On Sun Tzu...

[MenanderI]

If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.
Sun Tzu

One of my biggest issues with the Civ Franchise that has always irked my is the lack of any strategic depth to the gameplay with regards intelligence operations beyond the sight of a spy or unit.

The way I can see a positive change to the current system is having buildings and units that improve both global and regional intel. I will divide this system into three separate suggestions.

1. Barbarian hordes, this may not seem pertinent to intelligence but it is if you bear with me. Barbarians now function as a group of units clustered around a warlord who leads them. The horde will occasionally attack cities and city states in an attempt to plunder tiles, capture civilians, and ransom cities. The horde can be forced to retreat after it takes significant losses and retreats or the warlord is killed, eliminating the horde's ability to spawn new units to replace lost ones. This may seem overpowered but they can be bribed away, given a city to settle (as a city state) in in exchange for peace, or be spotted coming from far away using intelligence.

2. Global intelligence can be acquired through buildings, wonders, and policies. Global intel will give a player a chance every turn of being alerted to the plots of Barbarian Hordes, where and when they intend to attack and the size of the force. Also global intel gives players a chance of relieving the locations and numbers of other civs armies, though civs can build things that lessen the chance of this happening. For example, a certain building might give one play a +5% chance per turn of unveiling a unit in enemy territory or another might lesson enemies chances by -5% of peering in. Spies may effect this as well perhaps.

3. Regional/unit intelligence; units like spec ops and spy planes. In addtion to units with wide lines of sights, certain very weak land and naval units that can enter other civ territory without open boarders and peruse about without fear of detection. The invisibility will be unveiled if another player moves another recon unit to an adjacent tile. If a player were to catch an operative in his/her/(insert appropriate terms) country they now have three options.
a. kill it with a large negative opinion as a result. (both parties unhappy)
b. kick it out (the spying party has no opinion change but victim feels slightly unhappy)
c. declare war over it (victim of spying declares war over the incident)

Also spy planes and other forms of units as well. Open to suggestions on how these work.

these are all simply suggestions and I invite everyone to shoot it full of holes or add too it. Thank you.
Menander I

 

[ChequeMate]

After lurking for a bit on this forum I'd just like to say this compelled me to register so that I could say I think this is a great idea.

I'd love to see a new component added to the military game that is fun and strategic yet is not game changing. I also think your idea plays well evolving with time all the way to the information era. All across the board with each part you mentioned, the ideas seem like they'd fit well with Civ's combat system, but with a new layer of strategy.

Great Post!

 

[Mister_Chow]

This new intelligence system suggested by MenanderI definitely piqued my interest when I read this post; I find that the combat is a little too predictable and has a systematic/formulaic feel that has, in some ways, turned any instance of combat into some boring everyday ritual, for me at least.

I think having this added layer of complexity through this "intelligence system" can spice up the combat and offer a new challenge in approaching military decisions.

On another note, organized barbarians under a commander sounds absolutely terrifying (in a good way). It adds more unpredictability to the game, which I am all for. I mean, imagine a barbarian attack that shifts the tide of the war into your favor or your favor.

Overall, I like these ideas and would be thrilled to see these suggestions implemented into the game in some shape or form.

 

[Ryika]

Well, if you want to get away with using three different accounts that all registered on the same day you should at least make them sound different from one another instead of sounding like a stiff English teacher in all of them.

Moderator Action: Making accusations about other members is trolling. Please stop.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889

Joking aside, the idea itself sounds interesting to me, but I don't really see it working with a game like Civ. It's just too volatile for all of this to matter. Barbarians spawn and are removed very frequently, army positioning is information that is pretty useless if the AI still acts the way it acted in Civ 5, because it's units will just be at random positions until it then finally gathers its forces for an attack. And at that point a simple military unit stationed at their borders already does the job.

 

[MenanderI]

Well, if you want to get away with using three different accounts that all registered on the same day you should at least make them sound different from one another instead of sounding like a stiff English teacher in all of them.

These were two of my friends (all three of us just discovered this forum) who enjoyed the idea somewhat and wanted to comment. I know it seems like I wrote all of them, but it's not the case, and the judgement on how I write is not appreciated. Regardless thank you for your comment. It is nice to hear feedback.

Moderator Action: Welcome to CivFanatics. If you have an issue with another member in future, please use the report post function (the warning triangle icon under the forum name) and let us handle it. Thanks.

 

[ShadowWarrior]

Civ franchise needs to design the game so that spy intelligence will actually make a tangible difference to your game, otherwise no amount of new features on espionage will be interesting.

For example, if our spy can tell us what kind of wonders are each civ building, and the rate at which the wonders are being built, then this kind of intel will have VERY big value to us. For example, if we know that only China is building a pyramid, and its rate of building it is much slower than mine, then I can decide that I am not in a hurry to expend my engineer on building pyramid. I can use the great engineer for something else instead.

If espionage allow players to know the exact movement of all enemy units, then this will have great value to us as we can now play our defense and offense strategies. For example, by knowing the exactly movement of all enemy units, we can guess the location at which the enemy may be converging their armies. That knowledge allow us to know where to deploy the bulk of our own troops.

 

[MrUnderhill]

You could tie espionage into the culture system as a replacement for culture flipping: wherever your borders would overlap with another Civ's, that tile may become "compromised," letting you see whatever is passing through or being built there. You could also pay to compromise specific tiles the same way you'd buy unowned tiles, or even tag enemy units to see where they go. Add the ability to share your intel with other Civs (actual intel, not just "intrigue"), and I think we've got a good system.

 

[Iapetus303]

There needs to be a way of using spies or espionage to discover that civilization X is planning to attack civilization Y. (Of course, the intel might not always be accurate, and there should be a way to fabricate evidence...)