Please include the wonderful feature, which practically no game has and which is:

from Elemental Forums

Difficulty sliders.

 

 

Reason:

Civ4 on deity sucks for being too hard, on immortal its boring fast.

Civ5 the same.

Civ3 the same.

Age of Wonders 2 sucks on hardest diffculty for being too easy, like Heroes of Mightnmagic all versions.

GalCiv has similar issues.

 

The reason is simply, that the difficulty steps are steps and if the fun would be just between two difficulty levels, fun is gone. The solution is fortunately simple:

All (or nearly all) difficulty settings are anyway coded in some variables (e.g. production bonus for AI, health bonus, research bonus, XP bonus, which AI subrountines are switched on, ...).

Therefore for solution, its just one sub-menu accessible via option "Difficulty: Custom", with sliders (or fields to type in values or whatever) which directly change these difficulty variables, which are anyway changed by difficulty settings.

 

E.g. want to have tough instead of numerous AI opponents +200% HP, +0% production, which will be a different game experience as simply a high difficulty.E.g. diverse opponents, one AI opponent could be given swarm bonuses (production bonus for many units), one AI heroic ones (XP bonus, better souvereign) and the last just durable troops (kingdom/empire bonus points, health bonus), which will be a completely different game from simply 3 hard AIs.

A nice addition would be, that player bonus or malus could be set that way as well, e.g. player +100%xp bonus, AI +200% production could yield a "hero wades through hordes" game experience without being too difficult.

 

As a sidenote, i know exactly 1 single game with difficulty sliders, Empire from 1987, no other game ever seen again with them, always wondered why. Anyone idea why?

23,723 views 20 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

You can mod this if you want.

You will want to enter the "CoreDifficultyLevels" XML document, and change those around. You can see the path, although I have installed FE in a custom directory, the XML file is still located in "Data/English" from the FE install directory.

PS. Supreme Commander 2 had moddable AI to the point of choosing between 56% or 57% production bonuses, if you wanted to ^_^

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Groupy 2 - Organize multiple applications into grouped tabs on your Windows desktop
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Ok, apparently nobody cares about such a feature.

 

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

excellent idea. shouldnt be hard to add to UI?

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Elder Scrolls games have difficulty sliders. 

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

Difficulty sliders.

 

 

Reason:

Civ4 on deity sucks for being too hard, on immortal its boring fast.

Civ5 the same.

Civ3 the same.

Age of Wonders 2 sucks on hardest diffculty for being too easy, like Heroes of Mightnmagic all versions.

GalCiv has similar issues.

 

The reason is simply, that the difficulty steps are steps and if the fun would be just between two difficulty levels, fun is gone. The solution is fortunately simple:

All (or nearly all) difficulty settings are anyway coded in some variables (e.g. production bonus for AI, health bonus, research bonus, XP bonus, which AI subrountines are switched on, ...).

Therefore for solution, its just one sub-menu accessible via option "Difficulty: Custom", with sliders (or fields to type in values or whatever) which directly change these difficulty variables, which are anyway changed by difficulty settings.

 

E.g. want to have tough instead of numerous AI opponents +200% HP, +0% production, which will be a different game experience as simply a high difficulty.E.g. diverse opponents, one AI opponent could be given swarm bonuses (production bonus for many units), one AI heroic ones (XP bonus, better souvereign) and the last just durable troops (kingdom/empire bonus points, health bonus), which will be a completely different game from simply 3 hard AIs.

A nice addition would be, that player bonus or malus could be set that way as well, e.g. player +100%xp bonus, AI +200% production could yield a "hero wades through hordes" game experience without being too difficult.

 

As a sidenote, i know exactly 1 single game with difficulty sliders, Empire from 1987, no other game ever seen again with them, always wondered why. Anyone idea why?
End of quote

THis game doesn't need difficulty sliders. Just set the difficulty of the world AND the opponents to ridiculous and then make all the AI opponents (maximum allowed on the map) as ONE TEAM together and you'll have all the difficulty you need. If you beat that then you shouldn't be playing games you should be making them. ;)

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

It's a good idea, modding the XML to add custom difficulty levels that are between the existing ones.  It raises all sorts of interesting questions, like can the AI beat you if it has all these cool cheats, an HP bonus for example, but has an economic crunch/slump going on? ;)

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top

 

Quoting willie, reply 7


THis game doesn't need difficulty sliders. Just set the difficulty of the world AND the opponents to ridiculous and then make all the AI opponents (maximum allowed on the map) as ONE TEAM together and you'll have all the difficulty you need. If you beat that then you shouldn't be playing games you should be making them.
End of willie's quote

 

The problem isnt that game is too easy to beat, the problem is difficulty x too easy and x+1 too hard. And/or that while beating higher difficulty level is possible, it narrows down game options.

 

E.g. civ3-4 on medium difficulty wonder building nice, on high absolutely stupid. In civ5 they have altered AI bonuses such that AI doesnt get production bonus for wonder building -> on high difficulty civ 5 wonder building not absolutely stupid-> difficulty does not just make game more difficult, it alters game.

 

In FE for example the usefullness of the wealthy trait changes strongly with difficulty level, on medium levels its +500 gildar, on high its +50% cities because the 500 gildar translate into pumping out 2 pioneers earlier allowing to claim 6 instead of 4 city locations, due to faster AI expansion. If the difficulty increase would for example focus more on higher HP bonus instead of production bonus, the usefulness of wealthy is less effected.

 

 

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

I agree. Being able to alter exactly specific parameters of the difficulty instead of bumping up everything by a notch could make for a highly customizeable experience and thus very interesting games.

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Kongdej, reply 1
You can mod this if you want.
Reduced 29%Original 1920 x 1080

You will want to enter the "CoreDifficultyLevels" XML document, and change those around. You can see the path, although I have installed FE in a custom directory, the XML file is still located in "Data/English" from the FE install directory.

PS. Supreme Commander 2 had moddable AI to the point of choosing between 56% or 57% production bonuses, if you wanted to

Sincerely
~ Kongdej
End of Kongdej's quote

 

You know what this is:

"<AIIntelligenceFactor>10.0</AIIntelligenceFactor>"

 

It cannot  (should not) be the variable controlling the AI intelligence, as it rises with every difficulty level, although full AI should be on with challenging.

 

Reply #11 from Elemental Forums Top

more generally:

"AIDifficultyLevel InternalName="AIDiffLvl_Hard"> <DisplayName>Hard</DisplayName> <AIEconomicRatio>1.1</AIEconomicRatio> <AIFOWCheat>0</AIFOWCheat> <AIHPRatio>1.0</AIHPRatio> <AIStartingFundsRatio>5.0</AIStartingFundsRatio> <AISovereignHPRatio>1.0</AISovereignHPRatio> <AIUsesCombatMagic>1</AIUsesCombatMagic> <AIIntelligenceFactor>1.5</AIIntelligenceFactor>"

 

<AIEconomicRatio>1.1</AIEconomicRatio>

<AIStartingFundsRatio>5.0</AIStartingFundsRatio>

 

10% eco bonus, but 400% more start funds?

 

Instinctively i would say the AI should not get much boost bonus but more continous bonus. A boost means the AI power starts high but increases slowly, meanind human must just "holdout".

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting carn112004, reply 12
Instinctively i would say the AI should not get much boost bonus but more continous bonus.
End of carn112004's quote

Someone thought otherwise ;)
That said, I would tend to agree with you, but it doesn't matter much to me :)

Quoting carn112004, reply 11
You know what this is:

"<AIIntelligenceFactor>10.0</AIIntelligenceFactor>"

It cannot (should not) be the variable controlling the AI intelligence, as it rises with every difficulty level, although full AI should be on with challenging.
End of carn112004's quote

Hmm, my old brains thinks about it.
In truth I think only "Frogboy" knows what it is.
From OLD posts, I remember it from being AI intelligence, something about how long the AI uses to do calculations.
But I think it have a cap...
But honestly, I don't know/remember.

Try switching it to 9000 and see what happens :D

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #13 from Elemental Forums Top

GalCiv for OS/2 had this. People didn't like it for some reason. But maybe we're reaching a point where we can bring it back.

In the code, we use a number anyway.

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 14
GalCiv for OS/2 had this. People didn't like it for some reason. But maybe we're reaching a point where we can bring it back.

In the code, we use a number anyway.
End of Frogboy's quote

Had what in particular?... Cursed curiosity... :-"

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #16 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting StevenAus, reply 16
Difficulty sliders.  As said in the first line of the OP.
End of StevenAus's quote

Nah, can't have it be too easy to use...

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #17 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 14
GalCiv for OS/2 had this. People didn't like it for some reason. But maybe we're reaching a point where we can bring it back.

In the code, we use a number anyway.
End of Frogboy's quote

 

Thanks for considering this, the intent is not to replace the standard difficulties, but as an addition.

 

As a sidenote from the test game i had with economy bonus ~ 1.1, start bonus ~ 2.0, AI intelligence bonus 2.0 and hp bonus 6.0, i noticed that power rating and therefore probably AI is not aware of the HP bonus. Which would mean that the AI is too cautious on ridicolous (already having a +50%) and insane in deciding to attack, as it does not consider its HP advantage.

In that game it was obvious, as 6.0 HP means +500% HP, the game was smooth sail with outgrowing all AIs economically (was an awesome start location), the only thing keeping me realy nervous were those 500 HP juggernauts at my border and the nagging question, if there is something in the AI logic compelling it to start a war even although the power rating indicates AI would lose (which probably would not have been true, 500 HP is just a lot). Problem was solved by someone else declaring war on him and winning.

 

Reply #18 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 14
GalCiv for OS/2 had this. People didn't like it for some reason. But maybe we're reaching a point where we can bring it back.

In the code, we use a number anyway.
End of Frogboy's quote

It depends on how it was presented, I suppose.  A setting that says "Easy" and "Normal" is more intuitive than an abstract number.

Reply #19 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Mtn_Man, reply 19


It depends on how it was presented, I suppose.  A setting that says "Easy" and "Normal" is more intuitive than an abstract number.
End of Mtn_Man's quote

 

Therefore:

"Therefore for solution, its just one sub-menu accessible via option "Difficulty: Custom", ", which ensures one can safely ignore the complication if one doesnt care. An additional more complicated setup is already included via option to set the AI enemies individually and giving them differing difficulty.

Reply #20 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting carn112004, reply 17

 

As a sidenote from the test game i had with economy bonus ~ 1.1, start bonus ~ 2.0, AI intelligence bonus 2.0 and hp bonus 6.0, i noticed that power rating and therefore probably AI is not aware of the HP bonus. Which would mean that the AI is too cautious on ridicolous (already having a +50%) and insane in deciding to attack, as it does not consider its HP advantage.

In that game it was obvious, as 6.0 HP means +500% HP, the game was smooth sail with outgrowing all AIs economically (was an awesome start location), the only thing keeping me realy nervous were those 500 HP juggernauts at my border and the nagging question, if there is something in the AI logic compelling it to start a war even although the power rating indicates AI would lose (which probably would not have been true, 500 HP is just a lot). Problem was solved by someone else declaring war on him and winning.

 
End of carn112004's quote

 

I understand now, why in that game expansion and outpacing the AI was so easy due the AI not calculating its HP bonus.

The monster difficulty was set to ridicolous, meaning the monster number was noticeably increased compared to no bonus. The AI had little production bonus, meaning compared to standard no bonus game the AI had relatively the same or less number of units available for beating back wildlife. While the HP bonus would have easily taken care of that, the AI does not know about it, therefore its expansion speed was equal or slower than AI expansion in a no bonus game - said simply it probably calculated "Uh, have not yet sufficient fight power (cause i do not know i have a tremondous HP bonus vastly offsetting any disadvantage in numbers) to clear wild life -> do not build pioneer now as i cannot hold expansion".

 

So if i shift AI bonus from production to HP, i should leave so much production bonus that wildlife does not pose a problem for AI.

 

As a further note that means having AIs in game with differing HP bonuses (e.g. 3 AIs with expert, 1 with ridicolous) is at least problematic, because it will screw decision making of the AIs, especially a lower HP bonus AI might due to not considering HP bonus assume it is superior and attack, although the others side HP bonus actually means it is inferior.

 

AI programming looks complicated, keep up the good work Frogboy :thumbsup: .