Espionage in CivIV - issues and suggestions

[Blake]

A cool way for tech steal to work would be tapping another Civ's research, while the tap is up you share a %age of their beakers, for balance it probably shouldn't be possible to steal more than you're researching.

So: use spy to infiltrate a large enemy city, when researching tech if the infiltrated civ has that tech (or is also researching it) you get a bunch of extra beakers from the infiltration. The maximum stolen per turn is equal to your research efforts, or the # of labs being produced by the infiltrated city, whichever is lower. Infiltration would only last a few turns (8 or 10 maybe?) and success would be lower for subsequent infiltrations of the same city. You could infiltrate multiple cities at once. (the capital could have lower success rate but give a much better tap)

Seems like a good idea to me .

[Illuminatus]

SMAC system would be good, but with promotions it would be perfect. Tapping research of another civilization and assasinating super specialists sounds nice

[Fidel]

yeah, rtw has system of assasins. however, i found that it was rather easy to exploit it against ai, literally obliterating its nobility ranks....

[Melloj]

I like the idea of assassinations, however with a max of only 4 spies for offensive/defensive purposes, I think it would be very hard to defend against assassination of great persons.

Perhaps a split between offensive and defensive capabilities of a spy. Or a building option, such as a Intelligence Office which would act as giving a slight bonus to spy interceptions...

[Volstag]

While I wouldn't mind espionage becoming more useful, I don't want it to become too useful. The more sweeping the changes to the unit, the more the AI will have to be tweaked to incorporate it successfully.

[Jcg316]

Spys are balanced late as it is. With near 100% commerce you can sabotage spaceships faster than they can be produced. If you already have the techs to build your spaceship that makes for an easy ability to get past your spaceship built before opponents.

The problem is that they are not being used effectively, not that they can't be used so. Being able to see into enemy cities and see what they are producing is a giant advantage. Sabotage can be leveraged into a giant advantage as well. Short of going to war that player can do nothing against you for it without spies of their own, going to war still can't prevent it without them having spies of their own.

When spies are used well offensively and defensively by two civs they are a very inconsequential factor between those two civs, as they should be in that situation.

If you want the game to be extremely spy heavy it is quite easy to mod spies to be more effective.

[Cabbagemeister]

Originally posted by Martinus
I think the game should give a spin on the SMAC system, by introducing a system of promotions (in the same line as military unit promotions) that would allow spies to do anything but not everything.

Every time a spy would succeed in a mission it would generate some xp which would then be capable of being used for promotions such as:
- Mobility - more movement
- Stealth - less chance of being caught
- Saboteur - more chance of sabotage, with higher levels also giving a bonus to damage caused
- Demagogue - better chance and better result of inciting unhappiness
- Misdirection - better chance at framing another Civ
- Assassin - (only after few levels of Sabotage and Stealth) - allowing you to murder Great People
- Slayer (also available after few other promotions only) - ability to poison wells
- [ ] (after few levels of Saboteur and a potential promotion giving bonus to tech stealing) - ability to sabotage technology research
- Briber (after few levels of Demagogue) - ability to bribe units
- Culturalist (after few levels of Demagogue) - ability to increase your culture in enemy cities (increasing the chance of culture flip)
- Spy Master (say 5 or 6 promotions of any kind) - allowing you to sacrifice him in your city (the same way you use a great person) to build a spy academy, functioning as "barracks" for spies.

Also, each of these abilities (except for Spy Master) would have several levels, increasing the chance and damage caused (where applicable) of each type of attack.

This way, using spies would be a viable strategy, that could be pursued, however at the same time it won't be overpowered the way spies in Civ2 were, by not giving you all the abilities from get go, and at the same time forcing you to cultivate the spy network first. Also, the way promotions would be balanced, you wouldn't be able to get a "super spy" with all abilities - you would have one person to assassinate, another to spread culture, and yet another to steal technology.

I like this idea. I don't mind if the spies themselves are "overpowered," as long as you can only get them to be that way by investing a lot of time/resources into them. I'm thinking of MOO2, where you could play as the Darlocks and absolutely ruin people with your spies. You were weak in military and research, and you really had to fight to compete...but it was a blast if you knew what you were doing. To do this, though, you had to plan from the start to play an espionage path--you couldn't just dominate with spies as a side-interest, on your way to a tech or military lead. Just one more strategy thrown into the mix.

Along these lines, I would suggest at least one mid-game wonder that boosts your spies' chances, along with a civic that gives your spies bonus "spy XP".

[spy14]

I go for the SMAC system.

Also, how about the remote possibility of assassinating another Civ's leader, resulting in the breakdown of said Civ's society? Of course, that would kind of niggle if the AI did it to you...

[Gunter]

Originally posted by Gunter
I definetly love a lot this thread but the main question is : is there any remote chance that spies could be tweaked / bettered within patches or it is necessary to rethink the game engine therefore those marvellous ideas above posted are not applicable ?

Gunter

Anyone knows if Fireaxians are open to tweak spies on next patch or there is nothing to do ?

Maybe mods, but in this this case it seems hard to accomplish such a task.

Anyway your suggestions are definetly the best way to intend spies.

Gunter

[Traelin]

Originally posted by Solver
Basically, you're describing the SMAC model then. Reasonably early available units, causing riots, framing other civs for your actions, and increased chance of success after accomplishing missions.

I'd also much rather see something like SMAC. Maybe there could be two Spy units. A reguar Spy around the Classical era or early Medieval, and a Special Forces unit late in the game, with upgraded capability, such as perhaps assasinations of public figures (reduce happiness), increased chances of success, and so on.

Didn't Civ1 used to have a diplomat that had limited espionage capabilities (in addition to founding an embassy, which we obviously don't need anymore), and also a spy unit? Certainly it seems plausible to have a medieval diplomat/spy unit, that maybe you get (like in Civ1) when you discover Writing. Then later on with the discovery of Communism, you get the more powerful version of a spy.

The diplomat (this unit should probably be called an envoy from now on) should at least be able to:

- Investigate City
- Steal plans

The spy should be an upgrade of the diplomat, and should at least be able to:

- Perform diplomat's capabilities
- Steal techology, for a price (like Civ3, you had 3 differing prices for doing this)
- Initiate propaganda
- Destroy improvement
- Sabotage production
- Frame another Civ/Damage relations (should be a -4 penalty -- at least -- in diplomacy point deduction if it fails)

[Addled Platypus]

just a thought

x% chance of ruining another 2 civs alliance or MPP

heck even sabatoge trade deals

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

I think if we were to take the SMAC route on spies, then we also should have the interaction between spying and Civics. i.e. some civics (like Freedom of Speech or Representation/Universal Sufferage) should make a society more vulnerable to spy missions-the old 'Liberty vs. Security' idea!)

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by Navyman
Have the spy be able to do more interesting stuff like try to break up an alliance, sour relations between two different AI civs, blame it on others, destroy buildings, bribe units, make citizens angry in a city so that the production is harmed, etc...

I like these!

Originally posted by Martinus

Every time a spy would succeed in a mission it would generate some xp which would then be capable of being used for promotions such as:
- Mobility - more movement
- Stealth - less chance of being caught
- Saboteur - more chance of sabotage, with higher levels also giving a bonus to damage caused
- Demagogue - better chance and better result of inciting unhappiness
- Misdirection - better chance at framing another Civ
- Assassin - (only after few levels of Sabotage and Stealth) - allowing you to murder Great People
- Slayer (also available after few other promotions only) - ability to poison wells
- [ ] (after few levels of Saboteur and a potential promotion giving bonus to tech stealing) - ability to sabotage technology research
- Briber (after few levels of Demagogue) - ability to bribe units
- Culturalist (after few levels of Demagogue) - ability to increase your culture in enemy cities (increasing the chance of culture flip)
- Spy Master (say 5 or 6 promotions of any kind) - allowing you to sacrifice him in your city (the same way you use a great person) to build a spy academy, functioning as "barracks" for spies.

and I like these too!

Such a spy task list combined with the above described upgrades would make the game definitely more interesting!

[Utwig]

I think at least ability to investigate cities and explore should be there earlier, possibly spies available from classical era onwards, but gaining other abilities with latter technologies or wonders (Scotland Yard/Communism).

[Saldrin]

I just made a post in the stratigy forum about counter espionage... Should have looked out here first.

Counter espionage.... whats the deal? I had all four of my spies wandering around my countryside trying to find the bastard sabataging my resources.

Spies don't have a counter espionage ability?! I had a spy parked on my uranium and it was sabataged right under her feet. I thought spies were able to see other spies?