Requesting Ideas for Spy Missions

[Impaler[WrG]]

I am knee deep coding the Addition of several new missions for spies so far I have...

Theft - Steals some Gold
Espionage - Steals some Tech you dont possess
Assasination - kills a random GreatSpecialist in a City
Insurection - Starts a Rebelion

Any other ideas people come up with that I like or which get the most votes will be included. The whole package will go in the CCCP and then see action in Ket's XL Composite mod.

P.S. If you can do nice button Art that would be great too

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Off the top of my head, suitcase nuke, destroy a building, poison water supply... most of those aren't extremely useful...

Maybe sabotage a big project.. like somehow the spy sneaks a bomb up the space elevator and blows a big chunk of the space ship to kingdom come

 

[Jeckel]

I have a few that I think would be cool.

1) Poison Water Supply - This was in one of the previous Civ incarnations. In Civ4 I'm thinking it should reduce the city population by 1 if successful and shouldn't work on cities with only 1 pop.

2) Sabotage Production - This would not allow anything to be built in the effected city that turn. Other then that, you could lose the hammers gotten that turn or they could be carried over to the next turn. Or if you want to be a little more realistic they could lose some of the hammers already put into the thing being built.

3) Steal Plans - Again, this is from a previous Civ. It shows you the location of all the target civ's units. Alternitively, it could only show the units within a certain range of the targeted city.

4) Turn Unit - The spy can target another unit owned by another civ and cause it to change allegience and become owned by the spy's player. There could be a gold cost and maybe some diplo change with the civ that loses the unit.

Looking forward to see what you come up with, spys have needed some tweaking.

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Sabotage Production is already there though... you blow up the current work and they have to start all over again.

Btw, turning units... so retro Civ2 baby!

 

[Impaler[WrG]]

Ok just as a reminder Spies ALREADY HAVE the following Abilities

Sabotage - Destroys an Improvment
Destroy - Destroys Progress of a Cities current build, this can be Projects, Wonders, Units or Buildings (I find this to be the most usefull ability as it can block a player from achiving SpaceRace victory)
Steal Plans - Reveals all military units owned by the victim

I guess I should take this as a sign of how un-used spies are


On the subject of turning Units, I like this idea but what about stacks? I'm thinking that the turned unit should be moved to an adjacent tile, but how to desided which one. Perhaps it should be moved to the closest tile under your cultural control. This has the added effect of preventing you from being in violoation of borders agreements. Its a bit like the unit Defects to your side rather then being bribed.

 

[Jeckel]

Yea, Civ2 was such a sweet game.

As for the sabatoge, I was thinking it would be nice to have a less devestating version of the vanilla mission. It would be cheaper and more likely to succeed then the total destruction version.

 

[Dom Pedro II]

As for the sabatoge, I was thinking it would be nice to have a less devestating version of the vanilla mission. It would be cheaper and more likely to succeed then the total destruction version.

I dunno... by the late game, everything's getting built so fast anyway. It's usually not much of a loss.

 

[Jeckel]

That is true, but that is only a problem in vanilla because there is only the one late era spy unit. But I tend to spread a mission here and there to earlyer units and somtimes even make an early spy unit or two. But my main point with the mission isn't to destroy the production, quite the opposite. Most, if not all, the production should still be there, the city should just be delayed 1 turn in its building. The main idea being a mission you could use against cities building wonders, just to give you that extra turn or two to complete it first. Perhaps a better name for the mission would be "Delay Production".

 

[DrJambo]

Steal tech would be good, but I'd argue a strong case for the spy not being able to steal full techs each time it's successful, as this would be overpowered. Instead, like the tech conquest mod, maybe only small amounts of tech would be stolen each turn the spy is successful? Kind of like the spy filtering information back.

Likewise, in the same fashion, you could have a spy steal gold, culture, science or GP points from a city it's stationed in. Other spies should be able to see spies and have a chance to remove them causing a diplomatic penalty of course.

Other than just the sabotaging of a resource, what about a spy having a chance to steal it each turn it's stationed on top of a resource? Like above this should be counterable.

The defecting of units is an interesting idea, but any unit defecting in such a manner should be removed to within your cultural borders.

Obviously for all final implementations, the AI should be able to effectively use spies in the manner(s) intended. If the AI can't use it, it shouldn't go in.

 

[Grave]

I agree... Steal Tech is a fine idea.

The Assassination idea is good too, with taking out Specialists in a city.

Destroying buildings in a city is also a good idea.

Incite a Revolt is a good idea. Perhaps even go so far as have the city switch Civ's if the city is bad shape to begin with.

 

[Déja]

On the subject of turning Units, I like this idea but what about stacks? I'm thinking that the turned unit should be moved to an adjacent tile, but how to desided which one. Perhaps it should be moved to the closest tile under your cultural control. This has the added effect of preventing you from being in violoation of borders agreements. Its a bit like the unit Defects to your side rather then being bribed.

Do like Civ2... you can't turn a stack, only a single unit. Stacks provide ideological reinforcement and peer pressure not to rebel

 

[Impaler[WrG]]

I'm not thinking of turning a whole stack, I'm refering to the problem of selecting which unit to target (which was the underlying reason every prior Civ game prevented Stacks from being bribed). By their very nature the units in a Stack will reduce the Spies chance of success vs a Lone Unit, My thoughts were a popup similar to the GreatGeneral unit "Choose Unit to lead" selection list would be generated and you can choose a target from it. Cost would be assesed per hammer of unit cost + a per point of experience cost. Both would be easily modified GlobalDefines. If successfull the unit is imediatly ejected from the victims territory like when you declare war or cancel open borders.

 

[Jeckel]

I'm not thinking of turning a whole stack, I'm refering to the problem of selecting which unit to target (which was the underlying reason every prior Civ game prevented Stacks from being bribed). By their very nature the units in a Stack will reduce the Spies chance of success vs a Lone Unit, My thoughts were a popup similar to the GreatGeneral unit "Choose Unit to lead" selection list would be generated and you can choose a target from it. Cost would be assesed per hammer of unit cost + a per point of experience cost. Both would be easily modified GlobalDefines. If successfull the unit is imediatly ejected from the victims territory like when you declare war or cancel open borders.

That sounds like a resonable course of action, selection popups are good way to go, it makes the player feel like they are in control. Will the AI know which Civ turned its unit? And if yes, will that cause a negative diplo mark with them? I think the best would be if there was some GlobalDefine variable that lets you control the chance the civ knows who turned their unit. This chance would also aply to the human, so you may not know which civ turned your units.

 

[ArneHD]

How about this: Being able to turn your spy into a negative specialist. This does two things, first it gives you vison of the city and surrounding area, second it adds a specialist that detracts two hammers and two gold from your enemies city. The specialist can be removed by another spy.

It's purpose is not to acctually destroy the enemy production, but to distract enemy spies from a larger project, say that your enemy has a spy in it's space race cities, you use this one to distract them long enough to attack the project.

 

[Pvtbones]

implicate other civ: lower diplomatic relations between that civ and (random?) another civ.

 

[GRM7584]

Giving my own thoughts, some of them already mentioned but with different effects or names:

Culture War: Knocks off small amount of Culture based off difference between total culture of both civs as well as total culture in the city.

Industrial Sabotage: Temporarily decreases health and lowers production.

Industrial Espionage: Siphons a small number of tech points for a random tech unresearched by the spying civ but known to the target civ each turn the spy remains in the city.

Sabotage Monument: Destroys one culture-producing building and an amount of small amount of culture (varying directly by what the building produced). Target civ "recoups" a small amount of cost in gold.

Legislative Sabotage: Stops all progress on current project for a small number of turns (project can still be changed or bought).

Sabotage Project (currently just Sabotage): Destroy 1/2 of progress on current project.

Bribe Officials: Diplomatic bonus with civ; target civ gets a small "cut" of the bribe.

Propaganda: Diplomatic malus between target civ and random third civ that spying civ has a poor relationship with.

Criminal Contacts: Siphons a small amount of gold each turn to the spying civ.

Black Market: Spying civ receives access to a random resource of target civ, temporarily, with a preference for strategic resources (think Uranium).

Smuggle Narcotics: Decreases health in target city, Spying civ receives small "cut" of profits in return (with the potential to make a net profit, say a 5% chance).

Plant Mole: Target unit gains "Suspicious" promotion, and provides line of sight for the spying civ so long as the original spy lives.

Terrorism-- not sure if these require a seperate unit or not, but would all definitely need some sort of diplomatic penalty (and/or War Weariness) if the originating civ is made known. It is also questionable whether or not some of the above Sabotage missions need a big penalty or not, or whether some of the below shouldn't get as big a penalty.

Chemical Bomb (Terrorism): May destroy a building, may remove 1 population, small temporary health penalty.

Biological Attack (Terrorism): Large temporary health penalty, may remove 1 population.

Arm Insurgents (Terrorism, must have at least 1 in excess of ): City acts as if it has undergone a riot on behalf of the spying civ, damaging units and temporarily halting production.

Assassination (Terrorism): Temporary happiness penalty, removes one permanent specialist.

Smuggle Nuclear Device (Terrorism): City acts as if it has experienced a Meltdown.

As for 'buying' units: I don't care for the idea, and I don't really think there's a good way to implement it. At best, I think it should be possible to cause a unit to disband if it isn't in a stack, but not defect to your side, and it should cost a great deal (exponentially higher for more experienced units) to try to pull it off.

 

[Ket]

I have a few requests, that could be stubbed off to my next two projects..

1) Chemiclal Attack (Causes high collat/damage on units, and unhealthy/unrest in a city)

2) Nuke... Obvious

3) Kill Special_Unit_XXXXX this is for a regicide I allready have coded.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hmmm, interesting ideas here . My thought would be-above anything else-to have spies appear earlier in the game (still national units, though), and have them gain XP for successful missions-so that you can specialise your spies. This way, Scotland yard and other buildings can give bonus XP to newly created spies.

Being able to sabotage and/or bribe a unit would be fantastic. So would assassinations to 'kill off' specialists (other player could always generate a new specialist, but at the cost of another worked square).
I would like a 'Terrorist' mission which grants a +1 and a +1 Sickness to the targetted city.
I also really like the 'negative specialist' idea. Perhaps the controlling player can decide what type of 'negative Specialist' they want that spy to be-and this determines what they syphon off. For instance:

Saboteur (opposite of Engineer).
Smuggler (opposite of Merchant).
Radical/Iconoclast (opposite of Artist).
Sectarian (Opposite of Priest).
Criminal (Opposite of Citizen).

Additionally, for a higher risk, the player can try and make the spy into some type of 'anti-super specialist'-in much the same way as above (I confess that this idea borrows heavily on RogerBacons excellent BadPeople Mod!).

The ability to force a revolution would be pretty cool-though its chance of success should be low-but with success causing a change of a single civic-with a resultant period of anarchy (even if spiritual!).

Obviously, an ability to detect and remove spies is essential-particularly if they are made more powerful, and certain units should be able to 'see spies' if in LOS.

When I have finally gotten around to phase 4 of my civics mod (where ideologies serve a similar function to religions), I would be very happy to see a 'missionary-style' ability added to the spy which will allow them to spread an ideology and/or remove an existing ideology from a city.

Anyway, this is great brainstorming guys, and I look forward to the final product Impaler .

Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Dom Pedro II]

The ability to force a revolution would be pretty cool-though its chance of success should be low-but with success causing a change of a single civic-with a resultant period of anarchy (even if spiritual!).

Interesting point... I hadn't heard anybody pushing for this kind of revolution... I think ultimately this will all make for an interesting merger with jdog's Revolution mod.

Because you could avoid a city-flipping spy that kind of leaves a bad taste to me and instead have a spy that merely incites and arms rebels to start popping up around a city...

When I have finally gotten around to phase 4 of my civics mod (where ideologies serve a similar function to religions), I would be very happy to see a 'missionary-style' ability added to the spy which will allow them to spread an ideology and/or remove an existing ideology from a city.

This goes back again to the idea of revolution... there are, of course, lots of different kinds of revolutions led by different people for different reasons. It would be interesting if introducing new ideologies would cause the people to demand certain civics of their leaders...[/QUOTE]

 

[Impaler[WrG]]

All new missions are going to be given by XML booleans just as current missions are so it will be possible to create an array of Spy type units throughout the game with various combinations of missions that can be performed. In addition their are seperate flags for <bCounterSpy> which is what allows a spy to foil the mission of another spy, this could easily be given to other units (like thouse RiotPolice by White Rabbit) to help defend against spies (note that this is seperate from revealing spies so its a "blind" defence).

I too would realy like to see spies uses through the whole game. The earliest "spy" could be avalible a Writing and have only the <bInvestigate> flag which allows you see the City Screen. These guys would be called "Embasadors", their neither invisible nor able to go into enemy territory. Through the course of the game you get access to 4-5 additional types of Spies along a linear upgrade chain that ultimatly culminates at "Secret Agent" at or near the end of the tech tree. Each sucessive spy has more abilities then the last and retains all the abilities of its prepesesors (so upgrades are a no brainer). All that said its going to be done in XML and I'm working purely on the SDK Mission effects at this point so try to remain focused on the idividual mission effects, what the mission dose, what the nessary pre-requisites are ect ect. Cost and chance of being caught are going to be done with Global Defines so these questions/debates are also superflous at this point unless their good reason to change the mechanics.

Here are some details on the mechanics of the current effects

Theft - Currently this costs a flat fee and steals a percent of their total gold varrying from zero to twice the value of another defined percent. The victim must have more gold then the cost of the mission. Theirs lots of potential for this to be altered, say perhaps the mission fee is based on the victims reserves or their are extra modifiers based on the City being robed.

Espionage - When successfull a randomTechnology is chossen which meets the following criteria, The victim has it and you dont OR they have a greater % of Research completed on it then you (remember raw costs for the AI are lower then yours on high difficulty). You then reseve a quantity of points based on a % of the total cost of the Tech (and this is capped by the total % researched by the oponent so you can not exceed their research). The Percent stolen is determined by adding together a base Define value, a perunit of City Population Define and the Cities ResearchCommerceModifier (So Acadamies are good targets for Espionage). This is similar to the calculation performed in the TechConquest mod by Lopez from which I lifted much of the Algorithm, though ofcorse its in C++ rather then Python.

Assasination - Simply selects one random greatPerson settled into a city (not regular specialists or specialists being awarded as part of a wonder) and kills it.

Insurection - This can only be performed in a City not already in revolt ware the Owner is not culturaly dominant (but theirs no requirment that YOUR culture be in the city) . Thus their is some chance of a revolt in the City. When successfull the revolt occurs just as if it had happened by chance with all of the resulting effects of damaged defenders and a chance of flipping. This can be very usefull if cordinated with a military strike or to just plain hasten the flipping of a city.

Some of the ideas I've liked so far

Unit Flipping - obviously
Induce a turn of Anarchy - nice idea, simple to implement
Add temporary to the city - also should be simple to do
Destroy an Existing building - this could be random or use a selection list
Mess with Culture - perhaps remove it/change it
Frame another Civ - generates the "your spy was caught" effect but with a 3rd civ getting the hit, I think you should be able to pick who you frame
Poisoning - probably just kills 1 pop as a temporary health penalty is more complex to code
Black Market - nice idea, probably you get the resorce for a limited time and it can only be an avalible extra resorce (so you cant for example deprive them of their only Iron). This will be complex to do as deals involve a lot of code.

As for ideas on settling the Spy as a bad specialist, first theirs no reason this cant already be done along the same lines as the Ronalds badSpecialist Mod and its a wholey XML based mod. That said I'm concerned at a National Unit like a spy could be constantly built and settled ad infinitum and if their only giving some Commerce or Yield bonuses thats rather boring. The only legitimate use would in my opinion be as a "Mole" with the effect of making other spy missions more sucessfull on the City. I've already layed down a new City datamember for Spy Defence which will be affected by Buildings and probably also Civics (can you say REAL Police State). For one ScotlandYard will change to being +100% Spy Defence effectivly making 1 city in your Empire almost impregnable to spies. It is alfter all a local Police district which has nothing to do with forign inteligence operations (and its a stretch to give it a Counter-Inteligence function as thats realy the perogotive of MI-5).

I like the idea of Spies earning experience, they would obviosly do so for each successfull mission probably based on how risky the mission was. A new line of Promotions would be needed ofcourse. Besides generic stuff like Combat promotions to help them in Spy-vs-Spy fights and Sentry promotions the main thrust would be towards incressing their spy Success Modifier which incresses the chance of mission success on all types of missions. So for example if Spy would normaly have an 80% change of success but they have a +10% modifier the chance is instead 88%. Note that I'll be caping success at 95-99% so theirs always some small chance of being caught.