Why can he have a city 3 tiles close?

So I have no idea what's happening, why it's happening, what will happen when they win and why would it happen. Several barbarian camps on islands and all they do is spawn triremes and suddenly they all attack my city. No raging barbarians turned on either.

Ever seen this before? I don't think I have. I wonder if it was because he was afraid of losing his capital (which he did).

I'd like to get a list of the worst ~15 Civs to put them all in a game with me and see who lasts.

By worst, I mean they tend to underperform compared to other civilizations. My personal (anecdotal) choices would be civs like Mongolia, Carthage, Polynesia, and Brazil. They never seem to do anything in any game I have, and always fall behind everyone else.

I'm trying to use this site to make it a little more scientific - focusing on civs with the worst / lowest stats in the following key factors:

Traits:

• Victory Competitiveness (low)
• Wonder Competitiveness (low)

Diplomacy Bias:

• Afraid (high)
• Neutrality (high)

Flavors:

• Expansion (low)
• Growth (low)
• Tile Improvement (low)
  • I believe this one may be one of the most important factors in determining who sucks the most

City-State Bias:

• Ignore (high)

I'm also considering the start bias of some countries, like Russia, who start in unfavorable terrain which usually screws an AI over early-mid game. So far, my list of the wimpiest & least competitive countries (both 'scientifically' and anecdotally) are, not in order:

1. Portugal
2. Austria
3. Mongolia
4. Carthage
5. Polynesia
6. Byzantium
7. The Celts

Potential inclusions:

1. France
2. Assyria
3. Denmark
4. Mayans
5. Spain

Who else should be added to get the list to 15? Should anyone be removed from the list(s)? I'm wanting to overcrowd the maximum size map to force people to get friendly with one another. Looking forward to seeing what civs people suggest.

In my games, Greece and Iroquois are almost always the top contenders. They're so high in the threat list that if I don't crush them early, they'll get a massive lead by the mid-game.

For the worst, I would say Byzantium and Polynesia. They are either too friendly or peaceful, expand a lot, or get crushed by a warmongering civ. Also, am I the only one who rarely sees Rome doing well? They're almost always dead or irrelevant by the Renaissance era in my games.

I'm running a mod for a huge map, and no matter what I do the amount of barbarians are absolutely insane.

I'm talking by turn ~30 with just 2 cities and 12 units I can't stop losing units. On average I'm seeing about 10 new spawns near the edge of my field of vision (I keep units on the outskirts of my territories to try and prevent spawning). But nothing works!

I don't want to turn off barbs, but man...

I'm not the most technical person, but I do really enjoy my Civ5 games. With all of these recent AI advancements, is there any chance we can make a mod that greatly improves the current AI's logic? I wish I could contribute to the community myself with this endeavor, so for now, it's food for thought!