New to BTS, and boy do I hate espionage

[Billybgame]

Forgive if this has been beaten to death already. I can't search, here at work. I did look back through the last 10 pages and found no threads on espionage.

I did read quite a bit about this in Solver's BTS review and the forum thread. So, I know early on there was negativity towards this.

I'm in my early stages of BTS, and I gotta tell you, I'd go so far to say the game isn't even fun. I'm getting my resources and buildings ravaged constantly. I built every single espionage counter that I could, I do believe. I've got spies in every city, too. I'm getting close to my Space Colony, and it's like a constant barrage. Earlier, I was thwarting efforts more often than not. Now, it's like 80% in their favor, I'd guess. Getting very frustrating. When I'd like to be building railroads in lumbermills, I'm chasing around to fix up wells and camps and mines, etc.

At this point, I'd much rather play vanilla, I'd say.

Luckily, I built the Apolistic Palace myself, so at least that aggravation was eliminated.

Anyhow, am I looking at this wrong? I was sending some spies to do dirty work in other's territory, but that get's old fast. I find this change to Civ 4 to be an extremely annoying one.

[Dinner]

I have to admit in the beginning I didn't like espionage but it has begun to grow on me.

[Jaybe]

I was sending some spies to do dirty work in other's territory, but that get's old fast.

Yes, it does for me, too. What I do is spend a minimal amount on espionage early to mid game (I like to know what the AI are up to), and build those espionage buildings at a moderately high priority. Those (and your CULTURE) are defenses against enemy espionage, which you augment with Counter Espionage missions regularly against those you believe are causing your aggravation.

If you are winning (or they just don't like you), you are still going to be hit. Be okay with that: it gives you something to do with your workers, in addition to making you feel vengeful enough to perhaps wipe the floor with those irritants.

If you have the spare commerce, you might still be spending some on espionage at end game.

[SpencerH]

As Jaybe said, if you're winning you're gonna be hit. I know that the AI spends way more on espionage than I do, especially some specific CIV's. I agree its annoying for those of us who dont play the espionage game but others like it. Send spys out to your neighbors and do counter-espionage which will protect you for 10 turns.

Despite the espionage 'nag', BtS is still a vast improvement over vanilla IMO.

[wodan11]

IIRC, unpatched BtS had some funky AI espionage behavior programmed in. Do you have the 3.17 patch installed? You might also consider getting the so-called "unofficial" patch to 3.17 (the patch to the patch).

[Greybriar]

You can turn espionage off if you don't like it.

[rah]

If you turn it off, how does it handle the info screens?

[Jaybe]

From what I've heard, turning off espionage is a Very Bad Idea. All EPs (palace, court house, security bureau, ...) converted to culture can make for someone's early culture victory.

[rah]

yeah, that would suck. How about the info screens?

[Krill]

They're lost completely...

[joncnunn]

Look on the bright side:

Any Spies the AI builds is that many hammers they didn't do something more useful with like build a military unit.
Any use of the slider by the AI is that much commerce they didn't so something more useful with like research.

[Boracks]

I build sufficient spies to keep counter-espionage active on my neighbours, then watch their spies (and the hammers used to build them) go poof.

And I do have to credit spies with one win, a spaceship victory where destroying mines around the city an opponent was using to build their last spaceship part delayed them enough I launched two turns before they did. They where originally scheduled to launch two turns before me.

Like anything else in Civ, its a matter of learning to fit it into your playing style.

[Ming]

I've never really have a problem with AI spies. As mentioned by others, the AI wastes a lot of serious resources building them, and then lowers it's science rate by using the slider.

If you go for Code early to build courthouses, you usually stay ahead of the AI, and the information provided is useful. While I watch my important cities, the AI governor usually creates spy specialists in my not so important cities, and I'm too lazy to worry about those. So generally, have a few AI's have been removed, I get to see all the techs being worked on and even see into some cities.

I very seldom build spies (I might build a few more if they had an auto search feature) and later in the game, when enemy spies are really active, I have many spare workers to correct any damage being done quickly. So an occasional city gets poisened... no real problem. I might lose a tech... but again, no big deal.

And I have used spies as Boracks mentions to some times slow down a space ship launch.

No real problem with espionage... just another thing the AI can screw up

[Cort Haus]

AI governor Ming?

Oh dear.

[Theben]

I think he meant the generic AI governor.