Spy...clearly not a James Bond

[Tattila the Hun]

Not if you are allied to him.

I feel they come into play too late, require me to build a small wonder, and even then require me to build them in that one city...

There should be a spy-type unit from, say, middle-ages. Sun-Tzu speaks of spys...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espionage

Of course, his mission-options would be less than modern spy... Maybe tech stealing, beakers for research of a tech, spreading rumors and dissent, (angry citizens), few plaqued rats, (health), and of course keeping an eye on things in general.

[Arrian]

Maybe the missionary unit could be morphed into a dual-use unit - what they do now, PLUS stuff like the old CivII "diplomat" unit (toned down spy). Once you have converted a city, send another missionary there and you can do stuff...

I also like the idea of allowing spies to help out during a city revolt, increasing the likelyhood of the city flipping to your empire.

-Arrian

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Hauptman
Spy vs spy is simply, if they keep pillaging an oil well, you can park your own spy on that well and it will reduce thier chance of success, by a lot.

Let's see... in my last game chances of success on a tile without a spy was: 100%... as I parked a spy on the tile, chances of success was reduced by 0%, keeping it at 100%

[arcady]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
It's funny how some people crave game elements, like a random pest unit, suitcase bombs and worse that are disturbingly unfun and unbalancing to me. I hope these people never get to make design decisions for civ.

I'm finding that every edition of Civ has been plagued by the same basic problem - once you become too far high up in the 'top dog scale' there is little left to do save for keep hitting 'next turn' and waiting to get your victory handed to you.

I want there to be certain things left in the game that will always challenge me, no matter how much better I am doing than the other civs, and in fact challenge me precisely because I otherwise can slap the rest of the world around with impunity.

Things which, even in that late stage of the game, could threaten to knock me back down to having real competition.