapolis off, for 6 gold, and disbanded one worker taking us down to 8 which seems quite sufficient for everything.
t127 - 2 more outdated French units killed. That one elephant in the north seems to be deterred by our pike. Siam is moving on Akhetaten now.
on the computer's turn Genoa spawns a pike which kills the wounded elephant for us. Go city-states! Knights seem to be a particularly bad unit choice for us right now considering Siam's troop composition.
t128 - Physics is in, Steel in 3 turns. Neapolis burns down. I guess I can wait for Siam to get rid of Akhetaten. I upgrade our 4 catapults to trebuchets. Ayshe and Bursa finished their settlers and I order two more. I notice Edirne has been set up as a production centre and is making a knight. Because these ICS cities could be working any tile in the 3 radius it can get rather confusing what they're supposed to be doing. Anyhow I put the knight on hold since Siam's mainly fielding elephants and pikes right now. Switch it to a barracks instead, which should be done around the time we get gunpowder.
After some thought I decide to rebuild Neapolis on the same site, obviously naming the replacement city Neaneapolis. Akhetaten is actually a great defensive location, we can put ranged units behind the city and the city and river will protect them. One of our two new settlers is destined for a coastal site in the NW and the other for the hill 3SW of Constantinople if I can push the French forces back some.
t129 - Oh crap (I don't think this screenshot needs more description)
Anyway, we get to shoot that first elephant for now taking it to 60% health. Pikemen! Get ready to earn your pay!
On the French front I managed to push forward slowly - they're having a hard time taking Brussels. Angkor Wat was built, probably in that Aztec city just to our west as it's been expanding borders rather fast.
t130 - Akhetaten is surrounded by Siamese forces and at 2 hp now, however in their haste to capture the city they're completely ignoring the presence of our army. I paid Ramesses 50 gold for his open borders so I could kill 2 elephants and a cat that were next to the city while Siamese forces are distracted, definitely worth it.
computer turn: Akhetaten fell to Siamese forces as expected, our top knight was attacked by an elephant but the river crossing meant it survived, and we have a pike ready to take his place. City state pikes are doing a great job of killing archers but I think Brussels is probably going to go down soon.
t131: steel to gunpowder, do some quick arithmetic and fire a couple of scientists somewhere in the north - after checking around our cities (Economic advisor doesn't help annoyingly) it looks like the scientist situation is:
GS due in MLP on turn 145, rifling due on about turn 158, and GS due in Ayshe on turn 169
so that 2nd GS will be too late to speed our Artillery progress.
City state pikes are doing a great job of killing enemy archers. I advanced our forces some more to fill the gap in the Monaco/Brussels defence line and founded Kayseri. Also one more Northern backyard city went up.
Took out Akhetaten with the knights, killing a green health elephant unwisely hiding in the city for free, and reform our defence line:
Because of the roads our trebs can move 1 step, set up, and throw rocks at that elephant, killing it. So far 4 elephants down to us and 1 down to Genoa. That Siamese city to the east has a knight, I'm not sure where they got it from since the elephant UU replaces knight, probably a city-state. Our military advisor reports that we have a very confused crossbow wondering exactly where 1.6666626903 movement points get you:
t132 - Killed more obsolete French troops as usual, only seen one musket on that front for some reason. One elephant crossed the river to attack Fort Akhateten, unfortunately due to an unlucky combat roll we didn't kill it with our knight in the city and left it at 1 or 2 hp. On the computer's turn the elephant attacks the city and dies but does 9 damage in the process (ouch), while another elephant suicides trying to cross the river against our pike on the hill.
The city-states have muskets now.
t133 - doesn't look like I can hold the city but I can at least wear Siam down, another elephant that crossed the river was killed by our pike and treb bombardment. Unfortunately the Siamese knight I mentioned earlier shows up, charges our wounded pike down across the river and kills it for my first combat loss of this game (boo, hiss). I decide not to make another pike and save our money for janissaries instead since gunpowder is in very soon. France is retreating with very heavy losses on the Kayseri front and Brussels is saved.
I notice the knight keeping an eye on greece is our medic, and order him to swap places with one of the wounded ones at the Siamese front. Edirne finished its barracks, I let it get back to work on the knight it was producing previously.
t134 - Another unlucky combat roll with a pike left me in the situation with one badly damaged elephant next to the 2hp city of Akhetaten again. Since the city is definitely going to fall on the computer's turn, I decide to sell it back to the Egyptians for 75 gold, because they've been getting free bugged open borders from us for a while and I want something back in return.
computer turn: Well that didn't go as expected. For some reason, selling the city to Egypt magically repaired the defences to half health, then on Egypt's turn it rushbought the city walls you can see in the screenshot. Meaning it barely survives this turn, which I didn't really expect or want to happen - I wanted Siam to capture it so I could recapture dammit!! On the bright side, this means our pike in the city gets to live. The next elephant that shows up will probably take the city.
t135 - Just healing/consolidation this turn. Here's our position, most units are on fortify mode but they should all be visible on this screen except for the knight pulling sentry duty at Osaka.
No decent trades were available this turn so I didn't trade anything. Instead I just stockpiled money so we could rush out janissaries if needed. Monty wants a research pact (he's not demanding the extra 100 gold like Ramesses is, which is a relief), I'd probably take that one. He is unwilling to go to war though and no one will sign peace. Now that we've stabilized, maybe we can think about putting a 3rd battle group together and opening another front against Siam east of Kyoto. Btw I love our Japanese puppet governors. They build useful things like circuses! Unfortunately we now have minor beaker overflow because the cost of the gunpowder tech changed while we were researching it, not sure if this is a discount for other civs knowing it like civ4 has.
I had fun trying to figure out the best moves to push the AI back. Gunpowder due in 1, I guess that will boost our currently low power rating. Forbidden Palace due in 9. Artillery in about 30 at a guess, less if the FP boosts our science rate significantly.
Musketeers) and focus on Monty, but since none of the big guys want to have peace, and Alex looks like it wants to join in the dogpile... 
