Covert-Ops Experiences

[furball]

As a 'retired' player who is unable to delete his planet, I've been playing around with it a fair bit.

There is a way to make it profitable, and furthermore, you also get to inflict your own personal damage on the top 100.

Personally, I target the top 3 players of the top galaxy (look at me, no co-ords) and can expect to get about 500k of each resource each morning.

I have Security as Priority 1 (increasing my stealth bonus) and use 10 agents on the first planet (scan for resources first, it only costs you 9k for all 3), 2 on the second and 1 on the third. well worth it

Keep in mind here that my score was just bashed down to 60k (was 200k before ) I don't know if there's some sort of formula relating to sizes.

[Castigated]

The bigger difference there is between you and the larger planet, the higher a percentage of the planet's resources you get. Don't know the excact formula.

[Xeno]

Originally Posted by Nonentity

I don't know if there's some sort of formula relating to sizes.

There is, but it's not commonly known. The basics are easy to understand, though: The smaller you are, the more you will gain from your covert operations.

I strongly believe the formula will be modified before round 11. The problem with the covert ops the way they are working today, is that a big target can do pretty much nothing against a small planet draining its resources through covert ops. A skilled covert op player is thus able to severely damage a big opponent, by stealing his resources over and over again.

Experienced players will remember the Cargo Ship. Nobody would have believed you in round 2, if you had told them that future versions of PA would implement Cargo Ships available for the small players only, and that these ships would be able to steal hideous amounts of resources.

Well, guess what: That's what we're looking at. I've seen covert ops steal millions of resources on one singel go.


Xeno

[mikay]

Their Value / Your Value * 1000 * agents. Capped at 10% of each resource.

[ronnie]

Originally Posted by Xeno

The problem with the covert ops the way they are working today, is that a big target can do pretty much nothing against a small planet draining its resources through covert ops. A skilled covert op player is thus able to severely damage a big opponent, by stealing his resources over and over again.

sum ppl may view this as a good thing as it means even a small planet/player can feel good about himself and, if in an alliance, can feel he is helping them out in other ways than just having a massive fleet.

rock on covert ops (not on fang planets plz ;p)

[furball]

Originally Posted by Xeno

I strongly believe the formula will be modified before round 11. The problem with the covert ops the way they are working today, is that a big target can do pretty much nothing against a small planet draining its resources through covert ops. A skilled covert op player is thus able to severely damage a big opponent, by stealing his resources over and over again.

The whole idea behind covert-ops is that a small player is able to have some effect on the game, despite having a very small fleet in comparison. It's one of those changes that restricts growth of the top players, much like Heavy Cargo Transfers research - one alliance and its top players can't dominate the game to such an extent.