Espionage methods

[Aqualung71]

Just finished a game....got excited when I built the intelligence agency, and tried a bit of espionage. Only to find that the computer only gave me the options of investigating city or damage production. This is on the "abacus" part of the bottom right of the screen, where you click on "E". When I checked, there are so many more things you can do, like propaganda, etc. How do you get this stuff to work?

What have I missed this time?

[Demerzel]

you've used the IA to plant a spy in the civ you want to spy on? if you haven't done this then you'll only get the diplomatic spying options for that civ unless you haven't placed an embassy with them either whereupon you'll get no options.

if you have an embassy and a spy placed then having just the diplomatic spying options would suggest the problem being a bug.

[fittstim]

Sounds like you only built the IA and didn't send out any spies.

The Intelligence Agency only allows you the possibility to plant spies in other civs. It costs $$$ to attempt to plant a spy, planting the spy rarely succeeds and when you get caught, the other civ almost always declares war on you.

Having said that, the IA is a great thing (in some respects). For a modest (or sometime outrageous) fee, you can see all of the enemies troop locations. Most of the other functions are too expensive to use.

Trying to use propaganda to 'steal' cities is a joke. Total waste of money and you'll never succeed - even if your culture is 100 times greater than the other civ and the city you're trying to bribe is size 1. Worthless...

[bongo]

Don't forget that once you have that spy in place you will always know the number of enemy units, thats my favourite feature with IA

[Alex]

Originally posted by bongo
Don't forget that once you have that spy in place you will always know the number of enemy units, thats my favourite feature with IA

That's almost the only good thing about it, since all other things are either too expensive or simply don't succeed at all.

[bongo]

Another good one is the ability to spy on other civ's cities while you're at war with them.

Now thats.... 2 good things. Not Bad

As for the rest..couldn't agree more. Useless and/or too expensive

[Nym]

Another good thing is to know how far they are in building their space ship. In fact it can be particularly useful if you have another opportunity to win (like UN).

[bongo]

Do you need an IA to know the AI's progress with their spaceships? I'm asking because I haven't had a space race yet.

[Gunter]

You can always use the editor to lower a bit the costs for Spy actions,because I believe everyone here states that are too expensive,mee too.

The diffuclt thing is to find a correct balance.To have fun and a real challenge of course the costs shouldn't be lowered too much,on the other side the have to be lowered ....maybe 50%?

What do you think about " how much spy's action costs should lowered ? "

Thanks

Cheers

Gunter

[fittstim]

Yeah, I lowered the costs of spying and had just about every civ (even those I wasn't at war with) destroying my improvements every turn. Arrghh!!!

If you keep 'em high they'll continue to be worthless (or dearly bought) but the AI won't exploit them to death either - which it certainly does.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by bongo
Do you need an IA to know the AI's progress with their spaceships? I'm asking because I haven't had a space race yet.

Yes, you have to have a spy planted in order to know how many spaceship parts a certain civ finished so far and how many are being built. I am usually winning my games by launching the spaceship, so I know that very well...

[bongo]

fittstim : Are you saying that the AI can take advantage of lowered spy costs? Cool

vondrack : So once you have that spy in place you can check up on ai spaceships just like the size of his army?

[Gunter]

Originally posted by bongo
fittstim : Are you saying that the AI can take advantage of lowered spy costs? Cool

I had the same feeling.

Is there anyone of you that can witness the opposite??

Gunter

[vondrack]

Originally posted by bongo
vondrack : So once you have that spy in place you can check up on ai spaceships just like the size of his army?

Sort of. You will see how many parts are finished and how many parts are being constructed. But you will not know, which parts they are having done/built. But you can usually guess from the techs they know...

[WarpStorm]

Oh, yes. If you want a brutal game lower the price across the board to about 1/10 the current price. The only reason you don't see the AI using this stuff right now is the same reason you don't. It's too expensive to be cost effective. Lower the price and the AI will do it.