Cool hidden "Consume Star" Espionage Operation! (2024)

So by accident i found the hidden new operation that allow you to destroy a star . I didn't expect this to be honest

It is triggered if you kill the Stellarite Devourer Leviathan and select the new option (i was curious what this is) to recover the egg sack instead of reignite the star and complete the Situation. Then you can start to destroy a star of a capital system with the "Consume Star" operation (Sabotage, Military). Of course the reignite star option is missing after that but at least from my point of view that is a low price to pay.

The operation makes a good use of the situation system and can indeed be countered if you're fast enough to research the counter option! I switched per console to look what happens in the target system and i was impressed! If you succeed the operation is this a incredible powerful tool. The star will be destroyd and every planet becomes frozen, destroying everything in the system.

If this is the new prototype operation for a complete espionage rework utilizing the Situation System (like suggested) it would indeed be a furious comeback! I really have hope now!

So i want to say thank you for the first espionage operation with an impact that is really worth to mention!

Edit: I forgot my screenshots

It does seem to imply that for the most powerful espionage operations you may be default outed as the insigator. In the cosume star's case unless your militarily more powerful you may just end up dead since the victim receives the "ate out star" casus beli which is a total war wargoal.
Then again this also indicative of the strongest effect your goign to be getting with an espionage operation as it's locked behind killing a levithan, so regular operation's are unlikely to be quite as impressive.

An operation to trigger an revolution with the current revolt system would be quite insane since the revolting planent get's the 10 year forced truce afterwards.

Xenith_Shadow said:

It does seem to imply that for the most powerful espionage operations you may be default outed as the insigator

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I really hope this is not the case! It's all about staying hidden for what you've done. Especially in MP it is important that the target never know who used that operation. As soon this is common knowledge the complete espionage playstyle is done because everyone will attack the empire with this operation.

Xenith_Shadow said:

you may just end up dead since the victim receives the "ate out star" casus beli which is a total war wargoal.

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Why this game just constantly kink shaming me though?

A2ch0n said:

I really hope this is not the case! It's all about staying hidden for what you've done. Especially in MP it is important that the target never know who used that operation. As soon this is common knowledge the complete espionage playstyle is done because everyone will attack the empire with this operation.

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I have to disagree here, this absolutely needs to be known. Otherwise this would become a way to destroy another Empire with zero counter play on their end. Because espionage is entirely uninteractive as it is right now and there is nothing the target can do about this whatsoever.

-Marauder- said:

I have to disagree here, this absolutely needs to be known. Otherwise this would become a way to destroy another Empire with zero counter play on their end. Because espionage is entirely uninteractive as it is right now and there is nothing the target can do about this whatsoever.

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Have you read my op? There is actually counterplay with the situation you get. You can even completely nullify it if you're fast enough.

And it's about all what espionage is for. If you know who is the spy, a complete potential playstyle is lost for MP because you will never deceive someone. It's not only about this operation. It's about all of the operations that exist and are up to come. If you know who spies on you what will you do? Yes of course you will declare war until there is no spy left.

And a spy focused empire is most likely more about diplomacy or trade at least from the outside and not so much warfocused. A spy player normally don't like warfare. You want to stay hidden, smile and play other empires against each other and manipulate conflicts to your liking by sabotage and deception.

-Marauder- said:

I have to disagree here, this absolutely needs to be known. Otherwise this would become a way to destroy another Empire with zero counter play on their end. Because espionage is entirely uninteractive as it is right now and there is nothing the target can do about this whatsoever.

Click to expand...

It's actually the structure I'd like to see more generally for major spy operations: the operation causes a Situation in the target, which can be countered (and isn't spammable since each empire can only have one instance of a given Situation at a time).

More broadly, I think if espionage is becoming a more serious threat, we should have a Counterespionage operation that degrades the target's intelligence level on the operator, and can uncover operations against you. That way we can have more of an ongoing spy war between rivals as just a normal part of gameplay.

Yes, it makes logical sense that especially major Spy Operations should involve a risk - not a certainty but a percentage risk - of the target finding out who did it.

With further sophistication, it should be possible to combine a Spy Op with a False Flag attempt so that the target is at risk of getting the impression that a third party did it.

The polity conducting the Spy Op should then be able to expend resources and opportunity cost to improve its odds of not being found out, or of successsfully doing the false flag, with actions such as spending truckloads of Influence, having an Edict running to build up some kind of Elite Spies value (+1 per month, max value 100?), sacrificing a Capital Planet Building Slot on a Spy Academy, or taking an Ascension Perk, or a Tradition (or a pick in an already-existing Tradition, i.e. Subterfuge).

And yes, I agree that there must also be pro-active counter-espionage options. In fact that's how I usually rolled in Civ 5 and 6. I couldn't be arsed to do active espionage on other civs, so I just allocated my cloak-and-dagger people to counter-espionage instead.