Barb camps scaling with map size

[Milae]

Had a strong feeling there was a big difference while playing (much fewer barbs on larger maps) so did some investigating:

Turns out it was deliberate choice from Civ 5 base game where 'fog tiles per barb camp' is increased for larger maps. (it's 3 times more on Huge than Duel)

Is it just me or is this not necessary? I feel like it should be roughly the same number of tiles per camp on all sizes. This means there will be more total camps on larger sizes. But there are also more Civs killing them.

 

[DeAnno]

Yeah, I agree Barbs should be a density across the fog rather than a set population across the map. But this raises a question I wonder about sometimes, what controls barb spawning? Does the whole map produce barbs and distribute them around, or does each camp do it? Does hitting a camp make it spawn more? (This seems anecdotally true to me.)

It's possible the less camps on Huge maps is some weird idea to counterbalance less total barbs/hex being available over the sum of the map for placement, so that each camp gets an appropriate amount of spawns. Granted this is pretty backwards logic but from Civ V's backend I expect that kind of thing.

 

[Milae]

From what I understood each camp is treated separately for unit spawns and has it's own timer. Then when a camp is attacked, you reduce the spawn time by half. This was from VP code though so may have been cleaned up since vanilla.

 

[Deljade]

I'm usually playing on huge with raging barbs.. no scarcity of barb camp I assure you : D

 

[Milae]

I'm usually playing on huge with raging barbs.. no scarcity of barb camp I assure you : D

Try raging barbs on a tiny map and let us know how it goes

 

[Gidoza]

Since this thread is here - why not have Barb Camp rewards of 20 Gold scale with Era as well? It still won't be that much, but 20 Gold in Atomic Era is kinda dumb.

 

[Deljade]

Since this thread is here - why not have Barb Camp rewards of 20 Gold scale with Era as well? It still won't be that much, but 20 Gold in Atomic Era is kinda dumb.

Ah of course, I noticed that in my recent game as well, surely that Barb group of a Great War Infantry and a Machine Gun in the jungle (that I can only assume were doing illicit activities for profit) have equipment and loot appropriate to gear a Modern Era unit, as opposed to smoked deer and trinkets like their Ancient Era brethren.

 

[azum4roll]

Since this thread is here - why not have Barb Camp rewards of 20 Gold scale with Era as well? It still won't be that much, but 20 Gold in Atomic Era is kinda dumb.

So is the city state influence for killing barbs near them. 15 influence in Atomic Era is also dumb.

 

[Tekamthi]

needs to be more per number of civs relative to map size.... even on huge, 43 civ barbs are around for a few turns then never again. would be nice to see them have more of a naval presence in the mid-game too, as pirates etc.

 

[JamesNinelives]

I disagree tbh. I play on Huge maps and I actually suspect that barbs are part of the reason so many civs are picking Authority at the moment, because it helps them fight back.

I wouldn't mind there being a few more barbarians, but on big maps there tends to be much more fog of war already... I don't really want to see the early-game turn into a sort of Mad Max situation.

 

[Zanteogo]

needs to be more per number of civs relative to map size.... even on huge, 43 civ barbs are around for a few turns then never again. would be nice to see them have more of a naval presence in the mid-game too, as pirates etc.

One of the (very few) things Civ 6 did better than 5 was barbarian camps. In 6 if you ignore a camp it seems to "level up", and start to produce at an insane rate. They will even start to gather invasion armies. (With siege weapons and everything)

This means the unreachable water based ones start to become legit water threats in the mid game.

It's actually funny because one of my biggest issues with Civ 6 is that I have never felt a real risk of losing a war to the AI. Once you survive the initial swarm of units they will just sent a couple at you at a time. The barbarians however if ignored will send repeated invasion armies non-stop and are more of a threat. Anyways.. back to Civ 5...

 

[Tekamthi]

the barb description from civ 6 sounds great... i have a copy from the epic giveaway but only launched it once so far... the concept sounds somewhat modmod-able within civ 5's existing framework, though I am lacking in time for such things currently. I also enjoyed the advanced "barb" implementation in beyond earth

getting a more dynamic spawn mechanism in place would be a nice tweak to VP for now though I think

 

[Stalker0]

getting a more dynamic spawn mechanism in place would be a nice tweak to VP for now though I think

sounds like a great mod mod idea!

 

[Tekamthi]

sounds like a great mod mod idea!

yes, agreed, we could have a separate modmod barb spawner... but it would work at odds with VP's barb spawner, and tweaking the latter for a more intelligent spawn rate is essentially the OP concern: ie its already in, lets make it work consistently on all settings

 

[Milae]

I disagree tbh. I play on Huge maps and I actually suspect that barbs are part of the reason so many civs are picking Authority at the moment, because it helps them fight back.

I wouldn't mind there being a few more barbarians, but on big maps there tends to be much more fog of war already... I don't really want to see the early-game turn into a sort of Mad Max situation.

That's weird because my feelings were that when I am on a huge map it's a consideration that authority won't be as good because there are fewer barbs around.

Are you saying that there are the same/more barbs on huge compared to other sizes or just that the amount of barbs on huge is about right as it is?

 

[Tekamthi]

That's weird because my feelings were that when I am on a huge map it's a consideration that authority won't be as good because there are fewer barbs around.

Are you saying that there are the same/more barbs on huge compared to other sizes or just that the amount of barbs on huge is about right as it is?

can you clarify the OP? As I understand it, "Should there be more 'tiles per barb camp' on larger map sizes?" references a value in worlds table, 'FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp'

if the value of 'FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp' is increased (ie more), the occurrence of barbarian camps in the game decreases -- Last few posts seem to be discussing the opposite effect, ie "should there be less 'tiles per barb camp' on larger map sizes" aka "should there be more barbarian camps?". I am confused -- perhaps its my fault for taking this position earlier.

fwiw i agree with OP's last in a general sense, that authority should always be similar in value, and this value in early game should be regulated by barb camps available to each player. In 43-civ on huge, i rarely take authority (relative to smaller game settings anyway) cuz there are not enough barbs per player available to make it worthwhile... in this case there should be less tiles per barb camp aka more barb camps

I bandaid this 43-civ situation using the following code in a mod:

UPDATE Worlds
SET FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp = 10, GridWidth = 180, GridHeight = 94
WHERE Type = 'WORLDSIZE_HUGE';

 

[Zanteogo]

yes, agreed, we could have a separate modmod barb spawner... but it would work at odds with VP's barb spawner, and tweaking the latter for a more intelligent spawn rate is essentially the OP concern: ie its already in, lets make it work consistently on all settings

There is a mod in existence that causes barb camps to form barbarian cities if left alone too long. Pretty sure it doesn't work with VP though. Would be worth a try if you can locate it. Might even be in the workshop still.

Edit: If I recall correctly the issue with the mod was that they removed warmongering from taking barbarian cities. Think that change clashed with VP and caused issues.

 

[Tekamthi]

There is a mod in existence that causes barb camps to form barbarian cities if left alone too long. Pretty sure it doesn't work with VP though. Would be worth a try if you can locate it. Might even be in the workshop still.

Edit: If I recall correctly the issue with the mod was that they removed warmongering from taking barbarian cities. Think that change clashed with VP and caused issues.

yes i believe there's barbarians enhanced and a few others in this respect... they make some pretty profound changes, beyond the OP concern

FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp = (static number) is already in VP. It functions poorly in some settings, and could be better. This directly affects the value of authority in early-game, and I can confirm at least that my choice is guided by it in many games I play. imo we should take the barbarian modmodding ideas to another thread, and focus on whether this variable in worlds table can be improved.

Instead of status quo, consider something in the form of FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp = (function of map size) - (function of #players). This specific concern cannot be easily modmodded within civ 5 framework (okay my sql skills are very basic, maybe it can but I don't know how)

 

[Milae]

can you clarify the OP? As I understand it, "Should there be more 'tiles per barb camp' on larger map sizes?" references a value in worlds table, 'FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp'

if the value of 'FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp' is increased (ie more), the occurrence of barbarian camps in the game decreases -- Last few posts seem to be discussing the opposite effect, ie "should there be less 'tiles per barb camp' on larger map sizes" aka "should there be more barbarian camps?". I am confused -- perhaps its my fault for taking this position earlier.

fwiw i agree with OP's last in a general sense, that authority should always be similar in value, and this value in early game should be regulated by barb camps available to each player. In 43-civ on huge, i rarely take authority (relative to smaller game settings anyway) cuz there are not enough barbs per player available to make it worthwhile... in this case there should be less tiles per barb camp aka more barb camps

I bandaid this 43-civ situation using the following code in a mod:

UPDATE Worlds
SET FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp = 10, GridWidth = 180, GridHeight = 94
WHERE Type = 'WORLDSIZE_HUGE';

Yea it is a little bit confusing lol but we agree. I think Ideally in my mind there would be the same number of barb camps per player in a game. So you could use the map size/players to get FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp that gave the same camps per player.
I guess currently it seems like the FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp is used to give the same number of camps per map. But this ignores the fact that usually there will be more players on a larger map.

Clearly you have had to bandaid this yourself so you see the problem.

 

[Tekamthi]

yes, you're right, we're thinking the same. I suspect the disagreement from others above may be due to these different number of players everyone uses... in this sense, we could determine what the intended settings are for the existing static value, and derive a very simply 2-variable, 1st order formula from there

eg. iirc, FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp is set to around 30 on huge by default? what is the setting in mind when this was established? 22 civs? 12?

Beyond this, its possible that the existing framework just won't work the way I'm thinking... right now the game just doesn't consider number of players for this variable, and as you point out, only determines which one to use based on map size.. though these parameters can be read via lua, there's no way to then update the FogTilesPerBarbarianCamp variable as far as I'm aware. So formula or no, we would need some kind of dll update to affect the barb mechanism directly, and such a change may require major reworks for all we know, standing outside that black box.

As mentioned, a modmod that spawns barbs redundantly (this latter option is inelegant maybe but not difficult -- it just requires time, and personally I would likely only get to it around the holidays given I have a few mod projects open already) might be the way to get at this without troubling VPs core devs, if there's no taste for it beyond a few of us