Idea - Spies

[Bianary]

This may be more complicated than is desirable, but I had an idea for a new class of unit to expand the gameplay in non-combat directions (While still leading to battles for dominance) so figured I'd outline my thoughts here. This is only meant as a basis for the idea, I'd expect things to change heavily from this if it is used as this outline is pretty rough and has lots of room for improvement. That being said, this is a sci-fi game and there's a lot of info systems that should be around for spies to get into. This may mean hiding some information on enemy status until spies get into their cities to find it out for you.

Spies/Saboteurs

• Data thieves
• Production limiters

Introducing unit type spy

• 1 move per turn
• Can't be detected by nearby enemy units
• Does not reveal adjacent tiles from fog of war
• Attempting to move onto an enemy unit will cost its move but reveals enemy instead of moving on and getting detected
• Moving into a city "goes to ground" - can slip into an enemy city even with enemy units on them

Instead of attaching weapons/armor to spies, you attach tools/countermeasures

• Tools determine what the spy can do in enemy cities - information gathering options available or sabotage available
• Countermeasures determine what protection the spy has from other units and from being caught while in a city

Additional features

• Advanced spies can gain the ability to move onto enemy units in the field
• Advanced spies can hack directly into enemy comms or sabotage enemy units in the field.
• When detected there's a chance that the spy won't be identified (Unless it's an ally spy in the field, which would be identified but then not destroyed - maybe an option on the spy itself whether it would id itself to allies or not, if you were sending it into their territory you might not want them to know that if possible)

Benefits of Spying

• Reveal nearby enemy units on the map (Comm hack)
• Reveal additional data about enemy units (Comm hack)
• Reveal additional data about enemy cities (Comm hack)
• Reveal location of nearby cities
• Reveal additional information about nearby cities
• Reveal information about available enemy ops
• Plant false information for enemies regarding your abilities (Such as making them think you're not as far on research as you are, or are further ahead than you really are so they may be more willing to make a pact with you)
• Reveal accurate information about enemy state of advancement
• "Steal" research from an enemy (Bonus research to you, they don't lose it)
• Steal credits from an enemy (They actually lose them) - maybe just charge them for the spy's upkeep while spy is in their city.
• Undetected spying either doesn't show up at all or shows up in global amounts (In the case of credits stolen). Partial failure pinpoints the city with an alert, complete failure results in capture and elimination of the spy.

Benefits of Sabotage

• Reduce enemy production of a specified type for that turn from that city
• At the cost of the saboteur reduce all production in a city for a turn (Blaze of glory)
• Prevent repairs to a unit recovering in the same tile as the saboteur
• Slightly damage a unit in the same tile as the saboteur
• Hurt enemy morale in a city by causing untracable (They can't find the saboteur if they're failing their detection checks) vandalism
• Undetected sabotage shows up only on global amounts (-1 of whatever due to sabotage). Partial failure will pinpoint the city with an alert ("Sabotage detected at X). Complete failure will result in capture and elimination of saboteur.

Research Options (Very incomplete)

• Adaptive camoflauge - Allow spies a chance to not be detected by an enemy unit moving onto them
• Secured Infonet - Make it harder for spies to infiltrate your cities successfully
• Advanced Hacking - Improve spy success at infiltrating cities
• Citizen ID System - Adds a building option to cities, makes it harder for spies to infiltrate
• Generic equipment improvements - Allows your spies to use more standard gear, making it harder for enemies to identify where they came from