Dealing with early vanilla barbs

[intellectsucks]

I just downloaded the vanilla game with the epic games promotion and worked my way up to prince difficulty, where I ran into a bit of a problem in my early game: barb encampments. In lower difficulties a lone warrior is almost always enough to clear them, but on prince I often found myself facing 3-4 barbs protecting the encampments, and they would be too much for one warrior. I was lucky enough to find iron nearby and upgrade to swordsmen quickly which mostly solved the issue (though I did still need more than one unit for one or two), but what do you do when the nearest iron is halfway across the map? Scout in pairs? Ignore the encampments until way later? Attack and retreat often?

 

[tiamats4esgares]

You mostly want to ignore encampments until later.

It's rare, though, to find encampments with 3-4 barbs. Especially early on. But if the barbs get horses or iron early it can be scary as horsemen and swordsmen will wreck your warriors. If you find horsemen and swordsmen early, just ignore them for sure. But if it's just a bunch of warriors? Well, you COULD try fighting them in pairs; that IS one option. Or just ignore them.

More often than not, you'll come across an encampment with only 1 or 2 units. Spearmen are typically the ones guarding the camp itself. If it seems safe to do so, attack the spearmen and then rest for a couple turns until your health is over 90, then attack again, rest again, etc.

Keep in mind you should virtually always get the policy card that increases your damage vs barbarians, especially if they are a problem. Obviously.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

You mostly want to ignore encampments until later.

huh? why? encampments give me era score and gold so I kill them as fast as humanly possible, so a new one can spawn in the shadows... if a barb scout has found my city borders, killing that camp now has 100% priority over everything, even war. 2 warriors or warrior & slinger/archer can take down pretty much most camps until the barbs start getting Swordsmen or Horsemen, at that point you want to get your own Horses/Swords.

More often than not, you'll come across an encampment with only 1 or 2 units. Spearmen are typically the ones guarding the camp itself. If it seems safe to do so, attack the spearmen and then rest for a couple turns until your health is over 90, then attack again, rest again, etc.

Keep in mind you should virtually always get the policy card that increases your damage vs barbarians, especially if they are a problem. Obviously.

yeah, pretty much. a warrior kills a spearman with the policy card so a single warrior is enough early game.

 

[tiamats4esgares]

Why ignore barbs? Because they slow down your exploration

 

[walkerjks]

A couple things come to mind

1) Park your warrior and the best defensive terrain (wooded/jungled hills or behind a river) near the camp and let them kill themselves on you while you rest +10 health every turn. Works as long as you are only getting attacked by 2 warriors/horsemen/spearmen at a time. If they get pop an archer, run.

2) Build some slingers early and upgrade to archers. A warrior + an archer is more effective at clearing a camp than 2 warriors. Archers (and later crossbowmen) are very useful. Slingers, not so much outside of their easy upgradeability.

3) As mentioned, rest up some before repeated attacks on a camp. Always attack from decent defensive terrain. That way, if they pop another unit, you don't find yourself at 40% health in open space.