Guide to espionage

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    • Guide to espionage

      I’m a relatively new player, only seven games under my belt, but I won five of them. I largely credit these forums and guides with making it easy to learn the game.

      With that said, I really wish I knew more about espionage. Any chance someone could put together a guide for that?

      I’ve learned several lessons the hard way like keeping enough cash on hand to pay your spies upkeep at day change.

      I wish I knew more about ways to counter other spies. I know the obvious counterespionage, but what to do once you locate opposing spies? Can you get ride of them?

      Also, sure they have a 50% success rate, but success to do what exactly? How often will a spy on a military sabotage mission damage a building or reveal a their troop locations? What else will they do and how often will they succeed at their mission without it making the newspaper? How often will they be caught, when they are caught how often do they reveal their employer? Is there much of a benefit to having multiple spies working counterespionage in the same city? Sorry for so many questions, but that’s precisely why I think a guide may be appropriate.

    • Military Sabotage: Put 3 spies, 50% chance of revealing all enemy troop locations. It is better to not put the spies in provinces where there are enemy buildings cus the enemy could then notice and catch your spies.
      Counter Espionage: Mystery to me
      Intelligence Spies: 3 Spies, 50% chance of revealing all kinds of infos about the enemy; resource situation, relationship with other players, their last message to other players, their last trades with other players or on the market, troop locations in the area, as well as what buildings they have in what cities.

      The most used/popular spies are military sabotage to reveal enemy troop locations

    • 6thDragon wrote:

      For revealing troop locations does it matter where you put them? For instance, does putting them in their capital make it more likely? Can you reveal troop locations by assigning three spies to a rural providence?
      It doesn't matter where you put them, it doesn't increase or decrease the chances. Although it is better to put them in a province which has no building in it so it is virtually impossible for him to discover them.

    • The "empty province" thing is true, but not because of detection. If there are buildings, your spies will try to sabotage them, if there aren't, they will spend all their efforts on a reveal of enemy troops, which is usually about a million times more useful.

      I prefer using four spies btw, I'd estimate they are 60-70% successful to reveal all troops of that nation. This is the most useful thing to spend your espionage budget on; in fact I never use any of the other options anymore.
      When the fake daddies are curtailed, we have failed. When their roller coaster tolerance is obliterated, their education funds are taken by Kazakhstani phishers, and their candy bars distributed between the Botswana youth gangs, we have succeeded.
      - BIG DADDY.

    • K.Rokossovski wrote:

      The "empty province" thing is true, but not because of detection. If there are buildings, your spies will try to sabotage them, if there aren't, they will spend all their efforts on a reveal of enemy troops, which is usually about a million times more useful.

      I prefer using four spies btw, I'd estimate they are 60-70% successful to reveal all troops of that nation. This is the most useful thing to spend your espionage budget on; in fact I never use any of the other options anymore.
      Thx, I didn't know that.

    • What about capturing enemy spies? What are the circumstances where that happens? I had that happen to me recently.

      Love the trick about placing a few spies in an irrelevant providence to gain their troop locations! Works like a charm. From a realism perspective, I'm struggling to wrap my head around a way to rationalize it. But I love getting their troop locations reliably!

    • 6thDragon wrote:

      What about capturing enemy spies? What are the circumstances where that happens? I had that happen to me recently.

      Love the trick about placing a few spies in an irrelevant providence to gain their troop locations! Works like a charm. From a realism perspective, I'm struggling to wrap my head around a way to rationalize it. But I love getting their troop locations reliably!
      The Counter Espionage is a mystery to me, sry.

    • 6thDragon wrote:

      Perhaps I could have described that better. I had other spies join me and they became my spies. I'm not sure that is counterintelligence. It could be another country had spies in my cities and I conquered them.

      Has anyone else had this happen?
      Oh that what you mean, yes that has happened to me although I think your spies capture them and then bring them over to your side.

    • When you conquer an enemy province where you had spies located, they automatically turn into counterspies in that province.
      When the fake daddies are curtailed, we have failed. When their roller coaster tolerance is obliterated, their education funds are taken by Kazakhstani phishers, and their candy bars distributed between the Botswana youth gangs, we have succeeded.
      - BIG DADDY.

    • Tried to find an espionage thread rather than create a new one. This'll do. Can military sabotage spies damage buildings that are under construction? And does this happen without notice in the newspaper? I remember there being "mysterious large explosion destroys X" stories in the newspaper but can't remember if that has gone away.

      Just trying to make sure that my building being "completed" half-built (see attachment--the Red exclamation point shows up on the completion notifixation and it was around half built) is due to spies and not a weird glitch of some sort.
      Images

      • Screenshot_20220727-181743.png

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    • Bumping this again hoping someone can confirm that this is how spy mechanics currently work:

      If my enemy puts a military sabotage spy in one of my provinces and it damages a building, I will not get a notification in my front reports and there will not be a story in the newspaper. The only way for me to find out that a building has been damaged is to select that province and notice a building at less than full health.

      I ask because I've noticed several instances of a building having less than full health, but my counter espionage spy has had no reports in the 6 days I've had him active. I assume I'm just getting unlucky with my counter espionage and that the building is being damaged by a military sabotage spy.

    • Hey, I know that when a enemy spy complete his mission, you will be able to see on the newspaper a report of what happened (see the image) and if one of your spies capture a enemy spy you will see the report on the newspaper too. So you are not going to receive any type of notification but on the newspaper is going to appear if anything related with spies happened. Sorry if a misspell some word English is not my first language.
      Images

      • Captura de pantalla 2022-07-31 234437.png

        854.16 kB, 979×767, viewed 7 times
      Erwin Rommel

    • Thanks, that's what I thought happened but wasn't sure if it was also true for military sabotage to buildings. I can't find any newspaper articles in my current games about it but that might just mean that no one is using military sabotage spies. If there is supposed to be a newspaper article then I have no idea why my buildings are getting destroyed; spies was my only theory.

    • I think golden attacks on buildings aren't reported in the paper.
      When the fake daddies are curtailed, we have failed. When their roller coaster tolerance is obliterated, their education funds are taken by Kazakhstani phishers, and their candy bars distributed between the Botswana youth gangs, we have succeeded.
      - BIG DADDY.