Diplomacy - Spying - Stealing Advances

[Alinestra Covelia]

"Our spy reports that the citizens of $STRING1 are vigilant and wary, sire. Should she continue the attempt?

- Abort mission.

- Steal random tech (no specific tech can be targeted)"

I believe that this is the message that turns up when a city (namely, the capital) is the target of the second or later techstealing attempt. I have never seen this happen during a normal game of Civ2 - this may simply be due to my playing tactics, etc, etc.

Presumably I could create a Spylike unit in each capital with a cost of 1 or something, which cannot be built, and which cannot move. This ought to thwart most enemy Spy attempts - but does anyone know if multiple spy units stationed in a city actually have a cumulative effect on safeguarding it?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

[Michael Daumen]

I think the steal from a city twice ability is only given to spies and not diplomats.

[KaR]

The problem with having multiple spy units in each city is that, yes it will make it very hard to steal advances it will also make it harder for Sabotage etc... And you said your whole purpose for removing tech stealing was to allow the other spy options so the adding of spy units would not be a good choice IMO
[This message has been edited by KaR (edited February 15, 2000).]

[Alinestra Covelia]

What are the differences between Spy skills and Diplomat skills? Does anybody have a definitive list out there? Also, are there game mechanics that we don't see, but which act differently between spies and diplomats?

As for the scenario, I might place a defensive spy unit into each city, and limit the buildable units to only being diplomat types. Will this work?

Finally, I gather that only the unit in the Spy's position in the UNITS.gif file will have any possibility of acting as a Spy - any "Spy" unit created elsewhere will merely be a lowly diplomat. Is this right?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

[Miner]

You are right, the super spy abilities
are conferred to any diplomat unit in that position in rules.txt

[C Chulainn]

...and for this reason, the "Useless Tech" solution isn't viable, because dipolomats always steal a random technology rather than one their government would like to have.

[Alinestra Covelia]

I've just shot Matthew Mink! They're coming to take me away haha! They're coming to take me away hoho! They're coming to take me away heehee!

Swamp Water
You will need:
1 bottle of chilled Coca Cola
1 carton of chilled orange juice or Five Alive
1 shot of vodka, preferably Smirnoff
1 egg, raw

Extract egg white from egg and store. Discard egg yolk. Mix Coke, OJ, and vodka in equal quantities and allow to aerate. Gently stir in the egg yolk until evenly distributed.

Drink without pause. Doing so may cause regrettable side effects.

Auuggghhhh!!! Snake!!!!

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

[fish_damage]

I'm just guessing, but could you not steal tech from all the cities with diplomats, delete those advances stolen, then save the game as a scenario, so Diplomats would not be able to steal technologies from any of the cities.
Of course if more cities are then built, they are still suceptable.