Investing time and taxes on espionage

[sakhmet]

Hello

Thank you all for a great forum.

To my question.
I'm playing on monarch, where I've cleared all type of wins now. But I still need some more experience to advance to the next difficulty.
One of my problems is espionage. I don't seem to use it optimally.

I'm familiar with using spys in my border citys and when I'm invading another civilisation. But that's about it. I don't really enjoy using spys - I guess that's because I use them too little.
Do you guys heavily send spys to other civs, just to wreak limited havoc - improvements, arbitrary sickness and revolt? Or do you use them, as I, only during wartime?
One more thing. I the lategame I've noticed the last couple of games that the AI is stealing my techs! And by "junos C***" that makes me mad. Im guessing it's a necessaty to rise your esp-bar to at least 10-20% later in the game? Maybe use specialts and the two espionage buildings? How to get around it?

Kind regards

Jeppe

 

[Iranon]

Espionage is a decent alternative to science if you aren't trying to get ahead... after all, stealing is cheaper, and while spies are a little fiddly, they also allow streamlining your diplomacy (without feeding everyone gifts) and relevant in war if you plan around it.

I rarely just harass my opponents with them; if I'm taking soemone down the most likely uses are cutting them off a crucial resource (horses or oil) or revolts in cases where I planned the war for some time but want it over quickly.

I'd say you can safely ignore espionage, on any level... and I wouldn't touch the espionage slider under normal circumstances. If you consider espionage so important that you'd willingly divert commerce to it, spies and Great Spies beat the usual specialists by a comfortable margin.
So in the lategame, the slider is mostly the last option after building all available espionage buildings and running all available spies (limited by slots or food).

Because a big percentage will come from buildings, I regard an edge in espionage as a reward for large empires... doubly useful if you sacrificed some progress to grow so large in the first place.

 

[Charonicus]

I tend to leave it alone in terms of the slider, but I do use the espionage screen to change the weghting versus other civs so I have all their demographics and hopefully researches too.
It really comes into its own if you manage to get a great spy (Great Wall helps and I think there's something else that gives one). Using that to gain a huge EP boost on the tech leader gives you some nice tech stealing options.
As for accumalting late game points. I use the doemstic advisor to see if any cities are producing a good amount of EPs and then give those multiplier buildings like jails and security beaureus (sp?) mainly just to give me some defence against the AIs. If you watch a replay you'll usually see the AI start to increase its EP spending around 1700, or maybe that's just me.

 

[Bushface]

First one to Communism gets a Great Spy.
With jails, security bureaux and intelligence agencies, you shouldn't need to use the espionage slider at all to get a good EP lead over the opposition. Run regular counterespionage missions (which are cheap and 100% successful) to make their efforts much more expensive. None the less, things can get tricky when you have a dozen or so civs against you and they're all concentrating their espionage on you, so you have to try to distribute your EPs more or less equally between them.
The "AI EP boost around 1700 AD" is simply due to their starting to build SecBus when they become available. This can be a lot earlier than 1700, I have noticed.

 

[jenie]

personally i keep the slider at 20 % and at least 1 spy in every city....

 

[Hardin]

Spies can be very useful when using them to pillage resources. It can crucial to winning a war or at least making it much easier.

 

[kingnorxis]

Well I played my first game of BTS yesterday (finally bought it!) and tried out the new features, including espionage. I left the slider at 0 throughout the game, but built some espionage buildings (well the ones you want anyway, courthouse, jails) and popped an early great spy via great wall and the effects were pretty great in the late game. Because of my tech lead (playing on prince with no tech brokering - this feature in particularly screwed the AI i think, though it also could have been the raging barbarians and the 1500 year war waged between mali vs france and greece) my spies wreaked absolute havoc. Being able to perform simultaneous poison + discontent missions on all of France's 9 cities led to a strike --> easy invasion.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Espionage is a decent alternative to science if you aren't trying to get ahead... after all, stealing is cheaper, and while spies are a little fiddly, they also allow streamlining your diplomacy (without feeding everyone gifts) and relevant in war if you plan around it.

I rarely just harass my opponents with them; if I'm taking soemone down the most likely uses are cutting them off a crucial resource (horses or oil) or revolts in cases where I planned the war for some time but want it over quickly.

I'd say you can safely ignore espionage, on any level... and I wouldn't touch the espionage slider under normal circumstances. If you consider espionage so important that you'd willingly divert commerce to it, spies and Great Spies beat the usual specialists by a comfortable margin.
So in the lategame, the slider is mostly the last option after building all available espionage buildings and running all available spies (limited by slots or food).

Because a big percentage will come from buildings, I regard an edge in espionage as a reward for large empires... doubly useful if you sacrificed some progress to grow so large in the first place.

The one time I tend to put heavy slider % into EP is during a renaissance war, and especially so when using cuirassers or cavalry. It's amazing how fast these can be, but as you pointed out once you have the land EP comes mostly from buildings after that.

Some people have run dedicated EP only games and I'm not too familiar with it yet, but maybe I'll give it a try at some point.

 

[CoZe]

Being able to perform simultaneous poison + discontent missions on all of France's 9 cities led to a strike --> easy invasion.

that's awesome. I tried this once too, but didn't suceed, always some of the spies failed. Spies are so effective though the poison mission is dwarfed in BTS (it gave -24 pollution in the original AFAIR, now it gives -8, or was it 3.17 patch ?)

 

[GooglyBoogly]

personally i keep the slider at 20 % and at least 1 spy in every city....

Having multiple spies on one tile to counter-espionage serves no purpose. Once a tile has either a single spy or a security bureau it gets a boost, but no further bonus from any additional spies

 

[jenie]

well that being said....if i keep 3 spies in 1 city that is close to a someone i am at war with....then i can use all 3 spies rather quickly help bring them to their knees

 

[Bushface]

Spies can be a blessing if you have enough of them or an absolute curse if it's your rivals who have them in vast quantities. I have just managed to scrape a Space win against 10 rivals, of whom 7 allocated every one of their EPs against me and sent hordes of spies to do me what damage they could: in one turn, I caught three spies of known origin, two of unknown, and had two cities poisoned despite their SecBus. Worst of the lot was Pericles, who crops up in far too many of my games and always hates me; it was 28 tiles from my nearest border to his, which means it took my spies ages to get at him if they didn't get stumbled upon on their way, partly across his vassal's land. And of course my successful spies flashed back to my capital, two further turns away from the border.

 

[SJN]

A quick way to get an early EP lead is to do the Oracle->CoL slingshot. You'll have courthouses way sooner than anyone else. Those courthouses will reduce maintenance and give you some great EP production. I usually have an early EP lead, but I haven't yet learned to use it effectively.

-- SJN

 

[Breunor]

I'm not a huge espionage user, but it can be a very powerful tool under the correct circumstances.

It is important to understand that the game design was built that in general, it is 'cheaper' to produce beakers and research a tech than build espionage and steal it. However, like everything in Civ IV, this isn't always true .....

Espionage is especially powerful, like science research, if you use multipliers and especially specialists. Specialists produce a LOT of espionage. Now, say you build the great wall and you wind up with a few Great Spys. If you either settle one and build a Scotland Yard, or infiltrate, you can generate a tremendous number of espionage points and you will find that stealing techs is easier than building them!

A lot of people forget that failed spy missions do NOT use up the spy points, so keep at it.

Also, like many things in CivIV, it pays to concentrate. Just like we have 'science cities', espionage is about multipliers. Get a Scotland Yard and consider having your specialists as spys, have a courthouse, jail, and the two security buildings and you get espionage out the wazoo.


You also can do a lot more than 'just' steal techs. Even without a lot of espionage points, spys are good for (surprise!) intelligence. If you don't have open borders they are great for just looking around and seeing where everything is.

They also have a lot of nice other functions. One powerful function is that they can throw a city into revolt; this can be terrific if used conjunction with artillery. That is, if you need to attack with your artillery and take down the enemy army, and you don't have a lot left to besiege cities, the spy can throw the enemy city into revolt (which negates defensive bonuses) and then you can attack. Indeed, if the defense is 'expecting' you to take time to bombard the defenses, having the spies throw the city into revolt and attacking with the artillery can be a powerful combo. Unfortunately, this often takes quite a few spies to use at its best.

Another powerful function (maybe even too powerful) is to have the enemy CIV switch civics. This can be crippling, usually forcing them into anarchy to reverse the damage. Obviously this is less useful against a spiritual leader.

I often find that I have espionage points from courthouses and the like that I'm not using very wisely. This is a mistake. If you don't have the aggressive use of espionage as a goal, then counter-espionage is recommended.

Espionage has two features that make it different from other mechanics. With the exception of privateers, it is the only way to directly damage another civilization without being at war. Second, spending points on espionage differs from spending on research because espionage is 'targeted' at a Civ; its effectiveness is opponent specific.

You can certainly win without it, but like many features in Civ IV, it opens up some new strategies.

I admit, though, I rarely use it to its potential.

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[sakhmet]

Thank you for some great input.

In the future, I'll be more careful to build the necessary esp-buildings. But I will never be the big spy-lover. It's simply not as fun as tanks!

 

[Ericino]

I never touch the slider, but I do try to have spies in all my cities for counter-espionage purposes. Sending out spies for counter-espionage is also quite effective IMO.
Also, you can use them to get goodies which are guarded by barbarians if you lack the military to conquer that square!
Right now I am using spies to piss off my Vassal to convince him to renounce me so I can kill him, not sure if that is an effective method though.

As Breunor said, Spies are great for sabotaging enemies in all kinds of ways (City Walls begone!) and they add an interesting dimension to the game

 

[Yxklyx]

I never touch the slider, but I do try to have spies in all my cities for counter-espionage purposes. ...

When people say "spies in a city" do they mean a Spy specialist or a Spy unit? Is there a difference?

 

[Ghpstage]

When people say "spies in a city" do they mean a Spy specialist or a Spy unit? Is there a difference?

If a spy unit is in your city, it increases chances of enemy spies being caught by the same amount as a security Bureau.
However only 1 spy can have this effect, stacking doesn't help nor does a spy help if the city alread has a security bureau.

Another interesting bit is that with spiritual you can cause absolute havoc on an enemy civ, swap to any civic that will be the most useless to your enemy then swap the enemies, obviously better if you can do this to multiple civics at once, the anarchy can get huge so it makes a great opportunity to attack or just slow a civ down for extended periods.

Don't underestimate influence religion either, it can be a very powerful diplomatic tool nothing else in Civ 4 can alter the balance of diplomacy quite so enormously. Great for getting most people who won't to start trading with you while zealots like Monty and Izzie may be convinced to go to war for you. While they will usually swap back the turn after one turn shared religion can make a big difference if you plan it out well.

Has anyone ever moved they're capital for espionage reasons before? I mean to reduce distance costs and spy move times.
Also does Versailles reduce distance costs? (I know the FP doesn't)

 

[pfo]

If I can get the great wall, I strongly consider investing in espionage for the rest of the game. Rush to code of laws to get courthouses (and additionally, confucianism). Build them in all your cities. Then rush to engineering for castles to bump that espionage a bit. Then rush to liberalism to try to rush to representation and democracy. Build the espionage buildings you get from those techs. If you're the first to do this, you can probably leave espionage slider at 0% and still see everyone's cities. If you're getting hit by spies and you notice other civs lands start to light up with visibility, it's a good bet that civ is the one spying on you (because they are spending espionage) and you can also bet they will try to attack you soon, and you've got visibility on their cities. I've never really tried tech stealing with espionage, I usually have a good science thing going, be it specialists or cottages (or religion). I like having the visibility, I use espionage for that primarily and for supporting city revolts when invading.

 

[scyt4l3]

Knowing is half the battle, I want to know everything.