The joys of spies

from GalCiv2 Forums
It seems tech stealing by spies has nothing to do with your current espionage levels on a AI, inspite of the flavour text. I was at war with the Drengin over the weekend and over a long period of time I finally managed to get up to advanced levels of espionage but my spies never stole a tech once. Having finished the Drengin off I moved onto the Korx and dumped my 4 surviving spies on them. The next turn they had managed to steal a Korx weapons tech. Several turns later they managed to steal another tech. I never got beyond medium levels of information on the Korx at all, and they were far faster at nullifying my spies than the Drengin were. Maybe my spies were more efficient because they were scared of being caught :o)
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Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I just had my spies steal a tech from the Terrans and I hadn't even reached an espionage level yet. Just a turn or two after that, I reached a low level with them. Unfortunately, it was Impulse Drive 1 and I already had Impulse Drive 3 from a trade I had made, so it didn't do me any good.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm not 100% sure on this but I think a spy in the field has some percentage chance every turn it is active to steal a tech. No idea what the percentage is or if that is even true. Also I think the *Luck* racial bonus plays a role.
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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Luck??? What really is luck good for??? Is it worth it to put towards luck when you can instead put towards economy and other racial bonuses???
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Luck??? What really is luck good for???


Luck raises your minimum attack rolls in combat, for one. With 25% luck and Universalists, every attack will deal *at least* half of its maximum damage (though it may still be absorbed by defenses).
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Well, playing as the Krynn with their 50% espionage bonus and a Luck pick I’ve been able to get 3 techs from the Thalians, the only one that mattered was Advanced Toxic. It is now 2232 and I’ve had High infiltration for ~4 years, and have had one or more spies continuously in place since 2227 or so.

Overall I’m not impressed with spying or Super Spy. The above takes considerable effort to keep continuous infiltration since the spies keep on being knocked off, and the bloody things accumulate in my territory much faster than they I can get rid of them (without spending amazingly high amounts on espionage). The Counter Espionage building the Super Spy gets is not very worthwhile (particularly early) except at key planets, and even then it doesn’t do anything to existing spies. The morale bump is nice, though. Of course, the AI will just place spies at unprotected planets, so you can’t prevent infiltration.

Hydro
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Spys are a great tool and a nice addition. You dont want spys to be able toi d too much though. They can easliy be an unbalancing force within the game. i think they should be kept to a reasonable level of ability, just one more point for you to consider but not a game-changing force.

I'm thinking about Civilization 2 and how, with a strong economy you can pretty much conquor the word with spies. either by bribing cities to revolt or by destroying all city defences with a nuke device.
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Unfortunately, it was Impulse Drive 1 and I already had Impulse Drive 3 from a trade I had made, so it didn't do me any good.

Some older techs are useful because they provide a bonus. For example, Impulse Drive 1 provides +1 speed to all your ships (even ones without engines).
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Spies came in handy for me at the end of a game. I was in a race for the technology victory with the Altarians. We were pretty much neck and neck, but then I put a couple of spies on some of their larger research facilities, and was able to pull ahead and get the win. I've found that they are more useful at slowing down your opponents rather than actually stealing info from them.
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Spies came in handy for me at the end of a game. I was in a race for the technology victory with the Altarians. We were pretty much neck and neck, but then I put a couple of spies on some of their larger research facilities, and was able to pull ahead and get the win. I've found that they are more useful at slowing down your opponents rather than actually stealing info from them.


very much agree. Something that works really well in the early/mid game is dropping a few spies on morale/econ tiles of a large threatening aggressor while bankrolling the smaller guys with cash, ships, and weapons techs. The aggressor is suddenly losing tons of cash and often winds up losing ground while they try to put their economy back together. It works great if your krynn since your +morale bonus's let you jack the tax rate up so high that you make tons and tons of credits without neading to cover your planets with too many virtual reality centers.