What is the optimal difficulty setting for DeI?

[Fedual]

Hello

I will start by saying that i have no problems playing battles on Legendary difficulty, and the reason i start this thread is not because i need an easier time with battles. Instead i need an easier time with the campaign map, my favourite factions to play is Anthony and Octavian in IA. I play them on legendary but since 1.0 released i have such a hard time managing the economy that i will now give up and play on another difficulty. What i want to know is at what difficulty is DeI optmized for? and will the campaign map be easier (more public order, more income) if i lower the difficulty to what this mod has been designed to play at? is it maybe hard or very hard that DeI runs best on?

[TheOrangeProject]

Well, DeI is mainly focused for GC and i barely play anything else, so everything I say goes for the GC.

As far as I can tell the mod is made for normal/hard campaign difficulty. Battle difficulty on normal - otherwise strange things gonna happen. Once in 0.96 some farmers won against a sword unit of mine, since then I stick to normal/hard, even though I normaly don't lose on VH/L in battle.

Economy is a bit tricky in 1.0. Governors are even more useful than before if deployed into an army, since the reduction of upkeep is even better with the current upkeep in 1.0

[Ivan_Moscavich]

The mod is designed and balanced around Normal/Normal.

I 'think' Dresden said something about possibly making configurable mod difficulty or addressing balance concerns at different difficulties but for now, normal/normal is how the mod is designed, and playing it on any other difficulty is going to cause issues to crop up that don't otherwise exist.

[Fedual]

I have been looking around the forum for a place were it says what difficulty the mod should be played at for optimal challenge at the battles and so forth, but so far i havent found an answer, so one of you is wrong and the other one is right. I really wish it said somewere what difficulty i should have

[Ivan_Moscavich]

I have been looking around the forum for a place were it says what difficulty the mod should be played at for optimal challenge at the battles and so forth, but so far i havent found an answer, so one of you is wrong and the other one is right. I really wish it said somewere what difficulty i should have

If you actually want a sourced link to what Dresden himself has said, here.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ficulty-in-0-8

"The mod is basically designed around Normal battle difficulty. I know some users play it at higher difficulties, but the AI will get bonuses and it can affect the way battles play with morale and other issues."

Like I said, it's designed around normal. Higher difficulties buff AI units which are finely tuned using normal as a base. At hard, there may be little to no issue, but at very hard and legendary you're not actually playing the mod how it was designed.

Primarily, like in the linked post, it has to do with morale.

If you're fine with having to kill the entire enemy unit before winning the battle, you probably won't have an issue with that. But they're supposed to usually route at 50-60% casualties.
It doesn't seem like a lot of people enjoy playing a game where every single person from elite praetorians to hastily assembled mobs are super men. Though some probably do, hence some of the sub mods.

As for campaign difficulty, again, normal is the standard, designed for difficulty. But Hard is almost indistinguishable besides some higher AI aggression. Very hard can create some odd instances with single city states created full stacks every single turn and tearing apart other states dozens of times their size.
That comes down to personal preference because the campaign difficulty won't necessarily break the game, or the tactical battles themselves.

Edit: Also, in the future. I'd advise against telling someone they're wrong when you're asking for an OPINION based answer in the first place.
And further more, asking for a suggestion and telling someone they're giving you the wrong answer is a quick way to irritate someone.

Your optimal could be too easy for someone else. Or it could be too hard for yet another person. It's not a one size fits all question, or answer.

You should really just play around with the difficulty settings, and if need be, various sub mods, until you find a difficulty you both find challenging and rewarding to play on.

The reason so many sub mods exist, as well as the different difficulty levels, are because people are going to want to play in somewhat different ways than other people depending on personal preference.

[Fedual]

If you actually want a sourced link to what Dresden himself has said, here.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ficulty-in-0-8

"The mod is basically designed around Normal battle difficulty. I know some users play it at higher difficulties, but the AI will get bonuses and it can affect the way battles play with morale and other issues."

Like I said, it's designed around normal. Higher difficulties buff AI units which are finely tuned using normal as a base. At hard, there may be little to no issue, but at very hard and legendary you're not actually playing the mod how it was designed.

Primarily, like in the linked post, it has to do with morale.

If you're fine with having to kill the entire enemy unit before winning the battle, you probably won't have an issue with that. But they're supposed to usually route at 50-60% casualties.
It doesn't seem like a lot of people enjoy playing a game where every single person from elite praetorians to hastily assembled mobs are super men. Though some probably do, hence some of the sub mods.

As for campaign difficulty, again, normal is the standard, designed for difficulty. But Hard is almost indistinguishable besides some higher AI aggression. Very hard can create some odd instances with single city states created full stacks every single turn and tearing apart other states dozens of times their size.
That comes down to personal preference because the campaign difficulty won't necessarily break the game, or the tactical battles themselves.

Edit: Also, in the future. I'd advise against telling someone they're wrong when you're asking for an OPINION based answer in the first place.
And further more, asking for a suggestion and telling someone they're giving you the wrong answer is a quick way to irritate someone.

Your optimal could be too easy for someone else. Or it could be too hard for yet another person. It's not a one size fits all question, or answer.

You should really just play around with the difficulty settings, and if need be, various sub mods, until you find a difficulty you both find challenging and rewarding to play on.

The reason so many sub mods exist, as well as the different difficulty levels, are because people are going to want to play in somewhat different ways than other people depending on personal preference.

"The mod is basically designed around Normal battle difficulty. I know some users play it at higher difficulties, but the AI will get bonuses and it can affect the way battles play with morale and other issues."

I know that he has said that but again i am mainly not asking about battle difficulties, it was the very first thing i said in my OP that i did not have any issues with it. As i said in my OP my difficulties coping with the campaign map economy on Legendary difficulty is what is making me fail the campaign. I saw you mentioned that the AI can create some oddities on the campaign map and such, but i still wonder about the thing i had a problem with, wich is the conomy. Is my factions economy the same on legendary as it is on normal or any other setting? Or do i get some fanancial penalties the high difficulty i play on?

[Ivan_Moscavich]

I know that he has said that but again i am mainly not asking about battle difficulties, it was the very first thing i said in my OP that i did not have any issues with it. As i said in my OP my difficulties coping with the campaign map economy on Legendary difficulty is what is making me fail the campaign. I saw you mentioned that the AI can create some oddities on the campaign map and such, but i still wonder about the thing i had a problem with, wich is the conomy, is my factions economy the same on legendary as it is on normal or any other setting? Or do i get some fanancial penalties the high difficulty i play on?

Ah. It didn't seem to be worded in a way in which I read you were asking specifically about the campaign difficulties. There should be a post just here recently that I asked myself on campaign difficulties. Let me see if I can find the link.

But even before I find it, no, you are penalized in increasingly severe increments the higher the campaign difficulty. Normal would give you no bonus or negatives (as far as I know).

Edit: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...he-naval-mercs

Explains a little about what the AI gets. But isn't as specific beyond "the player is penalized." concerning player penalties.

I tried to look that up on the creative assembly forums, and found nothing in depth about the specific statistics that get raised/lowered for the player and AI on each difficulty level.


Still, your best bet is to play around with the difficulty until you feel like you have it where you want it.

[Fedual]

Ah. It didn't seem to be worded in a way in which I read you were asking specifically about the campaign difficulties. There should be a post just here recently that I asked myself on campaign difficulties. Let me see if I can find the link.

But even before I find it, no, you are penalized in increasingly severe increments the higher the campaign difficulty. Normal would give you no bonus or negatives (as far as I know).

Edit: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...he-naval-mercs

Explains a little about what the AI gets. But isn't as specific beyond "the player is penalized." concerning player penalties.

I tried to look that up on the creative assembly forums, and found nothing in depth about the specific statistics that get raised/lowered for the player and AI on each difficulty level.


Still, your best bet is to play around with the difficulty until you feel like you have it where you want it.

Cheers, im gonna ask in that forum if the economy is the same for the player on all difficulties

[zombieflanders]

If you're new to DeI: Normal campaign, Normal battle.
If you've played DeI before: H/N
If you want a challenge: VH/H
If you want to punish yourself: Legendary

Source: The FAQ sticky and posts from the DeI team.

[Fedual]

If you're new to DeI: Normal campaign, Normal battle.
If you've played DeI before: H/N
If you want a challenge: VH/H
If you want to punish yourself: Legendary

Source: The FAQ sticky and posts from the DeI team.

If you are quoting from http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...-et-Impera-FAQ then those are just personal suggestion and not specifications that the mod was designed around. Also Im not sure were you found that info about the legendary difficulty.

[Butan]

If you're new to DeI: Normal campaign, Normal battle.
If you've played DeI before: H/N
If you want a challenge: VH/H
If you want to punish yourself: Legendary

^

And Hard in MPC.

[Vardano]

I've read so much about game became so much harder that I switched back from legendary (last tome I played the game was september) to Hard/Hard and I should say it's not that much of a challenge for now.
I play as Hayastan and I'm around 70th turn and have conquered Ardahan, Kartli, Media Atropane, took half of Baktrian provinces. Baktria is flat-out beast in 1.0 and every campaign and it's no different from another in that respect.


Income is good and I can keep three full stack armies with no elite units. Battles became a sort of boring, I have 6-8 units of archers and they do all they damage and my spearmen only need to hold AI frontline for a sometime and yes, my cav deliver fatal blow almost in every battle. Maybe with elite units things will change but I'm not sure about this.
I don't want to start conversation about missiles but saying that I'm conquering everything around with 7 units of cheapest archers as a main killing force.


Pontus is my defensive ally and I have no agression pack with Seleucid and Parthia, so I'm rolling lol, once things will be be too obvious, I'll go to VH/VH and then to legendary.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[ablebodie]

Baktria is flat-out beast in 1.0 and every campaign

I've noticed Baktria's regular dominance as well. My Arche Bosporus campaign has them conquering all but three settlements on the way to Mesopotamia, with those three being defensive or military allies of theirs.

My Seleucid campaign was easy due to Baktria dominating the satrapy mess early, allowing us both to share the East.

Does anyone have any experience with Baktria not dominating? Another thing I've noticed is that with their start position, there's really no good way for them to lose dominance once they've taken a few settlements. The Seleucid satrapies are too small to make a difference, and there's nothing to their east to counterbalance their position.

Finally, I've not seen Parthia be able to put much of a fight up yet either. Just curious what other people are seeing in the eastern provinces.

[jazebiker]

Does anyone have any experience with Baktria not dominating? ...Just curious what other people are seeing in the eastern provinces.

In the campaign I'm playing right now, Parthia KO'd Baktria (and everyone else nearby) by turn 50, and own everything east of Media, and south of Amul. Roxolani have the whole Steppe to themselves. Persia and Seleucia are holding the Middle East with Media Atropane down to one settlement.

[Dresden]

Since Baktria starts with a province and only one direction to go, they are going to be fairly dominant in most campaigns I imagine.

[KAM 2150]

Well, Bactria was a bit dominat ; D

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[UsulDaNeriak]

I am pretty experienced with Rome 2 and also with DeI. DeI was always much harder than vanilla and most other mods: 1.0 is even harder.

I lately started with the Romans VH / H (Camp./Battle) as usual for me. But that was a very heavy challenge in early game. So I went back to H/H. So I recommend even for experienced DEI players to not start with VH in battle or campaign, if using 1.0 the first time.

Newcomers to DeI better start with N/N.

PS: Nevertheless my next campaign will be VH/H again. I guess i understood now, how the pain works on the campaign map. But this will need a lot of micromanaging and the right strategy right form the start. VH for battle is not my cup of tea. But perhaps ....

[Tyso3]

The ai doesnt get any smarter after Normal. Just it cheats more in order to 'balance'. IMO that just makes using DEI pointless as this mod is all about realstic balance, and a city state nation with an income 4X the size of Rome, 4X the Military etc is not 'balanced'.


I find the only real way to experiance true 'AI' in a campaign is a good H2H campaign where you play as each others enemies in battle.

[Dresden]

No one gets 4x the income of Rome or anyone else. Actually Rome as the AI has an income buff. But you are correct, essentially raising the difficulty is mostly about bonuses to the AI. However, there does seem to be some sort of hardcoded element that also makes the AI more aggressive on higher difficulties.

[Ragss]

I'm inclined to agree, Dresden. Its not plainly obvious, but it seems more likely on higher campaign difficulties to be suddenly attacked, or to be kicked when you're down. On normal it seems that the player almost always has the option to go lick his wounds and the AI will wait patiently.

How about diplomacy in 1.0? In the past its felt like normal campaigns were much easier to forge alliances in than H or VH.