I have a real big problem with Shaka as neighbour. He normally techs well (at least the military ones) and (amazingly) always have a huge army.

Early War is hard coz of his fast troop buildup. Using him as petdog is bad coz it seems very hard to get him to friendly (his civic is police state which is impossible to share until really late and he doesn't seem to care much about religion) and also coz he asks for tons of techs before he is willing to join in a fight... Also, this dude seems to be able to vassalise almost every single enemy I send him against, and once he vassalises a techer, it is often GG. :sad:

I usually play Boudica, Khan (his UU is useless against Shaka) or Cathy. I choose leaders who I am able to rush in case I get landlocked early. I play Monarch on normal speed.

Any tips please?

With Shaka, you must scout his territory aggressively and discover Animal Husbandry and Bronze and Iron Working fairly quickly so that you can deny him military resources. Rapid expansion and/or early war will be necessary to accomplish this. If he has an "undeniable" resource (due to location), then build the appropriate counter units and take him out ASAP.

It would be possible to play a defensive game against him and try to out-tech him (assuming he has other neighbors to terrorize), but you must be prepared for impi raids on your workers and tile improvements. Axemen and roads are the only real answer here for a long time. Make sure your power rating is high (build units) and try to share a religion with him. Eventually, however, he will have to be dealt with militarily -- and this is usually done better sooner than later.

Try spreading a religion to him to keep him somewhat happy with you until you can get a tech advantage.

Also, keep your Power rating up and hopefully Shaka will attack someone else. You can join in with his war to get a shared struggle bonus.

What you can do is to let Shaka beat another AI up and then bribe him into peace with the other AI before he can vassalize him.

I'd just like to voice my agreement with slobberin bear, if he's your neighbor dispose of him quickly. You do not want to fight this guy in the mid-late game, just picture stacks of 100 Cuirrasiers, tebuchets and musketmen. At that point the only option is to out fight him and reduce his empire in size. This will be difficult and costly, it will likely take 100's of years and multiple wars to accomplish shaka's demolition any time after the middle ages. If you fight Shaka early he can be taken out with a bit less difficulty than axe-rushing a protective AI.

Play Protective civs and laugh as he kills himself trying to take your first city. No, really, this happened in my current game as Qin. City Garrison is monstrously good for that kind of thing.

I have a policy of axe rushing the lunatics in the BCs. I'd rather lose the game in the BCs and not waste my time, than having to deal with sods 100s of units large later on.

If they're on another continent I make sure to keep a large garrison force in every coastal city. At least 5 units. Then in the late game I'll invade them.

Also, keep your Power rating up and hopefully Shaka will attack someone else. You can join in with his war to get a shared struggle bonus.


If you've kept your Power up, join the war against him :D . Sure, he'll be annoyed, but he's always annoyed, at least this way you might pick off some of his border cities before the war ends. Even better if you can pillage the heck out of his lands, deny his access to all those strategic resources and kill his cottages so he can't keep up in tech anymore.

The big question is what if you start with Shaka to your west, Ragnar to your east, Monty to your north and Alexander to your south? Found multiple religions and pray to all the gods?

In one of my first game I played as Isabella and had both Monty and Shaka as neighbours. It ended up with plenty of wars against Monty and side by side with Shaka. At some point my capital was guarded by Zulu troops against evil Aztecs. Man, I though, that is chivalrous, protecting poor Isabella from evil Montezuma!

In short, from what I can gather from this, is basically Kill him before he kills you :P

if you're not going to take him out yourself early, make lots of units so someone else looks more appetizing. If you can get him on your side, he's as good a pet as monty or boudica.

Getting on his good side usually isn't enough. I've been duped in the past by spreading religion to him but not being focused enough on military. Sure enough, he showed up, declaring war. Same mentality we as players take, "thanks for spreading the religion to me, but it seems your in possession of a shrine I need."

Someone else can verify the AI scripts, but I believe shaka will still DoW if he's only pleased but will not if he's friendly.

The big question is what if you start with Shaka to your west, Ragnar to your east, Monty to your north and Alexander to your south? Found multiple religions and pray to all the gods?


Khan to southwest and Sury to northwest:lol:

I'll just quit the game.

@pangu I can say this: Kill him as soon as possible.

Shaka is like fire. Dangerous if out of control, but very useful if you know how to use him.

If I have him on my continent, I will wait until he picks a religion and choose the same one and then be sure to join in any wars when he asks (you get a big bonus for mutual military struggle.) Also keep a good sized army in a walled city on any borders you share with him. Its also not a bad idea to send spies into his territory periodically to see if he is massing a SOD near you. Courthouses are important so that you will keep visability in his border cities to watch for a SOD.

I've found that if you do all those things, you can actually get Shaka to friendly status pretty easily. Let Shaka rage all over the continient, keeping the other AI civs down with constant warfare. When he asks you to join in, go ahead and declare war, but never fight. It makes no difference for the relations bonus you get. Then, when you have a good sized mass of cannons, go finally join in on one of the wars and pulverize your opponent with his help.

He will be so far behind tech wise, that he will just continue to bog down in perma-wars with obsolete units. Meanwhile, you can continue to knife through the rest of the continent, building up your empire to use for whatever type of end game you want.

In the end, if you want to turn on Shaka and finish him too, you can, but it usually is not neccessary.

Never fight him as a first opponent. His AI programming is very efficent at making counter units (his units start with combat one so anti infantry is available out of the box with a rax.) That makes an axe rush or a sword based attack a no-no. You can try it, but you will probably only try it once.

I find shaka difficult to handle.

If I start right next to him, I can axe-rush him and take him out with little problem, but he has to be right next to me as a starting location, it's too late.

Otherwise, I try to keep my power level high so that he goes after another AI. Then I try to bribe other AI's into going to war with shaka. It's expensive, but I find if I just let shaka run free, he makes vassals everyone he winds up going to war against and eventually grows too powerful. So I try to keep him bogged down in conflicts with several AI's without getting involved myself.

I find that I can contain him fairly well with this strategy and outpace him on tech. (For a war-monger, I find he techs pretty well.) If I'm going for a space win, then I just keep a fairly strong military but eventually stop worrying about him. If I'm going for a domo win and know I'm going to have to fight shaka to achieve it, I try to use my tech lead that I hopefully have to build some nukes before their banned via the UN. (Hopefully giving me some nukes but no-one else). Then I go to war with shaka, but keep all my units home. I watch for his huge SoDs to approach and nuke em while their still in his terrority. After that I release my SoDs and can usually take a couple of cities and can maintain pressure on him since I usually wipe a pretty large % of his military out with nukes.

The big question is what if you start with Shaka to your west, Ragnar to your east, Monty to your north and Alexander to your south? Found multiple religions and pray to all the gods?

Hit Ragnar early, get friendly with Alex and Bribe Monty to hit Shaka. Unless everyone is sharing the same religion, no state is your best bet.

I don't mind having shaka around. Obviously you have to keep you eye on him and bribe him into warring on your rivals, but if you can get him to war on monty or alex or rags, then neither will back stab you, at least while they're occupied. Hopefully they're on opposite sides of a large continent or even better they have a sea in between so that neither has a chance to get a real upper hand but they waste lots of troops anyhow. Then, as soon as one of them declares peace, swoop in and bribe them into attacking someone else.

I don't mind having shaka around. Obviously you have to keep you eye on him and bribe him into warring on your rivals, but if you can get him to war on monty or alex or rags, then neither will back stab you, at least while they're occupied. Hopefully they're on opposite sides of a large continent or even better they have a sea in between so that neither has a chance to get a real upper hand but they waste lots of troops anyhow. Then, as soon as one of them declares peace, swoop in and bribe them into attacking someone else.

^^^ This is the way to go.

And when you can see which way the wind is blowing, bring in your army to one of the weakened civs for a territory upgrade.

Everyone gets mad at shaka and monty for their aggressive backstabbing. I recommend doing this to them. Not only is this fun, but they typically have huge tracts of tech-poor land, so if you hit them at a bad time for them, you can really screw them with the nice "side" benefit of solid personal gains!

you have two choices:

1) Engage in "bend-over" diplomacy with him and give in to EVERY demand, gifting him things, etc. etc. Doing this I have had him at Friendly in some games and he makes a powerful attack dog. You have to be prepared to war a lot though.

2) Take him out. If he's close enough you can rush him early then do so (you're gonna need axes not chariots obviously). If he's not THAT close then you're going to have to consider hitting him with a tech advantage, probably rifles. That means trying to keep the peace at least for awhile.

What you really don't want is a long, drawn-out war in the classical-medeival era. Even if you win, you can be far behind the other AIs as a result.

The big question is what if you start with Shaka to your west, Ragnar to your east, Monty to your north and Alexander to your south? Found multiple religions and pray to all the gods?

I had Shaka to the West (well, a desert to the west and Shaka's capital on the other side) and Alexander to the south in my last game. Small map, so I couldn't squeeze the other two in, but I pulled off a late cultural victory. :)

I don't try to appease Shaka. He aggressively bullies for techs, so if you get him going he will more often than not become a monster with a large AND advanced empire.
If he borders a peaceful tech whore, one of them needs to die.
If not, I like to choke him and turn him into everyone's whipping boy: He's militaristic enough that he won't be wiped off the map, and an unpopular and emasculated opponent can be very useful for keeping others out of your hair.

I think the short answer is that you NEED to have a plan (and that plan can vary) for Shaka. Imho he is one of the best designed AIs, hands down. I wish more of the aggressive civs were designed like him (i.e., capable of posing a legitimate threat).

Whether you take him out asap, make him your bff, or manage him diplomatically, you MUST deal with him somehow lest he "deal" with you.

make sure he doesnt take a huge advantage in war. in one game as ottomans he conquered china then attacked me blocking my space race victory. i had to settle with time. :mad:

Yeah, if Shaka starts gobbling up territory, he can become a monster, so you have to keep that in mind. Bribing peace if he attacks a soft target can be a good idea, but then he might start itching to attack someone else...you.

Am I the only one that finds it hilarious that a Primitive Black man ( No Racism intended ), That has a primitive unique unit is the bane of everyone?


Oh and Monty..


Anyone see the similarity?

Shaka is definately interesting but I can think of far worse neighbours to encounter... say... any leader with the protective trait :|.

Shaka can be manipulated. Get alphabet, find a nice target and attack together, Shaka is pretty easy to twist to get him into a war against someone else. You dont even need to share religion (though obviously it helps) and you'll find Shaka can get very friendly very fast, he will never declare on you at Friendly (though if he decides to attack you before you and he are at friendly then he'll still attack). He techs well for a guy who favours war but nowhere near as well as most players should be able to.

Alternatively you can just wipe him off the face of the earth before he becomes a problem. Just bare in mind like Gandhi and Mansa are a curse to have on another continent, Shaka is an absolute blessing :).

I've just started a game as Suryavarman, and on my large size inverted L shaped Pangea-like landmass where I'm in the North East corner, there are about 25 marathon speed tiles to my nearest neighbour, Monty's capital, and Shaka further West of him! Tokugawa is to the South of them, and going further down there is Genghis Khan and Gilgamesh. (2 other civs, probably Ghandi & Roosevelt:cry: must be on a smaller continent in this low sea Fractal map).
Its only 1400BC and I have 6 nicely maturing cottaged and food/resource rich cities up and running and not even feeling a pinch of economic panic whilst teching like crazy. But i'm going to find the needed military expenses to be quite high whilst tromping a large sworsdmen army 25+ tiles to get to their nearest first destination! Shaka and Monty are very close together so it should be interesting to see how they react to each other! Knowing my luck they'll probably end up as best buddies and I'll have a Shaka-Monty combined 200 unit SOD on my front door, not to mention Tokugawa/Ghingis Khan's little contribution!

I've just started a game as Suryavarman, and on my large size inverted L shaped Pangea-like landmass where I'm in the North East corner, there are about 25 marathon speed tiles to my nearest neighbour, Monty's capital, and Shaka further West of him! Tokugawa is to the South of them, and going further down there is Genghis Khan and Gilgamesh. (2 other civs, probably Ghandi & Roosevelt:cry: must be on a smaller continent in this low sea Fractal map).
Its only 1400BC and I have 6 nicely maturing cottaged and food/resource rich cities up and running and not even feeling a pinch of economic panic whilst teching like crazy. But i'm going to find the needed military expenses to be quite high whilst tromping a large sworsdmen army 25+ tiles to get to their nearest first destination! Shaka and Monty are very close together so it should be interesting to see how they react to each other! Knowing my luck they'll probably end up as best buddies and I'll have a Shaka-Monty combined 200 unit SOD on my front door, not to mention Tokugawa/Ghingis Khan's little contribution!

With all those aggressive @-holes starting and maintaining a world war should not be overwhelmingly difficult.
If you haven't read this yet, you should check it out.
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/makeaworldwar.php

shaka is manageable if he is discovered early and near, or far far away, the problem is if he is on the same land mass but to distant to axe-rush

having learnt the hard way (it wasn't pretty!), if discovered nearby, I invade his territory early, deny him any bronze/iron/horses and take all his cities, forgoing all else until he is finished with

if he is too far away, then the above mentioned 'bend over' diplomancy works well, keep him sweet and let him drag down the other AI's with constant warring, while you tech away..

With all those aggressive @-holes starting and maintaining a world war should not be overwhelmingly difficult.
If you haven't read this yet, you should check it out.
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/makeaworldwar.php

Thanks for the link, and a good read. I've played on and still kept the peace while Oracling to 1 turn whilst teching Mathematics, hoping to get Currency with the Oracle. (never achieved this yet on Emperor). If nobody has Alphabet by the time I get Currency, then that will be a priority to maintain the world wars, which will definately be the way to go!

Take him out, or build a large military and get on his good side diplomatically.

He doesn't care much about religion, so to get on his good side, arrange to have an early war where you and him are on the same side. His "mutual military struggle" diplo bonus is quite high and sticks around a really long time.

Take him out, or build a large military and get on his good side diplomatically.

He doesn't care much about religion, so to get on his good side, arrange to have an early war where you and him are on the same side. His "mutual military struggle" diplo bonus is quite high and sticks around a really long time.

you're right, but you gotta get him to friendly, which is no easy task, or be prepared to keep him busy. If you're lucky you can bribe him to war then when he asks for your help join in and do nothing more than protect your border. Hopefully Shaka's keeping the other guy busy enough that he doesn't actually attack you and you can either sue for peace or keep accumulating the mutual military struggle diplo bonuses.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: just play a Protective Leader and let Shaka kill himself on a border city. Seriously, the last game I had him on my borders, I didn't care when he declared war; I just made sure to keep a modest stream of defenders in the border city he kept attacking. About halfway through the "war," I sent some settlers and protective units to claim all that land to the north he'd been ignoring . . . :)

I have no fear of Shaka, for I AM SHAKA! I love playing this guy. It takes alot of work to keep the economy up (lots of cottages), but the cheap rexing and the best UB in the game help alot. However, I second the guy about Pro civs. Current game I started in a box with Ragnar to the west, Alex to the east and Wang Chung to the north. I had a leg up with the first couple of cities (not alot of production, but lots of flood plains, some gold, and Iron) in getting the economy/tech situation set. Eventually mowed through Rags/Alex/Genghis/Peter/Ramses/HC, but put off Wang as long as possible; Pro is such a drag to get through. Still short of the land for the Dom win, I'm currently going at Wang and it's a slog; but I shall have him. And it isn't all war with this guy - my first Monarch win was a Shaka in Space in early 1700s. He's just so much fun.