Poor spies?

[Sir. Martin]

I like to build up a great society with all the things included. That means the Intelligens Agency and spies is a part of my game.

But whenever I try to use spies they ALWAYS fail...

Ex. i pay fx. 1500 gold for propoganda which NEVER works, and believe me I´ve tried it many times... Any of you with succes?
And expose a mole??! The only thing that ALWAYS happens is that the "victim" gets mad at me, and kill MY SPY! LOL
( The other things the spies can do works just fine.. but still! )

What is yours experiences and tips to this issue?

 

[MrBiggBoy]

Hey! Well, spies are cool and all... but you have to be careful when using them. If you try to plant propaganda in a city in the center of an enemy civ, it won't work. Try slowly taking cities on the border. The further the target city is from a capital (or maybe forbidden palace ) the higher chance of a succesful conversion. If you want to have your spies work better and you want to factor spies into an overall strat, try Communism (OK, NO ONE YELL AT ME CAUSE I SAID THE C WORD!!)

I was a n00b once too!!

 

[Sir. Martin]

I am already doing what you are proposing Biggboy! hehe I have played Civ for many years, knows the "basics and tricks"!

 

[Sir. Martin]

Have you had succes with this Bigboy?

 

[napoleon526]

I have had very little luck with spies and espionage in general.

For one thing, it takes far too much money to plant spies and conduct missions. In reality, spies are cheap! In every civilization, there's going to be people with who are dissatisfied with the regime and would be more than happy to cooperate with you, especially if your culture is attractive. Also, it's difficult to successfully plant a spy. More often than not, when I try, I get the "your spy has been caught and killed. (Name of foreign leader) is not pleased. How come it never tells me when other civilizations try to unsuccessfully spy on me? And once, when I was trying to expose a rival spy in my capitol, I lost my spy in another country! This makes no sense! The mission had NOTHING TO DO with my spy in the other country!

Okay, I'm done venting. Anyone else frustrated w/ espionage?

 

[D. Boon's Ghost]

I find the only use I have for espionage is the initial planting of the spy. The unit display on the Military Advisor screen is very much worth the effort. Beyond that, I have had very little luck with carrying out missions.

 

[IronicWarrior19]

Spyz suck.. they iz t00 xpensiv... I recommend j00 just buildz a big armee and takez the citiez... they will rezpect j00 afterwardz

 

[DrJambo]

Originally posted by IronicWarrior19
Spyz suck.. they iz t00 xpensiv... I recommend j00 just buildz a big armee and takez the citiez... they will rezpect j00 afterwardz

has someone stolen your dummy?

 

[Shaitan]

Originally posted by =DOCTOR=


has someone stolen your dummy?

 

[MrBiggBoy]

Hey yo Martin, spying is ok but personally I would use armies, then use spies to find troop positions etc. Good Luck!!

 

[Ouchgeddon]

IronicWarrior19, j00 s|-|l_1L|) 1234l|y |3|2uz\-\ uP 0|\| j0012 l337 sK|LLz.

On the non L33t side, spies are invaluable for trashing spacheship parts. A few turns are all that is required.

 

[sealman]

I agree with the people that are saying spies suck. I have never been successful planting spies, I just use them to attempt to start wars.

They are too expensive and ineffective.

 

[loki]

This is weird, Zouave hasn't reply to this thread yet.

As for spies, I plant them to get a view of the military units my oppponents have. I never use them for anything else.

loki

 

[JoseM]

spies are too expensives... i used spies a lot in civ 2, but in civ 3 i dont bother using them, to make a normal or easy mission u have to pay like 3000 of gold or more and most of the times the spies fail, so i dont bother wasting my gold in worthless spies.

 

[romelus]

since 1.17 i have lots of cash due to 0% science, and in the latest emperor game i'm being outproduced by the egyptians and my allies are on another continent, so i might try some spying action.

on the other hand, nah...

 

[LaRo]

Originally posted by JoseM
spies are too expensives... i used spies a lot in civ 2, but in civ 3 i dont bother using them, to make a normal or easy mission u have to pay like 3000 of gold or more and most of the times the spies fail, so i dont bother wasting my gold in worthless spies.

What is best: a) stealing tech at a cost of 1500gp
b) trying to buy tech from a civ. This civ may refuse trade or charge you a lot more than 1500gp.

I prefer stealing because the 1500 don't go in the opponent's banks.

 

[JoseM]

Originally posted by LaRo


What is best: a) stealing tech at a cost of 1500gp
b) trying to buy tech from a civ. This civ may refuse trade or charge you a lot more than 1500gp.

I prefer stealing because the 1500 don't go in the opponent's banks.

1500 with a low chance of success, and most of the times u fail and those 1500 are wasted and no tech is gained and also ur opponent or victim will get mad at u...

 

[escl]

I've had some success with propaganda when the city i tried it on is originally mine and got taken over by someone else through conquest. I suppose that the culture that still remains and citizens of my nationality helped. Hehe the good things is that the comp loses his units (i believe) and it works just like a revoltion but it is staged.

 

[Sir. Martin]

Hmm think I can agree with most of you. The thing with stealing techs is not something I can use because I am always the one leading in research!

Thanks for all the answers though!

 

[MrBiggBoy]

No problem Martin, and by the way, whats it like in Denmark??? I'm from Canada, and I was wondering why u speak english. (is there denmarkish? or is it swedish mostly?)