What is different with E/E M/M H/H VH/VH?

[Daaraa]

I did a few searches and maybe I just didn't search right.

What is the difference between the different difficulty levels?

I guess in the campaign what is the difference with Easy, Medium, Hard and Very Hard.

As well as the difference with Battles being Easy, Medium, Hard, Very Hard.

I'm sure this has been talked about. I figure my search queries are just poorly worded.

[Kobal2fr]

Campaign Difficulty :

- Relations between nations vary significantly. On Medium difficulty, relations with factions you are not allied or at war with will shift towards neutral ("don't know 'em, don't care about 'em"), while on Easy they shift towards Perfect, and on Hard/Very Hard they shift towards Abysmal, sharply so in the case of VH.
Since relations affect AI decisions somewhat, this means that while on Easy you'll mostly be left alone, on VH you'll most likely be attacked by everyone.

- Agent efficiency varies. On Medium, your agents (that is, priests + merchants + diplos + princesses + spies + assassins) and enemy agents have the exact same chances. On Easy, your guys are better than those of the AI. On H and VH, your guys have significant penalties to their success rates, and I believe on VH enemy agents also have bonuses against you, which can be a pain in the case of Inquisitors for instance.

- AI factions may or may not have a cash boost on H and VH. I heard both claims, and while I haven't seen anything about it in the game's .txt files, it's possible.


Battlemap difficulty :
- Morale and Fatigue are progressively more important to the player, depending on diff setting. On Easy you can pretty much run your guys all over the place, in the snow, uphill both ways, all the while being charged in the back by Darth Vader, and your boys won't falter nor wheeze. On VH, you have the same morale and fatigue values the computer has.

- Cleverer AI : it's been said that the AI makes less mistakes on VH, handles it's forces better etc..., but I'm inclined to believe it's not the case. The battlefield AI is in a moddable .xml file, and there's precious little about difficulty in it (in fact, the only variable that changes based on difficulty is called "retreat-analyser". May dictate at which time the computer will throw in the towel I suppose ?)

- No effect on stats. The AI soldiers are not wargods on VH, nor are they wimps on Easy - your guys and his are equivalent no matter the difficulty.

Did I miss something, TW gurus ?

[Didz]

I agree on the issue of battlefield effects, having played on M and VH I really couldn't see any difference. It would have been nice if on harder levels it increased the importance of morale and fatigue in general rather than just for the player as I really miss the STW style battles where troops behaved like real men.

[MStumm]

The one thing I noticed is that on Hard campaign difficulty the AI will use significantly more mercenaries than on Medium.

[Daaraa]

Does the AI actually have to worry about money? If so, won't mercs really hurt them indirectly?

[NightStar]

VH/VH tends to be harder than E/E methinks

[MStumm]

I don't think so, its not like they are marching full stacks of them, besides if I can see all the units in the army, its life expectancy and the upkeep required to support them would be rather small.

VH/VH tends to be harder than E/E methinks

Really? Whats the command line, cheat or a mod to enable this feature?

[rebel8303]

I've noticed that in M/M that I play the game the AI is creating armies of militia and peasants mostly and it takes quite a time till he uses more advanced units. Do you know if in harder difficulties this is changed? (AI creates better armies sooner)

[Guru]

I've noticed that AI maintains better economy on higher difficulty levels. On hard or very hard it's not always me who is the richest. Sometimes they even pay ransoms while on easy or medium they rarely have the money.

- Guru

[Husar]

It was some time ago when I tried Hard and Very Hard battle difficulty, I stopped it when I got the impression that all of my rams would instantly start to burn while AI rams would always reach my gate. On medium this felt more even so I settled with that.

[Didz]

That was the impression I got. VH seems to make a big difference on the Campaign map mainly resulting in the AI being much more agressive and undermining the diplomatic and trading aspects of the game.

But on the battlefield the only possible change I saw was that the player suffered additional penalties. I could see no difference in the way the AI played and it certainly wasn't any harder to beat.

In the end I just went back to M/M because I want to be able to use all the games features not just the battle engine.

[Daaraa]

So do most people play on M/M ?

[trickydicky]

So do most people play on M/M ?

I can't answer for most people, but personally I play on M/VH, this makes the campaign game more realistic, because you don't get attacked by everyone all at the same time, for no reason. At least not as much

And as far as the battles go, I find that VH is actually harder than than the easier settings. Don't ask me how, I just know that I tend to lose less men when playing on an easier setting.

Also the AI needs as much help as possible on the battles side. I tend to gift all AI factions 5-10K per turn to give them enough to tech up a little, and field stronger armies.

This at least makes the battles slightly more enjoyable. Although I still find the AI far too easy to beat, to the extent that I limit myself to only fielding half stacks to spice things up.

[Rhyfelwyr]

I've always played on VH/M. I though this would be realistic as I though the Very Hard campaign difficulty made the map AI smarter without giving it bonuses. And I thought the Medium battle difficulty would be realistic as no sides would have a statistical advantage. So have I got this the wrong way wround then?

Sounds like the AI cheats on hard difficulties on the campaign map, but not on the battlefield.

[Guru]

I use H/VH. Hard on campaign map, just to make sure that AI can afford some troops but still not letting it cheat too much. Very hard on battle map because it seems the most balanced option. And losing battles is still very rare. AI lacks brains...

Guru

[Rhyfelwyr]

In RTW did the AI units not get +4 attack on Hard and +7 on Very Hard? I would of thought that continued into M2TW. Thats why I always used VH/M until I read this, I thought that was the fair and balanced way...

[Kobal2fr]

@Caledonian : true for RTW, not true for M2. You can check for yourself by pausing the game and dbl-clicking on an AI unit to pull up its unit card (though now that I think about it, I don't remember if AI diff bonuses appeared on RTW unit cards ).
But anyway, I play on M/VH ("fairest" diff settings if you ask me), and units are equal across the board - all things being equal, I can send 75 armored spearmen into 75 other armored spearmen and not expect my guys to be butchered "just because".

[trickydicky]

@Caledonian : true for RTW, not true for M2. You can check for yourself by pausing the game and dbl-clicking on an AI unit to pull up its unit card (though now that I think about it, I don't remember if AI diff bonuses appeared on RTW unit cards ).
But anyway, I play on M/VH ("fairest" diff settings if you ask me), and units are equal across the board - all things being equal, I can send 75 armored spearmen into 75 other armored spearmen and not expect my guys to be butchered "just because".

Frenchie is on the money.

AFAIK the only difference on VH battle map is that your guys suffer from the same morale and fatigue penalties as the AI's.

[Tyrac]

You are going to win no matter what, unless you are doing SOMETHing that gives you, the player, a huge handicap.

May as well play at VH/VH.

Does anything else really matter?

[trickydicky]

You are going to win no matter what, unless you are doing SOMETHing that gives you, the player, a huge handicap.

May as well play at VH/VH.

Does anything else really matter?

The only thing that really matters is you have fun.

Otherwise what are you playing for?

And besides. not everyone has been playing these games since Shogun, like many vets on here, myself inculded. Or has the strategic nouse to whoop the AI with an inferior army. So not everyone will feel comfy playng on VH/VH.

Play to what you feel comfortable with and if it's too easy, up the difficulty, give the AI more money, turtle, don't rush the AI early, etc, etc

[atheotes]

I am an average player...
I find that M/VH is suited to my style fo play... i dont blitz. I like to build up and maintain peace generally. So it is better for me if the AI doesnt gang up one me and also the relations are not normalized towards absymal!!!

[Callahan9119]

i play on H/VH

i suspect (with no basis) that AI gets big money advantage on campaign map on VH, in the battles i couldnt care less...the harder the better...and it isnt rome, no super soldiers...if you dont play battles on vh in this game your missing out, they just dont seem to route fast like on M

[Didz]

AFAIK the only difference on VH battle map is that your guys suffer from the same morale and fatigue penalties as the AI's.

Thats interesting I assumed that would be the situation at M, and could see little difference on VH so switched back.

Is there anywhere that actually documents what the impact of the various modes are?

[Callahan9119]

how can you not notice? this morning i did a thing where i packed up portugal and moved it to alexandria, after i took cairo, alexandria and gaza i knew something was just wrong, enemy were routing way too fast i didnt change difficulty so it was stuck on m/m

started over on good ol H/VH, now i have cairo and alexandria, i lose more men and the egyptions arent routing left and right, now i'm at least looking at a few half stacks past the bridges to the east instead of no resistance

on meduim my genrals bodyguard made them route faster than satan and 20 of his closest friends on horseback, was boringly easy to win

[Didz]

Probably, a difference in playing style, if your moving Portugal to Egypt you obviously play much different to me.

But this merely demonstrates why we really ought to be told what impact changing the settings has. From what you describe it sounds like the morale of the AI troops is affected by the change of difficulty setting, and yet earlier someone else suggested that it was only the players troops whose morale and fatigue was changed.

Obviously, you can't both be right but there doesn't seem to be any clear explanation of what these settings actually do.

[trickydicky]

After some brief testing I can tell you this.

Easy Difficulty:
My men are all fully armoured marathon running energiser bunnies. They can run forever and hardly get tired at all. Even in 140 degree desert heat.

After said marathon, they can then face a screaming horde of demented psychos (Timurids) and their pet elephants. They happily get slaughtered until the last two guys decide to jack in all the war business, and merrily saunter back across the field of battle in search of something less dangerous to do.


Very Hard Difficulty:
My men are on par with the AI, the longer they run, the more they get tired (More Realistic).

And when facing the above screaming horde of demented psychos, instead of two guys deciding to saunter home, the whole army decides to join them this time.

And I was under the impression that there weren't any morale and fatigue advantages to the AI in this game (Unlike Rome). Perhaps someone with a bit more understanding of the game mechanics can answer that?

[Didz]

@trickydicky
So, based upon your testing it sounds like only the players troops are affected by the difficulty setting and the AI's troops are set at VH as standard.

That being the case VH setting should be the equivalent of normal or balanced.

However, what sabutai seems to be suggesting is that the AI troops, morale and fatigue are also adjusted by the difficulty setting which makes the decision of game balance far harder to judge. If the AI troops are adjusted then the question becomes at what setting is their morale and fatigue the equal to the players troops.

And obviously if both the AI and the players troops are being adjusted then it gets harder to judge still. My natural assumption was that balance would be acheived on the Medium setting as this is the 'de facto' standard for most strategy games but it doesn't sound like it is for MTW2.

[Bob the Insane]

It is interesting about the battle difficulty. I dorecall posts when M2TW was first released around the fact that they had moved away from giving the AI combat bonuses on H and VH which is why I moved to the VH battles...

For the campaign difiiculty, one thing that might be worth noting, whatever difficulty you chose when the AI interacts with itself it dipomatically it does so at the normal difficulty level.

Finally I think the OP is spot on for the settings up to the 1.2 patch. But with that patch in place I have noticed far more reasonable behaviour from the AI while playing on Hard (I normally do H/VH) than before. For allies the relationship seems to move towards good/very good on it's own rather that normalizing constantly downward like previously...

[rvg]

A.I. definitely has a morale advantage in VH battles, probably a Fatigue advantage too.

[Kobal2fr]

@Bob : yes, they have modified the relations file in 1.2 which now has allies progressively like each other more. In 1.0 and 1.1 it was not the case.

@rvg : it's not that they have a morale bonus, it's that the computer's general decides to withdraw its units later rather than sooner. I believe that what might look like a sudden chain rout on Easy is in fact the AI hitting "withdraw" early to avoid more losses. Which obviously doesn't work so well when you have cavalry to chase them, but being made prisonner is better than killed I suppose