Roman economy is better than brits in ancient-medieval. Better economy=better raid/attack initiative. Pretty simple really...it's why spanish dominates the early game, and snowballs it into victories.
Romans get +15 wealth from 0:00 to ~2:00, then +30 and up from ~2:00 onward. Thats 360 FREE wealth in the first 7 minutes, when most raiding occurs. Romans also have cheaper towers, and a free HI. British taxation and higher commerce cap doesn't even come close to matching this in the _early game_. Like I said during our last discussion, and like Rhonok said above: to reach the higher british commerce cap you have to build MORE...building more means paying for ramping costs, which means the payoff is MUCH SLOWER than with INNATE economic bonuses which come completely free: Mongol food, maya/french timber, inca/roman wealth ,etc, etc. You seem oblivious to these facts.
Early game strength can dictate the entire game...playing catchup until gunpowder makes it very hard to win. Romans can raid very early (pre-sci 2), and still have good medieval/gunpowder times with lots of scholars. Brits will be under a lot of pressure as their economy does not hit its stride until medieval (comm2) at best.
If brits make LC+pikeman to defend raids, their food is slowed a lot, worsening their medieval/gunpowder times and metal/wood gathering...hence falling even further behind. And pikes aren't so hot vs heavy cav raiding.
Either way, Rome vs Britain isn't a major concern. Niether is Britain itself for that matter...if you like em, you like em, but there is no evidence to suggest that they can hang with good nations in high level 1v1 play. If you have rec games showing a strong Britain I'd love to see them, the games you linked to above are a joke. Based on community-wide recorded games, and rated/tournament strategy, Britain is nowhere near the top.
Britain has no offensive bonuses (unless you count archer rushing), only marginal defense bonuses (archer upgrades and +2 tower range). And their economy is WEAK in the early game vs at least a dozen other nations.
Nations with a slow economy AND little to no offensive potential have a hard time keeping up in the early game. That's common sense. Nations that will generally beat Britain on contiguous land maps because of their INNATE economic bonuses, and/or great offensive potential:
Maya, Spain, China, Germany, Korea, France, Turk, Mongol, Nubian, Inca, Japan, Egypt, Roman.
Britain is good in alot of situations, but competive 1v1 play isn't one of them.
[This message has been edited by half_lotus (edited 01-14-2004 @ 01:52 AM).]