Spys and assassins..or and diplomats

**_TubbZ_** · July 07, 2007, 06:25 PM

Well i have always played this game in a blitz like manner without bothering with the extra agent units really. sometimes i have a good assassin but normally i cba with the hassle and killing a general on the battlefield is quite easy if you are prepared for it. So am i missing out on the spys, assassins and diplomats or are they not that useful anyway...

Also does anyone play the campaign with v little military use and all agents...

**unfortunate crow** · July 07, 2007, 08:27 PM

Agents are great for opening gates for your armies ahead of time! I use diplomats all the time, but then, I've mastered the diplomacy angle of this game more than most.

**sumaznguy** · July 07, 2007, 08:51 PM

I only use spies for seeing what enemy units have and see if the city has good economy. I wouldn't want to invade a city that is going to put a dent on my economy.

I tried building spies and assassins in every city to prevent enemies from using them on me, but the enemy seems to rarely if not never use any agents except diplomat.

**Subrosa Florens** · July 07, 2007, 10:05 PM

I consider spies a necessity in this game. I always have a web of them around my borders and especially ahead of my offensive armies. Without them a hostile army can literally come out of nowhere and attack you when you are unprepared. With them you can usually see an enemy invasion coming several turns away, giving you time to raise more troops and shift around reinforcements to meet them.

It is also good to know what you are facing before you attack an enemy army, so you can bring the right kind of troops to counter theirs. Plus they can open the gates in an enemy city for you, and cause unrest within it.

Diplomats are useful too. Not only for securing trade agreements, but also for selling map information, which is a effective way of earning much-needed denarii early in the game. Later when you have cash to spare, you can bribe enemy armies and cities into joining your faction. In my current XGM Macedonian campaign I tried to take Nicomedia and failed. So I sent a diplomat in and bribed the entire city and its garrison, including general. Where force fails, denarii prevails.

Assassins have their place too. They are generally not good enough to kill enemy generals, at least not most of them. However, they are very effective at killing enemy spies and diplomats. Considering what those agents can do, I think it wise to deprive my opponents of them.

**_TubbZ_** · July 08, 2007, 05:44 AM

Originally Posted by Subrosa Florens

I consider spies a necessity in this game. I always have a web of them around my borders and especially ahead of my offensive armies. Without them a hostile army can literally come out of nowhere and attack you when you are unprepared. With them you can usually see an enemy invasion coming several turns away, giving you time to raise more troops and shift around reinforcements to meet them.

see i use watch towers for that as they are cheaper in the long run and don't die

...

**unfortunate crow** · July 08, 2007, 03:12 PM

Watchtowers all the way for me too. Though you can't build them in enemy territory, so that is where spies become useful.

**Subrosa Florens** · July 08, 2007, 07:17 PM

I use watchtowers too, whenever I conquer a new territory I build towers along the border. That lets me see what is outside, and later when I expand further I can see when rebels pop up inside my borders. However, if you put a ring of spies out beyond the vision of your watchtowers you double the distance that you can see into the map. I have seen invasions coming as much as 4 turns in advance because I knew everything the enemy was doing.

For example, in my Greek XGM game I made an alliance with Thrace early on, after I had conquered Macedonia. Then I moved east into Asia Minor, the Levant, and Egypt. In the meantime Thrace moved west into Germania. Thanks to my spies I saw them eventually conquer the Germans, then turn all their offensive armies back toward my border.

I had nothing but cheap garrison units in Greece. I had to pull several stacks of my top-tier fighting troops out of Egypt, Armenia, and Mesopotamia to meet the threat. Thanks the extra early warning I had, I made it back just in time to meet the Thracian armies as the began laying siege to all my northern cities.

If not for the spies deep in their territory I would not have seen that coming until they were 1 turn away. They would have been at Athens before I had been able to mount an effective defense. As it was I did not lose a single city, and utterly crushed them with my armored elephants.

**Severous** · July 08, 2007, 07:16 PM

When I played Germany I kept my military within my 5 starting regions, and let agents roam the world.

I had agents spreading plague, making alliances, sabotaging cities, and causing riot and rebellion. Oh yes and a few assassinations. Most satisfying was influencing the fight between the two superpowers of my game....Scipii and Egypt doing all the above.

That was a 200+year campaign.

In regular campaigns I use many spies to scout ahead and open gates.

Sev

**Xyphos_Pet** · July 08, 2007, 10:39 PM

I always love to train up an assasin and assasinate oponents generals. I recruit spys too and move them and some assasins arround with my army so that when im going to attack a city or fighta battle, i can send spys to check out oponents team or open gates whilst using my assasins to assasinate their generals lol. Its a good way to go arround. Diplomats can be useful to move round too cuz i always seem to run into another factions diplomat that i can establish trade rights with.