Counter Intel Projects

[Emperor Zodd]

Why are Counter-Intelligence projects so costly?
Anyone else think they are too costly?

[This message has been edited by Emperor Zodd (edited 02 February 2001).]

[UmberGryphon]

If counter-intelligence projects only worked when they completed, then yes they'd be way too expensive. But that's not the way it works. Counter-intelligence projects work the whole time they're being worked on--in fact, the only time they DON'T work is when they've been completed (which is why many SE4 players have multiple counter-intel projects going that will complete at different times).

I believe that when someone tries an intelligence project against you, the intelligence points they spent are subtracted from your counter-intel project. So it would be in our best interest if counter-intel projects took forever to complete....

By the way, if you have a ton of points in a counter-intel project, can you go out of share points equally mode, shove the counter-intel project to the back burner, and coast on your stockpile?

[Sinapus]

Yes, but how do you time CI projects so they don't complete at the same time? All of mine keep getting completed at different times even when I wait 20 turns before starting another one.

It seems like the CI projects 'complete' when they thwart an enemy project. Or at least I've had projects with at least a year left suddenly complete themselves. And no, the number of Intelligence points available wasn't enough to complete six lvl 3 projects in that amount of time using divide equal. Unfortunately, I don't have a savegame for that. Has anything like that happened to anyone?

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--
"What do -you- want?" "I'd like to live -just- long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up into your lifeless eyes and wave like this..." *waggle* "...can you and your associates arrange that for me, Mr. Morden?"

[Atrocities]

This is what I do:

Set the Intel points to evenly distribute
Set the Intel Projects to repeat & then

Turn 1, Start CI 3
Turn 2, Start CI 3
Turn 3, Start CI 3

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"We've made too many compromises already, too many retreats! They invade our space and we fall back -- they assimilate entire worlds and we fall back! Not again! The line must be drawn here -- this far, no further! And I will make them pay for what they've done!" -- Patric Stewart as Captain Picard
UCP/TCO Ship Yards

[Tomgs]

quote:

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Originally posted by Sinapus:
It seems like the CI projects 'complete' when they thwart an enemy project. Or at least I've had projects with at least a year left suddenly complete themselves.

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That exactly how they work as soon as you have spent enough points on a CI project to stop one enemy project it completes. One CI project will not stop 2 enemy Intell projects. Thats why you have multiple ones running. The AI runs multiple intell projects at once (too many probably). So thats why you get the message that your CI project(s) stopped an attack and get hit with 2 or 3 other intell at the same time sometimes.

[jimbob55]

Ahhhhhh. That's why it is cheaper to run a sabotage intel project than defensive project...
I should have read the manual shouldn't I? .... LOL.

[Q]

As much as I like the offensive intelligence projects in SE IV with the possibility to target specific planets and ships, I found the counter intellingence of SE III much more convenient and efficient than in SE IV. If I am at war with multiple empires, I will get hit by their intelligence operations even if I have 10x more intelligence points than they together, because I can only run 12 counter intelligence operations! I would really prefer the solution of SE III where you just specify the percentage of intelligence points you want to spend on defence and let the computer do the rest.

[Emperor Zodd]

I agree with you Q.

[raynor]

It sounds like Intel in SEIV was thrown in at the Last minute, and the code was just copied from Research and made to 'sorta' work.

I liked the way it worked in MOO2. In that game, you manufactured spies for use on either offense or defense. Periodically, you would receive Messages that a defending spy had been killed. Once your number of defensive spies reached zero, you were open to any and all attacks.

The great thing about this approach is that you know you are pretty safe from attacks if you have a large number of spies on defense. This is much better than SEIV's approach where the empire with the most Intel points can complete more and greater offensive intel projects per turn but is wide open to attack if s/he is hit by more than twelve projects at one time.

Although... I wonder if you might not be better off spending your intel points on the 'Disrupt Intel Operation' Intel project. If you targeted each hostile empire with one of these and had 10x your enemies Intel points, then wouldn't these projects finish fairly quickly and 'knock' out the enemy Intel projects? The Intel setup seems to favor offense over defense. Still, it would only disrupt one project per turn. If more than 24 enemy projects completed in one turn, you could only disrupt one per offensive 'Disrupt' Project.

[Emperor Zodd]

That would be great having individual spies with different attributes.