Playing US right now but was wondering if there is a primer out to explain how to play with the new intelligence portion of the game. Also, looking for recommendations on division templates. Thanks!
Intelligence Primer?
- Thread starter Otay
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Have you familiarized yourself with the wiki? And would you want to heavily engage in espionage or just play normally with defense agsinst. Spies?
How to use intel:
- If you plan on annexing someone, do "collaboration government" mission(s) on them.
- Get intel advantage in the branch (land, air, naval) you are going to fight on the enemy you are going to fight
- Crack the encryption of the enemy and make sure yours is not cracked
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I can't go over all the intel stuff you need to know in a single post, but I will give some basic information that is relevant to the US.
1) You'll want to decrypt Germany, Italy, and Japan at the very least before you join the war.
2) You can fly scout planes from the Philippines to Taiwan. This will boost intel on Japan without using spies.
3) Unless you take over the Allies faction and/or invest in a minister that gives you an extra spy, your best bet is to pick one major power and focus HUMINT on them. Build a network throughout their country, then put it to sleep once you max it out.
4) Make sure you invest in all four types of espionage (civilian, army, navy, and air force) in your agency.
5) Build up counter intelligence. Max it out before joining the war.
6) Don't waste time trying to cause coups or flip the ideology of Germany, Italy, or Japan. It's a waste of time due to their stability and status as major powers. Instead, focus on getting information from your built up networks.
7) Don't race through the encryption parts of the agency. Go slowly. Ideally, you want to still have some levels of encryption available as you get near the war. Remember that the enemy can decrypt you eventually no matter what level you have, but they have to basically start over every time you hit a new level of encryption. So, instead of rushing through and giving them time to decrypt the highest level, let them finish decrypting your mediocre encryption, then raise it a level and have them start over.
8) If you are doing any kind of strategic warfare (bombing, convoy raiding), civilian intelligence is gold.
1) You'll want to decrypt Germany, Italy, and Japan at the very least before you join the war.
2) You can fly scout planes from the Philippines to Taiwan. This will boost intel on Japan without using spies.
3) Unless you take over the Allies faction and/or invest in a minister that gives you an extra spy, your best bet is to pick one major power and focus HUMINT on them. Build a network throughout their country, then put it to sleep once you max it out.
4) Make sure you invest in all four types of espionage (civilian, army, navy, and air force) in your agency.
5) Build up counter intelligence. Max it out before joining the war.
6) Don't waste time trying to cause coups or flip the ideology of Germany, Italy, or Japan. It's a waste of time due to their stability and status as major powers. Instead, focus on getting information from your built up networks.
7) Don't race through the encryption parts of the agency. Go slowly. Ideally, you want to still have some levels of encryption available as you get near the war. Remember that the enemy can decrypt you eventually no matter what level you have, but they have to basically start over every time you hit a new level of encryption. So, instead of rushing through and giving them time to decrypt the highest level, let them finish decrypting your mediocre encryption, then raise it a level and have them start over.
8) If you are doing any kind of strategic warfare (bombing, convoy raiding), civilian intelligence is gold.
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To elaborate on Simon's points:
You need agents for missions. Agents are recruited: 1 for having an agency, 1 for having 5 upgrades in said agency, 1 for an illusive Gentleman advisor and a variable number if you are spymaster and have allies.
Missions require an intelligence Network of varying strength, and agents (1-2) to so them, plus resources like civilian factories or guns.
Intelligence is a function of intel networks, agency upgrades, enemy laws and political leaning and a multitude of other factors. High is good and at 100%, you know more about the enemy than themselves.
Decryption requires investing in a cryptology branch in your agency, and works...read the wiki. It's there.
As a strategy, you need to invest a lot and Usually the whole process takes time. Expect some 130 days for a powerful mission to complete against a major, plus 60 days preparation - and you want to do 2 of those, usually, against each major enemy.
So, planning far ahead is vital.
Again: what do you want to do?
You need agents for missions. Agents are recruited: 1 for having an agency, 1 for having 5 upgrades in said agency, 1 for an illusive Gentleman advisor and a variable number if you are spymaster and have allies.
Missions require an intelligence Network of varying strength, and agents (1-2) to so them, plus resources like civilian factories or guns.
Intelligence is a function of intel networks, agency upgrades, enemy laws and political leaning and a multitude of other factors. High is good and at 100%, you know more about the enemy than themselves.
Decryption requires investing in a cryptology branch in your agency, and works...read the wiki. It's there.
As a strategy, you need to invest a lot and Usually the whole process takes time. Expect some 130 days for a powerful mission to complete against a major, plus 60 days preparation - and you want to do 2 of those, usually, against each major enemy.
So, planning far ahead is vital.
Again: what do you want to do?
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I think in single player you can just join Allies and click "Beconme spy master" and the AI will allow you. You don't have to take over Allies IIRC.
Does the spymaster get the extra operatives from number of faction members?
But isn't the sum of time the enemy needs in both cases, you mentioned, equal?
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You can't make progress on decryption if you've broken enemy ciphers.
So, let's say we broke the US's level 4 cipher. It's 180 days later and we're about to DOW the US to launch Tora Tora Tora or whatever.
Then the US cipher changes.
Suddenly, we don't have that passive buff anymore, we can't press the button to get the 30 day active buff if we want it, and we just spent 180 days not decrypting anything, so we can only now start making progress decrypting whatever the new cipher is.
The total time you spend might be equal, but when you are able to budget that time and effort matters.
I probably should have made that clearer in my post.
1. So, let's say we broke the US's level 4 cipher we needed 400 days ( 100 days per level for example ). Now we want to attack and the US cipher changes to level 5 ( due to US-research ). we need 100 more to break it again.
2. If the US had rushed trough their protection up to level 5, we couldn't break the cipher after 400 days and we have to "wait" 100 days to succeed. ( same situation as No. 1 )
In both cases the "outcome" for us is the same, without any advantage....
Or do I missunderstand your statement in total?
I think you do. Let's use a practical example.
Let's say I'm Britain. I see AI Germany begin the Danzig or War focus. Now, I'm not sure if my ciphers are broken. But I do know that after this focus fires, we will be at war. And I know the focus requires 70 days. And I know it only takes 30 days to run an agency upgrade.
So, I time an encryption upgrade to finish a few days before Danzig or War finishes. That way, I can blind Germany the moment they start the war. Yes, Germany will break that cipher eventually, but if they had any plans to use the passive buff from my ciphers being broken or any plans to run the 30 day active buff on me, those plans are out the window.
You can't do that sort of thing if you have run out of cipher upgrades. And the later in the game it is, the more likely someone has fired all their encryption upgrades. Good news: their ciphers are hard to break. Bad news: once they are broken, that's it until the enemy uses the active buff.
If you are the US, holding back an agency upgrade to work on in the middle of 1941 (with historical focuses) can be a real boon. You could spam all of the upgrades and have really awesome encryption, but then Japan and Germany can spend every day from January 1st 1939 to Pearl Harbor working on your cipher (if they want).
@Secret Master
Thanks, I see the point. In short: Only upgrade, if you really will need it! Sounds logical.
Thanks, I see the point. In short: Only upgrade, if you really will need it! Sounds logical.
It is logical from a game perspective.
I'm not the biggest fan of limitations on how often you can change your cipher. I'd be open to the possiblity that you could keep changing it (with some kind of escalating cost) so that there aren't finite times you can blind the enemy.
There's also a Youtube Video of a guy playing UK with ONLY using Diplomacy and Spies, and they managed to convert the entire world to Allies.