Description :

While playing Against the Odds Scenario, and checking Red's outpost, who has an exploited Unknown Strategic Resource pin on a coastal tile, I noticed that the tile tooltip reveals which Unknown Strategic Resource is extracted and exploited by Red AI.

Steps to reproduce :

1. Launch the savefile attached

2. Locate Ebla territory, and locate the exploited Unknown Strategic Resource pin on a coastal tile.

3. Hovering mouse over the pin displays Unknown Strategic Resource's tooltip, as intented.

4. But hovering mouse over the exploited tile of the Unknown Strategic Resource displays tile's tooltip that reveals the type of the Unknown Strategic Resource  : Oil.

5. Hovering mouse over other Unknown Strategic Resource tiles on the map (Red and Black AIs, who are the most advanced technologically) also reveals the strategic resources being extracted and exploited.

Intented behavior :

The tile tooltip shouldn't reveal the type of the Unknown Strategic Resource to a player who hasn't yet researched their related technologies to discover them. It should only show the tile's effect and exploitations values.

Example below from an unknown strategic resource in my territory :

Notes :

I haven't experienced it before in other playthroughs, this is linked to my vassal state to Green, who is allied to all the other AIs, which grants me vision on the whole map and any AI's territory.

But obviously, this allows players to gather information on their opponents strategic resources types (provided they have vision on the opponent's territory), and allows them to focus attacks/ransacks/bombardments on those specific spots, to prevent opponents from using those resources.

 Attachments :

UnknownResourceTileTooltip.ctr

DNLH wrote:
If anything, I'd rather have it so that once this unknown resource gets exploited, it just gets revealed no matter the tech, but not sure how feasible that would be.

Well that's exactly how it works right now, hence the post. If you (as a player who hasn't yet researched the technologies to reveal strategic resources from laters eras) hover the exploited tile with your mouse, the tile's tooltip will show you which strategic resource is exploited.

DNLH wrote:
IMO, it makes sense that merchants and gossip would tell you of distant lands where they mine 'coal', even if your science team is not yet sure what that whole coal thing could be used for.

I thought about that as well, and it makes absolute sense of course. Having words of resources yet undiscovered by you, because of your diplomatic relations with the others, is perfectly fine and understandable.

The point though is rather : do you have to know exactly which are those unknown strategic resources to you ?

The way I see it, and this is why I think it is not intented, is that since you know which resource is being exploited, you can use this information to ransack the district, hence preventing your opponent from using said resource. Say you're fighting someone who has Arquebusiers, and you know where they are exploiting their salpeter, you'd want to ransack the district as soon as possible, so they wouldn't be able to build more arquebusiers (granted trade can provide them with it if they have the necessary treaties). Or against Ming's Rocket Cart, which needs 3 salpeter. If you can disable at least one exploited salpeter from your opponent, you're penalising them to build more Rocket Carts.

This is an unintented "spying/intel gathering" issue to me.

This kind of information should be discovered by spies/agents, meaning you (again, as a player who hasn't yet researched the related technologies) should invest into spying to get that information. It could be something that the upcoming expansion brings, for instance.