Split Campaign And Battle Difficulties

[Sir Winston Churchill]

Another aspect from past releases that I wish had followed into this one, the ability to change the difficulty of the CAI and BAI separately. I say this because I personally am stuck between a rock and a hard place. I dislike the bonuses the AI gets on harder difficulties, but I enjoy the toughness of the troops in battle. I'm stuck either with a overly advantaged AI economy, or a handicapped AI army.

The armies in Normal are too weak for my taste, they break easily and I constantly find myself losing no more than a hundred troops while completely wiping AI stacks, and with a measly garrison fighting back entire armies with ease. I don't like this ease, which is why I like Hard when it comes to battle. Yet at the same time I like Normal because I and the AI economically speaking are on remotely balanced fields. They don't get any (radical) bonuses that I don't, and for the most part they aren't sending out entire stacks every turn nor am I being declared war upon by every clan on the same island.

For me the perfect balance would be a Normal campaign difficulty and a Hard battle difficulty, something I used to be able to do with games like Medieval II. Even Empire I think allowed this, and yet unless I'm mistaken, this is not so with Shogun II. Am I the only one who would wish for this ability to be granted back to us?

[SgtLong]

Yeah, I find it very mouth dropping that a unit, well trained in the art of melee can possible loose so much morale from being away from a general on a horse. The collective nature of the Japanese culture of discipline seems to get a "0" value in retrospect. I would also like separate tax values to as well. I think the "garrisons" should also incorporate the civilian aspect like in ETW, armed peasants.

[daniu]

You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign.

[Sir Winston Churchill]

You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign.

See I didn't know this, probably because of the underlined part. Pretty weird place to have that option instead of before you begin it.

Oh and

"You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign"
Unfortunately it doesn't work. i have usually set my campaign to normal and battle AI to very hard (with battle realism turned on) but i still win every battle easily in the same manner as described by OP. lately i have tried a few Very Hard and Hard campaigns without changing the battle difficulty and each battle has been a lot harder and i have lost quite a few. I think i read somewhere that CA are working to fix this but it may have been wishful thinking on my part.

[Humble Warrior]

See I didn't know this, probably because of the underlined part. Pretty weird place to have that option instead of before you begin it.

Oh and

I didn`t know this either. It is very strange since it used to always be in the options before Campaign start.

[Erwin Rommel]

You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign.

Oh snap.

[♘Top Hat Zebra]

Yeah, you can already do this.


I would prefer to be able to do it on the main menu, though. Not sure why they would have removed that...

[von stoker]

"You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign"
Unfortunately it doesn't work. i have usually set my campaign to normal and battle AI to very hard (with battle realism turned on) but i still win every battle easily in the same manner as described by OP. lately i have tried a few Very Hard and Hard campaigns without changing the battle difficulty and each battle has been a lot harder and i have lost quite a few. I think i read somewhere that CA are working to fix this but it may have been wishful thinking on my part.

[Humble Warrior]

"You can set different difficulties once you started the campaign"
Unfortunately it doesn't work..

I`ve just been trying this. It seems to work to me.

[Drtad]

I`ve just been trying this. It seems to work to me.

It seems to work for me too. While playing a VH campaign, I can set battles to normal and they seem like normal difficulty. I've done VH battles so I know the difference.

Not saying I'm absolutely right, but it seems like it works for me.

[von stoker]

I tried a little control test to see if setting battle difficulty level in the campaign options window actually works. it seems it doesn't. i started 9 campaigns as hattori and in each campaign I besieged asai on the 1st turn. they sallied out and attacked me on their AI turn.
I had 2 yari ashigaru, 1 bow ashigaru , 1 yari samurai and a general. Asai had 2 yari ashigaru, 1 bow ashigaru, 1 samurai retainer and a general.
In all battles, I left my units as the AI set them up and didnt touch them, i just let the AI attack them. all battles were in clear weather

Easy Campaign and Easy Battle setting = 3 battles for 2 wins and 1 loss
Easy campaign and Very Hard Battle setting = 3 battles for 3 wins
Very Hard campaign and Very Hard battle setting = 3 battles for 3 losses

Every battle is different though and while this small test is not totally conclusive, to me, it does seem that changing the battle setting in the campaign options either doesn't work or doesn't work very well

[Humble Warrior]

I tried a little control test to see if setting battle difficulty level in the campaign options window actually works. it seems it doesn't. i started 9 campaigns as hattori and besieged asai on the 1st turn. they sallied out and attacked me on their AI turn.
I had 2 yari ashigaru, 1 bow ashigaru , 1 yari samurai and a general. Asai had 2 yari ashigaru, 1 bow ashigaru, 1 samurai retainer and a general.
In all battles, I left my units as the AI set them up and didnt touch them, i just let the AI attack them. all battles were in clear weather

Easy Campaign and Easy Battle setting = 3 battles for 2 wins and 1 loss
Easy campaign and Very Hard Battle setting = 3 battles for 3 wins
Very Hard campaign and Very Hard battle setting = 3 battles for 3 losses

Every battle is different though and while this small test is not totally conclusive, to me, it does seem that changing the battle setting in the campaign options either doesn't work or doesn't work very well

What do you mean you let the AI attack them? You let just the enemy AI attack your troops while your troops did nothing or did you leave your troops on AI control as well?

From my testing where I actually fought battles, it appeared to me that the enemy AI fought stronger and harder than when on Hard. I was playing on Hard campaign and upped the battles to Very Hard\Legendary.

[von stoker]

i just left my troops to do nothing. no AI control. just left them as the AI set them up at battle start and didnt interfere with them at all. just let the battle run its course.
i also timed the battles because i thought they would all be losses and to see how much quicker my units would rout on VH compared to Easy

Easy Campaign and Easy Battle setting = Battle 1 Lost in 4.13: Battle 2 Won in 6.02: Battle 3 Won in 7.17
Easy campaign and Very Hard Battle setting = Battle 1 Won in 6.10: Battle 2 Won in 5.59: Battle 3 Won in 7.18
Very Hard campaign and Very Hard battle setting = Battle 1 Lost in 3.42: Battle 2 Lost in 4.58: Battle 3 Lost in 4.31

As you can see by these times. VH campaign -VH battles has very hard battles in actuality but Easy campaign-VH battles seem to be roughly equal to Easy campaign - Easy battles
But it is easy to see the large difference between Easy campaign-VH battles and VH campaign-VH battles

[Slaists]

Is the AI troop composition the same on Easy and Very Hard campaign difficulty tests you did? I'd imagine, AI can field much better troops on Very Hard camp. difficulty. At least, that's what I see.

I usually play VH campaign difficulty and Hard battle.

[von stoker]

to slaists. yes all battles were on the same map, in the same conditions with the same armies.

[Slaists]

to slaists. yes all battles were on the same map, in the same conditions with the same armies.

If I understand you correctly, you were testing battles in easy campaign difficulty (with varied battle difficulty) and very hard campaign difficulty (with varied battle difficulty). So, how did you get the AI to raise the same (composition) armies on easy and very hard campaign difficulty?

[daniu]

Interesting.
BTW I did find the campaign boni for the different difficulties in the database, but not the battle boni (although I did spend some time looking). I'm sure they're in there somewhere.
It's possible that they're meshed up in the units tables themselves; that might mean that changing the battle difficulty from in the campaign, this may only effect units recruited afterwards.
It would be a weird concept, but possible.

[von stoker]

to slaists. read post 11, it explains what i did. 3 battles E-E: 3 battles E-VH: 3 battles VH-VH. post 11 gives the outcomes and post 13 gives the outcome and length of the battles

[Slaists]

Doesn't AI get more units and higher starting XP on VH campaign difficulty? I have not paid attention to the faction rosters, but it seems starting VH campaign difficulty rebel armies are bigger in S2 (I haven't seen any starting rebels in FOTS).