The Zulu: How would you represent them?

[CivilizedPlayer]

I think it would be cool if the UA was some additional flanking bonus. And that way the UA would need so many caveats.

 

[MARDUK80]

Horns of the Bull: All Military buildings produce culture, during war zulu get bonus happiness.
Impi: Bonus for Flanking, 1 extra move through Zone of Control areas.
Kraal: 1 extra food and hammer, replaces pasture, 10 percent fighting bonus in adjacent tiles.

The idea of a Kraal or Homestead is intriguing as a sort of defensive pasture. Given how common cows and sheep, etc are, they could make useful positions for defending your own lands.

I like your ideas for the Zulu. Though would the Kraal remind too much of Polynesian Moai Statues?


Here is one old concept idea for the Zulu:

Zulu
Leader: Shaka Zulu
Unique Unit: Impi. Production 60. Replaces Spearman. Movement 3, not 2. Strength 8. +25% Strength for against Units with 2 Movement.
Unique Building: Ikhanda. Replaces Barracks. Production 80. Maintenance 1. Reduces city maintenance costs by 15%.
Unique Ability: African Terror. Every Zulu unit in enemy territory causes -.75 happiness in their (the enemy's) country.
Note: Zulus were one of the most terrifying military forces in all of Africa, and no one wanted to cross them, especially not Shaka Zulu. Some people call him "The Black Napoleon" because of his brilliant (but fiercely brutal) tactical innovations.

 

[seasnake]

I like your ideas for the Zulu. Though would the Kraal remind too much of Polynesian Moai Statues?


Here is one old concept idea for the Zulu:

Zulu
Leader: Shaka Zulu
Unique Unit: Impi. Production 60. Replaces Spearman. Movement 3, not 2. Strength 8. +25% Strength for against Units with 2 Movement.
Unique Building: Ikhanda. Replaces Barracks. Production 80. Maintenance 1. Reduces city maintenance costs by 15%.
Unique Ability: African Terror. Every Zulu unit in enemy territory causes -.75 happiness in their (the enemy's) country.
Note: Zulus were one of the most terrifying military forces in all of Africa, and no one wanted to cross them, especially not Shaka Zulu. Some people call him "The Black Napoleon" because of his brilliant (but fiercely brutal) tactical innovations.

I think the Kraal makes more sense then the Ikhanda mostly because the Kraal is an essential building to the Zulu way of life. It is similar to the Moai, but there is a big difference, in that you can only place them on resources that use a pasture AND those tiles will not only be better but the defensive bonus will create zones of defense inland, unlike the Moai which provides excellent defense that is limited to the coastal region only, culture, can connect all resources and provides gold after Flight is researched.

 

[Volapyk]

Unique Ability: African Terror. Every Zulu unit in enemy territory causes -.75 happiness in their (the enemy's) country.

Oh dear lord imagine playing against an ai with that ability, they will swarm you with wave after wave of units which would just crush your happiness leaving you even more ed.

 

[CivilizedPlayer]

Yeah the "African Terror" UA ability would be a little obnoxious, because:
1)The AI's swarm tactic would make this a pain. 5 of their units in your territory would = -4 happiness (they always round to the lowest number).
2)The AI cheats so hard on happiness that this wouldn't really make a difference, and even if it did, their unhappiness doesn't really help you, (unless at -10, which would be near impossible to achieve with this ability). It just slows their city growth.
I'm a fan of the flanking bonus or some sort of advantage where ZoC is limited.

 

[cuc]

Rise of Nations's idea was to incoporated the entire Bantu ethnicity into a Bantu nation, with Impi as its UU.

Bantu in RoN has "the Power of Migration". They can found more cities than other nations, and have a higher population limit. This comes from the Bantu expansion, one of the largest migrations in human history. "Founding more cities" can easily become too strong for Civ, but this is a viable line of thought, based on something that was actually significant.

However, there is a key difference: the design of civilizations in Civ is based more on political states than large and ununified ethnic groups, at least compared to RoN, thus Civ has Ottomans instead of Turks. Of course there are exceptions even in Civ.

 

[CYZ]

Rise of Nations's idea was to incoporated the entire Bantu ethnicity into a Bantu nation, with Impi as its UU.

Bantu in RoN has "the Power of Migration". They can found more cities than other nations, and have a higher population limit. This comes from the Bantu expansion, one of the largest migrations in human history. "Founding more cities" can easily become too strong for Civ, but this is a viable line of thought, based on something that was actually significant.

However, there is a key difference: the design of civilizations in Civ is based more on political states than large and ununified ethnic groups, at least compared to RoN, thus Civ has Ottomans instead of Turks. Of course there are exceptions even in Civ.

Hmmm... This gave me a very interesting idea.

UA: Melee units (not ranged, cavalry, naval or gunpowder) may ignore ZoC
UU: Impi: Spear or pike replacement, same strength, but higher cost. No penalty for moving or attacking on rough terrain.
UU: Bantu Settler (or something): Replaces settler, same cost but has 3 moves and ignores rough terrain.


The spear/pike will not be extremely powerfull but very usefull combined with the UA. The settler really allows you to expand faster early on. You will most likely not have such use for it later on, when you settle fewer cities. But it will certainly give an early edge. Getting your cities up several turns early might not seem like much but it will snowball later on.

Alternative idea: Bantu Settler: Very slight increase in cost but cities founded by this settler will start with 2 population.

 

[Louis XXIV]

Rise of Nations's idea was to incoporated the entire Bantu ethnicity into a Bantu nation, with Impi as its UU.

Bantu in RoN has "the Power of Migration". They can found more cities than other nations, and have a higher population limit. This comes from the Bantu expansion, one of the largest migrations in human history. "Founding more cities" can easily become too strong for Civ, but this is a viable line of thought, based on something that was actually significant.

However, there is a key difference: the design of civilizations in Civ is based more on political states than large and ununified ethnic groups, at least compared to RoN, thus Civ has Ottomans instead of Turks. Of course there are exceptions even in Civ.

I'm sympathetic because I want to represent a Bantu people in the game. It's why I'm not absolutely opposed to the Zulu even though it's not the greatest pick. However, you're right. Bantu is, generally speaking, too broad. The Polynesians are perhaps the broadest so far and the Bantu would be equally broad if not more (it's an entire language group. It might be the equivalent of having the Austronesians instead of the Polynesians).

I'd still prefer the Kongo Empire (capital: Mbanza-Kongo; leader: Lukeni lua Nimi), but that's certainly not all that famous.

 

[dexters]

Yeah, I think Zulu's are in because of Civ tradition, but Firaxis has also surprised with their choices in the core game plus DLC. WuZeTian and Askia of Songhai were unexpected choices.

If they do bring the Zulu's in, I just hope they're not a reskinned Monty in terms of AI leader variables.

 

[AbsintheRed]

I'd still prefer the Kongo Empire (capital: Mbanza-Kongo; leader: Lukeni lua Nimi), but that's certainly not all that famous.

Absolutely agreed
I'm hoping for a Portugal-Kongo double DLC, it would be awesome!

 

[King William I]

In my opinion:

UU: Impi replaces spearman (as strong as pikeman with cost of spearman)
UB: some sort of barracks
UA: Defense against muskets: All Zulu millitary units gain a defense against technologically advanced units


And as a play on his last words, when you defeat the Zulu, he says: "Your empire will not live long after my death"