assassins question

[Sllhouette]

im in a massive war with both france and HRE and all of us are using assassins extensively. i've killed countless nobles of theirs, but i've also lost a good portion of my family tree. some of the good generals just dont develop proper security traits. for the first time today i found out when i put the assassin as an agent traveling with the lord's army, they say they'll protect him from other assassins. i never knew about this. i know having spies embedded with the army or in the city help protect against other spies/assassins, lowering the success chance. but does anyone know about assassins, do they fight against other assassins? because the spy already does that job, so i don't understand. you never think to use assassins as a passive agent, because they're always supposed to be outside killing people.

also i read that spies can lower public order, is this true? i haven't noticed it. but it would explain why my regions in lower france have been rioting and rebelling for 100 turns now. there's no reason they're so angry, when my german provinces are automatically happy and growing right from being conquered.

[Michael Westen]

I don't know about assassins for protecting against enemy assassins, but spies DO lower public order. You can see it work on enemy settlements when you infiltrate them. It's the same with enemy spies in your cities and castles.
That's why I usually put spies in my frontier settlements or wherever unrest is unusally high.

[Sllhouette]

from their audio cues, spy yes he will "counterspy", assassin says he will "protect against other cutthroats" (scottish version). i never thought spy would lower public order by a significant amount. i always went straight to sabotaging for direct damage to order. however, the passive disorder was enough to lose much of france for me, so i have a new respect for rooting out spies.

it makes sense that city spies will make it harder for outside spies to get in. also makes sense that having a city assassin guards against foreign assassins. yet does having a protecting spy with vision of an enemy assassin, also make them less likely to succeed? or does that only protect against city sabotage, and only guard assassins can protect against assassination attempts? you see how confusing it can get. i can't find any clear explanation on google

[Macaras]

Guys, it’s not that confusing, as much as I can say, it’s like this:

1. Spy in the other factions city increases disorder,
2. Spy in your city or in your army prevents any enemy activity, acts as counterintelligence.
3. Assassins doesn’t act as counterintelligence at all, only to strike.

The second point means that assassins have much less chance to succeed any sabotage or murder action and the enemy spies will be encountered so they will not make your cities disordered. The spy is must have in capital city if you want your king to survive and very helpful with traveling generals, especially good ones.

[Sllhouette]

are you 100% sure about the counter-assassin possibility? i think common logic would agree with you about the spy being the main defense, most players probably agree. its just the voice line of the assassin saying that he will watch out for enemy assassins, when you put him into the city, is throwing me off. either he can serve that role (like agents in shogun 2 could be offensive or defensive), or CA put in that voice line but didn't design the game to match it

[Macaras]

100% I am only sure about death and taxes . The counter assassin it's just from my experience, I tried few times and they didn't prevent the hostile assassinations. I never paid attention to this voice, but I think it's not a reliable indicator.. I guess somebody could test it in the game playing a campaign using assassins instead of spies as counter intelligence to see if they work.