A native village is a feature representing small uncivilized villages. Native villages are randomly placed on the map when it is generated; they do not appear during play. The first civilization to expand cultural borders onto, or to move any unit into the tile where a hut is will get a random benefit (or sometimes release a bunch of barbarians). Native villages are called "goody huts" by players, and the process of moving onto one and getting whatever is there is called "popping a hut."
Goodies
There are several outcomes possible when popping a hut: a new Warrior or Scout unit, maps, gold, etc. Which outcome a human player gets depends on several things, but primarily the game's difficulty level (one gets better results on easier levels), and on whether or not a Scout (or Explorer) is used to pop the hut. The following table shows the probability of various possible outcomes, by difficulty level:
| Settler | Chief | Warlord | Noble | Prince | Monarch | Emperor | Immortal | Deity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| high_gold | 20% | 20% | 15% | 15% | 10% | 5% | 5% | ||
| low_gold | 10% | 10% | 15% | 20% | 20% | 20% | 25% | 25% | 25% |
| map | 5% | 5% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 5% |
| settler | 10% | 10% | 5% | ||||||
| warrior | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 5% | 5% | 5% |
| scout | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% |
| worker | 10% | 10% | 5% | ||||||
| experience | 5% | 5% | 5% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 5% | 5% | 5% |
| healing | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% |
| tech | 20% | 15% | 15% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% | 10% |
| barbs_weak | 5% | 5% | 10% | 15% | 15% | 15% | 15% | 10% | |
| barbs_strong | 5% | 5% | 5% | 10% | 15% | 20% | 30% |
The AI is always on "Noble" for this purpose (and many others). Some of the outcomes above are not valid in some circumstances:
- Healing is not valid if the hut was popped by culture, or the unit has 40+ hitpoints.
- Experience is not valid if the hut was popped by culture, or by an unpromotable unit (Spy, Worker, Missionary, etc.), or if GameTurns < 10.
- Warrior is not valid in multiplayer, or if GameTurns < 20.
- Settler is not valid in a one city challenge game.
- Tech is not valid if the civ has no cities yet.
- Barbs are not valid if:
- the game option No Barbarians is on.
- the hut was popped by culture.
- it was popped by a Scout/Explorer.
- no cities exist yet, or if there is exactly 1 city located at a plotDistance < 8.
In the case where an outcome is not valid, the game "rerolls" the outcome up to 10 times until it gets a valid one. If no valid outcome is found the hut just disappears without anything happening.
Huts and Barbarians
When a native village is on a tile that the game has linked as a good place for a city, barbarians will sometimes stop there and "guard" the village. When a barbarian is doing this, it will not move or attack even if a unit moves adjacent to it. Eventually such a village can be turned into a barbarian city, which eliminates the hut. A guarded village can be popped by cultural border expansion, by attacking and defeating the guard unit, or by moving a Spy into it.