For the horde deity

[DirtyFinger]

In three deity games in a row I noticed that Clan of Embers AI casts 'For the Horde' early and then starts sending all those barbs straight to your cities, even if you are on peace with them.
Ok, all barbs attacking me were officially barbs, so they either were real barbs or clan with hidden nation.
But having to defend against waves of barbarians (~50 units on large maps) was a bit unusual for standard barbs.

So my tip: Build warriors like crazy once you see someone casting the horde spell.

 

[slowcar]

this is not related, all for-the-horde troops are clan troops and can not attack you without declaring.
after a certain time barbarians start to appear, depending on difficulty level.
if there is much room for them to spawn they will come in great numbers.

if the map is big and there are few AIs the barbarians get very strong and can often overwhelm the AI while you get a lot of promoted units.

if you want a bit of training in the high art of defending try to play a survival game:
deity, always war, 3 allied enemies, at least one barbarian leader, raging barbs. make sure only conquest is switched on and you can win

 

[xienwolf]

Main thing is that casting For the Horde means that the number of Barbarians in the world drops a lot in one turn. Next time the Barbarians get a turn they will auto-spawn enough troops to bring themselves back up to the limit on Barbarians in the world, and spawns tend to be near a single "target civilization" instead of spread out. So it is somewhat related.

 

[DirtyFinger]

brrr, that explains it.

well, the advice stands: Build defenses like hell in case someone calls the horde.

I also had the special luck of living right next to the clan, which didn't raise my safety concerns either.

 

[slowcar]

always luck on the bright side, you get a ton of promotions and can walk all over your neighbour.