Luck and Espionage in Dark Avatar

Apologies, but I haven't found a good thread on either of these, and hopefully someone can show me where I'm missing the obvious.

How *exactly* how does one spy on a rival for the purposes of stealing technology and information? In Dread Lords, you just budgeted for it, but although I have put in huge budgets in DA, I never get more than basic info, nor does the 'Place and Agent' seem to help, although I'm not quite sure I'm even doing that right.

I have even had minor civs graciously offer me tech *they* stole (Little Squirrels - F*****s are just laughin' at me - I can tell! "Ohh - massive economy, 0% tax rate, very nice - but can the Psilons check a book out of the Drengin Public Library on Laser tech? Nooooooo . . .". Keep talkin' Chip n' Dale, I have a nutcracker that can open those nuts you like right up . . . from here. You might wanna stand back, just a touch . . . - <G>)

But if I could have this explained in nice, easy to use words, twould be deeply appreciated.

In *other* news - what exactly does luck do? I picked the "Lucky" stat, and I get the Lucky Rangers - sometimes 1, *this* game (The first one I'm winning fairly handily (I think - the scoreboard disagrees with me.), after correcting some assumptions about population, production and economics dating back to MOO II) I'm up to, like, eight of them. Sadly, this game I'm playing the Psilons as Pacifists, slowly pulling planets down with high tech, influence based turnover. It's so fun it's sad - my Tax rate is now 0%, all my expenses are paid by the Tourism board and the Trade tariffs. I haven't built a warship yet.

But, I have seen other races pick up the occasional 'Corvette', which looks to be a similar but smaller ship - is this because they're not the player race, or because they have lower luck? What other things does it affect? Is 8 rangers insane for 25% luck? If I had the 50% combo, would I be picking up even bigger ships, more ships, or both?

Thanks - Enjoying the game.

Jonnan

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Hi!

How *exactly* how does one spy on a rival for the purposes of stealing technology and information?

What *exacly* spies do know only developers (maybe

). But if while you have a spy (or more) on opponent's planet(s), there's a rather slim chance it will steal one tech. Rather slim means maybe one tech in a game-year IF they have that tech and you don't. Since you can research almost all techs anyway and AIs tend to nullify your spies, becomes the useage of spies for that purpose very soon very expensive.

I have even had minor civs graciously offer me tech *they* stole

That event doesn't work in GalCiv-2 as it did in GalCiv-1. Simply forget it.

what exactly does luck do?

You may find info on wiki useful: racial bonuses.

It's so fun it's sad - my Tax rate is now 0%, all my expenses are paid by the Tourism board and the Trade tariffs. I haven't built a warship yet.

IMO you're playing on too low difficulty level. I propose you to start next game on "normal", or even "though". For the difference check wiki: AI difficulty levels.

I have seen other races pick up the occasional 'Corvette'

That race is probably Drengin. Their super ability gives them some corvettes each time they go to war.

Enjoying the game.

BR, Iztok

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Actually, unless I just accidentally set it wrong when I started (What a horrid thought - I'm not getting better, I'm just too stupid to know I miss-set it-) I'm on the highest level that doesn't cheat (That's either Normal or Tough, I think? Sorry, bought this last Friday), but I have been far luckier this game than seems statistically likely in several spots - not least of which is that of the five influence resources in this game, I pulled in three of them, + one research and one morale real early on. In the Meantime the Drengin and Yor are on the other side of the quadrant from me, and you can sit and watch them, the Iconians, Earth, and the Drath continuously drain each others resources like a large, interstellar WWF match.

*My* closest neighbors were the Torians, and until they got into it with the Drath I'm pretty sure the trade routes betwixt us were mostly carrying popcorn to eat while we watched the "Drengin versus everybody" show down the street. "Oh look, the Drengin and the Terrans are at war again. How's the kids - is T'chj'ckff'r't doing good in College? She's a smart, ah, what are your genders again?"

I miss them - but I got four more mines when nobody moved in fast enough - two research, an influence, and a weapons enhancement.

Which brings me to the other really weird thing I've noticed, and I'm a bit confused by this, is the other races never really built survey ships. I built about 8 survey ships, upgrading them 3 or 4 times with sensors, survey equipment, drives, and life support, and they've been getting me various caches and those 1% increases in stats for ages. I still see other races flagships every so often, but no real scoutships. Maybe they just got into it with each other too often and don't want to waste survey scanners on ships of the line?

It hits me as odd anyway. It only costs 120 bc or so to build a really good survey vessel, and I've made that back about 50 times in salvage alone, never mind the 1% items adding up. I post that under "It's free money - why would you *not* grab every one you can find?". I think anomalies were set too abundant by default?

So anyway - I think *some* of it is me getting better. A lot more of it is that this has been a lot of good positioning - the Iconians *could* cause me issues, but they had the Drengin next door. The Torians could have, just never actually did so. And Psilon geeks in surveyors with three warp engines grabbing anomalies like they're going outta style - . We told them girls dig guys that survey anomalies for a living.

Jonnan

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Sadly, this game I'm playing the Psilons as Pacifists, slowly pulling planets down with high tech, influence based turnover.

You really played to much MoO.

With psilons I guess you mean Iconians??

But on a sidenote, I would like to know how the numbers of luck work.

F.e. I know luck effects your ships not rolling a hard zero when they attack ships. But with the Altarians, I chose luck, chose the universalists and researched the first special tech giving +10 luck.

Afaik there is another good aligned luck tech giving you +20 luck? So you got a whopping +80 luck. What does the difference make?

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What is this strange sentence - "Too much MOO." supposed to mean - I know all the words, but they make no sense in that order - ?

Naw - I created the Psilons as a Custom race, first thing I did - I'm pretty predictable, if there is a way, in *any* turn-based game, to play a faction of raving technophiles researching their way to universal domination, well - "It appears to be a geek, a theoretical, caffeine-based life form. It's life Captain, but not life as we know it." "Sulu - set phasers to . . . decaffeinate!"

Jonnan

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Hi!

So you got a whopping +80 luck. What does the difference make?

If you have a weapon that has max power of 5, it will NEVER roll less than 4. In practice the average damage your ships will do is increased by 80%. This is valid for DA. There was no mention Luck behaviour will change in TA, so it should work the same.

BR, Iztok

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