Too Many Barbs Too Soon (BtS)

[The Almighty dF]

Does it feel like, to anyone else, that the barbs in BtS grow in numbers too early?
It always seems like, no matter my tech path, the barbarians have a huge army of axemen and spearmen.
Like, for me to match that, I'd have to have only one city and I'd be skipping all traits that don't take me to Bronze Working, and I'd just have to constantly whip/chop axemen and spearmen.
Even then, I don't think I could match them in numbers.

This is -without- raging barbarians on.

It's kinda irritating me because it ends up making the Great Wall overpowered. Not having to build a gigantic army right off the bat to keep your stuff from being pillaged and your towns from being destroyed by large stacks of axemen and spearmen.

 

[troytheface]

i would agree with this observation. Barbarians seem more numerous and better armed than before BTS.

In the beginning its either the Great Wall or archers for me, which means hunting /archery.
However, early archers can get Combat and Shock which are good promotions at the start for archers.

 

[champ82]

Are you fogbusting? I've been doing a lot more of that recently with good results. Keep warriors or archers fortified in woods or hills or both on the land that has copper, iron and/ or horse and the land leading up to it.

Also, early on before HR I keep units, when I don't have that many, on roads inbetween my cities so they can quickly be deployed to cities' BFC if barbs come.

Barbs, maybe even more than the standard AI, are dumb. If you fortify a unit on a terrain bonus like woods or hills or accross a river or all 3, they will often attack you and lose.

Barbs aren't all bad. The military it inspires you to make is most likely needed anyway. Also, the AI is kind of late in getting their cities, so if you think of it, it saves you hammers on cities and sometimes even on worker turns building improvements.

Finally, a lot of players probably use barbs to unlock heroic epic, which is very neccesary, but I think I have only done this with CHA leaders.

To me, barbs are an inherent part of the game, even though they certainly can be frustrating or game changing.

 

[Lone Wolf]

BtS = Barbs too Soon.

 

[JonathanStrange]

Too many? NOT ENOUGH, I say, for none who oppose us are named JonathanStrange!

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You're going to have to take lumps at slower speeds.

But, I rarely struggle with them on immortal...fogbust...WITH CITIES! If you don't have bronze or whatever just get archers. If you expand quickly on most levels you + the AI will eat up most of the land. If you have THAT much land (aka you don't meet an AI for a long time), build the great wall, it will save hammers.

 

[sabo]

I thought it was just my bad luck, it's good to see other players are noticing this.

 

[binhthuy71]

The barbs seem to be definitely more on the ball in BtS. I can usually deal with them by remembering to move as many units as possible to firnges of my empire. What does get me is that Barbarian Horde random event. You know; the one where you click on the green button and it says something like "We will bear the brunt of the assault." More realistic would be if you clicked on the green button and it said "So kiss your new city goodbye."

 

[Willem]

More realistic would be if you clicked on the green button and it said "So kiss your new city goodbye."

More like "Kiss your game goodbye." The Barb events are grossly overpowered IMO. Even if it happens to the AI, it's going to completely throw off the balance of the entire game. For that reason I've turned them all off in my game.

 

[binhthuy71]

More like "Kiss your game goodbye." The Barb events are grossly overpowered IMO. Even if it happens to the AI, it's going to completely throw off the balance of the entire game. For that reason I've turned them all off in my game.

They can be game changing all right. I'd feel guilty about turning off random events if only because way back when CivIV was first released I was one of the people that asked for them to be included in the expansion. "Be careful what you wish for."

 

[The Almighty dF]

I should probably mention I always play on marathon, so it's possible that the barbs are unbalanced at that speed.
I really wish someone would come up with a mod to balance Marathon, since Firaxis never bothered to patch it besides the espionage screw up.

 

[azzaman333]

Personally, barbs are only ever an issue if I turn Raging Barbs on.

 

[Shackel]

I was JUST bringing up my first city, only had gotten 4 techs, and was building some defenders when I got the annoying "Barbarian" message.

4 Axemen right outside.

I just WB'd them. I didn't have the patience to deal with that. (Had no Copper)

 

[The Almighty dF]

I was JUST bringing up my first city, only had gotten 4 techs, and was building some defenders when I got the annoying "Barbarian" message.

4 Axemen right outside.

I just WB'd them. I didn't have the patience to deal with that. (Had no Copper)

To be honest, this is one of the few times where I think using world builder is okay.

I also think it's okay to check the area around you, as long as you don't look too closely.
I do this because I get a -lot- of bad starts. Like, almost no resources, jungle everywhere, isolated start, etc.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

To be honest, this is one of the few times where I think using world builder is okay.

I also think it's okay to check the area around you, as long as you don't look too closely.
I do this because I get a -lot- of bad starts. Like, almost no resources, jungle everywhere, isolated start, etc.

Using the WB is still cheating. If you don't like unbalanced features, turn them off beforehand rather than pulling a renege on the set rules .

Haha!

No, I'm only half-serious. God I hate events.

 

[The Almighty dF]

Using the WB is still cheating. If you don't like unbalanced features, turn them off beforehand rather than pulling a renege on the set rules .

Haha!

No, I'm only half-serious. God I hate events.

I'd play on Epic but... I'm the kind of guy that really likes to get into the game.

 

[Molybdeus]

I really wish Sentry didn't require Combat III or Flanking. The chances of me giving a scout Combat III are rather small. Anyway, the barbarians at least give you xp and force you to avoid neglecting your military if you're a builder. At least they start without promotions, so you should have at least one promotion over them.

 

[Earthling]

FfH2 players do tend to laugh at regular civ4 barbs... As far as I can tell it might only be a problem on marathon, maybe ~10% of games on Deity otherwise (and whenever you get invasion event 3000BC). Fogbusting is always viable, you can defend with warriors for ages, and archery as a last resort.

As the barb uprising has already been talked about a little more, I think it should occur later but with a few more units (or at least the archers + earliest of the others) and should spawn differently - only spawn in the Fog of War 3+ tiles outside of cultural borders or something - I seem to remember it can still happened in an (unowned) tile you can still see!

Edit: galleys are really annoying though. I like the idea of an earlier barb "pillaging ship" - and perhaps later in the game giving them actual pirates as well (particularly Terra type maps - barb cities late in the game could base pirates). Something the AI could use its bajillion caravels for.

 

[cj7loop]

Barb uprisings of Horse Archers while I'm still at the warrior stage makes me give up.

 

[azzaman333]

Barb uprisings of Horse Archers while I'm still at the warrior stage makes me give up.

Barb uprisings of Horse Archers requires a civ to know Horseback Riding and another civ to know Iron Working.

If you still have warriors at that time, your civ deserves to die IMO.