A feature I actually would like to see removed

Good day fellow EB-Fans!
When playing yesterday I stumbled over a feature, which is new compared to vanille (haven't played it in decades!), but which is actually rather annoying to me than enhancing the density of the gaming experience.
Its about how Agents gain their experience. I mean if there are buildings in a town, serving to educate and train an agent, why would a ruler drag his assasin in spe away from his book about lethal poisons and say: "Come on, you'll figure it out somehow, its learning by doing. And if not... uh your kind is very cheap to recuit. Nevermind."

So are there any plans to handle this differently? Is there a way to exclude this feature from EBI?
Thankyou !

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Originally Posted by ziegenpeter

Good day fellow EB-Fans!
When playing yesterday I stumbled over a feature, which is new compared to vanille (haven't played it in decades!), but which is actually rather annoying to me than enhancing the density of the gaming experience.
Its about how Agents gain their experience. I mean if there are buildings in a town, serving to educate and train an agent, why would a ruler drag his assasin in spe away from his book about lethal poisons and say: "Come on, you'll figure it out somehow, its learning by doing. And if not... uh your kind is very cheap to recuit. Nevermind."

So are there any plans to handle this differently? Is there a way to exclude this feature from EBI?
Thankyou !

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IMHO learning by doing is ok. I mean there are scenarios which can't be foreseen in basic training of an assasin (if such even existed) and if a succesfull murder was attempted, the man himself would learn very much.
Such experience could be used in the next kills ( roleplaying wise - how to enter a prior unknown building without being seen, how you must act to be trusted by different kind of presons etc...)

I don't really see what the problem is, are you saying you want spies and assassins to reach the maximum level through just training? IMHO that isn't realistic at all, as with anything there is only so much you learn through study, after that it is the application of that knowledge that allows you to progress further.

No, of course not maximum level. But they should (IMHO) start with the level they'd have after being "trained". And then of course they need to do some jobs and get their hands dirty for the final improvements

Not too sure what the OP is specifically suggesting either, but I think it would at least be good to have certain buildings increase the starting skill of spies and assassins, similar to the way their respective guilds work in M2TW. Not real sure what the guild system is going to be used for in EB2, but I'm pretty sure any building can be modded to increase agent experience in a region. Maybe there could be an optional line of buildings designed specifically for training agents which could do this, rather than relying on guilds and/or higher level markets.

And on the topic of changing things about assassins, I'd really like for them to stop losing experience when they fail a mission. Realistically, I'd expect them to learn from their mistakes, assuming they survive a failed mission in the first place. That may seem like a stretch in terms of gameplay, but I certainly don't think they should LOSE experience for receiving a bad dice roll.

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Originally Posted by bobbin

I don't really see what the problem is, are you saying you want spies and assassins to reach the maximum level through just training? IMHO that isn't realistic at all, as with anything there is only so much you learn through study, after that it is the application of that knowledge that allows you to progress further.

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To explain the mechanism ziegenpeter is referring too: in EB diplomats, spies and assassins start out with the "untrained" trait. You need to have them stay in a city with an academy (for diplomats) or a level 3 market (for spies / assassins) for some turns to "train" them. They will also become trained when they accomplish a mission or two. What ziegenpeter is asking for is to make them start out as "trained". This will cut down on tedious micromanagement.

The spy agents are an interesting feature of TW games. Do we need them at all?

Spying is definitely a part of many warfare traditions: I'm re-reading Sun Tzu (in the exciting new version wity the extra baloney chapters they found in 1973) and he makes a strong point about using intelligence. In particular he seems to stress using local intelligence ie bribe farmers etc.

When I march a diplomat next to a city he gives me a bit of a look inside (not a very good one), likewise when I march an army: if I double click for the AI focre/city composition scroll it says "spotted by..." agent name, FM or watchtower. Do different units appart from spies have greater chances to spot enemies? I know FMs have a bigger LOS (pool of sight? circle of vision?) than diplomats.

Maybe that would give a denser FOW feel if we ditched spies? I have to say I feel like I have some kind of satelitte veiw when I campaign atm, there's none of the tension of marching into the unknown which pretty much every military history I read depicts. If there were no spys I guess I'd use scouting units like cav or skirmishers as a vanguard to prevent the main army from being mauled by ambush.

I guess the game is too high level to represent ambushes, unexpected reinforcements and other FOW surprises in great detail, and it'd be boring inching around the map with units cycling out from the main stack on patrol etc.

If I want the FOW feeling I'll just use spies exclusively for homeland security and unrest-causing missions: thats a function I love. I dunno if we see it in our ancient sources much but the idea of meddling with a foe even if you're not at war catches my fancy and I am sure it happened.

I agree with your post Cyclops.
I believe that the spies see just too much. There is no "unknown" feeling, and there should defintely be one. It sucks that when i go where no man has gone before ( in my recent Parthia campaign in Arabia) and all i needed was a spy, and i saw every enemy army, the terrain, their forces etc...

It would be great, if there was a feature in the TW games that didn't even let you see the whole map!
Kinda of a Age of Empires feel, when you had to take a scout to find the borders of the map. Here of course one would know how the EB map looked, but not precisly.

Imagine, you would lead a Roman legion in to the north, where you knew there were some barbaric tribes, but suddenly you would find yourself in a forest, and a hugely garrisoned city just waiting for you to kick your ass.

However if this is not possible, it would be still nice imho to reduce the line of sight of every single unit in the game. The watchtower line of sight in EB is just huge. I mean i know i live in a small country, but now i have a spy and a watchtower in the balkans, and i can practicaly see from Pella to Patavium. That's a bit far isn't it?

I think spies and watch towers are abstractions of more exstensive surveillance networks hence their large line of sight. Also in reality armies didn't march blindly into enemy territory they would always send spies to scout out the land ahead and certainly wouldn't just stumble across a huge city the way you described.

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It would be great, if there was a feature in the TW games that didn't even let you see the whole map!
Kinda of a Age of Empires feel, when you had to take a scout to find the borders of the map. Here of course one would know how the EB map looked, but not precisly.

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If your meaning a completely black fog of war where you can't see anything then you get that in M2TW (it covers the americas).

That's what i ment yes. It would be interesting wouldn't it?

No. No black fog. It's unrealistic, ancient cultures were not that isolated that in 272 BC for example the Romans would not know about Seleukeia or the Celts about the Ptolemaioi

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Originally Posted by SwissBarbar

No. No black fog. It's unrealistic, ancient cultures were not that isolated that in 272 BC for example the Romans would not know about Seleukeia or the Celts about the Ptolemaioi

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Yes they knew that. But they didn't know the exact geographical look. I mean look at the maps of the time. They were very much wrong when you see hellenistic ones, image what the Sweboz would think how the world looked like. It doesn't have to be a complete fog of war, or the same for every faction.
The Greeks and Carthaginians would definetly know much more then the Saka or Casse

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Originally Posted by Ludens

To explain the mechanism ziegenpeter is referring too: in EB diplomats, spies and assassins start out with the "untrained" trait. You need to have them stay in a city with an academy (for diplomats) or a level 3 market (for spies / assassins) for some turns to "train" them. They will also become trained when they accomplish a mission or two. What ziegenpeter is asking for is to make them start out as "trained". This will cut down on tedious micromanagement.

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I actually agree with what he has to say, in a way. Why would you recruit a spy from your settlement who has been training to be a spy. But then actually leave him in the settlement to train MORE and get to the 'trained' level. What I think is that either remove the ability to get that from a settlement or remove the trait entirerly. No reason to hire someone who is only half trained and then train them more. It doesn't make sense from the employers point of view. If they start as 'untrained' then fine, but they should ONLY be able to get more experience in the field. They have already reached the best the can in the settlement, thats why they have a job now.

Maybe we doesn't have to remove that trait entirely, just give some chance that we could sometimes become "unlucky"... hiring an untrained agent, and the bueraucracy can't fire him....

I dunno. Spies - and indeed many other features in TW - are an abstract. No-one is surely suggesting that one man can act in this manner as a spy, and that he would be so hugely expensive to recruit and maintain. Ancient societies of all types used bribery, subterfuge and espionage type activities. Agents might not be recruited and employed directly by states, but would have provided detailed and relevant information to however was paying them at that time. The fact that "spies", "diplomats" and "assassins" are used in game to represent a complex system of information gathering and behind the scenes activities is just that a representation. If anything there should be more of this kind of activity in the game.

One thing that features in a massive number of ancient military campaigns for example is that they would be advised by a rival to the throne of the place they were attacking.

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Originally Posted by Cambyses

I dunno. Spies - and indeed many other features in TW - are an abstract. No-one is surely suggesting that one man can act in this manner as a spy, and that he would be so hugely expensive to recruit and maintain. Ancient societies of all types used bribery, subterfuge and espionage type activities. Agents might not be recruited and employed directly by states, but would have provided detailed and relevant information to however was paying them at that time. The fact that "spies", "diplomats" and "assassins" are used in game to represent a complex system of information gathering and behind the scenes activities is just that a representation. If anything there should be more of this kind of activity in the game.

One thing that features in a massive number of ancient military campaigns for example is that they would be advised by a rival to the throne of the place they were attacking.

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Whats your point? This post does not relate at all to the fact that spies and assassins start out as untrained.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Whats your point? This post does not relate at all to the fact that spies and assassins start out as untrained.

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I think that was related, because it means every "spy" or "assassin" was a new "spy" or "assassin" agency.... ^^ and the people shown are the head of teh agency, and when mission failed, he was safe or taking suicide

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Whats your point? This post does not relate at all to the fact that spies and assassins start out as untrained.

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Actually, it does. Recruiting "trained" or "untrained" spies suggests there was such a thing as a spy school. The wording of the OP implies something similar. Cambyses points out that in reality spies were recruited ad-hoc, rather than trained. It seems logical that they would need some time to gain the necessary contacts and skills to become proficient.

Edit: cute_wolf was quicker; or rather I was very slow.

Indeed. Thank you Ludens.

Its a fair point: like many aspects of the game a broad category of operations (intelligence gathering, counterintelligence, intrigue and fomenting rebellion) has been expressed through an entity in this case an agent. It allows varyinglevels of management-to-micromanagement, in the same way military operations allow the player to be the supreme commander but also direct individual seige engines.

Its fair enough to have individual agents to cover various intel operations, and to the modern mind we associate them with intel agencies that recruit specialists. Once we have that recruitment model in mind then the quality of training suggests itself, and broadly there's something be said for it: a mercantile centre would have a greater number of polyglots with experience of semi-legal-to-downright-corrupt dealings: that'd be your resource pool for spies.

My own impression (very shallow and based as much on the non EB era/area Art of War as anything) is smart commanders and leaders made use of traitors as much as anything, and battlefield intel was very hard to come by.

Some examples of classical military intel that spring to mind: Xerxes approaches Thessally and his Hellenic enemies find out from the Persian's vassal Alexander of Macedon (technically a traitor, and certainly not a "KH" agent).

Later Xerxes marches into Thessaly and has no idea there is a force holdiong a narrow pass until he hits it. A local shows him the way around.

These events might be simulated by FMs having a better LOS or ability that spies currently have to see "into" stacks/cities. Or diplomats might be able to have a "purchase intel" function similar to bribery: cheaper because your buying info not the loyalty of units.

Just speculatin' of course. I lack the skills to mod any of this, and I'm not sure FM's can be given agents abilities, or if the one I suggest for diplomats is even possible.

Spies currently fulfill some modern expectations about warfare and intel and have value telling the story, smoothing gameplay, and also because there probably were secret agents and they did their job well so we don't know about them.

Very interesting points, Cyclops. As for the second suggestion (diplomats buying intelligence) I am pretty certain the closest thing that can be done in M2TW is buying map information, which really only provides city positions and no unit/army details. Having an option to purchase army position/composition information would be awesome, but it's just not there. As for modifying generals LOS, I know there are traits that affect it, but I don't know if they can have the degree of detail that spies' LOS automatically provide. That is, generals could definitely be made to see further, but they may not be able to see anything more than the number of question marks an army contains.

With all this in mind, I wonder if it would be simplest to just increase spies' upkeep costs to somewhat more realistically reflect (in an abstract way, of course) the costs of obtaining such detailed information.

Well, maybe trainig and maintaining a spy, can be seen as a very abstract way of buying intelligence.
EDIT: Woooooops, you wrote that already...

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Originally Posted by Ludens

Actually, it does. Recruiting "trained" or "untrained" spies suggests there was such a thing as a spy school. The wording of the OP implies something similar. Cambyses points out that in reality spies were recruited ad-hoc, rather than trained. It seems logical that they would need some time to gain the necessary contacts and skills to become proficient.

Edit: cute_wolf was quicker; or rather I was very slow.

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Then how about:
Get rid of those two traits, and instead make new ones

1) By himself, greatly decrease sight range (really the spies right now have a rediculous sight range, same with armies)
2) Only a few contacts (increase sight range, increase skill point)
3) Large number of contacts (increase sight range, increase skill point)
4) Network (increase sight range, increase skill point)
5) Large Network (increase sight range, increase skill point)
6) Entrenched Network (increase sight range, increase skill point)

Instead of making it so that the spys stay behind to get training to get the trait. Make it so the spy must move into an enemy area/settlement and stay there to build up contacts. The longer he says the more contacts he can build up.

Or wait was that system already in place?

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Originally Posted by Parallel Pain

Or wait was that system already in place?

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A basic version: a spy that stays in a settlement for a while does gain a +1 trait for having an established network. Also, a spy's quality is not just determined by the number of his contacts. And the suggestion of the OP is to make the spy-trait system simpler, not more complex.

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Originally Posted by Ludens

A basic version: a spy that stays in a settlement for a while does gain a +1 trait for having an established network. Also, a spy's quality is not just determined by the number of his contacts. And the suggestion of the OP is to make the spy-trait system simpler, not more complex.

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Right right.

So what about instead of "trained" and "raw-recruit" it's "experienced" and "inexperienced" + like "incompetent" to "natural born talent"

i find that the solution is simple... increase the size of the map, and also no trained/untrained trait, to only see arrows when infiltrated, and when more turns go by, see more, since, you can't infiltrate and instantly know everything, you need to recon. I find it that that's a great solution (if possible) and i would love the larger campaign map (with more mov points too) because that would make it with more detail and make more provinces or cities (even maken 2 cities per province, if that is possible) that's my :2cents: for ya (btw, where the hell did that expression came from????)