Real balancing will start in Alpha 9, since it will include Attack Bonuses (paper-paper-rock-rock-scissors-scissors). These are already in the SVN version of the game, actually.
Looking good. A few things (of course!): I'd make the sun angle less vertical. It makes weird shadows on the slopes. Plus a slightly lower angle gives nicer shadows from trees and buildings.Make sure the terrain beneath the starting Civic Centres is flat.The cliffs should probably be 3x taller. Keep up the good work. My main issue is with terrain blending. Keep experimenting.
What if when the player chooses Ptolemaic Egypt, the Machimos becomes available as the Citizen-soldier Infantry Spearman (replacing the Pezhetairos), then the Pezhetairos becomes a Mercenary (its Food cost becomes Metal cost).
The SpecificNames for the Greeks are supposed to be transliterations (I thought so anyway). What's the Greek for Teikhisma/Teichisma? Does it use Kappa or Chi?