Very early barbarian attacks need to be patched

[futurehermit]

I would love to see Nay demonstrate how to stop 4 archers crashing your capital at 3000 BC on normal speed with a non-aggressive leader with a capital not settled on a hill.

I'm not going to play aggressive leaders, marathon speed, and settle all my capitals on hills even when the terrain doesn't dictate it just because there is a chance 4 archers will crash my capital at 3000BC.

 

[Blaarg]

In my experience, the longer speeds makes the early barbarian problem worse. I've never seen a barb attack my city on any speed prior to about 2500 BC, but they seem to attack earlier and stronger at Marathon and Epic.

 

[BSmith1068]

It's not exactly like you have invested a lot of time and effort into a game at turn 20, so if it happens try to ride it out. If you fail... so what? Start a new game and go from there.

It may not be "fair" that this happens sometimes, but seriously, is it really that big of a deal?

 

[Martin79]

I wish there were more barb ships (galleys, triremes, etc.).

Is there any Barbarian Privateers? I didn't play BtS enough to notice. Anyways, there is a need for this!

 

[MrCynical]

In my experience, the longer speeds makes the early barbarian problem worse. I've never seen a barb attack my city on any speed prior to about 2500 BC, but they seem to attack earlier and stronger at Marathon and Epic.

You get 20 turns grace at the start of the game when there are no random events. However, this doesn't scale with gamespeed, so the barb event can appear relatively earlier on Epic and Marathon speed (and is even more terminal).

 

[Truronian]

The Vedics are a problem... they shouldn't be taking out helpless civs that early. If I'd wanted a 5 civ game I wouldn't have chosen 6.

 

[Antilogic]

I, too, have experienced the rage of the Vedics against my poorly defended city of Madrid in the year of 2900 BCE. It's only happened to me once in about 15 BtS games, though, so it's been rare for me.

If the tech prerequisite is just Polytheism, that can be pushed back to Priesthood or Monotheism to give players a little extra breathing room...especially because those technologies tend to wait a little bit because even the AI grabs some of the worker technologies early on. And it would still occur early in the game, just not 3000 BCE early.

That can't be a hard mod to do...I'll incorporate it into mine.

 

[Dan Quale]

I lost at 3700 bc to a rogue archer right after another civilization was destroyed now thats broken

 

[ranger101]

I edited the game to remove the Vedic random archer event (or all random 4 barb army event, not sure now).

They tend to wipe out AI civs as well.

 

[Blaarg]

I played a game on Immortal difficulty/epic speed the other day, and I had several barb archers at my door around 3200 BC....wtf? I reloaded 4000 bc and tried again, and was litterally forced to bee-line archery in order to survive. They were relentless.

 

[Blaarg]

You get 20 turns grace at the start of the game when there are no random events. However, this doesn't scale with gamespeed, so the barb event can appear relatively earlier on Epic and Marathon speed (and is even more terminal).

I'm not refering to the event, I'm talking about the regular barbs that randomly spawn in the fog of war.

 

[Julian Delphiki]

Thats quite normal on highest difficulty levels, methinks.

 

[MarkM]

No it doesn't. He's refering to the random event that suddenly plops a half dozen Archers on your border when all you've managed to build for your capital's defense is a single Warrior. That happened to me a short while ago and when I saw that stack, I just quit the game and started a new one. There's wasn't much point in continuing against those odds.

I've had that happen too but if you play the "typical optimal" way and have BW in order to chop or whip already, it's not impossible to survive. I've seen cases where I'm sure to di but I go into emergency military buildup mode & manage to pull through it. the key is that these barbarion hordes -- even if they appear <6 squares away from your capital as they did for me -- seem to just sit around for a long time until they attack.

You should at least try to deal with challenges instead of just giving up without even seeing if it's possible to pull off ... although I did not have as many as a half dozen archers (is that really how many you had, six? or are you exaggerating? I think I've seen four, maybe five once ...)

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

On principle, events are not supposed to kill you, but rather add some flavour to the overall gaming experience. One time I've had an AI die before 2000BC, so I turned on the worldbuilder and saw one killed by 4 barbarian spearmen. I'm pretty sure it's a design mistake, of overestimating a civ's ability to defend against an early attack.

In fact, it's powerful enough in multiplayer. Ever heard of the Holken choke? It's where you play Mayans, and research bronze working and hunting. You chop out 2-3 holkens, turn down the slider and upgrade your 1-2 warriors, and attack the enemy capital before 2500BC. It's analogous to the barbarian uprising problem.

 

[Willem]

I've had that happen too but if you play the "typical optimal" way and have BW in order to chop or whip already, it's not impossible to survive.

Not if you've only been playing long enough to only build a single Warrior. That's exactly what happened to me. If I would have had an Archer or two, I wouldn't have given up, but the odds were pretty much hopeless at that point. 6 Barb Archers against 1 Warrior.

 

[Antilogic]

You should at least try to deal with challenges instead of just giving up without even seeing if it's possible to pull off ... although I did not have as many as a half dozen archers (is that really how many you had, six? or are you exaggerating? I think I've seen four, maybe five once ...)

The numbers depend on your map size. So, if you play smaller maps, you might only see 2 or 3. That could be survivable, if you get really lucky. However, on large and huge maps, there will be an overwhelming number of barbarian archers. Ordinarly, for a developed empire, this isn't a problem, because you will have more cities and more troops.

However, when you are just starting out, on a small map as well as a huge, you still only have one city.

 

[Willem]

One time I've had an AI die before 2000BC, ...

In one game I was just playing, the Arabians were wiped out around 3300 BC. That's barely enough time to build a single Warrior, especially for the AI. It almost always goes for a Worker first. So those Barbs no doubt descended on an unprotected city.

 

[jeffreyac]

Actually, my last game the vedics popped, wiped out the civ to the north of my continent. I fought the remainders off, then used the warriors (yes, warriors) I had fought the archers off with to rush the opponent to the south.

End result: Huge continent just for me!

Now, if only I hadn't over-expanded in my eagerness, and run my economy into the dirt...

 

[greentea]

I lost the game to barb archers popping before 2000BC two times in a row. On the first day I installed BtS! Almost made me give up the game. But it makes it fun I must admit. One of the next times a group of spearmen came, but I was able to build enough archers to scare them and they just passed through.

 

[Willem]

So it happened to me again recently. I had just set out my first Settler/Warrior team to found my first city. I had no units at all protecting my capital and suddenly 6 Archers are at my doorstep. And no they didn't hang around the edges of my borders for awhile, they headed straight for my capital. With me still needing 9 turns to build my first Archer. Personally I think situations like this are totally ridiculous. It turns out to be a game breaking event, not just something to add some atmosphere or stir things up a bit. Which is what the events are supposed to do.