For anyone who doesn't know about agents in E:TW, this is the place to be. I will try to be as organized as possible, and as simple as possible. I wish I had an agents guide to help when I started playing. So here it is:
Overview
This is, as you may expect, a guide to agents in Empire: Total War. The agents were changed so you would not have to track and micro-manage every single spy, assassin, diplomat, priest and princess inm your empire. Instead the agents list has been shortened to 3 simple types: Gentlemen, Rakes, and Missionaries. I will try my best to help you understand these new agents fully and thoroughly. The manual doesn't really tell you much, and half the things agents do you will not find on your own for a while. I strongly advise everyone to read this guide. You may think you know everything about Agents, but you very well might not.
Gentlemen
Gentlemen, my personal favorite agent in Empire: Total War. These will become the mainstay of your agent force. Gentlemen do more than any other agent, period. Following is a list of all Gentlemen abilities:
Gentlemen Abilities
-Boost Technology Research Rates:
Building a School or educational building in a province will result in a Gentleman being recruited in the city. Once you receive a message saying he has been recruited, move him immediately to your nearest School/College. Then, any technology this building researches will have a turn or 2 cut off the time taken for each Gentleman in the building.
-Duel other Gentlemen:
If you wish to try to mess with another nations research, you can duel any gentlemen in the schools. Be sure to save before engaging in the duel, so you can always retry if something goes wrong. Occasionally, your Gentleman will gain dueling traits for a consecutive number of wins (In my Dutch campaign, my starting Gentleman is on a winning streak of 7-0.)
-Steal Technology:
Moving your Gentleman into another nations Schools will allow him to try stealing Technology. If failed, he will not be killed, just ejected from the school. You can easily move him back if you wish. Once you end the turn with a Gentleman in a school stealing Technology, he will attempt to steal it. If he succeeds, you will recieve a message saying so. If not, he will try again until he is either ejected or succeeds.
Scholars
Scholars are simply an Eastern version of Gentlemen. The only difference is that they cannot duel anyone.
Rakes
I personally do not use Rakes much. They are useful if you desperately need an assassin or spy, but are rather inefficient. Even so, I must explain them.
Rakes are basically just a Spy and an Assassin put together. At the beginning they are somewhat hard to use, but can be useful later on. If you can get a kill/sabotage/infiltration streak for a Rake, he will begin to succeed in pretty much everything he does.
Rake Abilities
-Assassinate Characters:
Rakes can be used to assassinate enemy nations' characters. Assassinating multiple times in a row with no failures will gain positive traits that will give better chances at succeeding.
-Sabotage Enemy Buildings:
Rakes can also be used to sabotage an enemies buildings. Sabotaging several times in a row without being discovered will gain positive traits and give better chances of succeeding.
-Spy on Enemy:
Rakes can infiltrate enemy armies, cities, and villages/towns. You will not go to war with any nation infiltrated if he is killed. Several successful infiltrations in a row will gain positive traits and aid in chances of succeeding later.
Missionaries
Missionaries are very useful if used correctly. They can convert your populace and keep happiness high in provinces occupied by them. If you intend to heavily tax your subjects, you should maintain many Missionaries in the least happy provinces and cities.
Missionary Abilities
-Convert Populace:
Keeping Missionaries in a certain city will cause the population of that city to begin converting to the religion of the Missionary. This will help with the next ability.
-Satisfy Citizens of Missionaries Religion:
For every citizen of a city who is the religion of your Missionaries, the occupying Missionary will keep them happy. For cities where most of the population is of your countries religion, this will be a substantial bonus to happiness in said city.
That is my official Complete Guide to Agents for Empire: Total War. Thanks for reading and have a nice day!
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