It is hard to draw a beaker/gold comparison with regards to tech stealing because certain buildings provide espionage points outright:
Palace - 4 ep
Courthouse - 2 ep
Jail - 4 ep +50% to all ep
Intelligence Agency - 8 ep +50% to all ep
Security Bureau - 8 ep
Spy Specialist - 4 ep
With just those buildings each city in your empire will generate 44 ep/turn, 52 ep/turn w/ 1 spy specialist. Each Scotland Yard is then worth an additional 26 ep/turn. That is with the slider set at 0%.
10 cities can easily generate 500+ ep/turn which is more than enough to steal a tech every 10 turns or so, with no slider adjustment!
The point is: you can accumulate ep at a significant rate even with your slider set at 0. The bigger the empire, the faster they accumulate.
[Posting from work - no screenies available; numbers may be off slightly] In my current game (Prince, Large map , Epic speed) I am accumulating 900+ ep/turn with my slider set at 10%. Each 10% move on the slider means +/- 200 gp. With my Espionage set at 0%, I still generate close to 700 ep/turn
Late in the game, I could have researched Mass Media in 9 tuns with all of my economy going into Science (slider set at 60%). Hammurabi was set to finish it in 7 turns. I went into the espionage screen and weighted all of my ep towards him, parked two spies in his territory and waited. I set my research to Assembly Plant.
7 turns (and 5600+ ep) later, I stole Mass Media for much less than 5000 ep (50% discount for 5 turns stationary, significant discount for having 5600 more ep than his 1900). The cost was primarily tied to the spy specialists and the hammers I had invested in all of my ep buildings. The other cost is measured by the fact that those ep were not going towards my other 10 opponents. But I had significant advantage over them already - they barely even caught up.
[edited to include more accurate numbers]
Palace - 4 ep
Courthouse - 2 ep
Jail - 4 ep +50% to all ep
Intelligence Agency - 8 ep +50% to all ep
Security Bureau - 8 ep
Spy Specialist - 4 ep
With just those buildings each city in your empire will generate 44 ep/turn, 52 ep/turn w/ 1 spy specialist. Each Scotland Yard is then worth an additional 26 ep/turn. That is with the slider set at 0%.
10 cities can easily generate 500+ ep/turn which is more than enough to steal a tech every 10 turns or so, with no slider adjustment!
The point is: you can accumulate ep at a significant rate even with your slider set at 0. The bigger the empire, the faster they accumulate.
[Posting from work - no screenies available; numbers may be off slightly] In my current game (Prince, Large map , Epic speed) I am accumulating 900+ ep/turn with my slider set at 10%. Each 10% move on the slider means +/- 200 gp. With my Espionage set at 0%, I still generate close to 700 ep/turn
Late in the game, I could have researched Mass Media in 9 tuns with all of my economy going into Science (slider set at 60%). Hammurabi was set to finish it in 7 turns. I went into the espionage screen and weighted all of my ep towards him, parked two spies in his territory and waited. I set my research to Assembly Plant.
7 turns (and 5600+ ep) later, I stole Mass Media for much less than 5000 ep (50% discount for 5 turns stationary, significant discount for having 5600 more ep than his 1900). The cost was primarily tied to the spy specialists and the hammers I had invested in all of my ep buildings. The other cost is measured by the fact that those ep were not going towards my other 10 opponents. But I had significant advantage over them already - they barely even caught up.
[edited to include more accurate numbers]
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