Post your Shaka stories

[bjarkieinars]

Hi, I've been trying out the new civs and I have fallen in love with the Zulu's.

They are not the strongest civ but they are so much fun, please post your Shaka stories and offer tips by all means.

I'll start off:

Emperor Standard size Pangea game, no advanced settings and no mods (ongoing game).

Decided to go honor (even though I felt it would suck) and forward settled my 2nd city on a hill behind a river with iron, horses, salt and silver next to a land locked Carthage (wth?) who also went honor, this was to be my fort in my pursuit of glory.

My 3rd city went down next to resources and a happiness NW.

I made a trade route to the Inca's and starting making Ikhandi's and spearmen.

Dido then dow's me a few turns before Impi's so I rush buy walls and kill her attack off with 4-5 buffalo spearmen versus her 3 elephants, 2 archers, catapult and lots of warriors then I upgraded to impi's and took her cap.

Felt like the G&K aggression all over.

Well, then I made peace with Dido and charged Boudica, took her cap without meeting any resistance, apparently Boudica didn't bother with military with only 1 UU, 1 catapult and 1 CB to show for, and neither did the Incas who lost their cap to Napoleon around the same time.

Now my cap has an Ikhandi, Heroic Epic, Statue of Zeus and Alhambra and is producing a super elite Impi every 4 turns... early dom win here I come.

 

[VainoValkea]

I've got no particular desire to play Shaka, especially now that BNW has nerfed warmongering. I'd like to face them off as someone else though, but the roll hasn't been favorable yet.

 

[Randall_Flagg]

Have not played them and will probably never play as them. But I do have a story!! So, I am playing as Morroco, I am freinds with the Shoshone on my continent. I find Shaka on one of the others. I would never expect him to befreind me at all! But I will be damned if he did not offer friendship. So far, I have been through 3 renewals and we are still buddy buddy.
Nothing like the best freind ever The Shoshone, but suprised me.

 

[JtW]

My first BNW game was with them. Large Continents on Prince with all the new Civs and France.

I landed on an isolated continent with France as the only neighbor. I wiped them off the face of the Earth with my Impis and settled the whole continent. When I finally got to meet the other civs, there was no clear runaway, which I found a nice surprise (there were 3 or 4 civs who were doing very well, Assyria had been obliterated).

I had serious problems with setting up trade because of my isolated start. This forced me to found a city on the second continent for the sole purpose of trade. I also conquered some city states to use them as trading hubs. This was awesome - I actually had a reason to expand post Renaissance!

I ended up winning a time victory. There was no clear runaway, I didn't push culture in the early game, so CV was out of the question. I wasn't strong enough for a Domination Victory. Portugal had crazy influence with her CS allies (like 500 or 600) so Diplomacy wouldn't work, either.

And funnily enough, the science advancements were very slow across the board. In 2050, I was the science leader, and had just discovered Computers.

A weird and fun game, all in all.

 

[fuzzatron717]

First game still going I am Poland neighbour Zulu best friends in the world we beat on Brazil together while having a glass of root beer. Lately they have been trouble ideologies came a while back they chose order and then next turn their people made them autocratic. While I am freedom their city UMgungundlovu switched to me and Shaka denounced me now were enemies I will tell more as time passes.
Probably will never play Zulu's either.

 

[feralminded]

I was skeptical about how effective he could be given the penalties to warmonger. I was wrong, he's broken.

Game: Standard size Continents (went continents because I felt pangea would give me too much of an advantage), Normal speed. Emperor.

~ Turns 1-10
I went Scout->Worker. Beelined Bronze. Warrior popped a culture hut and I opened Tradition, then went exclusively Honor. Stole a worker from a close CS I planned to kill anyhow ... I probably shouldn't have built my own but it was half built when I found this.

~ Turns 11-40
Found Babylon really close (too bad for them), England, Inca, and Egypt beyond. Fought and killed every barbarian I could for the massive culture boost and snagged an Ally CS for my efforts (faith, whatever). Got Bronze and bought Ikhanda, then began to build 3x spears. I now started to tech Calendar as I was sitting on a mountain of cotton and I wanted the money.

~ turns 41-80
Once I got all three spears (2 of them fully uniquely upgraded off of barbs) I took them, my general, and the warrior and took out the nearby CS. Easy money, free worker, lost the warrior (my heart broke). During this war I finished calendar and switched back to construction for a couple of CBs as I was worried about Babylon's walls (and they were next). Sold Cotton to everyone for anything (took 1 GPT for cotton from Catherine) to keep the war machine churning. Had enough money to buy a settler to take my natural expansion which had more goodies I could sell off. Economy was hurting so I built a caravan (that turned out to be useless, no one in range but a CS). Then started on Zeus. I was still in last place at this point.

~ turns 81-130
Got 2 CBs and 1 more spear and annihilated Babylon (puppetted his expansion, annexed babylon). The walls did suck but probably could have won without the CBs (not sure). Certainly could against any other civ. Those triple unique upgraded spears are ridiculous (3 speed, bunch of offense and defense combat and flanking bonuses that stack with Honor). The other civs fed on Babylons last remained expansion so it wasn't even me who wiped him off the map. Ranking on jumped to upper middle of the pack, catherine was still ahead of me by 100 points and was wonder spamming and had great wall up, London was strength 25ish already. Ew.

~ 130-150
Civil Service complete, upgrade all spears to Impis. Beeline at Catherine, she's the enemy. Raze an incan city in the way (just cause it was in the way) and then crash into London around 145. Take the city by 150 because Impi's are dumb. Already have one with all 3 unique upgrades and 3 normal upgrades, probably gonna have to name him Manimal or something soon. Saved game after I took London ... rank shot up to #1 ahead of unmet by 50 points.

Shaka is stupid. I played nowhere near optimal and muddled my way to juggernaut status on emperor. I am not a pro-deity player either, emperor is usually my comfort zone and I am usually a builder not a warmonger. My dog could have pulled this one off. Also the fact that these insanely upgraded Impis will one day become Rifleman just tickles me pink. Not sure the world will survive that long but it IS continents (did that on purpose so that maybe the world WILL live that long) so its possible.

 

[Enrico Swagolo]

I played only against them, but I've got a story:

Shaka was a guy on another continent. I was Venice and took almost everything on my continent (left Carthage in a pathetic tundra city I wouldn't hit with a stick). We made a Declaration of Friendship, and I made a DoF with his best friend Maria of Portugal. I paid Ramesses "wonderful wonderwhore" to attack him and Maria to have everyone hate Egypt and get Embargo on them later.

Ramesses killed Shaka very fast and halved Maria in size, after which I declared war on Ramesses and took his now barely defended capital, which contained pretty much every wonder I didn't get. Then I backstabbed Maria, took her capital, and won domination.

That's the story of Shaka that game. He did little, had only one city (at least at the time I met him), I - his ally - was the one responsible for his destruction (demographics said Zulu had the biggest army! I guess Great Wall of Egypt made Shaka lose everything).


First game there was a Shaka too. I was Poland. Shaka took Venice, destroying my friend... Dandy. I took Shaka's everything soon later and liberated Enrico.

That's the story of Shaka that game. Did do something, but couldn't stop the Venetian Glory.


Another Venice game, also continents Emperor - I had a weird, very small continent with 4 city states and Wu Zetian. After taking her capital and some cities (left her one, from which I profitted - not only she sent me trade routes, and then got more cities in better places, and I took them)

Zulu was on a small continent alone, with three cities. He attacked Hanoi, my ally. I sent Galeasses, DoW'd Shaka, repelled his huge force without losing anything and Hanoi was safe, I then counterattacked and took his capital. Only left him one city later, which I didn't want (wouldn't be worth raising science costs AND getting even more warmongering menace hate).

He got another city settled on the continent a bit later. I DoW'd, took it (it had access to good strategic resources, so I decided it was worth it), then peace.

That's the story of Shaka that game. He did nothing, and I still managed to embargo him and China just because (in fact, others wanted to embargo them, I only gave a few positive votes, because why not).

 

[Monado]

Lots and lots of buffalo loins.

 

[ToothedBomb]

I had won many victories with the Zulu, taking the Mayan and Dutch capitals, as well as some cities from India. I set my sights on the Shoshone, who had the biggest military and the best tech. As I prepared my army he built the Red Fort. Well, no biggie, my Impi can still beat him. Then he built Himeji Castle... Let's stay positive! I can build the Brandenburg Gate and negate this disadvantage! My units are upgraded to riflemen and I even have cannons! A message popped up on-screen: Pocatello has finished Brandenburg Gate!

I still tried, and took one of his cities, but everyone hates me and has declared war on me. I'm losing money and the World Congress has put lot of work in making sure I'm heavily taxed. All is lost now.

 

[livsbrand]

I played Shaka. I took Venice with Composites and a Spearman and settled down. I ended up not building a single Ikanda, and then by the end-game I wondered why there was no option to build the Heroic Epic for a writing slot. Culture victory in the mid 300s, two turns before diplomatic. Not exactly what I had in mind when picking the Zulus.

 

[A Rabid Dopsis]

Culture victory with Shaka. I anhilated the last non-influential civ (Morocco) with my impi-riflemen. It was tremendously fun.

The Shoshone and Morocco formed an Aliance against me and Carthage for most of the game. They even simultaneously declared war twice. I laughed at their puniness.

 

[Tursas]

I started a game with Shaka, trembling in anticipation of the war drums and carnage to come.

Then I heard the music.

Didn't start a game with Shaka again.

 

[budweiser]

Me Venice, immortal, pangea, standard. Spawned next to Shaka. On the other side of Shaka is India who has the GW. My spies tell me he is plotting against me. Its early Renaissance, 800ADish and he hasnt come at me yet. He better hurry up because I already have an Observatory and I am gonna get Flight.

 

[aluelkdf]

Shaka was huge, controlled almost an entire continent, also had the biggest military. To bad for him, I placed an embargo on him which lasted until the end of the game. Shaka was losing about 350 gold per turn, couldn't keep up in science, and had no money to ally city states. His ideology was under too much pressure and cities started to flip. By the end game I had 34 delegates, Shaka had 5. I won a diplomatic victory and Shaka lost.

By the end game Shaka's huge military was no threat either. I DOW to protect Spain (the last civ on that continent not conquered by Shaka). I destroyed Shakas navy, destroyed his airforce and captured a key city. Shaka's military went from 500,000+ to 250,000 in about 10 turns. I had almost zero loses and would have continued to conquer Shaka, but since I won a diplomatic victory I'm starting a new game.

 

[Simplicity2]

I'm playing as Shaka, but I'm playing him a little oddly. Firstly, he's only gone to war once. Mainly, it's a religion focused game. He's spreading the religion of Shakamania everywhere. And everyone who gets it, pays a Tithe straight to Shaka. He's also the head of the Shaka's Tea Party. And as he built the Forbidden Palace, and was the one to find everyone else, he's really got all the say there. First proposal, Shakamania is the World Religion. Boom. It is so. Next up, World Shakataucracy...

 

[God of Kings]

I'm playing as Shaka, but I'm playing him a little oddly. Firstly, he's only gone to war once. Mainly, it's a religion focused game. He's spreading the religion of Shakamania everywhere. And everyone who gets it, pays a Tithe straight to Shaka. He's also the head of the Shaka's Tea Party. And as he built the Forbidden Palace, and was the one to find everyone else, he's really got all the say there. First proposal, Shakamania is the World Religion. Boom. It is so. Next up, World Shakataucracy...

Everyone will sing "uShaka!"

 

[Mesix]

I played a game as Shake last night. What a fun warmongering experience! I researched Mining, Bronze Working, and Archery first, built the UB and cranked out two Spearmen and four Archers (along with my initial Warrior and a Scout I built first). I started rolling and never looked back. By the late Medieval Era I had conquered the entire Pangaea map and had my armies parked outside the last capital. I hadn't even reached Crossbows yet at this point!

My only complaint is that I wanted to get the achievement for Conquest with the Autocracy Ideology so I had to get peace with the last civ left alive on the map (the Maya) and research for 100+ turns to reach the Industrial Era. Thankfully I had enough to buy the three Factories as soon as my worker finished the coal mine allowing me to open the ideology and DOW for the win.