Diplomacy - Spying - Stealing Advances

Alinestra Covelia · February 12, 2000, 19:49

My metaphorical knickers are in a proverbial twist; I'm trying to enable diplomacy and diplomat-type units...however, I'd like to prohibit stealing of tech advances.

This works to limited effect, when I surgically remove the "steal technology" option from the @SPYOPTIONS list in Game.txt. This means that the player can sneak a spy character into a city and do all the normal things, EXCEPT steal techs... Seems like a waterproof plan, but it isn't.

This lack of menu option does not prevent the computer players from doing this! So in effect, although the human player cannot break the rules, the computer controlled civs (who should be definition be the epitome of rule abidance...ahem) are flagrant rulebreakers and do so as usual!

Does anybody know how I might get this to work?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Hendrik the Great · February 12, 2000, 20:00

I sorry to disapoint you, however, there is no way to make it work. I faced the same problem once when making a scenario. I played around with the game.txt for weeks but to no avail.

Actually it is the same for all other spyoptions and unit options like for the settler/engineer. It's possible to disallow it for the human player but the AI will always be able to do so.

The only thing I believe you could do is to just give diplos/spies to the human player in the scenario. Of course this does only work if there is only one civ suppossed to be played

Good luck!

Eyn · February 12, 2000, 20:12

most of scenarios don't have diplomat
units. If u want diplomats but you don't want AI steal all your techs, give some diplomates with the "event" file...
(every 20-50 turns)

Alinestra Covelia · February 13, 2000, 09:08

How do diplomat units do against tech-stealing operations? I read in some FAQ or manual somewhere that stationing a spy in a friendly city means that enemy ops become more difficult. Is this true?

In that case, is it possible to place "n" Spies with movement of 0 in each city, to thwart enemy spy operations? Does this ever become 100% proof against spy ops?

...And while we're at it, who shot JFK?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Hendrik the Great · February 13, 2000, 10:30

I've never seen it work. But on the other hand I don't try it very often. I see no reason why it shouldn't work. However, imagine you have to place half a dozen spies or so into every city...
And I believe there is always a chance that something might get stolen anyway.

But the idea ain't bad.

Alinestra Covelia · February 13, 2000, 12:19

Does this "counter espionage" work only with Spy units? Or can Diplomat units also prevent technological theft by an enemy?

Hendrik the Great · February 14, 2000, 01:33

I don't know. It should work with both I think. I mean why not? But spies would be more effective I prosume.

February 14, 2000, 01:48

Here is a thought, you could set all the advances to low AI value (really low) and have nonsense techs eg. STEALTHISDUMBAI with high AI value it would stop the AI from stealin the important techs as long as you have extra techs with high AI value (this is only a hypothesis neverbeen tested)

Alinestra Covelia · February 14, 2000, 07:47

Sounds good from a tech stealing point of view, but wouldn't that also make the AI civs more keen to research dumb techs? The scenario I have in mind needs separate tech trees, but it also requires a lot of research to go into the techs, so that is a must.

If push comes to shove I would rather get rid of the entire spying/sabotaging aspect to retain the scenario's tech advances...

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Michael Daumen · February 14, 2000, 09:12

If you didn't mind the tedium you could use diplomats from every civ to steal a tech from each city, then remove said techs from all nation's record books with the cheat menu. And I bet there is a way to do this with a hex editor that is easier, too.

Zulu Elephant · February 14, 2000, 12:35

You could make the nonesense techs unresearchable, then the computer wouldn't waste time researching them - cos they cant

Harlan · February 14, 2000, 15:58

Here's how I'm gonna do it for the scenario I'm working on. Go to webpage: http://members.xoom.com/HistCiv2/hexvalue.htm and download the Hexedit program Andrew recommends. Within the program, set column width to 28. Scroll down near the end of the file, and on the right side you should see city names. Put your cursor on the first letter of the first city name, to the right. Now move the cursor up one row. It now should be on the right hex for preventing tech stealing. Change the second number of those two numbers in that hex to 8. Go to the first letter of the next city, and repeat for every city. Since they're all in a line, it shouldn't take more than 10 minutes.

I don't know about capital city rules, that may prove a problem. Another problem of course is if new cities are built. And don't allow units with Spy abilities, only Diplomats!

Hendrik the Great · February 14, 2000, 17:14

But is it not true that when a city is conquered or reconquered techs can be stolen from it again?
At least that's what I always used to think.

Just a thought.

Michael Daumen · February 14, 2000, 21:31

I thought the reverse, that a capital is harder to steal from. I guess that just applies to subversion. But I don't think it is easier. Has anyone tested it (or a reconquered city)?

Alinestra Covelia · February 15, 2000, 01:30

Sounds like a damn good idea, Michael! But how about the capital city? Isn't it possible to steal from that as many times as needed?

And yes, it would be very tedious, but I'm willing to do that if it means the scen will work properly!

Does the AI recognize a city that has already been stolen from? Does it know that that cannot be stolen from again?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Alinestra Covelia · February 15, 2000, 12:14

"Our spy reports that the citizens of $STRING1 are vigilant and wary, sire. Should she continue the attempt?

- Abort mission.

- Steal random tech (no specific tech can be targeted)"

I believe that this is the message that turns up when a city (namely, the capital) is the target of the second or later techstealing attempt. I have never seen this happen during a normal game of Civ2 - this may simply be due to my playing tactics, etc, etc.

Presumably I could create a Spylike unit in each capital with a cost of 1 or something, which cannot be built, and which cannot move. This ought to thwart most enemy Spy attempts - but does anyone know if multiple spy units stationed in a city actually have a cumulative effect on safeguarding it?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Michael Daumen · February 15, 2000, 21:27

I think the steal from a city twice ability is only given to spies and not diplomats.

February 15, 2000, 22:53

The problem with having multiple spy units in each city is that, yes it will make it very hard to steal advances it will also make it harder for Sabotage etc... And you said your whole purpose for removing tech stealing was to allow the other spy options so the adding of spy units would not be a good choice IMO
[This message has been edited by KaR (edited February 15, 2000).]

Alinestra Covelia · February 16, 2000, 15:46

What are the differences between Spy skills and Diplomat skills? Does anybody have a definitive list out there? Also, are there game mechanics that we don't see, but which act differently between spies and diplomats?

As for the scenario, I might place a defensive spy unit into each city, and limit the buildable units to only being diplomat types. Will this work?

Finally, I gather that only the unit in the Spy's position in the UNITS.gif file will have any possibility of acting as a Spy - any "Spy" unit created elsewhere will merely be a lowly diplomat. Is this right?

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

Miner · February 16, 2000, 17:13

You are right, the super spy abilities
are conferred to any diplomat unit in that position in rules.txt

C Chulainn · February 17, 2000, 21:48

...and for this reason, the "Useless Tech" solution isn't viable, because dipolomats always steal a random technology rather than one their government would like to have.

Alinestra Covelia · February 21, 2000, 16:04

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You will need:
1 bottle of chilled Coca Cola
1 carton of chilled orange juice or Five Alive
1 shot of vodka, preferably Smirnoff
1 egg, raw

Extract egg white from egg and store. Discard egg yolk. Mix Coke, OJ, and vodka in equal quantities and allow to aerate. Gently stir in the egg yolk until evenly distributed.

Drink without pause. Doing so may cause regrettable side effects.

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"In all creation, there can be no task more onerous or tedious than that of playing God." - Stephen Fry, 'The Liar'.

fish_damage · February 22, 2000, 01:05

I'm just guessing, but could you not steal tech from all the cities with diplomats, delete those advances stolen, then save the game as a scenario, so Diplomats would not be able to steal technologies from any of the cities.
Of course if more cities are then built, they are still suceptable.