Bird Men ships can espy enemy friendly codes. Super Spy consists of two parts:

  • After movement, the ship's crew will gather information about the planet. You will be told the number of planetary structures (mines, factories, defense), resources (credits, supplies, minerals) and the friendly code.
    However, there's a chance that your spies get caught. Having multiple ships spying at a planet does not increase your chance to see something (because it is 100%), but your chance of being found. When you were found, the enemy will know you were there, but you'll not know he knows.
  • Before movement, in next turn, your ship will attempt to change the planet's friendly code. This is known as Super Spy Deluxe. Each ship has a 20% chance of succeeding in changing the friendly code. Chances are cumulative, so five ships super spying at the same planet are guaranteed to change the friendly code. The friendly code will be set to the friendly code of the lowest-Id ship spying. Thus, you can, for example, beam cargo off the planet using friendly code matching.
    When you change the friendly code of a planet, the enemy has a 20% chance to generate an Ionic Pulse. This will pop all ships that orbit the planet out of cloak. When the Birds try to set the friendly code to something starting with "mf" (=universal minefield friendly code), the Ionic Pulse will always be triggered. The planet needs 30 defense posts to be able to do generate a Pulse; 10 of them will be destroyed by energy overload.

Ships that are doing Super Spy will cloak if they can. Super Spy ships are immune to a base's "Force surrender" mission, even when they have a matching friendly code. Note that this immunity will stop when you change the mission.

Preconditions for Super Spy:

  • ship has fuel
  • ship orbits a planet (after movement)

Preconditions for Super Spy Deluxe:

  • ship has fuel
  • ship orbits a planet (before movement)
  • planet is owned by a player other than the ship owner
  • ship's friendly code does not start with "X" or "x"

(4.1) Super Spy Deluxe is performed in per-player Id order.

In case multiple players (which must all play a Bird Man race, of course) perform Super Spy Deluxe on the same planet, they will together try to change the planet's friendly code. The ship which ultimately defines the new friendly code for the planet is the one with the lowest Id among one player's fleet. For example, if one player spies at a planet with ships #10, #140 and #390, and another one with ships #231, #480 and #490, it will bei either ship #231 or #10 which defines the new friendly code. In PHost before version 4.1, it would always have been ship #10 which was chosen.

Preconditions for Ionic Pulse:

  • planet has 30 defense posts or more

Relevant Configuration Option: SpyDetectionChance.

Relevant PControl Stages: DeluxeSuperSpy, SuperSpyMission.

Relevant Formulas: Cloaking.