Espionage Technology
Espionage Technology improves information gathering and resistance to enemy scouting. Reports depend on effective strength, not raw research level alone.
Strength and cost
Level 1 grants +1 effective espionage strength. Higher completed tiers increase the bonus before whole-number rounding; check the Research panel for the next supported quote. Recon contributes your own and the strongest allied shared bonus; Counter Intel raises defensive strength.
Level 1 costs 8 base RP; later levels grow exponentially before other-domain tier surcharges. There is no lab or research prerequisite; buy with RP or automatic investment.
Report detail
Let A be the attacker's effective espionage and D the defender's effective defense:
Probe penalty = max(0, D − A)²
Remaining probes = sent probes − probe penalty
A layer appears if either its remaining-probe threshold is met or the attacker has the required effective-strength advantage:
| Information | Remaining probes | Strength advantage |
|---|---|---|
| Resources | Always shown | Not required |
| Ships | 2 | 1 |
| Defenses | 3 | 2 |
| Buildings | 5 | 3 |
| Research | 7 | 4 |
At equal effective strength, seven probes reveal all five layers. A defensive advantage of two consumes four probes' worth of detail before those thresholds are checked.
Standard completed espionage missions notify the target. There is no separate counter-espionage probe-destruction roll in this system. More probes improve detail rather than changing a detection probability.
Reports retain the target's name, owner and measured details from probe arrival. Renaming or losing the target station later does not replace the report with a new occupant's information. If a section was not revealed, its absence is not a zero reading; an older report without a recorded activity reading cannot reconstruct that reading from the current station. Older reports can still list retired ships, facilities or research at the levels recorded when the scan happened. These historical entries are display-only; they do not make the retired objects available to build again.
Using intelligence
Read the report timestamp, station slot and missing sections. Missing defenses are not proof of zero defenses. Scout again before an expensive attack and account for reinforcements or a changed fleet. Counter Intel can raise defensive strength but cannot guarantee secrecy against enough probes.