Going for Gold: Espionage System

[Stalker0]

Going for Gold: These threads are designed to lock down elements of the mod for the gold release. In other words, if approved, no further changes are expected for this item.

This thread will debate the Espionage System.

The question is: Is this item in a reasonable state of balance?

Important Notes:

1) There is no such thing as perfect balance.
2) The key is that each element is strong enough to have a niche, even if that niche is for very specific playstyles.
3) If you vote no in the poll, please comment on the elements you think are in an unreasonable state of balance.
4) If you vote yes, there is really no need to comment. The poll is the key note.

 

[CppMaster]

I find sending spies as thieves is very weak compared to other actions. I steal GWs very rarely despite sending them to several cities.

 

[Recursive]

I really dislike that Advanced Actions make your Spy lose view of the enemy's city screen, since you can't control them and it might be more useful to know what the enemy's up to (e.g. building a Wonder you're also building) than to assassinate a Great Merchant.

I'd say it's reasonably balanced, but that particular snag bothers me. By chance is it possible to maintain surveillance without stealing techs?

 

[Moi Magnus]

The main problem with current system is that there is not a lot of info we have access to.
The way spies work is quite opaque and arbitrary, and we are really missing a infoaddict-like mod to show all the variables for spying.
In current version, I can just says that "I don't like the spying system", but I don't really have any constructive criticism.

In fact, to be fair, with Gazebo's event system, I would even consider droping all the advanced actions and great work stealing and move them to events enabled by spies. But that would be a lot of work...

 

[bigcat88]

I think late game(Modern+ era) spies are unbalanced at all. And currently there are very strange % of coup chance in some CS(2-4%).

 

[John.B.C]

I think spys in city-states at least should have the ability to see the i fluence of other nations and also be able to see who's in the lead in diffrent quests. But that is perhaps disadvantegous to the ai, since a human might exploit this by allying the city state and then to declare war against the leader. Like i did in my current game (only through having a pretty good idea of whom it might be) and thus i won the culture quest twice giving me 8 happiness.but if the ai could do the same... That would be cool.

 

[Psikus]

I tend to play with spies disabled, because I don't really enjoy the whole system. I was wondering if some game elements could be rebalanced when playing with this option. I'm mostly fine with constabularies as pure happiness buildings, and I don't need to play Elizabeth, but the Statecraft tree really suffers without spies, particularly the Shadow Networks policy.

 

[Recursive]

I do wish spies gave access to more information, I agree with Moi Magnus's assessment on that. The current system is opaque and...while it's balanced, I don't feel it's very fun.

However, changing it may be prohibitively difficult. I'm not sure, nor would I know how to improve it.

 

[Enginseer]

In fact, to be fair, with Gazebo's event system, I would even consider droping all the advanced actions and great work stealing and move them to events enabled by spies. But that would be a lot of work...

Not necessarily. Just stealing Great Works might be the difficult part event-wise, but everything else about the spy system is event-doable.

 

[Gazebo]

Not necessarily. Just stealing Great Works might be the difficult part event-wise, but everything else about the spy system is event-doable.

It wouldn't be any more or less random than the current system, however.

G

 

[Stalker0]

It wouldn't be any more or less random than the current system, however.

G

I think what he meant was you could then turn off great works stealing by turning off events.

My own general thoughts on spying.

1) Tech Stealing has gotten better with recent updates. I don't feel that I steal techs quite as fast in Renaissance like I used, but I feel that I can still steal once in a while in the later game.
2) CS involvement could use some work. I don't feel that the influence boost for having a spy in a CS is that great. Coups seem to take a lot of effort to get the percentage up, and it always seems extremely binary (either I'm max chance or like 5%).
3) I personally hate the advanced actions/great works stealing. I don't find them interesting or fun, I think its just another weird RNG factor that doesn't really add any strategic planning to the game.

My general take is that the spy system was really meant for one thing....to provide a "realistic" rubber band mechanic for lower science civs to catch up to their super science breathren. And the system does that job. Everything else added tries to make spying something "cooler" and "more involved". But....it doesn't work. You need the rubber band, and spies do the job. And....that's enough. Not everything in the game has to be strategic and involved.

 

[kawyua]

Has anyone been trying to send spies as diplomats first to level up? I've been feeling like they are much faster at leveling as a diplomat. At quick speed I got a level 1 spy to level 3 in just a couple of turns somehow. I'm not exactly sure what's going on though lol.

 

[wobuffet]

Has anyone been trying to send spies as diplomats first to level up? I've been feeling like they are much faster at leveling as a diplomat. At quick speed I got a level 1 spy to level 3 in just a couple of turns somehow. I'm not exactly sure what's going on though lol.

I like the idea of diplomats leveling up quicker than spies.
If this is already true, should be documented better. If not, I like it and would support a change.

 

[Txurce]

I like the idea of diplomats leveling up quicker than spies.
If this is already true, should be documented better. If not, I like it and would support a change.

They speed up much faster. I recently got off my ass and began doing it, rather than just trying to defend my tech lead with a rookie spy in the capital. You wind up with three chevrons in no time, and then you have an absolute hunter-killer at home.

Now if you're behind in tech... I think you're better off spying asap, and hoping you didn't pick a civ that already has crazy protection. Don't be lazy, and rotate your spy out of a capital where you're wating 45 turns, and hope to find one with better odds.

What i have never done is send a fully-romoted spy out to spy at an AI capital. My gut says that at that point, their defenses will overcome my prowess. But guts exist only to humble you.

 

[ElliotS]

I think what he meant was you could then turn off great works stealing by turning off events.

My own general thoughts on spying.

1) Tech Stealing has gotten better with recent updates. I don't feel that I steal techs quite as fast in Renaissance like I used, but I feel that I can still steal once in a while in the later game.
2) CS involvement could use some work. I don't feel that the influence boost for having a spy in a CS is that great. Coups seem to take a lot of effort to get the percentage up, and it always seems extremely binary (either I'm max chance or like 5%).
3) I personally hate the advanced actions/great works stealing. I don't find them interesting or fun, I think its just another weird RNG factor that doesn't really add any strategic planning to the game.

My general take is that the spy system was really meant for one thing....to provide a "realistic" rubber band mechanic for lower science civs to catch up to their super science breathren. And the system does that job. Everything else added tries to make spying something "cooler" and "more involved". But....it doesn't work. You need the rubber band, and spies do the job. And....that's enough. Not everything in the game has to be strategic and involved.

I disagree with 3. I like advanced actions and great works stealing. I use great works stealing somewhat often, especially when I see an AI built a wonder in a city other than it's capital. (Parthenon comes to mind.)

Advanced actions add value to Mandirs and other buildings that stop them. Now that Gazebo has made the attempt wasted if stopped it's actually an interesting part of gameplay. I do feel like the chance of getting killed on advanced actions is too low though.

 

[Paramecium]

The only problem I have is that you have no influence on your spies what kind of advanced actions they will perform. From the immersion point of view, spies would follow instructions/orders so if you could at least tell them in what kind of direction it would go, it would be fine. But I think the problem is the code, civ 5 only ever proposed two options for spies and I suppose it is hard coded. It would be just better to tell your spies, if they should assassinate in general or steal in general, depending on your situation (like being short on money or another civ is running away with culture and gps). But that are just dreamy wishes.

 

[Enginseer]

I believe there are some buildings that encourage spies to do a certain type of action, but I forgot which.

 

[Omen of Peace]

I seem to remember The Motherland Calls, the wonder for the Order ideology, is among those.

 

[Mad Madigan]

It would be nice if when a Spy was ready to perform an advanced action you got an event box with a list of valid options for what they should do rather than it being entirely random, but otherwise I really have no complaints about the current Spy system. Actually, I can agree with Coups being a bit wonky in recent versions as it feels like they either have 1-5% chance of succeeding (as shown by the UI) or a 90%+ chance of succeeding. I wish the % chance gravitated more towards 50% instead of all or nothing.

 

[grmagne]

It would be nice if when a Spy was ready to perform an advanced action you got an event box with a list of valid options for what they should do rather than it being entirely random, but otherwise I really have no complaints about the current Spy system. Actually, I can agree with Coups being a bit wonky in recent versions as it feels like they either have 1-5% chance of succeeding (as shown by the UI) or a 90%+ chance of succeeding. I wish the % chance gravitated more towards 50% instead of all or nothing.

I would prefer it to gravitate to maybe 10-20%. A CS Ally is way more valuable than the life of a spy so it should be a high-risk/high-reward gamble that fails more often than not.

In my current game as Poland in the Industrial/Modern era I've lost every single CS ally to Greece by coup. He's already got the UA + Statecraft. Getting all these coups too is just ridiculous.