elthrasher, you ruined this game for me!
I've been playing this on the PS3 for about 6 months and kept seeing people on the leader boards with BC and very early AD wins and just could not comprehend how they could possibly be doing it. I even tried to google "cheat codes" for this game several times thinking they must somehow be cheating to win so early on, I was lucky to finish in the 1990's, usually into 2000, sometimes the game even timed out on me.
Just tried your Aztec rush the Horseman and crank out the cities with workers managed to production then switch to technology method. 1 Horse Army upgraded with infiltration from slaying Barbarians and an acquired Spy from Villagers turned out to be all I needed to sweep the board clean by 1000 AD.
My biggest mistakes before (other than not finding this site and the info sooner) were never even researching the Horseman option, and leaving my workers managed to "balanced". I always had a feeling I should be messing with the worker management option, but just thought if I switch it to gain in one area I'll be losing too much in others so "balanced" seemed like the best way to go in my mind. What a difference your advice made, but it kind of took the fun out of playing, it just made winning too fast and easy. I'm ruined now though, it's not like I could ever go back to playing like I had been now that I know better, but I have to admit the game isn't nearly as much fun to play when I just sweep through it like this.