King of the World #8: Shaka

[Terrance888]

Instead of REX, do SEE! Have some Smart Early Expansion and take over Mali. Carthage will likely be destroyed between Egypt, Rome and Spain but if it survives it can easily own much of the med.

 

[DMOC]

Carthage might do a better job than the other Mediterranean civs because they've got extra land in Africa, even though its junk, while the other civs only have room for 1 city (or 2 if they get lucky).

 

[mystyfly]

Glad to see another KOTW game launched - subscribed!

I'd also like the WB overview of the map (with resource tags ).

Good luck Neal

 

[Joshua368]

Dangit guys he doesn't want to cheat the map into view, how many times does he have to say that?

 

[BakingTheArt]

I'd like to see him conquer only sub-saharan Africa, and maybe the Middle East, and see if you can win Domination using the New World.

 

[sophie]

yup, I've been waiting for another legitimate intercontinental ever since he did Toku.

 

[huerfanista]

These EarthXXcivs maps bring up an interesting decision point: since they do not assign the AI bonuses properly for each difficulty level (AIs start with warriors and without archery), it's quite possible to do massive early rushes. In this game, once impis are available you could take down nearly every civ on the continent with them. Some will consider this quite cheesy but others will not. Trying to do a cultural win (as Neal proposed early on) will benefit hugely from not having to be in war thru 1200AD in order to conquer the continent so you can get some decent land.

BTW, IMO this map has really hosed the african civs. The Zulu start position is terrible (3 peaks in the BFC - WTH ). Ethiopia is even worse:

Spoiler :

5 peaks in the starting position, no food unless you give up the cows to grab the fish, desert, almost totally inaccessible from the rest of the continent - don't play Zara on this map). And wait untill you get a look at east africa - a maze of lakes, peaks, plains hills everywhere.)

IMO, this crummy start location justifies a cheesy impi rush. Can't wait to see how Neal plays it. (I think I'll edit the map sometime to make africa a bit more reasonable to play).

 

[Neal]

Hey, all,

I'm going to try to get Round 1 in before Monday night. After that, I'm gonna go dark until about the 5th. But once I'm back, I'll be back. No more long delays like this. Thanks for the continued interest.

So nobody sees any reason not to settle in place, right?

 

[Pieman]

Yeah, settle in place, but move the capital later on in the game.

 

[slobberinbear]

There's no benefit to moving. Get that workboat out!

 

[DMOC]

Yeah, settle in place.

 

[Mansa Musa]

I'm really gonna to enjoy this one, but I'd love to see a challenging Ethiopian game one day. You'd have the Egyptians to the NW and Arabs straight to the East.

YOu'd deal with the Central Highlands and Ethiopia not to mention the Ogaden desert and desert-like Somalia. That'd be a challenge to carve an empire out of it.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Well, I like Cre/Org...

 

[CHEESE!]

Yay ZULU!!!

SIP. I love the start position for Zulu, it's a production and commerce powerhouse- not like Egypt or China-level good, but very powerful.

 

[huerfanista]

Yay ZULU!!!

SIP. I love the start position for Zulu, it's a production and commerce powerhouse- not like Egypt or China-level good, but very powerful.

Wow, I can't say I understand that at all. First of all, there's no food in this capital at all. You'll be very hard pressed to grow beyond size 7 for a long time, and you can't work all those hammer tiles anyway. Yes, there's some early commerce from the gems and gold, but working those tiles won't give many and will use up all of your food. Working the high tiles means you can't work those tiles. Exactly how is this a powerhouse? Another fish or even a couple of riverside grasslands - instead of riverside peaks - might turn this into a "powerhouse", but it's an extremely limited site in terms of being able to actually use those and .

 

[Feyaria]

You have missed the crab. Ulundi can make 21 and 29 (without trade routes) at size 7 (working the 6 resources and a farm). Thats a very decent early capital. Good enough to build lots of Impis to rush all of Africa and pay for this expansion.
There is space for about 20 cities in Africa, only a few very good ones, but under the jungle of central africa is a lot of riverside grassland for cottage spam. Its the challenge to build a strong empire out of average land.

 

[Juvenal]

Woohoo! I love these threads - always very entertaining and informative. Thanks Neal

Never played earth with all those extra civs before though.

I'd settle in place and good luck

 

[Tephros]

This is a consideration for later in the game, but wouldn't it make sense for the zulu to found corporations since they can do -70% maint. in cities? Often I use state property in games, but for civs like the Zulu and Holy Romans I would think free market would almost always be better provided you can get a corporation.

 

[huerfanista]

You have missed the crab. Ulundi can make 21 and 29 (without trade routes) at size 7 (working the 6 resources and a farm). Thats a very decent early capital. Good enough to build lots of Impis to rush all of Africa and pay for this expansion.
There is space for about 20 cities in Africa, only a few very good ones, but under the jungle of central africa is a lot of riverside grassland for cottage spam. Its the challenge to build a strong empire out of average land.

First of all, you should put your comments about the map in a spoiler - I don't think that Neal has seen the map and wants to play this game "fresh".

And, no, I didn't miss the crabs.

Spoiler :

There are only 2 tiles that have a food surplus before civil service: crabs (+3) and grass farm (+1). There are 4 plains hills (-8), so you can only work 2 of them. The cows are food-neutral. The gems and gold are on plains, they only give 2 each and are -1 each, so you have to give up one of those plains hills to be able to work them both. City square is 2, cows are 4, gems are 2, gold is 2, plains hill iron is 6, farmed plains are 1 each. So working both gems and gold and iron, you can get 18 base and 24 at +1. If you give up either the gems or the gold to work the copper, you get 21 base and 17 at 0. I have no idea how you came up with 29. There is only 36 if you work every single tile in the BFC, and you can't come close to that. You can't whip this capital at all or you'll take forever to grow to size 7, and that's a big loss of in the early game, when they're needed most (since your capital supplies all of your production early).

IMO. the only thing this capital gives you in the early game is enough and resources to go capture a better one. The from the gold and gems doesn't pay for early expansion, the UB does, and the UU makes it possible to get to Thebes (the only decent capital on this continent) before Rameses gets archers. You certainly won't gain anything by keeping Zara's capital.

 

[Tephros]

BTW, IMO this map has really hosed the african civs. The Zulu start position is terrible (3 peaks in the BFC - WTH ).

That's not a huge problem. Other than when volcanoes erupt and destroy improvements, which doesn't happen often, they're about the same as having overlapping tiles between cities. An overlap of 3 isn't a big deal, and 3 unusable tiles will be inconsequential in the early and even mid game. It's especially not a problem since this is not going to be a >20 pop sort of city. This will be a production/commerce city that will build a factory, coal plant, and industrial park eventually.

IMO, this crummy start location justifies a cheesy impi rush. Can't wait to see how Neal plays it. (I think I'll edit the map sometime to make africa a bit more reasonable to play).

A gem and gold resource with adequate food to support them is not a crummy starting city at all. This city would be outshined in terms of commerce by the late game by a cottage city, but by providing instant commerce and 2 happy resources it's a good starting city, though perhaps not excellent due to a minimal food surplus.