Barbarian uprise in a single turn

[Chicken Pizza]

Where, when in time and depending on what barbarian settings, can uprises occur, and how can I handle it?

I had some horsemen scouting around, watching the land close to my borders (if it's closer to an AI's border, they can have the trouble).

Then about 20-25 horsemen turn up from a camp because I hadn't checked that tile for one f-cking turn...

Is it possible to avoid such massive gatherings, which is stupid (but I admit, kind of fun because I get to discuss it with you), by having tiles uplighted/seen?

Should I have 20 spearmen in all my border towns, let the barbarians pillage those to the ground and steal all my money (how the h-ll can they do that by taking over a small town in the outskirts anyway).

Or should I continue to chase camps, or what? I'm confused and unable to plan ahead.

Is it a number of unhandled camps on a continent, island or the entire game, that creates these uprisings?

And what can you do to fight them? Are they drawn to unprotected colonies, settlers and workers more than unprotected towns?

I figure you can get massive experience with a wall and 10 defenders, but you can't get there in time. Zulus Impies is probably nice.

 

[justanick]

You should simply settle all available land. That way there is no place for barbarian camps to spawn. Before anyone reaches the medieval age all tiles should either be in culture or adjacent to culture. If so, then no barbarian camps can spawn.

An uprising does occur at the time when 2 civilizations have entered the medival age. Then every barbarian camp gets about 2 dozen horsemen. It can happen again when 2 civilizations have entered the industrial age and when 2 civilizations have entered the modern age. The later two are of course less likely and less relevant due to progress in available military. You might want to farm experience for your cavalry, but i doubt it is worth the hassle.

If you fail to settle all land in time the best strategy can be to essentially ignore the barbarians. Let them pillage a worthless bordertown. It hardly does damage to you, especially if your money stockpile is reasonable low. Just keep your settlers, workers and military units at a safe distance.

 

[Chicken Pizza]

I have no worthless border towns, you commie bastard.

 

[justanick]

I have no worthless border towns

Then you have not settled enough. If you have settled enough, then you are likely to have a bordertown that generates only 1 commerce and 1 shield after corruption. It is just a freshly founded town that has not build up anything meaningful, yet. Set production to wealth, so production is not lost either. Use your one citizen as a scientists to not grow beyond size 1. That is the idea. Donnot put anything of meaningful value in the way of barbarian hordes while you are not ready to fight them, at least not at reasonable price.

Another way is to simply scout with military units. Within their sight no new camps spawn. During despotism you have the free unit support for it to be viable. But as this may take quite some amount of military units this is likely to be no sound strategy once you have entered the republic. Hence the rational choice is the worthless border town.

 

[vorlon_mi]

An uprising does occur at the time when 2 civilizations have entered the medival age. Then every barbarian camp gets about 2 dozen horsemen. It can happen again when 2 civilizations have entered the industrial age and when 2 civilizations have entered the modern age. The later two are of course less likely and less relevant due to progress in available military. You might want to farm experience for your cavalry, but i doubt it is worth the hassle.

I'm pretty sure that I've seen the barb uprisings in the Ancient Age, too. I have a vague memory of them happening every N turns, where N is something like 30 or 50. Maybe triggered when a certain number of Civs have built two cities? I will look for the post to see if I'm misremembering.
I've also seen the crowd of horsemen all congregate on a hill, not moving, if a town or unit is not sufficiently close by. Once they hear your foot step on that dry twig <crack>, they follow you and usually suicide on the nearest town,

 

[justanick]

I'm pretty sure that I've seen the barb uprisings in the Ancient Age, too.

I rather doubt that, unless you only mean to imply that you were still in the ancient age. It is somewhat well observed that 2 civs having reached a new age triggers an uprising. Without sound proof of the opposite i would consider that part safe knowledge. It does of course not safely disregard the possibility of other triggers.

Something else to keep in mind is that new barbarian camps spawn only on landmasses with settlements on it and only reasonably close to them.

 

[Chicken Pizza]

Another way is to simply scout wih military units. Within their sight no camps to spawn.

I tried that and haven't had any barbarian activity on my island for 50-75 turns, very nice.

I placed units where my borders wasn't enough. So in an uplighted tile, camps can't spawn, great.

Kind of interesting that a camp can spawn if you just leave a tile unattended for one turn though.

The only scout left is a regular archer who's been standing on a mountain forever. I'm going to move him and see what happens.

If you know where the horsemen are going, I guess you can get some great exp, but I bet if the nearest town has walls, they go somewhere else or split up.

 

[justanick]

The roman legionary is arguably the best unit for using an barbarian uprising. At defence 3 you can defend really well, but you also have a decent attack value for using your freshly promoted eliteunits.

Count with one legionary per two horsemen. The second fight grants the promotion from veteran to elite.

In the end such farming is a niche. In most circumstances is it not a wise choice. Settling till no unclaimed land is left and waiting for cavalry would be the more sensible approach.

In a duel i had the pleasure of using infantry against hordes of 2 uprisings of multiple barbarians camps. In that instance it needed much more than 2 horsemen per infantry as it takes quite some horsemen to damage a 5/5-infantry enough to let a 4/4-infantry defend instead.

 

[Theov]

Use units who can enslave then to get a bunch of free juicy slaves out of them.

If you dont want barbs, make sure all land is lit up. Barb camps only spawn at dark tiles.
Or turn barbs off before you start a game.

 

[CKS]

I'd say instead, if you don't want barbs, play with No Barbarians selected. It's quite nice.

 

[justanick]

It can be nice, but being forced to deal with barbarians and their potential to spawn can also be nice. In the end they are just a small nuisance.

 

[Chicken Pizza]

It can be nice, but being forced to deal with barbarians and their potential to spawn can also be nice. In the end they are just a small nuisance.

You're a small nuisance.

 

[Theov]

It can be nice, but being forced to deal with barbarians and their potential to spawn can also be nice. In the end they are just a small nuisance.

I actually like dealing with barbs.
So I made barbs tougher in my mod and to cancel it out I added more enslaving units.
And the Mongols basically behave like barbarians.
Its a bigger part of the game now. Not a small nuisance.