Holy crap! Shaka is a beast

[gilmore606]

Finished my first Shaka game on Prince. Good lord that guy is amazing. Ikhanda + half-price Courthouse = expand like crazy in the early game. I exterminated one civ and crippled another before I even had cats, and with cottages and the lucky capture of a holy city managed to pull out of the economic tailspin and get a huge tech lead to domination in the late 1800's. Pretty sure I would have crashed and burned without the Ikhanda and fast Courthouses.

The Impis seemed like a side dish at best -- I did get some double duty from them early on by giving them Cover promo for taking archer cities, but most of the work got done by good old Horse Archers.

Is there any leader better than Shaka for this kind of early rush expansion?

 

[dirtyparrot]

You mean other than the Incas, Persians, Egyptians, and Romans? I should probably add the Vultures as well. I do confess that I've developed such a disliking to Shaka that I don't really play him, but he's certainly suited to early expansion (whether he's controlled by the human or the AI).

 

[gilmore606]

You mean other than the Incas, Persians, Egyptians, and Romans? I should probably add the Vultures as well. I do confess that I've developed such a disliking to Shaka that I don't really play him, but he's certainly suited to early expansion (whether he's controlled by the human or the AI).

To be clear, it was the cost savings in city maintenance after the conquest that made Shaka work so well for me. I've played a fair few games as the Romans and struggled a lot more with that issue; I found the whole process far easier as Shaka.

 

[revengeofmakno]

You mean other than the Incas, Persians, Egyptians, and Romans?

Right, and the Mongols and.... well, there are plenty of good early attackers.

 

[dirtyparrot]

To be clear, it was the cost savings in city maintenance after the conquest that made Shaka work so well for me. I've played a fair few games as the Romans and struggled a lot more with that issue; I found the whole process far easier as Shaka.

If you know what you're doing, the city maintenance cost isn't a huge deal when you're crushing your foes into the dust. You can always dig yourself of your economy nosediving by some combination of cottages, scientists, building currency/research, extorting techs.

 

[Fleme]

Shaka doesn't get discount courthouses. He's expansive and in order to get the discount you need organized. Therefore, Hammurabi would be the leader for Zulu (and Sumeria; Discounted discount courthouses that come early!)

Ikhanda is obviously great and augments regular courthouses spectacularly. However, there are situations where you wouldn't normally want a barracks in every city but with the Zulu you will pretty much build one everywhere because the Ikhanda is so good and has a unique bonus to it. So, it's a bit of a double edge but the other edge heavily outweights the other so one can't really complain about the Ikhanda - it's top 5 as far as UBs go.

Burger King is best as far as plain old large supported empires go - given that he gets CoL. 75% cut from a single build is huge and while Shaka has 70% combined from his two builds and more favorable traits, if you're looking at just plain old straightforward expansion, Charles takes the cake.

Not saying Charles is the best for REX at any rate but he does have his plays. Given that there's a huge expanse of land to claim and that you can for example Oracle CoL, there's probably no-one who can make better and faster use of that land than he can. The other side of that play is corporations, seeing how the Rathaus cuts their maintenance. It's actually funny that as far as best corporate leaders go, Charlemagne and Shaka come first.

Anyhow, Shaka is great and he's actually a very versatile leader for the human player.

 

[coanda]

Hammurabi of the Sumerians would be downright terrifying. 45 hammers for a courthouse, available at Priesthood, plus aggressive vultures. Some day when I feel like a steamroller game I may try it.

 

[Fleme]

Yep. Hammurabi actually becomes a total monster if you play him outside of Babylonia. He would work well with Zulu, Sumeria, Aztec, Vikings and HRE (although the last 2 are just technical additions) but with Sumeria I think he'd be constantly in the top 5 of any poll while he's now bottom tier with 0 synergy between his traits to his UB/UU.

That said, Gilgamesh and Hammurabi should just go ahead and switch places, would make traits match the uniques for both of em.

 

[madscientist]

Shaka is one of the better war-mongers due to the UB and discounted graneries which promote whip abuse. As Dirtyparrot said I would prefer the Romans/Persians and would toss in the Mongols. While Egypt and INca are well suited I tend to prefer their builder abilities instead.

Also as mentioned Hammurabi is pretty nasty to play as also. Gilgamesh seams more of an economical power than a real war-monger, his vulture never impress me much as they are weaker against axes.

 

[coanda]

I think vultures are somewhat difficulty-dependent. Playing below Immortal difficulty, you can reliably pull off an axe rush (or vulture rush) before your opponent has more than one or two axes of their own; if you do that, then vultures are way better than axes (very nearly as good as swords, but they cost only 3/4 as much and you don't need IW first).

Of course, if you're looking to play on Immortal or Deity, you're in for a rude wake-up when your vultures start running into axes and getting chewed to pieces.

 

[Ataxerxes]

I think vultures are somewhat difficulty-dependent. Playing below Immortal difficulty, you can reliably pull off an axe rush (or vulture rush) before your opponent has more than one or two axes of their own; if you do that, then vultures are way better than axes (very nearly as good as swords, but they cost only 3/4 as much and you don't need IW first).

Of course, if you're looking to play on Immortal or Deity, you're in for a rude wake-up when your vultures start running into axes and getting chewed to pieces.

Given the defensive bonuses, I would think the defender would win most battles between a Vulture and an Axe. Whichever was the city defender would be the probable winner. An Axe rush or a Vulture rush vs. Axes - both sound pretty painful.

Maybe I'm conservative, but I think Julius would be the best at getting an empire and paying for it. Organized cuts the costs right at the start and courthouses are cheaper. Although all the Civs mentioned are very good at paying for an empire. I'm not running down Shaka, he does well whether human or AI. From what I've read, I think AI Shaka has beaten more people than any other AI.

 

[madscientist]

Given the defensive bonuses, I would think the defender would win most battles between a Vulture and an Axe. Whichever was the city defender would be the probable winner. An Axe rush or a Vulture rush vs. Axes - both sound pretty painful.

.

Given no defensive bonus (open ground) a Vulture versus axe goes

No combat promotion: Vulture 6 vs Axe 6.25

Combat 1 : Vulture 6.6 vs Axe 6.75

Combat 2 : Vulture 7.2 vs Axe 7.25

Combat 3 : Vulture 7.8 vs Axe 7.75

At combat III Vultures get the advantage, however how long does it take to get a vulture to combat III (10 XP). Also Vultures have more difficulty against Agressive AIs who get the free COmbat I off the bat.

City defending axes or vulture are different as they have no inate defensive ability (like archery units) nor do they get CG, they have to be combat I followed by shock. So a CR axe or Vulture can knock off at least the culture bonus, a CR II can knock off walls. Now it's Vulture/axe versus vulture/axe again. I still see vulture weaker than normal axes.

This is not to say Vultures are not useful, they are better against archery units although swords are better for city defenders, and even money against horse archers. Still a UU that get's any disadvantage is a little lacking.

 

[coanda]

By the way, it's even worse if the vulture is the defender:

No promotion: vulture 4.8 vs Axe 5
Combat 1: vulture 5.22 vs Axe 5.5
Combat 2: vulture 5.71 vs Axe 6
Combat 3: vulture 6.3 vs Axe 6.5
Combat 4: vulture 6.9 vs Axe 7
Combat 5: vulture 7.5 vs Axe 7.5
Combat 6: Vulture 9 vs Axe 8.75

Yes, the only time that a vulture has an edge against an axe with identical promotions if the vulture is defending is when both units have great generals attached and are up to combat 6.

 

[LuCiver]

How do you shuffle leaders and civ to play Hammy of Sumeria? Is there a Mod or Can it be done in plain BtS?

 

[Fleme]

Unrestricted leaders. Just play a custom game and select the option.

 

[Ataxerxes]

By the way, it's even worse if the vulture is the defender:

No promotion: vulture 4.8 vs Axe 5
Combat 1: vulture 5.22 vs Axe 5.5
Combat 2: vulture 5.71 vs Axe 6
Combat 3: vulture 6.3 vs Axe 6.5
Combat 4: vulture 6.9 vs Axe 7
Combat 5: vulture 7.5 vs Axe 7.5
Combat 6: Vulture 9 vs Axe 8.75

Yes, the only time that a vulture has an edge against an axe with identical promotions if the vulture is defending is when both units have great generals attached and are up to combat 6.

I think I did not explain properly. I understand that, on even ground, the axeman has a small advantage and will usually win. However, whichever one is defending in a city with any culture or is on defensive terrain will usually prevail. At the time of axes, catapults aren't around which would shift the balance back to axe if the Vulture was in a city. Even the 20% defensive bonus of a starting capital or hills would shift the balance to the defender.

 

[bobbyboy29]

I remember that when I was moving up through the levels, from about noble to emperor, I always thought that the last leader I played was the strongest, as each time I was finding it easier and easier to win. That's why my avatar is of shaka coz when i signed up to these forums I had just won a shaka Prince game convincingly and I too thought he was super powerful.

After a while I realised that each leader has cool combo's UU's and UB's but it wasn't that I was playing stronger leaders that was making my games easier, it was that I was improving markedly with each game.

Ironically, the leader who I deemed to be the worst in the game originally, Mehmed, is now my favourite .

 

[pigswill]

Not sure why swords are better than vultures against cities.

Sword Str6 +10vs cities. 40H
Vulture Str 6 +25 v melee 35H.
280H = 7 swords or 8 vultures.

Swords v defending archers have a slight advantage. Vultures against defending axes have a slight advantage.

Another point is that swords need IW which is a significant early game detour from pottery>writing>alphabet.

 

[madscientist]

Not sure why swords are better than vultures against cities.

Sword Str6 +10vs cities. 40H
Vulture Str 6 +25 v melee 35H.
280H = 7 swords or 8 vultures.

Swords v defending archers have a slight advantage. Vultures against defending axes have a slight advantage.

Another point is that swords need IW which is a significant early game detour from pottery>writing>alphabet.

All very good points.