Can I control the bandit spawn rate independently of difficulty settings?

{edit: looks like the next two paragraphs were nonsense, please ignore them}

I've been playing as Pontos on VH campaign and normal battlle difficulty. I was fighting tooth and nail against the Seleucids every turn, gradually taking Western Anatolia. Then there was one of those huge chain alliance shifts and I suddenly got the ceasefire I'd been after. It lasted 9 months. In that time, 5 bandit armies totalling 17 units spawned at random around my backwoods. It took about five years to clean them out, what with renewed hostilities with Seleucia (and a sudden attack from the Ptolemies as soon as the Seleucis laid off). A bit later, I took Antioch and built some strategic forts and got the Seleucids at arms reach. Suddenly, another 4 bandit armies pop up, complete with heavy cavalry.

I'm guessing the game is doing this to keep me busy on the VH setting, but it's no fun. What's the point of outplaying infinitely rich Seleucids if your "reward" for sucess is bandits that outnumber some factions?

So I'm wondering: is there any way I can modify the bandit spawn rate by editing the game files?

Yes you can. This was the most awaited part of .80 for me since I couldn't stand the tediousness of either fighting absurd amounts of rebel spawns in well-kept areas in .74.

You want to go to descr_strat.txt in this directory.
Rome - Total War\EB\Data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign

Scroll down for brigand_spawn_value and change it from 10 to 99999. I don't believe I've had any rebels spawn on me in 72 years, which has made my Macedonian campaign so much more fun and interesting.

However, I do not know whether this will take effect mid-campaign or not.

I don't think the strat file can change in mid-campaign :(

Well, I may have to apologise to the AI about the bandits...

When I got the ceasefire out of the Seleucids, the Ptolemies went hostile. And the Ptolemies had about three spies in Asia Minor. And guess whose cities they moved into to spark unrest? OK, gotta see if I can clear this up.

[I didn't realise spies could do this. Man, I need to RTFM. And to think Pontos starts with a level 10 spy, and I've been beating the Seleucids in a straight fight instead of using him to subvert their cities...]

Oh, and thanks for the replies.