Fabricate Scandal - Holy #

[Victoria]

I have had a little play around with Fabricate Scandal as Catherine. Its pretty OP.
The main factor against it is the deault time to completion is 16 turns but you should be running Machievellianism and have the Linguist promotion which make this drop to 8 turns.
So I have a master spy which does not have the fabricate scandal promotion. He is level 4 with a quatermaster at home and of course the intelligence agency in place so gets the typical 90% chance fo success. If he had +2 promotion as well that would remove up to 8 envoys from each CIV... crickey!
I have run 5 scandals so far and none have failed, I will update when I know what happens at failure.
This is the effect using a Master spy.
So it looks like additional levels from intelligence agency and quatermaster add to the reduction and you cannot reduce below 2
You also cannot counterspy in a CS

Before

After

It looks like the default for a level 1 spy is for this task is 37% / 26% / 37% killed
With Intelligence agency this is 50% and so on and of course no counterspies to worry about.
You can really make mincemeat of CS envoys with this mastyer spy and 8 turns. Mixed with Kilwa this is a super OP option.
Of course the CS have to abe alive for this as an option. My experience is very few are removed a prince, a few at Emperor and pretty much most of them at higher levels.

... Catherine gets these early and with the extra intelligence agency spy she is sooo strong early. Looking at what the other civs are doing with spies... This is all there is in the espionage.csv log so far
I'll play for a while and see if they start doing this themselves.

EDIT:Looks like standard escape sequence for Fabricate scandal indicating normal spy detection mechanics as expected and the impact of failure is similar althjough I have no idea how you get a captured spy back from a CS

 

[Inlex]

I have to say, espionage feels a lot more powerful, interesting and relevant since R&F. I haven't used the fabricate scandal yet, but as Cree, I did steal about 10 great works from my culture rival Pericles within about 40 turns with 2 spies. Having 90% success rate is quite insane. With these powerful effects, like removing dozens of envoys in a single blow, maybe it's becoming a bit too powerful. Especially since the envoys are basically murdered. Where you can at least attempt to steal the great works back.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Maybe they need to tweak success rates & mission times for Fabricate Scandal a little bit.....perhaps also add a "cool down" timer for using the same mission on the same city state.

Another possibility might be for Suzerains to be able to place spies in their own City-States, to Counter-spy.

 

[Aurelesk]

You can go from 16 turns to 4 turns with:

• The « Linguist » promotion (-25%)
• The « Machiavellianism » policy card (-25%)
• The « Master of Lie » golden age's dedication (-25%)

Fabricate Scandal is scary awesome: you can basicly stop all players. Not only to gain Suzerainety, but also gain massive Culture / Science from 3/6 Envoys. Are you sure you can't go below 2? Because I have to relocate a Spy because he can't do the mission because they no longer have enemy Envoys no more.

On "online speed", the Foment Trouble can go to 1 turn and do -35 Loyalty. So, your nearby enemy cities WILL fall (because you can't really have 35 Loyalty per turn, except by sloting a lot of Loyalty card).

 

[Disgustipated]

Is the AI using this spy operation? I completely forgot about this spy operation. I need to be using it.

 

[Victoria]

The « Master of Lie » golden age's dedication (-25%)

Thats a later Era, I am Catherine but good point. Later golden ages can be a challenge depending on the route taken to get there.

Is the AI using this spy operation?

As said above, no sign yet, look in your espionage.csv log files to see what they are doing and post... I do not have enough info from just the games I play, this is where everyone can help

 

[jbavon]

I've tried three times now. Once with a master spy and twice with an ordinary spy. They all got killed. I was starting to think that it's bugged but I guess I was just unlucky

 

[Cagarustus]

How do you use the Fabricate Scandal? I couldn't seem to find it when I had spies?

 

[Uberfrog]

How do you use the Fabricate Scandal? I couldn't seem to find it when I had spies?

They need to be stationed in a City State.

 

[Victoria]

I've tried three times now. Once with a master spy and twice with an ordinary spy. They all got killed. I was starting to think that it's bugged but I guess I was just unlucky

The master spy you were unlucky with ... The other two you were not. I have been looking into spies and a 50 % rate is not that simple. Yes 50% of the time you will create a scandal but about 70% of the times you get captured or killed doing so. You may have even succeeded but got killed ... if you did not check the texts enough it looks like you failed because your spy dies but they did in fact succeed.

 

[thecrazyscot]

That's quite a nice little buff for Catherine. The more robust espionage gets the better her ability becomes.

 

[Tech Osen]

Are you sure the envoys are permanently gone? Maybe they are just disabled for 10 turns like governors?

 

[Uberfrog]

Are you sure the envoys are permanently gone? Maybe they are just disabled for 10 turns like governors?

They are dead and gone, just like if the CS is conquered. It's designed to flip the balance of power, not be a temporary disruption, just like the Coup mission in Civ V

 

[jbavon]

The master spy you were unlucky with ... The other two you were not. I have been looking into spies and a 50 % rate is not that simple. Yes 50% of the time you will create a scandal but about 70% of the times you get captured or killed doing so. You may have even succeeded but got killed ... if you did not check the texts enough it looks like you failed because your spy dies but they did in fact succeed.

The success rates were in the 70 % range for the untrained spies. The master spy was 90 % iirc. None succeeded despite of death. So complete failures. Must have been unlucky.

 

[Victoria]

None succeeded despite of death. So complete failures. Must have been unlucky.

90/7/3 has roughly a 2% death rate
74/21/5 has roughly a 10% death rate

I do know from testing that the death rate for 50/34/16 is in fact 20%. A lot higher than the figures lead to expect.

So certainly unlucky but less unlucky that many people think. And if they had a spy or a card in play your odds plummet but naturally you are not advised of this.

 

[jbavon]

I did not know that CS also get policy cards.

 

[Timodelphia]

Another possibility might be for Suzerains to be able to place spies in their own City-States, to Counter-spy.

This ^^^

 

[Victoria]

I did not know that CS also get policy cards.

Yes they do!
I have not looked at the log too much but the Civs 'slot' cards like we do but the CS seems to just get a lump and seems to jump the era gap playing catch up.
I really need to look at it more... so much to do and limited data
I someone had a good 12 hour session without shutting down and provided the zipped log files it really helps in understanding.Every time you shut down the log files are zeroed out.

That's quite a nice little buff for Catherine. The more robust espionage gets the better her ability becomes.

Do not forget her +3 combat against all civs which goes to +6 with a gather info mission.
And with a couple of extra good wonders and better adjacency with culture the game I am currently playing is quite nice.

Are you sure the envoys are permanently gone? Maybe they are just disabled for 10 turns like governors?

Fairly sure but there is no log of civ stored envoys. There is a log of when they use them where and I can look at that over a long period to identify re-use (A higher allocation rate) It just takes time.

 

[Karpius]

@Victoria

I typically leave my game on even when I am not there (which greatly inflates my "hours played" on Steam) but I only get a few hours a night to play. If I gathered a couple days worth, would that help?

Do you have a certain game you would like me to play to facilitate your data gathering?

Of course, you will have to give me good instruction on how to get all relevant info to you because, well, I'm sorta 'iggerant' with this stuff.

But I'm happy to help if I can!

 

[Victoria]

I'm sorta 'iggerant' with this stuff.

Dislike that word, you just have no need of these items, so no requirement to pursue knowledge in that area.

So under my documents\games there will be a civ folder with whatever firaxis games you have installed. In the civilization VI folder will be a log folder. Just shut down civ so the files are not in use, then right click and zip or however you want to zip em. The whole log folder.

Now it does not matter about the game too much although it should be standard speed, standard rules.
It would be nice if it was just one game and try not to replay too many moves as it gets a little confusing and just takes longer.
Now I would like to see things like long term spy use and envoy placement (so the longer the game the better) but if there was something you want me to look at I can as a thank you. Perhaps track the cards a certain civ used? Or give some graphs on your game like you could in Civ V?
The zip will be tiny so probably could post here but happy to get from dropbox or whatever.