How Are You Liking The Barbarians Game Mode?

[Tech Osen]

I find it rather inconsequential so far but that might be because of my preference to play with limited land space (always use high sea lvl). Camps that are near are in the way for expansion so I clear them, the ones further away don't bother me and eventually turn into city states. So turning off barbarian mode and increasing the number of city states would pretty much have the same result.

 

[shaglio]

One thing I've been doing with Barbarian Mode is decreasing the number of City State from "1.5 x # of civs" to "1 x # of civs" so it doesn't get too ridiculous when the camps start flipping.

 

[aieeegrunt]

Gave up on this mode

The net effect is having barbs disappear from the game by the medieval era (a huge negative for me), a bunch of immersion breaking useless Polar Research Station City States (another huge negative) and occasionally stupidly OP barbarian forces early on (another big negative)

I never interacted with a camp once except to disperse it. Raiding a camp seems like a pretty obvious farming cheese strat, and if I wanted that I could play WoW or a gatcha phone game. The other interaction options, by the time they might be cost effective the camps are already gone/city states, or they don’t actually work (incite or danegeld).

So far the only game mode worth using for me is Dramatic Ages, because it’s the only thing that can potentially change the Late Game Snowball and is the only mechanic that makes the answer to “should I spam settlers” potentially no

I think what would save this mode is setting passive conversion to zero

 

[Tuvok694]

Barbarians (clans mode or not) are still totally overpowered and the biggest annoyance this game has to offer. Right now I am staring at a "wall" of four barbarian crossbowmen and three swordsmen with my two gaesate and two archers, they do not stand one little chance. And I cannot bribe the camp because I cannot even see it on the map (and also have not enough money). Meanwhile China decides to attack me on the other side of my territory because they must have noticed that I cannot produce units fast enough to compensate for the losses to the barbarians. Plans for getting science and culture to catch up with the AI went down the drain long time ago.
I would like to turn off barbarians completely but then I have no chance against the AI.
People who say that barbarians are "fun" must have some weird pleasure by being tortured.

 

[Abaxial]

I very much like that by the Medieval era it's no longer important to escort your settlers, as they are not going to be ambushed by hidden barbarians.

Incidentally, if you like that sort of thing, there is a mod that generates wild animals which behave like barbarians but don't have camps. Any spot in your empire that is not guarded may suddenly spawn a tiger or lion. There is a companion mod which makes the wild animals dinosaurs. If you use this, marine dinosaurs spawn like crazy, and getting a religious unit to the other side of an ocean is fraught with difficulty.

 

[DanQuayle]

I very much like that by the Medieval era it's no longer important to escort your settlers, as they are not going to be ambushed by hidden barbarians.

Incidentally, if you like that sort of thing, there is a mod that generates wild animals which behave like barbarians but don't have camps. Any spot in your empire that is not guarded may suddenly spawn a tiger or lion. There is a companion mod which makes the wild animals dinosaurs. If you use this, marine dinosaurs spawn like crazy, and getting a religious unit to the other side of an ocean is fraught with difficulty.

I think the reintroduction of wild animals (from Civ IV) would work really well with my idea of introducing an "aggressiveness parameter" for barbarians/animals which I've mentioned here.
You could have animals with high combat strength, but low aggressiveness like elephants and others with lower combat strength, but higher aggressiveness like wild boars.
Another "barbarian logic system" would probably need to be made to make sure they don't pillage and generally stay away from cities (a current problem of the wildlife mod you mentioned).
Another related idea which I have just read about is that shrinking habitats can lead some animals (such as leopards) to become more aggressive. So, as the more the land is settled, the more aggressive some animals would get.

 

[FloodPlain]

Can a camp have multiple unique units over the course of a game? Because one near me sent out Legion's, then a unique that I can't remember and then Samurai!

 

[blackbutterfly]

Can a camp have multiple unique units over the course of a game? Because one near me sent out Legion's, then a unique that I can't remember and then Samurai!

Yes.

Also it seems that camps allow you to hire uniques, then later on regular units.

 

[blackbutterfly]

FYI Portugal works really well in Barbs Mode.
(Cos you need gold to hire barbs).

 

[Greywulf]

FYI Portugal works really well in Barbs Mode.
(Cos you need gold to hire barbs).

This is indeed the reason why I'm now playing Portugal a lot, lol.

 

[Pietato]

Barb tribe mode is still bugged to all Hell. No more tribes spawn after the first converts, they have the wrong defense value as a CS (a few had -1) meaning they die instantly, and you can freely walk through their territory.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

I don't believe the CS defense value issue has been specifically reported in the Bug Reports forum yet. If someone has a save game, it would be beneficial to create a post over there.

 

[Daigotsu Max]

I find the mode pretty inconsequential and boring. At first it looks good with the tribe names and stronger camps, but then camps get wiped out and no more appear, or they convert to CS fast and (as other have pointed out) sometimes in locations that make no sense. It looked like it had a lot of potential but the balance just isn't there yet. I'll be turning it off for now.

 

[blackbutterfly]

I don't believe the CS defense value issue has been specifically reported in the Bug Reports forum yet. If someone has a save game, it would be beneficial to create a post over there.

I did actually -> [NFP] - [1.0.10.15] [Barbarians Mode] Converted City State Negative Defence | CivFanatics Forums

 

[kaspergm]

I find the mode pretty inconsequential and boring. At first it looks good with the tribe names and stronger camps, but then camps get wiped out and no more appear, or they convert to CS fast and (as other have pointed out) sometimes in locations that make no sense. It looked like it had a lot of potential but the balance just isn't there yet. I'll be turning it off for now.

Same here, I've turned it off too. The interesting things this mode had to offer doesn't really come into play because it costs too much gold and/or is too inconsequential, and the downsides are just too big.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

I did actually -> [NFP] - [1.0.10.15] [Barbarians Mode] Converted City State Negative Defence | CivFanatics Forums

How did I miss that! Still no save game there, however, so that would help if you have one in the future.

 

[aieeegrunt]

I find the mode pretty inconsequential and boring. At first it looks good with the tribe names and stronger camps, but then camps get wiped out and no more appear, or they convert to CS fast and (as other have pointed out) sometimes in locations that make no sense. It looked like it had a lot of potential but the balance just isn't there yet. I'll be turning it off for now.

Same here, I've turned it off too. The interesting things this mode had to offer doesn't really come into play because it costs too much gold and/or is too inconsequential, and the downsides are just too big.

I’ve also turned it off

It’s a truly amazing level of fail. Corporations and Monopolies causes the AI to stop improving the luxury resources that are that mode’s core mechanic, and Barbarian Clans basically removes barbarians from the game.

How? Do their playtesters and QA moonlight as Suez canal pilots?

 

[Abaxial]

Barbarian Clans basically removes barbarians from the game

Not completely, which is why I like it. You still have to deal with them in the early game, then you can relax. So it is different from actually turning barbarians off altogether.

One thing I have noticed which I have not seen mentioned is that with this mode, the Sanguine Pact becomes much less valuable, as (for me at least) one of the main uses of vampires is to hoover up barbarians. Especially nice if you are playing as the Scythians.

 

[blackbutterfly]

Not completely, which is why I like it. You still have to deal with them in the early game, then you can relax.

Barb Mode + Zombie Mode =

Things like Ransom totally makes sense with Zombie mode. (O/w it's easier to just go and get your settler or worker with your army).

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I think the reintroduction of wild animals (from Civ IV) would work really well with my idea of introducing an "aggressiveness parameter" for barbarians/animals which I've mentioned here.
You could have animals with high combat strength, but low aggressiveness like elephants and others with lower combat strength, but higher aggressiveness like wild boars.
Another "barbarian logic system" would probably need to be made to make sure they don't pillage and generally stay away from cities (a current problem of the wildlife mod you mentioned).
Another related idea which I have just read about is that shrinking habitats can lead some animals (such as leopards) to become more aggressive. So, as the more the land is settled, the more aggressive some animals would get.

People complain about "silly"modes in civ 6, but imo the civ 4 lion attacking and eating a large roving band of workers armed with shovels and pickaxes trumps them all. At least if you don't like zombies you can turn them off.