(6-CP) KISS Espionage System

[Stalker0]

Counterproposal to: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/6-43-espionage-system-overhaul.685902

Rationale: The initial Espionage proposal is focused on making adjustments to the current system, but keeping the concept similar. This is a very different take, this version returns spying more similar to how Vanilla Civ 5 works. This version is meant to very simple and easy to understand...focusing on espionage as intrigue, city vision, and the stealing of techs. This system is meant to do what it does well, but its a much more limited system than the other proposal.

You should choose this concept if you want to return spying to a simple but solid part of the game, and are willing to exchange options for ease of use.

Proposal:

The KISS (KEEP IT SIMPLE SILLY) Espionage System v1.3
Number of Spies: Unchanged
CS Rigging/Coup: Unchanged
Diplomats: Unchanged (and are still setup in the capital).

Spy Travel Time: 2 turns to foreign city, 1 turn to own cities.
Spy Setup Time: 3 turns, -1 if you are popular+ with the civ.

The Only Mission: Steal Tech
When a spy settles into a city, it provides surveillance and intrigue as it does today. In addition, it accrues "Intelligence" per city (see below). The Intelligence in a city is reset if the spy leaves the city. The Intelligence from all the cities in a civ are added together; once the threshold is hit for a civ, a tech steal occurs and all the Intelligence you gained in that civ resets to 0.

• If a counterspy is present in any city: Primary Spy in that civ is killed (but mission completes).
  • Otherwise, Spy is identified and returned to HQ
• If no tech is available for steal, the mission is put on hold but the Intelligence continues to accrue. When a tech becomes available, the tech steal occurs as soon as the Intelligence meets the threshold, and then reset to 0 as normal.

Tech Steal UI Notes(when you hover over any spy in an enemy civ that is not a diplomat from the spy screen)

• Shows current spy level, how many xp its gained, and how much Xp it gains each round.
• Shows current tech difference and security.
• Notes if this is the current primary spy.
• Shows how much Intelligence is gained with that civ each turn.
• Shows the total Intelligence gathered in this city.
• Shows the total Intelligence accrued/how many are needed to steal a tech.
• Shows how many turns to steal a tech based on current values.
• NOTE: Security and tech difference numbers can change each turn, so this value can adjust a bit turn by turn.

Intelligence
Spies produce Intelligence on a city basis, but all cities for that civ are added together. The more cities in a civ you have spies in, the more intelligence you collect.

• Primary Spy (Spy with the highest XP in the civ or random if two have same XP): Generates 4/6/8 Intelligence for level 1/2/3 respectively.
• Additional spies in the Civ: Generates 2/4/6 Intelligence for level 1/2/3 respectively.
  • If the primary spy leaves the civ, a new primary spy is chosen.

At base, it takes 200 Intelligence to steal a tech, modified by security, tech difference, and game speed:

Intelligence = 2 * (100 + Security - 10 * Tech Difference) * Game Speed Modifier; where Game Speed modifier = 1 for normal speed, .67 for quick, 1.5 for epic, 3 for marathon.
Ex: On standard speed, if my Tech Difference was 3, and my security was 200, my needed Intelligence = 2 * (100 + 200 - 10 * 3) * 1 = 2 * (300 - 30) = 2 * 270 = 540 Intelligence.

Tech Difference
This is simply the number of technologies that the civ you are stealing from knows that you do not currently know, maximum of 5.

Security
Security is now a CIV WIDE value, adding the bonuses from all of a civ's cities. The security value is the % increase in how much Intelligence is needed to steal a tech. Example: A security of 100 is 100% more Intelligence.

Security Modifiers

• +75 (before Renaissance, aka for England balance)
• +2 per constabulary (+3 additional security for every guild in the same city - works similar to how the arena buffs the barracks and forge)
• +2 per police station (+3 additional security for every guild in the same city - works similar to how the arena buffs the barracks and forge)
• +1 per military base
• +10/20/30 per level 1/2/3 counterspy in a city (does not have the be the same city that an enemy spy is in).
• +20% (Rationalism Empiricism Policy)
• +10% (England UA)
• NEEDS UPDATE: I need to know standard map size modifiers to put that here.

Ex: A 6 city civ has constabularies in all of its cities (and 3 of those cities both contain the writing and artists guilds). It also has a level 1 counterspy in one of its cities (doesn't matter which one).
Current Security = 6 * 2 (constabulary) + 3 * 3 (writing guild bonus is 3 of the cities) + 3 * 3 (artist guild bonus in 3 of the cities) + 10 (level 1 counterspy) = 40.

Security UI
The "Stars" Security UI would be replaced with a simple number. Each city would show this security number (which is the same for every city in the civ, as its the civ wide number), and this value is updated once per turn if there are any changes.


Spy Roles, XP, and Death

• Standard Spy: +1 XP per turn settled in city.
• CS Spy: +1 XP per turn settled in CS.
• Diplomat: +3 XP per turn settled in capital
  • Otherwise, unchanged.
• Counterspy: +3 XP per turn settled in city.
• XP levels: 50/100 for rank 2 and 3.

Death: When a spy dies (either from a failed coup or a tech steal in which there was a counterspy), a new base level spy appears 5 turns later.

Designer's notes on counterspies: Counterspies have a few strongly defined roles:

• They give a large bonus to security.
• They autokill spies that steal a tech, creating a strong deterrent.
• They level up 3 times as fast a normal spy, so you can use counterspying as a "training ground" to get your spies into fighting shape.

CS Quests

• Spy on a Civ X times Quest: Updated to be - "Steal a technology from this civilization". There will only be 1 tech required in all cases (no more variance).
  • Quest Note: This will draw from Civs that have 2+ tech that can be stolen from when teh quest is generated. If there are no such civs, the quest is declined in favor of a different quest. The quest will auto-cancel should the target civ no longer have any techs available for steal.

Spy Beliefs/Policies/Civs
General Updates (Civs/Policies/Buildings)

All references to spy mission adjustments and spy resistance numbers are completely removed from the game. The new bonuses are applied below:

• Constabulary: +2 security. Gain +3 security for every guild in this city. (replaces spy mission duration modifier)
• Police Station: +2 security. Gain +3 security for every guild in this city. (replaces spy mission duration modifier)

(Designer Note: The guild bonus may seem a little odd here. Its purpose is to ensure a nice balance between Tall and Wide, it gives Tall a nice starting point for security. It also smooths the curve a bit between constabularies and police stations by adding in a little more security with musicians' guilds. Ultimately a wide civ can get more security, but it scales slowly and requires a lot of infrastructure investment).

• Military Base: +1 security.
• Covert Action (Freedom): (replaces spy mission duration reduced by 2 for spies).
  • -1 setup time for all spies/diplomats.
  • -1 travel time for spies going to foreign cities.
• Double Agents (Order): (replaces spies are twice as likely to capture spies, spy mission duration reduced by 1, increased by 1 in foreign cities).
  • +10 security for all counterspies.
  • -2 setup time for your spies going to owned cities or city states.
• Shadow Networks (Statecraft): -2 turns to Spy recruitment when a spy is killed. (replaces -1 spy mission duration).
• Police State (Autocracy): Police Station +1 security (replace +2 spy mission duration)
• National Intelligence Agency: -1 turn to Spy recruitment when a spy is killed. (replace 15% spy resistance, spy mission adjustments).
• England UA:+10% security. All spies start with a free rank, starts with enough spy points to get a free spy. (replaces spy resistances, +10% stronger spies).
• Empiricism (Rationalism): +20% to Security (replaces 34% spy resistance).
• Foreign Service (Statecraft): (remove spy mission duration adjustment)
• Bletchley Park: (remove spy resistance and spy mission duration modifiers).
• White Tower: unchanged.

Clarification: For bonuses gained when you complete a foreign spy action (such as the NIA or white tower): This is a CS rig, CS coup, or tech steal. For "countering a foreign action in a city" (such as the white tower), this is when a counterspy kills a tech stealing spy in the capital.

And now...lots of EXAMPLES!!!
A new spy system is a lot to take in, and while all of this might sound amazing and great....what does it really mean? How fast will spies steal, how fast will they level? I am going to provide a number of examples below to give you some understanding of how these mechanics actually translate into the game.

Spoiler :

Example 1: Initial Spying

Spoiler :

Its the Renaissance and you have acquired your first spy. You eye a neighbor that has a 5 tech lead on you, and you want to steal a tech. How effective will you be?

You send your fresh level 1 spy into an enemy city (gaining 4 Intelligence a turn and gaining 1 XP a turn once you finish travel and setup).
Travel Time: 2 turns (foreign city)
Setup Time: 3 turns (default)
Current Security: 0 (no buildings or modifiers yet).
Needed Intelligence: 2 * (100 + 0 - 10 * 5) * 1 (Standard Speed) = 100 Intelligence

Tech Steal in 25 turns.
Total time (Travel + Setup + Tech Steal): 30 turns
Spy XP: 25/50

Example 2: The First Spy Defense

Spoiler :

(Continued from Example 1) That first steal was easy enough, but now the enemy has put up constabularies in its cities (as well as 3 writer and 3 artist guilds), so its a little bit tougher now. How much tougher?

Remember that with each successful steal we get kicked out of the city, so we do have to send our spy back in to a city again to start the process.
Travel Time: 2 turns (foreign City)
Setup Time: 3 turns (default)
Tech Difference: 4 (since we stole a tech before, lets assume the difference has dropped by 1).
Intelligence per Turn: 4 (however it will increase to 6 after 25 turns, because the spy will have gone to level 2).
Current Security: 30 (6 constabularies * 2 = 12, 3 writing guilds * 3 = 9, 3 artist guilds * 3 = 9. So 12 + 9 + 9 = 30.
Needed Intelligence: 2 * (100 + 30 - 10 * 4) = 180

Tech Steal: 39 turns
Total Time (Travel + Setup + Tech Steal): 44 turns
Its 47/50/54 turns for 3/2/1 tech differences respectively.
Spy XP: 66/100 (Level 2)

Example 3: The Power of Foreign Service (Statecraft)

Spoiler :

In this case, we have unlocked foreign service, which gives us 3 spies total on standard. Lets take our level 2 spy from Example 2 (at 66/100 xp). Now with all of these spies, we could spread them out to different civs, which is a good strategy if we are behind multiple civs in tech. However, if we are mainly behind the tech leader, its often better to focus our spies. Lets go for broke, and put all of our spies onto the tech leader! And this leader continues to lead, though we have gotten a couple of techs from them, they managed to add another one to the arsenal, so they are still ahead by 4 techs.

Primary Spy: Our lvl 2 spy will be our primary spy for this example
Travel Time: 2 turns (foreign city)
Setup time: 3 turns (default)
Tech Difference: 4
Intelligence per Turn: 6 Intelligence (from a level 2 primary spy) + 2 (from a level 1 spy) + 2 (from a level 1 spy) = 10 Intelligence per turn.
Current Security: 30 (as shown in example 2)
Needed Intelligence: 180 (from example 2)

Tech Steal: 18 turns
Total Time (Travel + Setup + Tech Steal): 23 turns
Spy XP: 84/100, 18/50, 18/50

for comparison: Had I spread all spies out (lets say to 3 civs with the same general security and 4,3,2 tech differences respectively), I would have stolen 1 tech in 35 turns, another tech in 55 turns, and the last one in 59 turns (so 3 techs over the course of ~60ish turns).

Example 4: Bring out the counterspies!

Spoiler :

(Continuing from Example 3) Alright, this enemy civ is just tired of being stolen from, and decides to add in a counterspy. Meanwhile, you have noticed yourself getting hit with spies, and decide to use one of your 3 spies as a counterspy. Remember you could put the counterspy in any of your city's to get its bonus.

Lets assume the enemy had an 18/50 spy just like you do to spare, and both of you decide to put in the spies and counterspies at the same time. Let the duel begin!

Travel Time: 2 turns (foreign City). However, the counterspy only needs 1 turn since its their own city.
Setup Time: 3 turns (standard)
Tech Difference: 4
Intelligence Per Turn: 6 Intelligence (from lvl 2 primary spy) + 2 (from a level 1 spy) = 8 Intelligence per turn.
Current Security: 40 (30 from teh constabularies, with +10 for the level 1 counterspy).
Needed Intelligence: 200

HOWEVER, counterspies gain xp very quickly. The enemy counterspy got settled 1 turn before we started, and gains 3 xp a turn. By the time my spies get close to their steal, the counterspy will be level 3! That's an extra +20 security, and so the Intelligence I need are actually 240.

Tech Steal: 38 turns
Total Time: (Travel + Setup + Tech Steal): 43 turns
Spy XP: DEAD (the primary spy is always killed if there is a counterspy), 54/100 (level 2), 100/100 (level 3, this is the counterspy I left in my capital to defend).

Alright so I stole a tech, but because of the enemy counterspy my spy paid the price and was killed. But having kept a counterspy of my own had an advantage, I now have a level 3 spy ready to go!

Example 5: Moving into the late game

Spoiler :

So lets look at a later game scenario. Now my enemy civ has a level 3 counterspy (maybe it starts at level 2 but will likely level before I steal)...and then constabularies, police stations, and military bases in all 10 of its cities (as well as all 9 guilds). I am close to the tech leader and trying to gain that final bit of ground, and I am at least popular with them in influence. With the NIA I have all level 2 spies now. I also have Covert action from Freedom lets say.

Travel Time: 1 turn (Foreign city, -1 for covert action).
Setup Time: 1 turn (Default, -1 for covert action, -1 for being popular with the civ)
Tech Difference: 3
Current Security: 107 (2 * 10 constabularies, 2 * 10 police stations, 1 * 10 military bases, 30 counterspy, 6 * 9 guilds)
Needed Intelligence: 2 * (100 + 107 - 10 * 3) = 354

Tech Steal (1 spy): 64 turns
Tech Steal (2 spy, 1 in cap, 1 in other city): 41 turns
Tech Steal (3 spy): 30 turns
Tech Steal (4 spy): 23 turns

Total Time: 66/40/30/24 turns (depending on using 1/2/3/4 spies respectively.)
For context, if I didn't have the counterspy present: 58/37/27/22 turns

Example 6: England Prevails!

Spoiler :

England being our special snowflake, lets see how she does in the very early game. Does she steal every tech in sight, is it barely worth using her spy to steal tech? Lets find out!

Travel Time: 2 turns (foreign city)
Setup Time: 3 turns (default)
Security: 75 (base 75 before renaissance)
Tech Difference: 5 (early game humans often tend to fall pretty far behind so lets see what that looks like).
Intelligence per Turn: (6, remember England starts with rank 2 spies).

Tech Steal: 42 turns
Total Time: 47 turns
For context, its 50/54/57/59 turns for 4/3/2/1 tech differences respectively.

EDIT History:

Spoiler :

Version 1.1

• Replaced Spy Points with Intelligence, due to spy points already being a game mechanic.
• Removed capital vs secondary city distinction, now all cities work the same.
  • Primary spy is highest XP spy in a civ, and now get the extra intelligence.
  • Counterspies always kill the primary spy regardless of which city they are in (or which city the counterspy is in).
• Spy points gained in a city are now reset if the spy leaves (preventing an exploit that allowed a user to remove a high level spy right before a tech steal to ensure that spy wasn't killed by a counterspy).

Version 1.2
Updated the CS Quest "Spy on Civ X times".

Version 1.3
Added some clarifications to teh CS Quest "Spy on Civ X times"

 

[Stalker0]

reserved for comments and other notes

 

[azum4roll]

The term "Spy Points" is already used to spawn spies.

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England player can (and should) time their spies to have 200 Spy Points at the start of Renaissance (if leading, less if not) so they waste the least amount of spy turns.

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Since Security is visible, you know exactly if there's a counterspy in the city or not, which means you should send a level 1 spy there to steal tech, only wasting 5 turns and no XP. Not much of a deterrent of using counterspies.

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Your Example 5 shows how little counterspies matter in the late game. Security keeps growing, so counterspy's impact on number of turns required is less.

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Counterspies leaving the city can either immediately make an impact (some spies have enough points to steal tech now), or none (all spies have low points). This is why I made counterspies affect points gained instead of points needed.

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It's entirely possible to have a tech tie with some player for some time, only to have them research a tech 1 turn faster than you. Your spy is then forced to steal that 1-turn tech, wasting all those Spy Points.
This is always a problem for any delayed missions.

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What's the point of multiplying everything by 2 in the Spy Points formula? Points gained per turn are already even numbers.

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Just a personal opinion, but I'll miss the tactical missions if this passes.

 

[Stalker0]

Version 1.1 up. I removed the capital vs secondary city distinction, as Azum had noted some exploits that can cause. This new version means that a person can have a diplomat in a civ and tech steal from them at the same time, promoting diplomats a bit more!

 

[Stalker0]

added in updates to the CS spy on civ x times quest.

 

[Rosete]

This is perfect. Sometimes simplicity is best.

 

[Arthur Jama]

Yeah, this system can easily be understood and further tweaked based on play test feedback.

Regarding empire size modifiers, you can find them in VP/Balance Changes/World Sizes; science and culture scale 5% for each owned city (non-puppet) for all map sizes. We could take the same value for empire wide security, reducing the value by 5% for each owned city.

Edit: I'm not sure how it works for science and culture, but for security it should be multiplicative and not additive. Otherwise you could end up with -100% security with 20 cities.

 

[Solic]

CS Quests

• Spy on a Civ X times Quest: Updated to be - "Steal a technology from this civilization". There will only be 1 tech required in all cases (no more variance).

This might be a no-brainer, but maybe this should have some logic to ensure that there is a technology to steal. Either don't give the quest for any civilizations that don't have any technology you can steal or only give out this quest for like the top 50% technology leaders in the game. This quest will be very frustrating if given out for a civilization that you couldn't even steal from if you wanted to. Potentially also nicer if you wouldn't be given this quest for civs you are friendly with, so you're not "forced" to spy on friends and make them your enemies.

 

[Stalker0]

This might be a no-brainer, but maybe this should have some logic to ensure that there is a technology to steal. Either don't give the quest for any civilizations that don't have any technology you can steal or only give out this quest for like the top 50% technology leaders in the game. This quest will be very frustrating if given out for a civilization that you couldn't even steal from if you wanted to. Potentially also nicer if you wouldn't be given this quest for civs you are friendly with, so you're not "forced" to spy on friends and make them your enemies.

the first one seems reasonable (and I've made the update). for the second I don't agree, sometimes CS quests drive tension and that's part of teh fun. Take the denounce quest, it can be a really nice benefit but it ratches up tensions, that's part of what keeps diplomacy dynamic.

 

[azum4roll]

The quest already can't be targeting friends.

 

[Solic]

I'd say that it also shouldn't depend on the total number of technologies, but on the number of technologies you could potentially steal. You can have 2 civs both be at 50 techs for instance, but if one went the top part of the tree and the other the bottom part of the tree, I don't see a reason why they would not be able to get this quest for each other.

 

[Stalker0]

I'd say that it also shouldn't depend on the total number of technologies, but on the number of technologies you could potentially steal.

this was my intention, I've updated the language slightly to make this clearer.

 

[axatin]

I sponsor this.