How do you deal with barbs efficiently?

[Banafrit™]

As much as I like this game, its the barbarians that make playing a game unbearable. Sometimes its easy, and I get maybe 1 or 2 camps I have to clear out. But sometimes, I get WAY more.

Example: today in an Egypt game (prince difficulty), I had found a whopping four barb camps within range of cities I planned to settle in the future. However, the amount of scouts and such that ended up finding my city, left me swamped in barbs, which just ended up killing my entire army due to the overwhelming numbers.

Another example: sometimes I'll find a camp on the coast, but it'll spawn naval units which make it impossible to attack with melee units, let alone even TOUCH the camp, since it's basically a suicide mission. On barbarian clans, you practically can't destroy the camp, because of all the boats surrounding the camp, which just lets the camp continuously produce even more barbarians, and likely even more boats.

How do you deal with them? I don't want to disable them, since they're needed for a few eureka and inspiration effects in the early game, and I find it lags you behind and can arguably even be unfair in multiplayer if you account for tribal villages. Plus, I like to play a domination heavy game, so getting quick access to bronze working and archery helps out a lot. That, and I just simply want to get better.

[Raceclimb]

Well unlike many advice threads i feel qualified to answer this one....

I am an unabashed warmonger and don't care one iota who i annoy, after all if you can get them to declare war on YOU their forces will have to contend with YOUR defenses and eventually you can pillage their lands and take over with little resistance.

In the first few turns or so you should AVOID the barbs and just concentrate on exploring. Once you have the first policies choose the one that gives you a perk fighting barbs. (Sorry if this seems obvious)

My build order from the start is (almost) always the same...

1) Builder 2) Slinger 3) scout


depending on how things are going i might build a few things for my civ (granary etc.) before adding to my forces

next will be a spear-man and a galley (actually a viking Long ship...but we'll come back to that)


this will usually be my entire military till way later in the game (once i have an armory and barrack i add two archers (yes i'm that far developed by then)

the trick to dealing with barbs with such small forces is to be "defensively offensive", using a lot of "hit and fade" tactics or (better still) getting the barbs to attack my warrior first and just healing on my turn till the poor barb just beats himself to death !

depending on terrain even a slinger can withstand a fully healthy spear-man (not recomended)

using you scout to "draw fire" is also an important ploy....if the barbs aren't screaming "they came at us with everything...even their DOGS"...well i'm just not happy...lol


To your point about barb navy....yup this can be rough

Which is why i usually play Harold the Viking....

see viking Longships take 50 % less effort to build, can heal in open tiles AND act as coastal raiders

barbs don't heal.....ever

so with just a few troops harrassing on the land and one longship i can wipe out the barb navy and take their fort with just my longship


Hope this helps and feel free to ask for more help (i'd prefer it not come in the form of "you're full of poop RC...." but what kind of warmonger would i BE if i couldn't handle being under-estimated !

Happy Hunting o7

[Eldrane]

Just checking you know you can turn barbarians off in advanced settings before starting a game?

[Admod, the Equivocal]

Originally posted by Banatit™:

How do you deal with them? I don't want to disable them, since they're needed for a few eureka and inspiration effects in the early game, and I find it lags you behind and can arguably even be unfair in multiplayer if you account for tribal villages. Plus, I like to play a domination heavy game, so getting quick access to bronze working and archery helps out a lot. That, and I just simply want to get better.

Originally posted by Eldrane:

Just checking you know you can turn barbarians off in advanced settings before starting a game?

Just checking, you know you can read before responding to a post right? Right?

[pitonsnaboca]

Whenever possible, get a river between your unit and their unit. Even better if your plot is a hills and/or forrest. Even better if their plot is a marsh. Stay in a defensive stance and let them throw thelmselves at your units, while healing your unit and promoting it every time possible. Build 1 or 2 units to replace that one if it can't handle one more hit and needs to retreat and heal.

[jonnin]

You capital can't be trashed. A single slinger there stops them cold and gains several xp levels from it. Just don't bother with a builder for a while, don't give them anything to tear up until after you have a slinger and your first settler cooked. Then the second city can make military, the capital can make another settler. Then the third city can make a builders ... and it snowballs. By the time you have the third city, you should be able to send out pairs of military units to find the camps and smash them.
if you see a horse, you need to smash the camp sooner, as fast as you can.
if sumaria, you need to make a war cart and smash them as fast as you can (extra free stuff)

[grognardgary]

I start warrior slinger settler though sometimes I may build a monument before the settler as I prefer to wait til my capital has 4 pop before. Note this has to do with playing huge maps on marathon time setting,

[pitonsnaboca]

Almost always it's scout-slinger-slinger-settler for me, in huge maps standard speed games.

[Raceclimb]

i'm morally opposed to building my own settlers...

any true warmonger just steals them from their neighbors...hehehe

[grognardgary]

Originally posted by Raceclimb:

i'm morally opposed to building my own settlers...

any true warmonger just steals them from their neighbors...hehehe

You actually leave them around long enough to build one?

[Raceclimb]

only when i'm slow....lol

honestly, i once took over Egypt with just a long boat before turn 25

[Solitus]

The trick with barbarian camps is to NEVER let a barbarian scout see your city. and if it does, you cannot let it return to its camp of origin. That is when the horde of barbarians start pouring fourth (and the more troublesome units like cavalry)

Scouts are cowards though, and you can position your units between your city and the scout to drive it away from your empire, so they never get the reveal on your cities (the red exclamation point above their head) and thus can't trigger the hordes.

If you see a barbarian scout with an exclamation point above its head, that scout is your number 1 priority to kill early game; as it is trying to rush home to let its camp know about your civ.

The best way to stop this is with Scouts. You have about 20 turns before barbarian camps will spawn. Also, camps can only spawn in the fog of war, so if you position scouts around your land, you can push the spawn points further away.

I always build 1 scout first, to see what the land is like around me. If playing on a Huge map, make another scout. If on a smaller map, make slingers or warriors.

TL,DR; The trick is you can corral scouts and force them away from your cities. Scouts will not willingly move towards your units (normally) so you can herd them back out into the wild. Once you learn this trick, you can keep them away until you have mil to attack the camps or kill the scouts.

Build early military (three slingers) always. you need them for the eureka, and you need them to delay attacks from other civs.

To that point: Settle on a plains hill if you can. It will give your capital 2 food, 2 production (instead of 2 food 1 production) which will cause you to produce these early units that much faster. You have about 20 turns on standard speed before camps spawn in the fog of war. Use that time to get some units and another city down, to reduce where the camps can spawn.

[guard65]

I always LUV every Barb camp i get get to spawn near me. They are experience, gold, eureeka's, and golden age points. I always build a strong military that matches or out does other civs. A strong military ensures peace so you can attack those barbs.

[johnarhoades]

Clear the camps if near you.

Try to get the gold (1st hit) and then leave them, if near an enemy. (Hope they spam on them.)

Get the two-faced Hero with 2 names. ( can't remember the name - H&B?) Use that hero and some good units, and it's cheap recruiting. Weaken enemies with regular army and flip them with the Hero.

[The Bored Chairman]

Kills the scouts and their little dogs too.

Seriously, Barb Scouts are public enemy number one. The moment they find your city and report back to their camps, it's Barbariantide for your civ.

The camps might spawn a few odd troops here and there, but if you let that Scout narc on you, the camp will produce new units every turn.

And since Barb spawns have been bugged since the Barbarian Clans update, they'll NEVER stop. You might want to consider beelining Archery if you're having a Barb issue, because the AI doesn't understand tactics and will often attack into your melee units protecting them if they can't reach your ranged unit.

Additionally, make liberal use of terrain and promotions. A single fortified Warrior with Battlecry can hold off everything the Barbs throw at you until they start breaking out Archers of their own. By that time, you can likely build Horsemen to clean up their Ranged units though.

If you're having a boat problem, that's some pretty tough beans. Barbs will be able to contest your ownership of the coasts until you break out the Caravels. Use the coastlines to your advantage to force them into attacking your Galleys one at a time, preferably into Reefs. Don't bother shooting ships with Archers unless it's safe, since their damage against Naval Units is horrible and Quadriremes will out-damage them if you trade blows.

You can't defend as well with a single Galley as you can with a single Warrior, simply because by the time you have a sizeable navy, the Barbs are still cranking out new ships.

[Catalytic]

As others have said:

1) Immediately kill any scout with an exclamation point over its head
2) Keep the fog of war away with your own scouts
3) You must build military early as others have suggested. I'll typically put up 2 scouts and a 2nd warrior and I'll consider buying a 3rd with gold depending on the threat.
4) Barb camps near horse resource will spam horsemen + cav archers. You'll need want spears and archers ideally, but if you're careful, you can use warriors. Be aggressive getting those camps down
5) Naval camps are a pain. There's often not great incentive to settle on the coast anyway, so be selective. If you do have a coastal city, put ranged units in it, and prioritize getting walls up. Boats can't heal. Your city does automatically. All naval spamming barbs have a camp on land. Find it. Remember that until you get to privateers in Renaissance, your boats don't clear camps, so you need a land unit. Your navy fighting their navy can take much more resources than you want to spend on that nuisance. Typically, I'll turtle up with ranged units unless they're a really easy target or they're killing my trade routes, then smash in Age 4.