AI destroying completed Spaceship parts

[50_dollar_bag]

Is this supposed to happen?
I've had several SS parts destroyed after they've been completed.
I could understand if it was detroyed in the capital or the city it was built in but it happened in a city which I'd only just accepted into my empire through a culture flip and as such was still building infrastructure.
Bug or not?

 

[Desert-Fox]

For me it is also strange... because these are projects not buildings and thre should be top security guarding it... once I lost 2 parts in one turn... even I had more EP with every rival.

 

[ori]

could you post saves? preferably after AND before it happened?

 

[r_rolo1]

Did your capitol received nuclear strikes? I've seen some posts claiming that repeated nuking of capitol makes SS parts to be destroyed ( can't comfirm that )

 

[50_dollar_bag]

Unfortunately I lost the auto save coz I started another game. Although I think I may have a save somewhere.

@ r_rolo1. No there were no nukes flying. It was a very strange game I drew Mansa randomly and had a few floodplains and Marble nearby, Willem was my neighbour to the left, he shared Judaism and built the AP and spread Judaism to my cities for me. To my right was Qin and Darius but for some reason they hit a bottle neck with settling due to a 1 tile isthmus and left a whole swath of land unsettled to the right which was nice juicy river grassland.

So I had a huge amount of land and I only killed 1 AI unit, I was in a phony war with Darius for a while because I wanted mutual war points with Justinian. And darius must have bribed Qin, but that war only lasted 1 turn because of the AP . I was in control throughout the whole game and snagged every wonder of the Renaissance age and beyond plus a nice horde of earlier wonders. My easiest Emperor game ever

 

[Desert-Fox]

I think there is no need to save... play several games for SS victory and you see that some SS components will be destroyed by spies.

 

[Bhruic]

Well, nothing personal, but that's a pretty silly thing to say. I haven't had a game hit the SS component era in 3.13. I usually wrap up my games well before that. And since I can't diagnose a bug without an example of that bug, that means that having a save is pretty valuable.

Bh

 

[dcbandicoot]

It's happened to me as well. I will upload a save soon if no one else does, just figured I'd point it out... I'd do it now but I have a meeting to get to.

 

[Roland Johansen]

I think this is working as intended. Space ship parts can be destroyed and since they are projects, they don't have a base city and can be destroyed anywhere in your empire. It changes the space ship race into an espionage struggle too.

It's pretty expensive to destroy space ship parts, so at least you know that it costed a lot to your competitors in the space race. You can use it too if you might lose the space race.

 

[50_dollar_bag]

The problem I have with it is the Espionage cost in newly captured/built cities is much less than an established city with a Security Bureau. In my case the part was destroyed in a recently acquired city from a culture flip. If the part was built there then fair enough, but it wasn't therefore why should the part be able to destroy it in that city and not the city it was built in.
IMO it parts should only be able to be destryoed in the city it was built in, the capital or maybe the Apollo program city.

And I forgot to bring save again, sorry.

 

[Roland Johansen]

In the real world, spies will use the weakest link to infiltrate into certain top secret parts of another country. A newly acquired city is such a symbolic weakest link.

The whole implementation of espionage in civilisation is symbolic and not a 1-to-1 correspondence to reality. You could write a whole new game about espionage and then there would still be elements that would be unrealistic.

The space ship is a project and as such it has no home city. So it doesn't matter in which city the opponents spy is, it can destroy it. It will of course pick the weakest link (if the AI is programmed correctly).

You could argue that the cost to destroy a space ship part and the chance to do so successfully should be dependent on the lowest security level within your civilisation as that will be the point where spies will infiltrate in real life. So in whatever city the spy infiltrates, it should face the lowest counter espionage level within your civilisation. The programmers didn't do that, but just programmed the AI to find this weakest link, the weakest city itself.

You could also argue that the space ship project realistically has increased security levels because that is something you would do in real life. This is also already implemented in the game. Any sabotage on a project has a significantly increased chance to fail compared to sabotaging a tile improvement, sabotaging a normal construction or poisoning the water supply.

Placing a spy in the weakest links in your civilisation, the cities without a security bureau is a good idea. It will significantly increase the chance of capturing the enemy spy that tries to sabotage the project.
Running a counterespionage mission against the likely terrorist nation is also a great way to increase the chance to capture the enemy spy.

Of course, there is always a chance that the enemy spy will circumvent your security measures. Who know, the enemy nation could have employed James Bond.

 

[50_dollar_bag]

I don't think a newly acquired city should be a gateway into sabotaging Spaceship parts especially if they have no part in the construction of the spaceship.

Also if what you are suggesting about how projects are treated, then should it also be possible to sabotage a part under construction anywhere in your empire from the weakest link?

I have no problem with the parts being destroyed, I kind of like it. Just the arbitrary point of entry.

 

[Roland Johansen]

I don't think a newly acquired city should be a gateway into sabotaging Spaceship parts especially if they have no part in the construction of the spaceship.

Also if what you are suggesting about how projects are treated, then should it also be possible to sabotage a part under construction anywhere in your empire from the weakest link?

I have no problem with the parts being destroyed, I kind of like it. Just the arbitrary point of entry.

Ok, I can imagine that you don't like it. You would probably prefer a system where the space ship was treated as a building with a fixed location (one of your cities). In that case, the building could also only be destroyed in the city that creates it and has it in its list of buildings. It would of course look a bit weird in the present game to have a space ship engine in the list of buildings.

I think the present system is more realistic because a project like the space ship in the real world also isn't something that is constructed in a single city. Even parts as big as the engine or the electronics or software aren't constructed in a single city.

I consider the spy system as a very abstract representation of real world spying. A newly acquired city is the (symbolic) weak link in the spy defence and allows a foreign spy a point of entry to infiltrate into the higher ranks of the space race construction project. Even if the city in question isn't the major centre of space ship construction, it could still be an entry point for the spy.

I don't mind infiltration into a project from various cities, but I can imagine that you don't like it. And it is of course annoying to lose a major space race part. Although, it's fun to do it to your main competitor. Are you going to pick his main construction city or a weak border city without a security bureau and which is partly your culture and has your state religion instead of his (all things that reduce the cost)?
(ok, I know, not fair, if they can do it to you, then you can do it to them)

 

[ori]

Just a thought - the space ship IS tied to one city (your capital) once it is off into space - you can destroy it by capturing that city, so why not treat the not yet finished space ship like it?
OTOH knowing that spies can do this would just lead me to spam spies in cities that don't build space parts and distributing them around my land to catch those spies - and I do agree with Roland Johansen that if they can do it I should not hold back

 

[50_dollar_bag]

Once the part is completed it is a physical entity, so it has to be located somewhere, and logic would suggest the capital as that's where it launches from.

I never thought of it as a empire-wide project. I see it as a city building one part at any one time. Not several cities helping to build the same SS life support. They're building different parts of the same Spaceship which eventually end up in the capital (and hopefully don't travel via my border cities or new conquests )

I suppose it just my interpretation.


Kind of works like the influence civics mission. A newly acquired size 1 city can bring you city into anarchy

 

[Roland Johansen]

If I had designed the spaceship victory for BTS (and had thought it through), then I wouldn't have made it a project. I would have made a special type of building build in several parts of your empire and then assembled in the city of your choise. The destroy production mission could then destroy a part in the city where it is being constructed. And a special mission against the space ship would be available at the assembly site and would also only destroy one of the parts of the space ship.

Since the space ship victory wasn't changed and it is still a project, I don't mind that it can be destroyed in every city. Maybe not perfect, but it is logical given that it is a project.

What would be the security level of the space ship in my hypothetical new space ship victory? I guess slightly higher than normal security level (slightly higher chance to capture a spy). In real life security is a lot higher, but a space ship is also a high tech construction which can thus be sabotaged more easily.

 

[50_dollar_bag]

Here's a save if anybody is interested.
Maastricht should lose the SS cockpit in the IBT

 

[Cowabunga]

I have a real problem with the current concept. The Romans sabotaged my spaceship cockpit, one turn before I finished my last spaceship part. Not only did that prevent the launch of spaceship, but because the cockpit had already been built, and the ship only required one cockpit, I could not rebuild the cockpit in any city! This totally denied me the ability to win by spaceship victory, and I don't think that was the intent of the game.

If you want to prevent a civ from EVER winning a spaceship victory, just destroy a cockpit, or some other single part. They will never be able to rebuild it.

V/r

Cowabunga

 

[KMadCandy]

Cowabunga -

did you hit enter? i just downloaded 50_dollar_bag's save where a previously-built cockpit is destroyed in maastricht, i'm able to start a new cockpit the next turn. there are still two other parts to go, tho.

if you still can't build it even the next turn, it must be because your whole ship was done, in the computer's mind, since the cockpit was destroyed the turn before the last part was built? i'd TOTALLY agree that's not savvy use of espionage, that's a game-breaking bug. do you have a save that Bhruic can look at?

 

[PieceOfMind]

Cowabunga and KMad,
Perhaps a team mate / ally / vassal was building it? Since it's a team project doesn't that now make it impossible to build yourself? - ie. you will need to wait for the team mate to finish it.