I hate the zulus.

[WechyPichu]

I started my first game on 6 difficulty, I started building some wonders, then Poland told me that the Zulus were plotting against me. All of a sudden, out of nowhere at all, the Zulus declare war and take Marakech, then they proceed to sweep Rabat. I had done NOTHING wrong, infact, I didn't have a single negative modififer on him. I didn't even settle anywhere near him.
What did I do wrong?
City Locations:

 

[GoStu]

In his eyes, the thing you did wrong was existing. Shaka has a 12 out of 10 for expansionism and a max value for aggressiveness.

 

[FeiLing]

Lesson 1 learned: If someone has no modifiers to you / is neutral they very often WILL turn hostile towards you soon. AIs do try to simulate deception.
Lesson 2 learned: If you were weak (no units / last in army value) YOU DID NOT do nothing wrong. You invited everyone to invade you. And an aggressive neighbor like Shaka doesn't have to be invited to such a party twice before he joins it.

You had a size 4-5 capital and just got out a single settler just by turn 157? Even if that is marathon speed, this seems awful. Try to grow and expand a bit instead of trying to snag every single wonder (which will again make everyone hate you and make you the target no.1). What difficulty are you usually playing? Sorry to say that, but what I see on that screenshot might not even work on Prince.

 

[WechyPichu]

Lesson 1 learned: If someone has no modifiers to you / is neutral they very often WILL turn hostile towards you soon.
Lesson 2 learned: If you were weak (no units / last in army value) YOU DID NOT do nothing wrong. You invited everyone to invade you. And an aggressive neighbor like Shaka doesn't have to be invited to such a party twice before he joins it.

You had a size 5 capital and just got out a single settler just by turn 157? Even if that is marathon speed, this seems awful. Try to grow and expand a bit instead of trying to snag every single wonder (which will again make everyone hate you and make you the target no.1). What difficulty are you usually playing? Sorry to say that, but what I see on that screenshot might not even work on Prince.

I'm on the Demo, the game had just started on turn 82.

 

[cinattra]

You probably had territory that he wanted and you also probably I'm guessing had little to no military. In that case even Ghandi will invade you.

 

[WechyPichu]

You probably had territory that he wanted.

What is there for him to want?! He has..like 4 salt! Probably more!
I didn't have a millitary because the game had just started on turn 82

 

[FeiLing]

Seems weird that the demo even allows players to play an immortal game in such a behind starting position... they'd rather not have people that try the game get crushed if they want to sell it to them; LOL.

Unfortunately I can not find any info on what exactly the demo is/offers.

 

[civ54lyfe]

yeah really that's like a ultra-suicide demo

 

[arand86]

You had a size 4-5 capital and just got out a single settler just by turn 157? Even if that is marathon speed, this seems awful. Try to grow and expand a bit instead of trying to snag every single wonder (which will again make everyone hate you and make you the target no.1). What difficulty are you usually playing? Sorry to say that, but what I see on that screenshot might not even work on Prince.

This really hit the nail on the head.

Shaka wants your land. That's biology, my friend. The only way you can deter him is to A: bribe him to fight somebody else or B: Build a big enough army to make killing someone else more worth his while.

You did C: Build wonders for him to grab along with your cities, which was a really really bad Idea with Shaka on the map. Perhaps you should start on a lower difficulty level.

 

[Moriarte]

Don't pay attention to diplomacy. Shaka is there to build impis and try to kill you. That's his purpose. Next time be prepared, or, better, kill him while he is small. If you leave him with just one crappy city he will build impis still, so might as well kill him off completely. He is hard to fight with. Use forts, citadels, melee in front, ranged in the back.

By the looks of it Ulundi is easy to capture and has two unique luxuries that you don't have. So, what you could have done is: plant one more city south of Marrakech on top of the hill. Build 7 composites, few pikes and carefully push forward until his capital is yours. You can always build wonders later .. plenty of them in every era.

 

[WechyPichu]

Don't pay attention to diplomacy. Shaka is there to build impis and try to kill you. That's his purpose. Next time be prepared, or, better, kill him while he is small. If you leave him with just one crappy city he will build impis still, so might as well kill him off completely. He is hard to fight with. Use forts, citadels, melee in front, ranged in the back.

By the looks of it Ulundi is easy to capture and has two unique luxuries that you don't have. So, what you could have done is: plant one more city south of Marrakech on top of the hill. Build 7 composites, few pikes and carefully push forward until his capital is yours. You can always build wonders later .. plenty of them in every era.

I can only play up to the beginning of the industrial era, and I just wanted some early wonders... ;n;

 

[cpm4001]

Welcome to the club! Shaka's attitude towards you can be best summed up in this picture from the Scramble for Africa scenario:

Spoiler :

...he hates you, and wants you to know it.

 

[Moriarte]

I see. You've encountered the most terrible thing you could in your demo. Nice luck!

 

[Moriarte]

Welcome to the club! Shaka's attitude towards you can be best summed up in this picture from the Scramble for Africa scenario:

Spoiler :

...he hates you, and wants you to know it.

First time i see this modifier.

How did the whole thing go?

 

[Sagax]

I`m fairly new to this game, but the first time I met Shaka I knew he was going to be a trouble. You can call it a stereotypical perception, but I can't easily trust a leader in tribal warrior's outfits with elephant skulls on the background. His second city settled RIGHT NEXT to my capital sealed the deal - Shaka is going down first, and I`m going for domination victory.

 

[GoStu]

I`m fairly new to this game, but the first time I met Shaka I knew he was going to be a trouble. You can call it a stereotypical perception, but I can't easily trust a leader in tribal warrior's outfits with elephant skulls on the background. His second city settled RIGHT NEXT to my capital sealed the deal - Shaka is going down first, and I`m going for domination victory.

I like your attitude, and I may offer some advice. If you're going after Shaka, there's two times to do it.

1) Before he gets Civil Service
2) After you get Rifling.

In the period between those two things, you can look forward to a seemingly endless wave of Impi. I've had to fight him at that time, and I can say only that I was grateful to be Aztec with full Honor.

 

[Sagax]

I like your attitude, and I may offer some advice. If you're going after Shaka, there's two times to do it.

1) Before he gets Civil Service
2) After you get Rifling.

In the period between those two things, you can look forward to a seemingly endless wave of Impi. I've had to fight him at that time, and I can say only that I was grateful to be Aztec with full Honor.

Thank you! I`m playing on Prince, so it's not that bad. In that game I just spammed Composite Archers while abusing Furor Teutonicus. Barbarians make a good meat shield

 

[Aenthin]

Another thing. When Shaka tries to meet up with you in the front door, say hello to him at the back. I've had games where Shaka sends all his forces to another war somewhere and I easily took his cities with little resistance.

 

[Arachnofiend]

First time i see this modifier.

How did the whole thing go?

That modifier is exclusive to the SfA scenario. It's designed to make absolutely sure that the European civs and the Zulu will DOW you eventually.

 

[Socratatus]

What did I do wrong?

Some people will attack you because they want what you have and you look weak (defenceless), even though you`ve done nothing wrong, Civ 5 reflects this historical reality.

This is why you have to have some units in defence, even if you don`t want to use up time and cash on them. Or you can take the risk of not, but then you get someone like Shaka attacking you.

Keep an eye on diplomacy too to see what`s generally happening.