Stellaris

Stellaris

Espionage Rebalance
49 Comments
Watchman 12 Dec, 2023 @ 9:21am 
Is the mod still working?
powerwordspirit 8 Apr, 2023 @ 2:21am 
I don't want a cap on espionage techs.
Darthsawyer 24 Apr, 2022 @ 9:11am 
Better yet, make it possible to automatically repeat missions once you get to the selected infiltration level. Being able to tell all my envoys to steal technology every time they hit 100 infiltration would be a huge quality of life improvement
Col. Hathi 11 Jan, 2022 @ 3:25am 
So I did a bit of playing around with a lot of hacking, and constantly spamming something like the asset or tech hacks gets old real fast. Any chance you could make them more impactful instead of fast?
Col. Hathi 8 Jan, 2022 @ 8:45pm 
I think Alastair makes a good point
ThatsSoWitty 24 Nov, 2021 @ 10:03am 
Will this mod be updated to 3.2?
Alastair 27 Oct, 2021 @ 12:29am 
As I and Dr. Nolegs asked. Can a cap on the repeatable techs that increase encryption and codebreaking be added?
Dr. Nolegs 27 Sep, 2021 @ 9:47am 
Could you add a cap to Espionage techs?
Alastair 21 Sep, 2021 @ 6:39am 
From looking at it I feel like the repeatable techs should be capped or something. Since it could then make the bonuses you get from some Ascension Perks or from traditions feel less impactful/useful.

Like if I can just infinitely get +1 to those then the +2 Codebreaking and +1 Encryption from Subterfuge is kinda pointless. Same for say the +2 to both from taking Transcendence. Maybe offer it as a addon/separate mod?

Though the other changes look really cool.
V3N0M 20 Sep, 2021 @ 1:16am 
been playing with this mod, steal tech is awesome right now but what if diplo incident reduced the target's diplomatic weight, smear campaign damage the target's relationships with multiple allies/neighbors and sabotage starbase applied a harsh but temporary debuff to starbase weapons instead of just breaking a random module?
Butts McGee  [author] 19 Sep, 2021 @ 9:33am 
@V3N0M: I updated it to 3.1 last night but incorrectly marked it as 3.03. Should be fixed now.
V3N0M 18 Sep, 2021 @ 11:15pm 
it says this is for 3.03 but has anyone had any luck with 3.1? I'm about to test it myself but if theres issues I might not know what to look for.
Spider 4 Aug, 2021 @ 11:36am 
I think it’s ludicrous that you need such high intel to open branch offices as a megacorp.
Coulson 16 Jul, 2021 @ 7:29am 
Hello! Please add me as a friend on steam, i want to talk with you about your mod Espionage Rebalance being added into the reborn 3 modpack!
ShadyDemoness 11 Jul, 2021 @ 12:38am 
@Luna Assassin

No it can't. It is specifically made for the DLC content. Use logic pls.
Valse Griffyre 5 Jul, 2021 @ 10:28pm 
can this mod work without the DLC?
FasterMaster98 23 Jun, 2021 @ 7:59pm 
Is this mod ok to add mid game or will that cause some problems?
Risker the 34th 11 Jun, 2021 @ 2:14pm 
I'd say it would be best, if possible, to have ship designs revealed at different intel levels. corvettes and destroyers around 50-60 intel, cruisers around 70, battleships around 80 and then titans and up would be revealed at 100 intel.
Semen Reaper 10 Jun, 2021 @ 5:30pm 
Any plans to make it so you don't need 100 god damn Intel to see enemy ship designs? I feel 50-60 would be more reasonable but thats just me.
Butts McGee  [author] 9 Jun, 2021 @ 9:14am 
@Peter34: Nope, it will not interfere with other mods' repeatable techs.
Peter34 9 Jun, 2021 @ 3:28am 
Will this mod interfere with other mods that also add Repeatable Techs?
Dragonfly 13 May, 2021 @ 9:51pm 
I'm bringing up Smear Campaign again to note that you can only choose the target the first time you do the operation on a particular empire, so you can't even spam it with specific targets to take advantage of the opinion stacking you implemented.

I also think you misunderstood what I meant when I said Smear Campaign and Diplomatic incident would never start wars. I'm aware that opinion is not the only thing that factors into war declaration; my point was that these operations do not cause enough opinion loss to cause any substantial effects whatsoever--war, treaty nullification, dissolution of federations, whatever--and the inability to choose the target every time only cements this. The ability to manipulate the relations of other empires was the most potentially interesting part of espionage and it's just not performing.

Side note, I also support a buff to Arm Privateers as it's rather pathetic right now. It should scale with the target's fleet power.
Mushroomancer 8 May, 2021 @ 4:57pm 
Is there a way to make Arm Privateers better? It usually spawns a very small (as in, less than 100 fleet power) fleet to attack the empire.
The wise old man 2 May, 2021 @ 6:09am 
I think a 4 year cool down and an increase of operation difficulty to 10 would make it balanced, if you just get 100% technology
Dragonfly 1 May, 2021 @ 3:34pm 
I'm not saying a single smear campaign should be enough to start a war, just using that as an abstract example of the fact that they pretty much do absolutely nothing.
AlienFromBeyond 1 May, 2021 @ 3:34pm 
Cooldown would be good but that's per empire, as long as you got the envoys and energy you can just steal from other empires. That leaves operation difficulty and progress gained really (I suppose cost as well but you can power through that unless it was increased to absurd amounts that render it useless for most everyone), and between those I think reducing the progress gained would be the healthiest option. It means you still need and want your own research capability, instead of pushing you leaps and bounds ahead every time you do a round of stealing.
Butts McGee  [author] 1 May, 2021 @ 2:11pm 
@Dragonfly: Unfortunately, that's beyond the scope of this mod. If low opinion was all you need for the AI to declare war, then genocidals would never be at peace, or the whole galaxy would unanimously declare war on you after cracking a planet or two. Unfortunately, neither is the case. If you increase AI aggression in galaxy setup, or use a mod to increase aggression, then the AI should consider negative opinion more heavily and be more willing to declare war.
Dragonfly 1 May, 2021 @ 10:46am 
Good mod. I feel like smear campaign and diplomatic incident need to have their values massively increased, still; in my experience they will never cause treaties to be broken and they sure as hell won't start any wars.
Butts McGee  [author] 1 May, 2021 @ 9:44am 
@AlienFromBeyond, @The Wise Old Man: I was worried that might be the case. There are a couple ways I could try to balance it out more. Off the top of my head I can try increasing the operation difficulty, or putting a cooldown back in place (maybe 4 years instead of vanilla 6?), or decreasing how much is stolen at once so you still need some research (maybe only steal 75% or 80% progress instead of 100%). Any thoughts on which change might feel the best?
AlienFromBeyond 30 Apr, 2021 @ 11:26pm 
I agree, stealing tech is way too easy, I can easily become the best in tech not by researching but gathering an enormous amount of EC and using it to steal over and over again. The AI doesn't seem to properly value the Encryption techs to protect themselves, though I do at least see them sometimes take Enigmatic Engineering.
The wise old man 29 Apr, 2021 @ 7:45pm 
I feel like technology way too easy to steal with the right assets, it would be nice to have a bigger cooldown or maybe a huge risk your taking by attempting to steal the technology
Hero Tales 22 Apr, 2021 @ 10:12pm 
@Drakal I also vouch for this. I mean really buff my privateers to the level of the raiders. Or maybe have different level of privateers. But I understand this mod is just for vanilla and just faster speed.
Devs really miss the ball to add a high risk operation to add unrest to a planet. Rarely I ever press that martial law button
Drakal 22 Apr, 2021 @ 11:16am 
And maybe buff privateers cuz it sucks atm
WhispWeb 21 Apr, 2021 @ 11:08am 
One thing I would also add, although I dont know if its posible, is increasing the amount of targets of smear campaign
WhispWeb 20 Apr, 2021 @ 12:22pm 
@Dragon of Desire Do you mean, if you get caugth you recive a big relationship penalty?
Dragon of Desire 20 Apr, 2021 @ 12:11pm 
Could you make the relations penalty from causing an incident be something really big like -200 for 5 years? Make it so that it can royally fuck up alliances and stuff if you don't know what you're doing.
Butts McGee  [author] 20 Apr, 2021 @ 10:53am 
@SaltyRocksPew: Thank you very much! Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a way to do that, but hopefully the changes I made to energy costs should make it less of a pain.

@Iacton Qruze: Ohh, I get what you mean now. I'm not sure how to do that, but I love the idea so I'll try to figure out if it's possible!
Willi Sänger 20 Apr, 2021 @ 12:32am 
@Crimson_Warlord: The idea of an information broker / spy federation looks good. I wonder if it is possible to implement a corporation that sells intelligence?
Willi Sänger 20 Apr, 2021 @ 12:26am 
@Crimson_Warlord Okay, good. But I meant the exchange of information about opponents, and not about the members of the federation. The fact that they exchange information about each other is pretty obvious.
SaltyRocksPew 19 Apr, 2021 @ 5:19pm 
Very very good rebalance. I'd like to pay influence for spy actions rather than energy as an optional choice maybe? In my current tall playstyle I always end up selling a bunch of alloys for the energy to run spy campaigns while sitting on 1k influence. In the mid game at least.
Butts McGee  [author] 19 Apr, 2021 @ 2:41pm 
@Tomas83: I just checked it out, I noticed smear campaign opinion penalty can't stack, so I'll start out by enabling stacking for it.

@Iacton Qruze: Federation members already share a large amount of intel on themselves with each other. Although, if I can figure out how to do federation modding, I'll see about adding some kind of information brokerage/spy federation, since that could be neat!
WhispWeb 19 Apr, 2021 @ 2:06pm 
One thing I would suggest is increasing the impact of smear campings. It could be a little too op but it still feels like it needs a buff.
Willi Sänger 19 Apr, 2021 @ 12:30pm 
Hmm. To be honest, I haven’t had time to test the new DLC properly, so I can’t say anything.
Col. Hathi 19 Apr, 2021 @ 12:21pm 
I'd assumed that was automatically shared between federation members?
Willi Sänger 19 Apr, 2021 @ 12:01pm 
Cool! I wonder when modders or Paradox will come up with an agreement on the exchange of intelligence? I think that would be a good option for playing with friends in the same federation, when one of the players essentially takes on the role of the head of the Federal Intelligence Service?
Butts McGee  [author] 19 Apr, 2021 @ 9:28am 
@James009: Thank you!

@Col. Hathi: That sounds like a good idea. I'll see if I can make the sabotage break more modules on a slightly longer cooldown.

@Drakal: The problem is to keep that from being overpowered it would have to be very expensive and on a very long cooldown. If that hit a citadel, you'd essentially delete a minimum of 5,500 alloys and 10 years of effort, and that doesn't even take modules, buildings, and defense platforms into account.
Drakal 19 Apr, 2021 @ 7:16am 
Well if i could suggest ... would be beter to just blow up whole station and have more cd on it rather then blowing up components one by one. when im planing to invade some empire and building intel on them i should be prepared to clear the high armed targets by spy rather then blowing only few segments in critical cheekpoint.
Col. Hathi 19 Apr, 2021 @ 2:43am 
Wouldn't it be better to make the starbase thing potentially affect more modules? Otherwise you might end up getting spammed, or have to constantly repeat the same task.
James009 19 Apr, 2021 @ 1:46am 
This mod looks very useful. Thank you.