Chill! with the Barbarians

[heinous_hat]

I cant speak for the others but I always played with raging barbs before and even now, my next game will be with raging barbs. I dont mind if a "relaxed barb" option gets introduced but please dont just tone everything down, its fine as it is now

That sounds painful. Morbid curiosity will no doubt lead to selecting 'raging barbs' in my next game

 

[Boombar]

There is way to much rng with the barbs. Last game i was surrounded by barbs withing turn 10 or so. I scout around a bit and see 3 camps with 6-8 tiles of my capital.
Game before that, there was 1 nearly dead barb showing up after 20-30 turns. meanwhile, my ai neighbor is getting owned while i spam wonders. The difficulty difference between those two games is way to high.

 

[Workerspam]

I also played with Raging Barbs prior to this patch (on Emperor). And even with Raging Barbs my only adjustment was throwing an Archer or Spearman somewhere in my first 5 builds (if going Tradition or Progress). Early barbarians were largely non threatening, a bane to unguarded caravans. Eventually Horsemen and Triremes could become an annoyance if you disregarded your army and navy. And that was the extent of the barbarian threat.

The current state of normal Barbarians is a step up from Raging Barbs in previous builds (I turned off Raging Barbs after getting wrecked by them my first game with the new patch) and while I'm sympathetic to those who enjoy a more peaceful early expansion I'm really enjoying the change. My initial warrior previously Marco Polo-ed his way across the world, only returning when he ran out of land to explore. Now he can only check out our immediate surroundings as he will be needed for defense. Similarly, my first Scout may need to stick nearby if I want to build my Monolith and Shrine ASAP. But the challenge is certainly doable. Your capital is sturdy, it can take a few hits if need be.

I'm just finishing a game as Netherlands (first time playing them in CBO, very fun civ) and started with 5 barbarian camps within 8 tiles of my capital. I settled two additional cities and protected two workers with only my initial warrior, one scout, and two archers (both built after my Monolith and Shrine); goes without saying that I didn't have the manpower to take out any of the camps. But I had enough to protect what I needed, my cities took a few hits while units healed or took out bigger threats, and once I had established my proto-empire I raised an army to beat back the heathens. Found the experience far more exciting than previous games where the drama boiled down to whether I beat my neighbors to the premium plots.

 

[Enrico Swagolo]

That sounds painful. Morbid curiosity will no doubt lead to selecting 'raging barbs' in my next game

Not painful at all if he picks Monty. Jaggy can even face barbie Horsies (if you have Authority... and fortify) and he'd get tons of free Gold, Faith, Culture and Science. Monty would thrive in this setting like none other.

 

[zeta]

In my opinion Relaxed barbarians shouldn't be any easier than it was before. Old barbarian rates were perfect, so I suggest we revert to the old values if that setting ever comes. Another option I like would be the one Lee Saxon suggested, increasing spawn rate over time, since you're having more units afterwards (again, if that's possible). I am thinking too that those who are not feeling any difference or those who love current barbies are the ones who play on higher difficulties.

 

[Meticulous]

I registered just to add to the notion that the barb spawning levels have gone a little off, and this is from the perspective of someone who usually played with Raging Barbarians active before. I like more barbs, but on some maps this is a really drastic increase compared to before. I think my problem with it is that - correct me if I'm wrong here - Raging Barbarians just increases the rate at which barbarians spawn from camps, making individual camps more threatening if not dealt with; while what's happening now is a drastic increase in the number of camps spawning - which is just annoying. I just started on an inland spawn, and had a camp in every cardinal direction. Four brutes run up to my borders within my first two turns and now I'm playing Authority Gandhi as a result.

Now, I do usually play on Communitas or large Pangaea maps, and these generally have more inhabitable space for barb nests to build up in than vanilla Continents. Rather than an inverse Raging Barbarians setting, it seems to me the barb camp spawning script could use some tweaking to make it more consistent between map types. Otherwise it sortof turns non-Continents map scripts into the same situation as, say, Archipelago where you're really pigeonholed into an optimal strategy. My big draw with this mod was that it opened up more actual strategy instead of forcing you down an optimal path to play on higher difficulties (although it may still have more optimal paths, it's much less drastic), but the barb levels make Authority seem very optimal to me now. One thing I will give the camp spam credit for is that Authority AI don't do quite as terribly as they did before since you no longer have to actively seek out camps to benefit from it, they just spawn on your borders for you every few turns. But, again, that's just abuseable by the player. The AI generally closes off all possible lands with expansion, while a player can leave some barren wastes as their personal barb farms, especially around city-states where you can farm free influence as well. I'm of the opinion that Authority is already the best early game policy tree, because a strong military is basically never a bad thing - it eats up production time but gives you the extra hammers and free settler to make up for it, and even if you want to play peacefully, Big Stick Diplomacy has always been the best way of keeping all of the backstabby AI in check. Having this many barb camps not only makes Authority better directly, but it makes it harder to capitalize on the bonuses of the other trees early on via peaceful expansion/growth and building, because you will need to create a reasonably sized border patrol and escort squad for settlers. Also a huge boon for civs like the Aztecs and Celts who not only have good early game uniques for fighting barbs, they get additional resources from it. Playing on Communitas as Montezuma now feels like easy mode on Immortal. You don't even have to go domination, taking Authority and just farming barbs puts you solidly ahead enough to pursue any victory condition without taking a single foreign city.

I'd also like to echo the sentiments, as a barb-supporter, of having barbs grow more threatening over time. Maybe even spawning two or three encampments at the same time in later eras, since later on even the most peaceful nation with a token defense force is going to drastically outnumber the barbs (while right now having your single warrior against 4 brutes on turn 2 is a little absurd). In games with a lot of militaristic/expansionist civs barbs are phased out pretty quickly anyway as every inch of territory is claimed, stronger scaling barbs at least into the medieval or renaissance era would help break up the mid game monotony when you've got largely peaceful/tall empires around.

 

[Takagi Hiro]

I'm actually starting to get used to it. Who says all civs have to be on an even playing field from the start? I'm pretty sure China cried mercy historically with the barbaric Mongols next door. Deal with what's thrown at you, and try to adjust accordingly. If you sense heavy barbarians near you at the start, then pick Authority! It's logic.

 

[Dawnbringer]

Well...Gazebo just added a "chill barbarians" option...

 

[Takagi Hiro]

Well...Gazebo just added a "chill barbarians" option...

Yeah, but I'm saying I might skip on it. Besides, I can't play that version. My installer isn't working for some damn reason.

 

[Magean]

I'm actually starting to get used to it. Who says all civs have to be on an even playing field from the start? I'm pretty sure China cried mercy historically with the barbaric Mongols next door. Deal with what's thrown at you, and try to adjust accordingly. If you sense heavy barbarians near you at the start, then pick Authority! It's logic.

I haven't played on Communitas in the 10/12 version, but if the posts above yours are true, then it means Authority is the number one choice no matter what. Shouldn't be so. On Tectonic though, I didn't have any such issues. Barbs are more dangerous now, but I haven't run upon 4 barbs in the first few turns.

 

[zeta]

Ibut if the posts above yours are true, then it means Authority is the number one choice no matter what. Shouldn't be so.

Agree. I don't want to waste my hardly worked culture on one social policy I won't even use afterwards.

 

[Lee Saxon]

I'm still seeing barbarian camps every 5-6 tiles right from the start keeping me from exploring :/

I just don't think the game is fun this way (or with barbarians turned off completely) :/

 

[merill]

I'm still seeing barbarian camps every 5-6 tiles right from the start keeping me from exploring :/

I just don't think the game is fun this way (or with barbarians turned off completely) :/

solution =>

Well...Gazebo just added a "chill barbarians" option...

(or maybe you are talking about the "chill barbarian" option, which could be not effective enough?)

 

[Lee Saxon]

Yes that's right I'm saying I don't think the option is "strong" enough. Gazebo himself described the spawn rate reduction as "slight."

 

[CrazyG]

Chill Barbarians doesn't seem to do all that much. I find the inconsistency of barbarians rather frustrating. If they loot your city (which you cannot always stop early on) sometimes you lose 1 gold, sometimes you lose 2 turns of production. Thats a huge difference

 

[zeta]

Chill Barbarians doesn't seem to do all that much. I find the inconsistency of barbarians rather frustrating. If they loot your city (which you cannot always stop early on) sometimes you lose 1 gold, sometimes you lose 2 turns of production. Thats a huge difference

You can disable gold stealing in CBO Options file (CBO folder) as well as barbarian healing in camps. Just a few tips on how to make barbs even less annoying.

 

[Lee Saxon]

Personally, I actually think the looting and healing are good things. My problem is the camp density. Every 4-6 tiles at the beginning of a Prince game is too much.

 

[CrazyG]

I think healing and looting both are good features, they make sense. I just wonder if the looting punishments should vary less (1 gold is basically nothing happened)

Also camp density makes some alternate map scripts very unbalanced. For instance on Mediterranean, the Sahara region is so infested with barbarians that there is no reason not to pick Authority, and with Authority its very easy to runaway with the lead even on a very high difficulty

 

[Stalker0]

Its important to remember that not only did camp creation increase, but now each camp auto creates an extra barb unit if I'm not mistaken. So the numbers of barb units as a base is markedly increased.