Rebels of other Civs targeting me rather than their oppressors

[rjg85]

Anyone else find this?

Other Civs and city states seem so bad at keeping their amenities in check that rebels spawn quite often. But instead of attacking the power they are rebelling against, they seem to prefer to march straight into my lands and attack me. I never thought to station any troops near my border with a city state, so the rebels that spawned there were able to enter my lands and pillage for a few turns whilst I marched my army from half way across the map.

Surely this should be fixed in future somehow? Like disabling their ability to enter my borders. Makes no sense that a rebel army (which BTW is always the latest tech level) should target my lands rather than fighting their oppressors.

 

[Stilgar08]

Since they are just barbaric in gameterms they attack whom they please... And since barbs seem to have a bias attacking the human player I see why this occurs to you. I haven't encountered this yet myself... I highly doubt this is going to change... keep your defense up!

 

[teks]

Why wouldn't rebels fight you? You are still threat number 1 from their perspective.

 

[rjg85]

I shouldn't be a threat to the rebels though - the whole reason they spawn is due to unhappiness with their ruler, not me.

If Greece is having a hard time governing it's lands and 2 AT crew spawn in rebellion (BTW Greece had not researched the tech for AT crew, and it's entire military at this point consisted of 1 spearman and a battering ram), how does it make sense that they don't attack Greece but saunter into my lands and attack me?

 

[Siptah]

In my current game, this happens all the time. I had to abandon my conquering spree against Scythia, because every time I layed siege to a city, 4 barbarian knights appeared next to my bombards and crossbows.

 

[rjg85]

It's a great mechanic in principle, but it shouldn't punish me if the AI is bad at governing.

I think this might explain why the amenities allocation between cities is automatic - I can imagine settling a trash city on another continent, not allocating any amenities to it and watching a whole bunch of rebels spawn and cause havoc to everyone around them. Rebels always appear to be the latest tech level and always target districts to pillage, which is truly devastating.

 

[Janskey]

Since they are just barbaric in gameterms they attack whom they please... And since barbs seem to have a bias attacking the human player I see why this occurs to you. I haven't encountered this yet myself... I highly doubt this is going to change... keep your defense up!

So apostles with heathen conversion promotion should work? Hmm... Besides using them for defensive purposes, you could trade all/enough of your luxuries to someone, wait for rebels to spawn, convert them, then DoW the aforementioned someone to get your luxuries back. Maybe capture some cities too, while you're at it.

 

[kampori]

This happens to me all the time, and its fricken annoying. I'm a greedy player, and always steal luxuries away from CSs and Civs with my cities, however come mid-late game this bites me in the ass. Every 10-20 turns CSs and Civs revolt and spawn 2 highly advanced units for the era (when they start spawning 2 mech infantries, it becomes exceedingly troublesome).

Nowadays I'm prepared and always have field cannons/machine guns/cavalry at the ready near the borders. But still, it sucks. As you said, it makes no sense for them to attack us. It's not our fault their ruler is bad. French Revolutionaries didn't decide to bugger off to England and start pillaging things.

 

[blasto]

It was the opposite for me.. recently took city rebeled and spawned 3 AT crews that I wasn't even close to being ready for. I was bracing for the pillage and possible city loss catastrophe but they beelined to a neighboring AI instead and left me completely alone. I thought it was funny

 

[rjg85]

It can be funny when you're not on the receiving end. It just doesn't make sense though!

Rebel 1: "I'm unhappy with my ruler, this empire has no entertainment whatsoever - let's rebel!"

Rebel 2: "Er, okay - shall we attack the palace?"

Rebel 1: "Nah let's cross the border and visit Germany's entertainment district!"

Rebel 2: "Oh you mean to finally experience some entertainment??"

Rebel 1: "Nah I was thinking more of burning it to the ground and sending them back to the stone age."

Rebel 2: "Ok good plan! Wait...how will that help us in our struggle to overthrow our oppressors?"

Rebel 1: "Meh..."

 

[idjit]

Yeah, this is somewhat of a problem. I've noticed sometimes city states don't spawn with luxuries and they'll spend most of the game spawning barbs. These barbs of course are always mech infantry and always gunning for me. I hate it. If a city state is nearby and it has no luxuries, conquer it asap otherwise you'll have to deal with THEIR barbs all game long.

 

[blasto]

This does explain how I would sometimes see a high ranking barb out of the blue sometimes and had no idea where it came from. Rebels always seem to be a copy of the highest unit available vs your normal barb.

 

[Jewman]

Had a game where I was getting crushed by war weariness cuz I was fighting a 100 year 3 way war and was struggling to take out my enemies last cities (terrain was very rough) and my cities and my neighbors cities were all spawning massive amounts of rebels every turn. It was like fighting a war within a war, it was really annoying... But in a kinda cool immersive way. I felt like my state was a totalitarian war machine that was using my people for the entire purpose of waging war, so maybe some people should be upset.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

This is annoying.

Barb camp scouts spotting the AI, but then sending units to you is worse. It makes a mockery of the concept of scouting the target.

 

[Helmling]

Well, we could say there's a real-world parallel. Look at the Civil War in Syria. It spilled over into Iraq and even threatens Turkey.

 

[joncnunn]

My guess is that the barb AI in Civ VI is aware of the bonuses both the human (if not on Deity) and the AI get (at all difficulty levels this is at least as high as the human's) in addition to if the player (either human or AI) has the policy granting bonuses against the barbs.
This is resulting in if the human has the same units as the AI, the human appearing to be the easier target to the barb AI.

Note that barbs formed as a result of Rebels are treated the same by the barb AI as those created via a barb camp.

 

[dexters]

Worse are the city-state barbs/rebels

City-states not always spawning with a luxury has been a problem. I think they need a rejig on their happiness as barbs spawned by city-states tend to cripple them a lot more.

I do like the general barbarian mechanic though; they remain relevant for most of the game. Hard a barb camp spawn a warparty in the late game in a no-mans-land region between two Civs, 5-10 mech infs and other assorted modern units over the span of 10 turns spawning forced me to react to the camp.

 

[AriochIV]

Iraqis currently fighting Syrian rebels say, "working as intended!"

 

[rjg85]

Well, we could say there's a real-world parallel. Look at the Civil War in Syria. It spilled over into Iraq and even threatens Turkey.

Iraqis currently fighting Syrian rebels say, "working as intended!"

Yeah but those Syrian rebels didn't immediately beeline for an invaluable cultural site to blow it up....wait...er...

I see your points, but that is a specific case. Iraq was a juicy alternative Vs fighting the Syrian government in entrenched positions. Civ rebels choosing not to attack undefended cities/districts/weak units of their own ruler but instead suicide marching into my field guns doesn't quite compare.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

My guess is that the barb AI in Civ VI is aware of the bonuses both the human (if not on Deity) and the AI get (at all difficulty levels this is at least as high as the human's) in addition to if the player (either human or AI) has the policy granting bonuses against the barbs.
This is resulting in if the human has the same units as the AI, the human appearing to be the easier target to the barb AI.

Note that barbs formed as a result of Rebels are treated the same by the barb AI as those created via a barb camp.

If that's so it's a broken mechanic, bugged or by design. The whole principle of the scout --> follow up mechanic is that the scout is looking for someone for the barbs to raid. If someone else screws up or just gets scouted, that's what the barbs "saw", per the in-game implication. Sending the units somewhere else blindly is nonsensical in this context.