I was trying to do a bit of wonderspam on monarch with Ramesses in normal pangaea map (I wanted Big and Small but somehow misclicked or something). Once I noticed I was on Pangaea I knew someone would probably come and kick my ass since I didnt have army... Just like couple of warriors and pair of war chariots wouldnt hold attacks. But this is crazy. It's 1AD and Shaka declares on me, and HE LIVES EXACTLY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD :eek: . I mean, he probably sent that army like million turns ago to fight against me.. My capital is defended by lone warrior and he's about to face 2 Axemen, 4 Imps and a swordsman in 3 turns :lol: . I guess it's time to start over :P. But jesus, I have never been on same continent with Shaka and definitely dont want to know what it would be having him as a neighbor!

Here's (http://www.southafrica-travel.net/history/eh_zulu.htm) your answer to Shakas behaviour. It was his nature, you see. :D

Here's (http://www.southafrica-travel.net/history/eh_zulu.htm) your answer to Shakas behaviour. It was his nature, you see. :D

"He expanded his territory systematically" :lol: Yep, for sure he did.

Off topic, but...

You have the pyramids, your capital is only size 6, and you have hapiness problems? Farm that flood plain so you can work all your mines and go into either HR or Representation. If you go into rep farm the grasslands too and run a specialist or two, otherwise cotage them. You spent all those hammers on a wonder and really aren't putting it to use.

I have never been on same continent with Shaka and definitely dont want to know what it would be having him as a neighbor!

If you have him as neighbour you just got to rush ihm befor ehe rushes you :D

Off topic, but...

You have the pyramids, your capital is only size 6, and you have hapiness problems? Farm that flood plain so you can work all your mines and go into either HR or Representation. If you go into rep farm the grasslands too and run a specialist or two, otherwise cotage them. You spent all those hammers on a wonder and really aren't putting it to use.

Whoops, thats my most common mistake, I forget to switch civics after I finish pyramids.. It happens about 80% of the times I build it ^^

Shaka declares on me, and HE LIVES EXACTLY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD :eek: . I mean, he probably sent that army like million turns ago to fight against me.. My capital is defended by lone warrior and he's about to face 2 Axemen, 4 Imps and a swordsman in 3 turns :lol: .

in one of hubby's first BtS games it was a terra map, and shaka was literally on the farthest side of the continent from him, just like he was from you. hubby had made a couple wonders, he had more cities than you, and more troops, but he wasn't very high on power.

shaka did the same exact thing. he had a pretty good size army with him. impis of course and axemen, i don't think any mounted troops, and it was before construction. total surprise, hubby was not expecting that! he lost one city but then he took it back and got shaka to give him money for peace. he wasn't about to go crawl across the map himself to go try for shaka's cities. shaka's behavior itself didn't really surprise me, but based at the map, it was like OMG what is the guy thinking? and the city he took, he didn't raze. yeah good luck affording maintenance on that one, even with an ikhanda, you're lucky you didn't hold onto it!

for the rest of the game, any time anybody was at war with shaka, no matter who started it, hubby joined in :lol:. once he had decent navy techs so that he could sail troops over he had fun fighting him. before that it was a pain, since toku was one of the civs in the way.

shaka is one of the best creations by the programmers. he's a legitimate threat to the player via warfare. can't say enough about him really.

shaka is one of the best creations by the programmers. he's a legitimate threat to the player via warfare. can't say enough about him really.

he's awesome. even when he's doesn't go to war with me, say he starts on another continent and i don't meet him for ages. if he's done well in the early stages, and didn't overexpand in his lust for blood and land, he really manages what he has quite well for someone with no "tech traits". there have been games when i meet him and the scary part isn't that i think he'll beat me up it's the techs he has that i don't. which is really spiffy, he's definitely not one-sided!

well okay, he's awesome except when he makes me lose. more likely, makes me quit out of despair :mischief:. but even that's nifty, i like that it's a challenging game.

They will do that on huge maps too even.

he's awesome. even when he's doesn't go to war with me, say he starts on another continent and i don't meet him for ages. if he's done well in the early stages, and didn't overexpand in his lust for blood and land, he really manages what he has quite well for someone with no "tech traits". there have been games when i meet him and the scary part isn't that i think he'll beat me up it's the techs he has that i don't. which is really spiffy, he's definitely not one-sided!

well okay, he's awesome except when he makes me lose. more likely, makes me quit out of despair :mischief:. but even that's nifty, i like that it's a challenging game.

yeah, and it always seems to be shaka that gives deity players a hard time as well :goodjob:

Zanttu, as others have said, change you civics. Either whip units or do whatever is necessary to sue for peace with Shaka, except for giving up a city. Your start isn't bad. You only have three cities but you have good room for expansion: up towards that barb city, NW of your capital (which I think you have culture blocked, don't sign RoPs with anyone), and towards the center of the continent.

Also: those Portugues cities are ripe for the picking and are bound to be lightly defended. Also take Angkor Wat and you'll have the Khmer and the Ports under control.

I had a similar game myself with Shaka also. I had decent size army, close to the end he dozens and I mean DOZENS of horses and pillaged my to hell. Very clever character, very untrustworthy too
Cripp

But he can make an AWESOME ally if you are able to get a collar around him. Basically, as long as you're not pushing borders against him, cave in to his every demand, go to war with him, gift him stuff, etc. etc. etc. if you're able to get him to friendly, he'll declare on anyone at the drop of the hat. You can gift him key military tech and he is a BEAST you can unleash on your opponents. I haven't had that happen alot but I remember one game in particular I was able to collar him and it was good times.

What's crazy about it? You've got a city protected by about 3 squares of border, with Pyramids and Stonehenge and Great Wall and possibly other wonders in it, protected by a single warrior. I'd declare war on you from across the globe too, if I saw that (nothing personal, you understand :p)

While Shaka is one of the crazy ones, I don't see what's crazy about that. He's not that far away from you, looks like maybe 2 city widths of distance away, and you've made your capital a tempting target and failed to defend yourself at all. I'd certainly attack in that situation, killing a warrior and 2 chariots for a wonder is definately worthwhile.

He's not that far away from you, looks like maybe 2 city widths of distance away

*boggle* shaka has to cross the borders of three different civs to reach this player's capital :crazyeye:

If you look at the move from the perspective of "does this help the AI?", then attacking you from the other side of the world is a terrible move.

If you look at it from the perspective of "does this punish the player who doesn't defend his cities?", then it's a great move. :lol:

In my last game (cultural, ghandi) i started next to Shaka and he didn't declare on me once. I just converted him to my state religion early on, kept giving him stuff, and re-converted him 4 or 5 times during the game (through bribery) to keep him on side.

He's bound to attack someone, and you can just make sure it isn't you. Then its a GOOD thing to have him nearby.

What's crazy about it? You've got a city protected by about 3 squares of border, with Pyramids and Stonehenge and Great Wall and possibly other wonders in it, protected by a single warrior. I'd declare war on you from across the globe too, if I saw that (nothing personal, you understand :p)

same thoughts exactly

If you look at the move from the perspective of "does this help the AI?", then attacking you from the other side of the world is a terrible move.

If I saw an AI player on the other side of my continent with pyramids and stonehenge but basically no defense, I'd attack them in a heartbeat and consider it helping me, not hurting. It's a nice production city and gives the ability to pick and government civics for the rest of the game in exchange for inflated maintenance costs because of distance. I think it helps Shaka quite a bit.

On higher levels the maintenance costs would be crippling not to mention it is a city you would be hard-pressed to defend under fire.

I don't really play on Emperor or Deity, but the maintenance costs would not be 'crippling' compared to the benefit of early representation at levels below that. And it's certainly not going to cripple the AI civ (which is what I was commenting on), since they don't get stuck with that level of maintenance cost, so I still don't see how it's a 'crazy' move for the AI.

A better move would be to attack a neighbour. Better programming would be for one of the OP's neighbours to attack him, instead of an AI on the other side of the world attacking him.

But you're welcome to your opinion, of course.

Don't forget units away from your cultural borders also cost maintenance/turn. I agree that the AI doesn't deal with the same extent of maintenance, but still in theory a single city with those kind of treasures IS a tasty dish and what I'm saying is that Shaka would be hard-pressed to defend it (i.e., send reinforcements) if any of the other AIs were smart enough to take it from him.

That is why I don't see it as an overly strategic move on his part.

Shaka is definitely the best at warfare and the most dangerous. Some of the ways I have managed him.

1) Become his best friend and pay him plenty to declare war on your AI of choice.
2) Somehow hold his army off via diplomacy until you have outteched him.
3) If he somehow starts slow (jungle, lack of a military resource) go after him early.
4) Leverage a war elephant advantage or good UU (Prats, Immortals) and go after him head to head.

As I said in my first post, I knew someone was going to attack me, the thing what surprised me was who did it. I also know I would maybe act the same way as shaka did, the mainteance isn't such a killer when compared to all those wonders I have there. If a human player would do this to me in multiplayer, I wouldnt be surprised at all. AI has never attacked me from so far so early in the game. Seriously, I think I have known him like 30 turns, and it takes ~15 turns to move those units from his lands to mine... He had not made any demands, we had open borders and he was cautious at +1 relations. So we haven't know each other long enough to have +1 "years of peace..." And one more thing, he had a neigbour who he was annoyed with. This makes me think the AI is programmed to play against the human, not to play for themselves.

Looking at the other posts (I cannot open your game from work) I noticed you have the pyramids. I wonder if that is the reason, as Shaka will build the pyramids (One of the few wonders we will try) in order to get access to police state his favorite civic. I am wondering if the pyramids plus being very vulnerable militarywise is the reason. Napolean will attack you if you build the pyramids to get his hands on representation early.

Looking at the other posts (I cannot open your game from work) I noticed you have the pyramids. I wonder if that is the reason, as Shaka will build the pyramids (One of the few wonders we will try) in order to get access to police state his favorite civic. I am wondering if the pyramids plus being very vulnerable militarywise is the reason. Napolean will attack you if you build the pyramids to get his hands on representation early.

Interesting, that would explain something. I didn't know the leaders are programmed so well they would look for the wonders they want when picking attack target.

I am about 90% certain about Napoleans love of the pyramids. I know Shaka will build them and stay in police state the entire game, which would explain his attitude.

I am not sure about other AIs, until this thread I thought Napolean was alone but makes sense with Shaka's actions.

Shaka is definitely the best at warfare and the most dangerous.

I don't doubt this in general, and I've seen Shaka do quite well in some games, but in my current game he started on the same small continent with Mansa Musa, and Mansa somehow got the better of him. Near the beginning of the 19th century, Shaka actually vassalized to him! Must be embarrassing, esp. since Montezuma started on the same small continent as Huyana Capac and beat him to a pulp, becoming the score leader. Shaka must be afraid to visit the Warmonger's Club for fear Monty will mock him mercilessly.

Seriously, I think I have known him like 30 turns, and it takes ~15 turns to move those units from his lands to mine... He had not made any demands, we had open borders and he was cautious at +1 relations. So we haven't know each other long enough to have +1 "years of peace..." And one more thing, he had a neigbour who he was annoyed with. This makes me think the AI is programmed to play against the human, not to play for themselves.
Your problem is that you have Zero deterrent. Shaka, Montezuma, Alexander and Genghis will all declare on you in that position. As soon as you met him he saw how "ripe" a target you are, since he builds more troops than anyone your relative power is much lower when compared with his and that is a deciding factor in war declarations.

Shaka is not chasing the wonders, it is all about the power graph.

Your problem is that you have Zero deterrent. Shaka, Montezuma, Alexander and Genghis will all declare on you in that position. As soon as you met him he saw how "ripe" a target you are, since he builds more troops than anyone your relative power is much lower when compared with his and that is a deciding factor in war declarations.

Shaka is not chasing the wonders, it is all about the power graph.

IIRC Ragnar is the one with the highest build-troops factor in the game, not 100% sure, will have to look at the data.
Shaka should be somewhat 2nd or 3rd.

Pyramids, Stonehenge, and Great Wall protected by only a warrior? Even if I couldn't keep the city.... ZOMG raze.

I'd do it in half a heartbeat.

See the latest ALC for more shaka.

lmao well you know the saying, you made your bed now lie in it... lol

GW, SH and Mid... I know you were Industrious but you should waste all those hammers unless you had stone nearby. If you decided to use those 500 hammers for defense instead of the Mids you'd probably be able to fend off Shaka.

Didn't I make it clear enough? I was not trying to play normal game, I just wanted every single wonder possible and I knew I was going to get attacked because I couldn't get defence up in time.

Didn't I make it clear enough? I was not trying to play normal game, I just wanted every single wonder possible and I knew I was going to get attacked because I couldn't get defence up in time.

My bad probably missed it.