Difficulty Level

[Ruff_Hi]

If someone was to, say, run an adventure were a win result wasn't much of an issue - important but not really a contest - what level should the game be run at?

1) Noble
2) Prince
3) Monarch
4) Emperor
5) Other - please specify

[Kylearan]

Hi,

If someone was to, say, run an adventure were a win result wasn't much of an issue - important but not really a contest - what level should the game be run at?

But it would still be a game where you compete with the other participants? I think the answer to your question depends on the scenario, variant rules and scoring system and cannot really be answered without. For example, if for a given scoring system a CS slingshot would be broken, Emperor would be the level of choice to make it impossible. In other scenarios Emperor might be too hard, as you have to worry too much about the AIs and cannot concentrate on the variant, etc.

If forced to vote anyway, I'd say emperor, as I think even Monarch has become too easy in BtS, and Noble would be outright boring.

-Kylearan

[Ruff_Hi]

But it would still be a game where you compete with the other participants?

Yes, definitely.

[Ruff_Hi]

Duh - this is what happens when you don't know the order of the difficulty levels. I thought Emp was the one after Noble. It is actually ... Noble, Prince, Monarch, Emperor.

Edit: found I cannot edit the poll ... effectively ruining this for an info gathering device. Oh well - I think people are indicating a higher level than Noble.

[Sullla]

Duh - this is what happens when you don't know the order of the difficulty levels. I thought Emp was the one after Noble. It is actually ... Noble, Prince, Monarch, Emperor.

That would explain why your comments to me in our email exchange we so odd! Did you really think that Emperor was next after Noble? Too much modding, too little playing recently, methinks...

Since I'm already responding to this post... Ruff, I really appreciate your help in working with our succession game. Unfortunately, I can't get the desired changes to work in the XML; I can swap some things around (opening up new unique buildings, for example) but changing the civ traits just isn't working correctly. Rather than spend more time fiddling with it, I'm just going to use the Worldbuilder save, with all the associated problems. No hard feelings, I hope.

Unfortunately, even with my mod powers, I can't edit your poll either.

[Compromise]

Hi Ruff,

Just to give you my thoughts on the levels with and without variants:

Emperor: A skilled player will usually win non-variant emperor-level games. Very skilled players can often choose what victory condition too. Less-experienced players will often struggle to win non-variant play. Depending on how much the variant interferes with normal gameplay, an emperor-level variant game may be extreme.

Monarch: After playing for a few months, especially with reference to the many forum posts on strategy, most careful players will usually win this level. A skilled player will have no difficulty here, and it has proved to be a good level for variants with wide appeal.

Prince: Many players will have little difficulty with this level. Even with a variant, skilled players will almost be able to ignore or take advantage of the AI on this level. (I think at Prince, there are no advantages for the computer, so here you play the AI on even ground; and humans quickly do much better.)

Noble: The player will have no difficulty with the AI here. Without an extremely limiting variant, this level is best suited gentle adventures.

All comments subject to the details of the in-game layout, but I think these thoughts are generally about right.

[sunrise089]

My thoughts exactly Compromise.

[darrelljs]

I would agree with Compromise. Ruff is asking about what level to play when victory isn't a goal, and I would tend to think for most variants I would tend to say Monarch which lets you play around quite a bit.

Darrell

[TheArchduke]

Monarch here, it is the level where I tend to get no headaches but the AI puts up a challenge or two. Emperor I play when I want to fear for my life.

[timmy827]

I generally agree with the last few posts, but a few specifics:
Noble is actually the "even" setting for AI-human, not Prince. But Prince has very slight favors to the AI (some of their costs are 95%, some still 100%. The AIPerEra modifier is -1 so I think that means the costs will go down 5% more across the board by the modern era), not much of a difference at all. And I two main map features - how much land/good land the player has around them, and whether the player's immediate neighbor(s) are easy/hard to rush, easy/hard to get along with are very important. It's difficult to quantify but I think those factors can be worth 1.5 or 2 difficulty levels in either direction.