Barbarian Civs

[Ric Flair]

I was playing CivII on Emperor level as the French. While taking out the Russians, some "raging horde" barbs popped up in the area. So, I decided to have a little fun by knocking out the Russian military and letting those nice little barbs take over the nice cities.
The "Barbarian Civilization" now has 6 cities and actually discovered some early science advances (e.g. Ceremonial Burial). Too bad I can't enter diplomatic relations with them.
Anyone else ever try setting up such a Barbarian Civilization?

 

[ElephantU]

Six is pretty good! I've only seen them get three in one game, but that was without help. Might be fun to see how big a civ you could "cultivate" for them... I remember one Early Landing game Solo was leaving a city empty hoping to get taken over - never happened. I've seen them walk right by empty cities. Have not seen them get beyond starter techs, but that's probably because I go buy up their cities when I find them (unless I'm playing OCC).

I see by your registration date you've been around CFC longer than I have, but not posted much. Here and over at Apolyton.Net is a treasure trove of Civ knowledge. Join a GOTM or Democracy Game sometime!

 

[la fayette]

The 'Barbarian Civ' has been used in at least one succession game over at Apolyton. It was used as a nursery for cheap (and sometimes NON) units, and there were some diplomats waiting nearby for organized bribery of those units.

 

[funxus]

Ceremonial Burial? I thought they'd pick some militaristic tech, or do they already have them?

 

[ElephantU]

They start with Archers, Horse, and Trireme, and get updated whenever anyone discovers Wheel, PT, Iron, Feud, MT, Gun, Chiv, and so on up to but not including MobWar. Worse you face is Barb Rifles, Calv, and Arty. Ships go to Frigates, I think.

 

[The Person]

Do the barbs pillage improvements around their own cities?
Just wondering.

 

[funxus]

Don't know, but it could easily be checked. Take an old game and enter cheat mode to give one of your good cities to the barbs and see what happens.

 

[Andu Indorin]

Yes, it would have been nice if successful Barbarians could have been treated as an civilization in the game. Unfortunately, Barbarian scientific research pretty much goes no where since they never a Palace to reduce corruption.

"But honest, we came here for culture ..." said the Visigoth standing atop the smoking ruins of the Forum.

 

[Katlover97]

Worse you face is Barb Rifles, Calv, and Arty. Ships go to Frigates

-- I was wondering why, when designing a scen., I couldn't get the comp. to create barbarian Spithres(extended orig., TOT). But I still can't get the computer to recognize "Spithre" as a valid unit, so I guess that's irelevant.

 

[ElephantU]

If you visit the Great Library at Apolyton.Net you should find a link to a paper on Barbarians. Visit the Scenario Creation forum here at CFC to get help with your troublesome unit.

 

[Achinz]

There was also a fascinating and unusual OCC Fortnight Comparison game at Apolyton (in the heyday of OCC) in which Tom DeMille actually used Barbarians as an ally to the civ you are playing.

A quick search of my archives:
It's the 17th Fortnight Comparison game where " Tom hacked the saved game so that you play as both the Romans and the Barbarians."

See

http://www.paulvdb.cistron.nl/occ/occ.htm

 

[cdscivnut]

I've found (by watching and playing as them myself) that even when the research something, it acts like they didn't even research it. They will sometimes research the same thing several times (I've done that too, quite exciting).

 

[Carrot]

Just wondering. Are barbarians less likely to appear randomly once they have established themselves by capturing cities? In my GOTM37 they were early on listed as a 'top five city', but I have yet to encounter them, despite it being 'raging hordes'.

 

[funxus]

I have a feeling that it's a lot about luck, in some games they come all the time and you always have to be prepared, but in other games they maybe show up like once before 1000AD...

 

[Pariah]

@Carrot: I've never noticed that, but maybe I'm not looking closely enough. It does seem, though, that, once the barbarians have a city which constantly manufactures more of them, those units tend to stay in the vicinity of that city. They may be a constant threat to their neighbours, but they don't seem to wander far and wide.

We know that barbarian cities can build only military units - no improvements - but it's odd that you never gain any gold from capturing them. Surely they still exploit the surrounding terrain for food, production and trade, like the cities belonging to "proper" civs?

 

[Ace]

Its suposed to be random. Sometimes you get swamped with barbs, and the next game you barely know they exist. I have noticed that in the GOTM games too. There have been games where I had many barb uprisings and others have posted in the GOTM threads that they didn't see a single barb. It has also gone the other way where I didn't get many barbs and someone posted that they were overrun by them.

Its just like popping huts, its suposed to be random, but all of us have had "runs" where you get 4+ advanced tribes in a row, or scrolls of wisdom, and than a game where you get barbs a couple of times in a row. Within the parameters of the game, its just random, or as I like to think of it...pure luck!

 

[mardukes]

Originally posted by funxus
I have a feeling that it's a lot about luck, in some games they come all the time and you always have to be prepared, but in other games they maybe show up like once before 1000AD...

AD 1000

 

[funxus]

I've seen both, but since you're native I take your words for it.

 

[kefra(tm)]

I think it's funny how barb cities can't make anything but warriors (if no other civ has discovered gunpowder), despite the fact that they used horsemen and archers to capture the city in the first place. What happened to the horseback riding and warrior code? (P.S.: Ric Flair, I still don't see it--what's so great about 5...g6?)

 

[Nylan]

I agree with Ace. One game, I got nothing but advanced tribes, and the next, I was drowning in barbarians.